Five Questions with Angela Porter & Alexandra Johnson

What Makes You Come Alive?

I am incredibly moved and enlivened by the transcendent and transformational possibilities inherent in the momentespecially when I am afraid of something and I stay with myself and let go into that fear and groundlessness and am suddenly living in a bigger experience of life Or when I truly connect with someone being to being and the energy of that dissolves the separation we elf moments beforeand sometimes traveling in a new place I have no reference points for.

Pivotal turning point in your life?

I was 28 years old when my mother passed away from cancer. I was very close to my mother and when she left her body it cracked me open like an egg; I suddenly knew that I was living in the smallest parts of myself and that life was so much bigger. It set me on a search for purpose and meaning, and a connection with life that I trusted from deep within. I quit my job, left my relationship and home and set out to discover what it means to serve life, my mother was really an expression of this. It was like an invisible hand nudged me from behind and was directing my path, first to Esalen Institute where I lived and worked for two years, studying Gestalt and body-centered therapies, and then via an injury I sustained at Esalen while mulching fallen trees in a storm, to the Breema Clinic where I recovered my ability to walk, and discovered in the practice and philosophy of Breema, what would become the foundation of my psychotherapeutic work, and the deepening of my search for meaning .

An Act of Kindness You'll Never Forget?

This was in Maggie Valley North Carolina at Joey's Pancake House. We were out of money and super soggy it was stormy and raining, summer thunder storms- we would wake up in our tent in a sudden downpour, laying in inches of water, soaked to the bone, ticks and mosquitos were constant, and often some verbal assault from muscle-car pick-up truck bullies who didn't like the color of our skin, or the way we looked, then cat callers, and those wanting to convert us save usThe dishwasher at Joey's saw us walking up the road, asked if Lisa(my twin sister and I) were twins he is a twin too. "Yes, we are twins, walking with these other twinsindicating Jo, and Emily, walking for peace, you know, 911, the destruction of the twin towers, and the subsequent bombing of Afghanistan, we were called to do this" He let us camp on his front lawn and insisted on us coming to his job the next day for pancakes. We were flat broke by then and nearly broken spirited, fiercely fighting, and subsisting on beans, tortillas, apples, and sunflower seeds for weeks, feeling exhausted, worn down, and tempted to call it as our small cadre of walkers were in conflict about continuing we had made it pretty far, were walking 17-23 miles a day at that point and had crossed the country, only 500 miles to go to get to Lafayette Park in Washington DC, our destination, for the 1 year anniversary of 911. "Could we just put our thumbs out and hitch the rest of the way?" We asked for a sign from above, "should continue?... or was this far enough?"next morning we walked to Joey's Pancake House excited for something besides beans and tortillas. Jimmie told us to wait then went to the back and emerged a few minutes later with the proprietor, Brenda, who greeted us in the entryway, seated us at a large group table in an alcove near the entrance of the diner, and asked if she could treat us to breakfast in exchange for our story. Heck Yes! We told her why we were walking and how we'd come to be there, dusty and weary on Joey's doorstep. We stuttered at first naming our cause because geez after all we were in the South, Republican county, home of the Confederacy And we were walking for peaceShe then brought us some Joeys Pancake House T-shirtsadvertising op I guess, people would see us walking up the highway, 7 women wearing Joey's Pancake House T-shirts in light pink and blueBrenda treated us to a fine breakfast"have whatever you 'd like from the menu", she said. We were happy. . As we sat feasting on eggs, sausage, and Joey's famous buttermilk pancakes, people began passing by our large group table and at first we didn't understand, one man laid a $20 bill on the table, said, "thank y'all for what you are doing, its very brave", and in short order other people did the same. Finishing their meals, they walked by stopped set $2, $5, $10, $20, $50 dollars down on the table and thanked us for walking. We were flabbergasted this was definitely a sign As we left the restaurant with full bellies and a revival of faith in our mission, we were shocked yet again to be met on the highway by 120 or so people who showed up to walk with us from Maggie Valley to Asheville NC. A friend who we would later visit had told his church fellowship that were coming and why and they had put the word out in the entire community to come join us in walking for peace. This I will never forget.Peace by Peace Cross Country Peace Walk post 911. We walked as a prayer for peace from Berkeley CA. to Washington D.C. January 2002- September 2002

One Thing On Your Bucket List?

Camping on the shores of, Laguna de San Ignacio in Baja where the Grey Whales are birthing their calves in Winter, before heading north to the feeding waters of British Columbia.

One-line Message for the World?

Your primary purpose in life, is to be as completely, truly, honestly and fearlessly yourself as is possiblefind out who that is. Don't give up. And there is no Us and Them. Only Us. All of us.