Namaste! Well it only feels like yesterday that Kuthumi Fest happened, but write a few more chapters of a novel and pop across to Asia to teach and explore and before you know it three months have passed. It feels great though to be back and sharing with you. Usually I create a theme to work throughout the newsletter, dropping some quotes inbetween the interviews but nothing would come to me, so I decided to just start, knowing that something would unfold. I put the interviews in place with their pictures and re-read them to check for spelling,etc. There is so much being shared in the interviews this month that it seems redundant to place quotes from the past inbetween them. This month's gorgeous creators handed me the theme and it is joy! Our featured author is Chris Simon, who this month joins the ranks of Kuthumi authors by releasing the fourth title that Kuthumi spoke of at the Crimson Circle conference in July 2006. As I read Chris's words I was reminded of my own journey to begin writing and the joy of stepping into one's choices with passion. Our featured artist is photographer Rupert Davis. Rupert's photos seem to breathe before you and I was delighted to read that he doesn't even know all the features on his camera. It's all about capturing the joy of being in the moment.

Featured Author;Chris Simon What areas of creativity do you play in? Around age 6 I played the piano. Somewhere in my teens I played the guitar (rhythm and bass) as well as the trumpet. I seem to remember always enjoying writing and have a vivid memory from 1992 of saying “I want to write a book” but it was going to be about government waste of tax dollars. In about October of 2006 I began opening to what someone called “my inner voice” by sitting in front of my pc, closing my eyes and recording spoken words that just seemed to arrive. This actually went on for several months and resulted in me capturing 30 of these ‘recordings’. Then I spent another 3 months or so transcribing the recordings, which was pretty neat because when I was actually doing them, I wasn’t listening to or hearing them. But in the transcription process I had to really listen and hear. It was also very interesting to find that there was a different “feel” to the words when I read them as opposed to when I listened to them. Not really sure what to “do” with them, I had a website created www.expansionanddiscovery.com with 3 of the recordings (audio only) so people could purchase them. I also had the website set up so a person could listen to one recording for free, you know, to see if what I was creating resonated with them before they decided to buy something. Funny, too, within the last year or so, I’ve found myself singing more and more when I’m by myself. How did you get started in these? I think they mostly got started by someone else saying “hey you should do this”. Parents - piano, high school friends - the guitar/bass because they needed someone to play that instrument so they could form a band, trumpet -  because I think the teacher said that’s all that was left! As for the recordings, I think they were really born of necessity. I was going through an incredibly difficult human stage (among other things, a divorce from a partner I’d spent the last 20 years with) and Shaumbra stage (that whole nutty pre-Quantum leap energy) and these words or feelings or emotions or realizations or whatever you want to call them just had to be released or shared or whatever you want to call that process. Writing is a little more fuzzy with fewer specifics, other that I seem to remember submitting a lot of English assignments in my last year of high school that were based on, of all things, humour. Can you talk about how you decided to write “Good Blowing Job”? Decided? Well probably the best way to answer this is right from the book - Page 13 "The time was 2:22 a.m. The date was Wednesday July 25th, 2007, (or 07/07/07). After jolting awake from a deep sleep and accepting that there was no chance of getting back to sleep, I stumbled from my bedroom to my computer and recorded what I assumed was going to be something similar to the 30+ channels that had begun to flow since about October of 2006. After going back to bed and waking later that same morning, I listened to the recording.Tears triggered and I realized it was the beginning of this book." Really, there’s probably a little bit more to it than this, since I’m pretty sure I “knew something” on some level from the moment Kuthumi mentioned the books in July of 2006 at the Crimson Circle’s Midsummer New Energy Conference. But I guess I had to go through a lot of other “stuff” before the timing was appropriate. Actually, I’ll just add one thing here that’s embarrassing for me, but I’m sure you and others will find it funny and hey, I’m not face-to-face with anyone right now. Part of what took so long (about 1 year) was me figuring out how to stop 'blushing' at the title! Really, for a Virgo, that was quite a ‘situation’. Never mind the fact that I’m male and 40 years old. (I think there’s laughter even (or still?) taking place on the other side of the veil about this.) What did you learn about your creativity while writing? Writing the book was a very different experience for me because I had just become very (well somewhat) comfortable with ‘channeling’ or ‘capturing insights’ by means of audio recording. So to some extent there may have been an “expectation” on my part that the book was going to arrive in audio first and then be transcribed. Just the whole thing of sitting at my computer typing was a little odd. Now I guess to really answer your question, one thing I definitely came to feel or to understand was this: I wasn’t writing this book for me or Kuthumi or the world or for any real reason in particular. I was just ‘being’ for a short period each day and ‘doing’ what I honestly felt moved to do. Now if you’ve ever met a Virgo in your life, you’ll know that’s just a crazy “feeling” place to be. I mean, come on, no set start time or finish time or structure or deadlines or even an idea about what I was going to type that day! What advice would you give to any other writers who are preparing to release a book? I would suggest they contact each of the authors of the 4 Kuthumi/ Midsummer 2006 books because we all seem to have done things a little differently. Based on my own experience I would say that setting up your own website to sell either a hard-copy of electronic copy is not really all that impossible. The only reason I haven’t done it on my related site yet is that I’m going to pretty much recreate and re-tool it, so in order to let my book flow out now, LuLu was definitely the simplest and easiest route to go What’s next for you? To be quite honest, for the last several months, and especially now in this post-Quantum-Leap New Energy, most days when I wake up, I’m not always exactly sure I’m 100% familiar with the person I see in my bathroom mirror! So much has changed for me in the last 2 to 5 years. If I had to guess and maybe try and get a feel for some potentials, I’d say there’s a real feel that I’ll be speaking more, and whether that’s in public or via recordings or channels I don’t know. I also get a sense that music is going to come into the mix somehow. And the word travel seems to keep popping up. Right now all I can say for sure is one thing. And this by no means implies that my life is 100% stress-free or lacking in some of the usual day-to-day ‘stuff”. But overall, I Am enjoying my life. Chris's very own Kuthumi book "Good Blowing Job! How to Get A-Head With the Breath" is available now at http://www.lulu.com/content/1264307 Also please visit Chris's site at www.expansionanddiscovery.com

