By Kim LeMieux
Email: kimslakesideliving@gmail.com
The Lake Chapala Society host Open Circle every Sunday at 10:30am, a popular community gathering in Ajijic, to enjoy a diverse range of presentations.
Entrance by the side gate on Ramón Corona, gate opens at 9:30am. We recommend bringing a hat and bottled water, and please remove containers upon departure.
Use of mask is mandatory and chairs will be socially distanced.
Please make your reservation if you want to attend. https://opencircleajijic.org/reservation_form.php
Check their website for upcoming presentations and if you missed a past presentation you can still enjoy it on line. https://opencircleajijic.org/
May 1, 2022 – Presentation by David Rosh: The Universal Threshold to Life: The Experience of Grief and Loss
We all begin our life journey in a warm and protected space – the peace of our mother’s womb. It would seem the Creator intended for that amniotic universe to be paradise. What is true, paradise or not, is we all got evicted.
I have come to see that loss is the SINE QUA NON for the journey. We are born via traumatic loss. We are endowed from the first moment with our most overlooked gift – our breath. Each new breath is born out of loss. Then, the new born shows us that we come equipped with survival energies: pain, anger, fear and love. Although these energies have no moral value, when not honored, they can result in behavior ignoble, even villainous.
Our learning the healthy expression of these feelings transforms not just “paradise lost” but the constant of loss into a JOURNEY TOWARD WHOLENESS. For most, if not all of us, a significant measure of those energies gets pushed down, ignored, rationalized, intellectualized, anesthetized through ignorance, addiction and/or dysfunctional programming.
Whatever has been your most recent or painful loss, I invite you to an 8 week experience of transforming that loss into liberation and empowerment. That’s your win. In exchange for this service, I ask that you gift the Lakeside Food Bank, following each session, with an amount of your choosing. Win/Win
David Rosh began his work as a priest and teacher. After earning a master’s degree in social work from Rutgers University he made his career as a psychotherapist, licensed marriage counselor and certified family therapist. His postgraduate studies and passion continue to be the study of transpersonal psychology. He served as Spiritual Coach with Hospice of the Valley for eight years. For over 20 years he led experiences of liberation and empowerment as a certified Grief Recovery Specialist with Arizona Banner Hospice having served some 8000 clients. He is a certified Infinite Possibilities Trainer. He proudly offers as his claim to fame walking “the wild woozy” while engaged in a Native American Vision Quest in the Adirondack Mountains of New York.
May 8, 2022 – Presentation by Fernando Ausin
Sustainability Leadership
BioTU is a sustainability education program that inspires sustainability-minded leadership and a deep sense of community collaboration through practical education, local opportunities, and replicable solutions. We provide educational resources that support the restoration of local environments through feasible solutions that leverage ecotechnologies and that promote sustainable entrepreneurship within communities in a creative, conscious, and enriching way. After 13 years of a mobile educational program crisscrossing Mexico and beyond, BioTU is currently developing its first Sustainability Education Training Center lakeside at the CETAC01 technical high school campus in Jocotepec. Please join us in co-creating an innovative and inspiring methodology for today’s students and future generations. You can learn more about their work at www.biotu.org.
Fernando Ausin is an international social entrepreneur with a strong passion for social justice and global sustainability. For the past 15 years, he has been studying the promise of survival for humanity from an indigenous perspective, traveling across 48 states in the US and most of Mexico to learn from scientists, academics and indigenous elders. He is the Co-Founder and Executive Director to BioTU, where he helps transmit their lessons to younger generations. He holds a BA in Latin American politics from Dartmouth College and has worked extensively as a consultant, educator and healer around the globe. For more information about Fernando, you can visit www.facebook.com/fausingomez/
May 15 – Presentation by Juanita Crampton
Post Life Planning for Pets
Ajijic and Lakeside communities are animal lovers. Expats and Mexican families are giving homes to many of the stray dogs and cats that have traditionally roamed the streets in record numbers. The question for us older expats, is what do we do with our pets when we can no longer care for them. The truth is many of us have pets who will outlive us. We are making end of life plans for ourselves. Are we making end of life plans for our pets? Post Life Planning for Pets is a new program Lakeside whose mission is to raise awareness about the need to plan. This is a program embraced by the animal rescue community as a way to minimize animals being dumped or abandoned when an owner dies. The program suggests guidelines for making a plan. This talk can offer a conversation and answer questions about planning for pets.
