“On the Path with Barbara Moore”, Common Ground Magazine, Winter 2002
In my growing up years in Southern California, I was blessed with loving parents in a home that my mother built with her mother. It seemed only appropriate for my mother to help me build my home in Hawaii, now called The Dragonfly Ranch: Healing Arts Center. Creating this nurturing environment while honing my healing skills has been my life’s work. When I turned 30, I was gifted two extraordinary blessings: (1) To be the Big Island’s first Lomilomi massage student of world renown Kahuna Haha, Aunty Margaret Machado, and (2) To become the steward of 2 beautiful acres in the middle of the ancient “Healing Triangle” on Hawaii’s Kona Coast. My dear mother and best friend helped me build my home here until she was diagnosed with life-threatening cancer in 1978. Together we decided to travel around, experiencing holistic treatments at several healing centers in and out of the US. While I seriously studied diet and nutrition, I gave my mother Lomilomi massage regularly. We did a series of cleansing programs together, fasted and did colonics for several days at a time. Miraculously, and much to the surprise of the doctors, my mother cured herself. She then continued to help me with my education in the healing arts while we developed the Dragonfly Ranch into a designer restoration sanctuary incorporating ancient and modern healing tools.*
In 1980, I had a spiritual awakening at the Temple of Abydos on “The Journey of Transformation” with Jean Houston. I got a distinct message that my home was to be used as a center for growth and transformation, especially for healers and creative artists. When I returned from Egypt, I expanded my Swiss Family Robinson-style home into a 5-bedroom indoor/outdoor “uniquely chic eco-boutique” B&B. One of my greatest joys is having the opportunity to share with my guests the amazing healing experience of playful dolphins that like to swim with us in three pristine bays nearby. These Spinner dolphins, like my chihuahuas, beam transformative love energy. After learning another powerful healing modality, Flower Essences with the Flower Essence Society in Nevada City, I experienced a “command dream” about making Hawaiian orchid flower essences. As an agricultural experiment, I built a rainbow cathedral “Illuminarium” to grow these orchids interactively with movement therapy. I chose to make a colorful labyrinth for centering and focusing positive energies. This dream that I am still working at manifesting has to do with relating to the orchids and elevating our consciousness as we create powerful orchid flowers that can then be used to make essences.
While crafting my gigantic expansion-mansion “tree house,” I learned how to work in harmony with the land, combining permaculture with ancient Hawaiian “Aloha Aina”(love of the land). As I age, I feel more “on purpose,” using the Dragonfly to fulfill its potential as a center to share the Aloha message. We now host interns, symposiums, retreats, workshops and weddings as well as provide a safe haven for guests seeking peace, creativity, greater health and spiritual awareness. Here in South Kona near the ancient “Place of Sanctuary,” the true Hawaiian lifestyle has been preserved. We work together to protect the Honaunau Valley from over development while respectfully maintaining the Spirit of Aloha. It is a blessing to live where time is slow and easy. Having received one-on-one training in the art of Lomilomi (sacred rejuvenation treatment), I was given the added blessing from Kahuna “Aunty Margaret” Machado to teach this art to others. Gratefully perpetuating this ancient art is an important mission in my life. After spending more than 4 and 1/2 decades in Hawaii, I deeply appreciate its people and culture. It is my sincere belief that sharing Hawaiian wisdom, we can potentially all realize that we are all the Ohana (family) of the World. I pray daily for assistance in this realization that everyone can peacefully live Aloha. I am open to having people of impeccable integrity assist me with this work at the Dragonfly. As a harmonious family, carefully selected people join me supporting this family vision and also apprenticing at the Dragonfly, having fun together while learning from and serving others under our 501(c)(3)–the Dragonfly Ranch Educational Center. To pursue this end, we are open to receiving grants and gifts.
Welcoming people into my Hawaiian hideaway and my heart is the path that I have chosen…always with Aloha.
*(My mother remained cancer free the rest of her life, dying of a stroke when she was 76. She requested to have her ashes buried at the Dragonfly Ranch where her nurturing presence is continuously felt.)