New Book Listings Chris Simon's Kuthumi book joins us on the book page with some other new releases. Louise Sarezky has released her third Kuthumi book! It is a wonderful continuation of their writing together building on the teachings within their first two books together. A new author to join us at N.E.W.F is Shontara, a self-published spiritual author.  Please head to the Books page to read more about all these books and links to purchase them.

Featured Artist; Photographer - Rupert Davis What areas of creativity do you play in? I play through photography, speaking, writing, and I have this feeling about playing the harp which I’ve only explored a little,and of course.. breathing! I’ve come to see that it’s not so much about the medium itself for me, it’s about me allowing myself full and free expression.  I am channeling really, though I rarely use that word, and what brings me the joy in these creative activities is that I am feeling my soul, I am playing with my soul & it is playing with life.  The words ‘photographer’ and ‘artist’ have never sat well with me and I didn’t understand why until I realized that I am not really either one of these, I just let my soul play because it feels so great.  Soon after realizing this I launched my teaching which is called Authentic Creativity and I am currently creating a website for it at www.authenticcreativity.com.  I ran my first big workshop at the Quantum Leap (Crimson Circle gathering) and it was beautifully successful and popular.  Through these events I facilitate and inspire other people to connect with their Authentic Creativity, which is the expression of their soul, and I show people how this can truly come into form, not just be experienced as feelings or spiritual enlightenment, but that our soul is ready to pour into our creations, be it a cake, a painting, a relationship, or our whole life, and as it does so, all it does is sing and bless everything and everyone.  You cannot do this and not fall in love with yourself.   How did you get started in photography? A voice inside me as I went to get my train to Glastonbury insisted I buy a camera.  When I realized it wasn’t going to stop, I went into Boots and bought a disposable camera.  After going through about 30 of these I bought a compact film camera and so on…  The context to this was that I had just left my career in investment banking, my luxury apartment in Sydney, my belongings, everything, and with very little money and very many angels I got on a plane on new years day 2004 for England, feeling to visit Glastonbury and Stonehenge.  Just a month before, I’d been to a 2-day Crimson Circle event in Melbourne, so I blame Geoff and Linda for all this!    'Dark Mother Beech, Dartmoor, UK' ©2007 New Earth Photography Ltd, UK   What draws you to photographing something? Often I am aware of entering into what seems like another dimension.  Maybe it is simply becoming extremely present.  Either way, things change and often there is a total flow that happens like this: I am walking up a hill and I get a feeling in my stomach, a feeling of expansion and joy and I start seeing a scene unfold in front of me as I am walking and see the sun sinking into cloud in a way that is creating the most beautiful shapes and colours, most often I will see and feel the elemental energies that are creating this.  I am a part of this scene, my openness flowing into this moment, each breath of awe flowing into this scene and my breathing the scene back into me, we are one and with my jaw dropped, my heart, my very being, open, I reach into my backpack, pull out my camera, take a breath and holding it up to my face, I take a few shots, not many, just a few before I pause to honour this space, this extraordinary unfolding, this moment where the beauty of life gives herself to me.  I could go on and on….there have been so many incredible experiences in many different places and they all feel like great gifts to me.  I have also had that same darned voice urging me to ‘go outside’, or to ‘wake up’, or to ‘walk this way’! How different is it taking a portrait as compared to a scene or landscape? Not really much different except that I am feeling a person and all that they are as opposed to feeling Gaia.Whenever I am taking a picture I am deeply connected with my subject.  So when I am taking portraits the main difference is that I have to handle feeling someone so deeply.  