Juanita Crampton is an Ajijic resident, retired here for 5 1/2 years. Animal lover and visionary for the program Post Life Planning for Pets. Formerly a business owner and co-creator of Sattwa Chai, a nationally recognized chai brand in the US and Canadian markets. Partner in Briggs and Crampton caterers and Table for Two in Portland Oregon. Social worker in case management with low income adults and in resource development for developmentally disabled adults.
May 29 – Presentation by David Greenstein
The Innocence Project, Wrongly Convicted
Frightening and fascinating. Real stories of real people who have been freed by The Innocence Project, including some in Mexico. What happens when an innocent person is convicted and all avenues of appeal have been closed? The Innocence Project is not part of the legal system. It is private and has had over 1,000 people freed, some off Death Rows. Understand innocent is not the same as “Not Guilty.” I have given this talk to well over 10,000 people during the 9-years I did Enrichment Lectures on Royal Caribbean cruises. On many cruises this talk was voted one of the “Top Ten” best features of onboard “activities.” It won’t disappoint. Q&A period available after talk.
A Day In The Life Of A Despensa
I’m just a bag of groceries — beans, rice, soap, milk, eggs. When we arrived, we were sorted into smaller bags called despensas at the Surtido Warehouse in Chapala. We were tossed by Surtido workers Cesar and Martha into the hands of Javier and dumped in the back of his pickup truck. Then off we went to the pueblo of Santa Cruz, where I get to ease the suffering of elderly, sick and out-of-work folks who – without me – do not know where their next meal will come from.
Javier owns a little tienda in town and he knows everyone on a first name basis. He served as our guide to the 35 families who were on the FoodBank Lakeside list to receive groceries this week, delivering the life-sustaining despensas to the families. Another 40 families receive their despensas next week.
Javier unloaded my fellow despensas from the truck at various houses while Juanita, the coordinator who, like Javier, knows everyone in town, checked off recipients’ names. Dogs and cats were not forgotten, either. They got their own despensa.
In March FoodBank Lakeside celebrated its two year anniversary. They are currently delivering despensas to over 700 families each month. In addition their partnership with Poco a Poco San Pedro Itzicán in the Kids Kitchen program, provides over 3000 nutritious mid day meals each week to children that are most at risk for food poverty in the indigenous villages east of Chapala. To learn more about volunteer and/or donation opportunities, please visit their website at www.foodbanklakeside.org or their facebook page at fb.com/foodbanklakeside
Gelli Printing MASTERCLASS with Dr. Blanca Ruth Casanova
May 12 & 13 (Thursday & Friday)
11am – 1pm
Learn how to make monoprints on gelatin with acrylics. This fun technique creates surprising and beautiful results. For beginning and advanced students.
Cost per class: 400 pesos
Cost for reusable materials for beginners: 1,300 pesos
Teacher: Dr. Blanca Ruth Casanova, Ph.D., Art Educator and Visual Artist
MATA ORTIZ CERAMICS MASTERCLASS with José Loya and Ana Pena
May 24-27 (Tuesday – Friday)
11an-3pm
Mata Ortiz pottery is based on the prehistoric Paquimé techniques found at the Casas Grandes World Heritage Site in the state of Chihuahua.
In this four-day workshop, you will learn pre-Colombian and contemporary pottery techniques.
You will hand build a pre-Columbian style pot from your own hand-made single piece mould. Pots will be finished using Mata Ortiz glazes and hand-made brushes. Pots will be fired on location. All materials, clay, plaster, brushes, glazes are supplied. No experience necessary.
Instructor: José Loya and Ana Pena, Mata Ortiz Pottery Masters
Cost for 4-day workshop: 2000 pesos
Registration and enquiries : dianepearlclasses@gmail.com
Lakeside Published Writer’s Group is back at El Gato Feo Cafe + Roastery with their “Meet the Authors” event.
There will be 3 authors reading from their works and answering a live Q+A at the end of each reading.
Authors will have copies of their books for signing.
This event will take place the second Wednesday of every month.
Next one: May 11th. Readings start at 11.
Come early: coffee is available.
Meeting held in the lovely salon of Estrellita’s Bed & Breakfast. (Where El Gato Feo Cafe is located)
Open to the public.
- Lakeside Living – April 2023 - March 30, 2023
- Lakeside Living – March 2023 - February 27, 2023
- Lakeside Living – February 2023 - January 30, 2023
