Art Of Tracy Verdugo Blog

Tonight I'm making pesto...from scratch...my mouth is salivating...but I am not without apprehension. Apprehension? Over pesto? Let me explain...... several years ago after a delish meal of homemade pesto, I slipped into my PJ's, squeezed some toothpaste onto my brush and had the oddest experience. The toothpaste didn't taste like toothpaste at all, instead, there was an overwhelming taste of bitterness I came downstairs and asked Marco and the girls to try the toothpaste.. does it taste weird to you? nope, all fine.... so strange, I thought and took myself off to bed... Over the next week things got worse EVERY single thing I ate had the same taste..bitter, bitter, bitter! apples, yoghurt, salad. chocolate, chicken, everything bitter! No differentiation whatsoever between foods.... It was like all of the different areas of my taste buds had been switched off  and turned to bitter sensors, sweetness, salty, sour, umami, all gone bitt...

In my Sacred Marks workshops I love to share the Aboriginal concept of Dadirri ~Deep Listening. Aboriginal writer Miriam-Rose Ungunmerr-Baumann describes deep listening as follows: “NGANGIKURUNGKURR means ‘Deep Water Sounds’. Ngangikurungkurr is the name of my tribe. The word can be broken up into three parts: Ngangi means word or sound, Kuri means water, and kurr means deep. So the name of my people means ‘the Deep Water Sounds’ or ‘Sounds of the Deep’. Miriam-Rose speaks of: “a special quality of my people. I believe it is the most important. It is our most unique gift. It is perhaps the greatest gift we can give to our fellow Australians. In our language this quality is called dadirri. It is inner, deep listening and quiet, still awareness. Dadirri recognises the deep spring that is inside us. We call on it and it calls to us. This is the gift that Australia is thirsting for. It is something like what you call ‘co...