It really is a beautiful and fun process because I talk to the person as I am photographing them and they seem to move quickly into a higher dimension of themselves and a space of shared joy. With portraits I am letting the deeper layers and beauty of a person flow through me and into a picture.  With Gaia I am doing the same, allowing all that she is to come into me, the camera and the picture.  This is what gives my pictures such depth and aliveness – some of them still look like they are moving.  But the main point here is this: I fall in love with my subject, a pure love, a total appreciation.  I am in love when I take a picture.    'Quantum Leap, Maui' ©2007 New Earth Photography Ltd, UK Technology is a huge part of photography. How do you relate to this part of your art? I let it look after itself!  I never expected to develop any technical skills but along the way it has felt important to do so in certain areas and equally important not to do so in others.  I’ve learnt a lot about changing and growing my websites and I’ve learned a lot about the printing process.  I've learnt some things about all the functions on my camera and the Photoshop software and I’ve also known to tread lightly here.  My focus is always on the energy and my state of being at the time of photography, if I got too mental about what function to use on the camera I would lose the true magic and skills of what I create.  It makes me laugh when photographers come and talk to me at exhibitions because I don’t understand many of the terms that they use and I love how they are usually pointing out all the technical things in my photos that are perfect and I smile inside knowing that the details are really looking after themselves.  I think I look back at them a bit like the Mona Lisa – enigmatically! Who or what would you really love to photograph in the future? The first feeling I got to this was, more people and then – Shaumbra.  Well, that doesn’t surprise me as I just cant keep away from Shaumbra.  The second is to be the cinematographer for Kuthumi’s movie, well it’s all of ours, but the Kuthumi-inspired/led movie, 'What’s Missing?'.  I want to direct how to capture the light for a scene, I want to create and communicate the vision for how to transpose the energy and script of a scene into the physical filming and scene set-up.  I want it to flow with beauty. It’s funny that for a few years I’ve had such a clear feeling that my photography would lead me into film-making without knowing how, where or why.  Maybe the two will come together in this project – maybe the film will involve more photography of humans and Shaumbra…?  I am also enjoying expanding into other areas like designing book covers. And of course, my heart desires to continue exploring this magnificent planet and sharing her amazingness in my photos, especially as this is my last trip here, my victory lap. To see more of Rupert's photos, purchase prints or even sign up for a class please go to www.newearthphotography.com

From the Message Board It was an interesting month for the message board having survived a hacking attempt, but it is now back stronger than ever. My utmost thanks and blessings to Gary Dodd, the guardian angel and Rae Jensen, the technical angel, for their support and help. Lots of new people have come to play and I have included here a poem from Carmen who has only just started to explore her writing skills. Untitled by Carmen In perfumed nights In hallowed dreams I sought you My hands caressed a thousand lifetimes Waiting for your kiss The glance between us That would render Heaven and Earth as one In sacred beat In gentle love In honeyed swirls The crimson heart exploding A thousand universes Of you and I as one Never again to wander alone, soulless Aching at the stars.

New Energy Publishing Guide I am getting to the final stages of putting a publishing guide together. This came about as after self publishing my Kuthumi book many people have asked what was involved. So I have put together a basic outline of the steps involved as well the differences between all the types of publishing that are available. The final part is a directory of people that provide the myriad of services involved from editing through to cover design and webdesign for people to set up a site like this to actually sell their books. If you would like to be listed or know of anyone that would suitable please email me!  Email Marisa That's it for this edition. Thanks for dropping by and I will see you soon with some more amazing creators and their sharing. Marisa Read past editions of Highlights