Posts Tagged ‘change’

A journal entry from 10-30-09

The little boy I picked up in the labyrinth (http://liciaberry.com/blog/2009/11/10/the-boy-in-the-labyrinth/) is beginning to stir now…he has more life in him, whereas he did not seem to inhabit his body very much before.  I feel he is a personification of my power.  I am healing my power as well as exploring what authentic power looks like for myself.  As I do this, I predict I will see this little boy grow into an actualized man.  And that I will feel comfortable and confident in the world, a genuine soul expressing their authentic power, informed by the Sacred Feminine in her power.

In recent weeks, I have felt such outrage and despair about the plight of women and children who are preyed upon by those who would use their power to dominate them.  So many stories of rape and murder; it is so heinous to me.  I was worried about myself because some modern “spiritual” folk say that anger is a bad thing to feel and it “takes your vibe down”.  I find myself wanting to fight them, which of course means I am fighting a part of myself that wants to gloss over the feelings and pretend everything is okay.  I also don’t want to be one dimensional, the angry feminist who drives folks away by her intensity and ire.

But I chose to trust my body and emotions as a message to me that there was something wrong, and I let it take me down a path.  Trusting, trusting.  As I allowed my anger and expressed it in my writing and conversations, it took me to a new place. 

I saw a purple matrix on a field of black, or a Great Web, and heard “Mending the Web”, over and over, for days and now weeks.  I saw that it would be fairly simple to continue down the angry path, let it fuel itself continuously, and break the web by posting and publishing angry thoughts. 

But then I saw that it is “women’s work” to heal, to mend the breaks in the web that out-of-balance folks cut.  I understood that my original desire in the world was to heal, and that has been the case until I got angrier and harder in my heart, wanting to be acknowledged for being right and for being victimized.  It is such a tricky thing to stay on that tightrope of balanced, righteous anger that needs to be felt and expressed, or falling over into letting it consume you, become who you are.  Letting ourselves be human when we have studied spirituality can be a tricky game to play with ourselves.

As I continued with some trepidation down this path into greater room and understanding, I also saw that women who are empowered (and me) are strong enough to be the big ones, the ones who will take the first step and reach out our hands to do the mending.  Just as many wise and respected feminists have said, it is the women who must lead the coming awareness and shift in consciousness to balance.  Quietly, perhaps in some ways…..but that it is up to us to start the healing of this world. 

Then, I saw and heard “healing the masculine”.  Ah, is it not enough to heal ourselves as women, and the damage done to us at the hands of the outrageously immature masculine without (and our internalized fathers and immature masculine within)?  Perhaps we may be called to turn and heal those who have trespassed against us. 

Well, I don’t know how this will work…I sure don’t want to get in a conversation with my father and attempt to “heal” him.  I already know he doesn’t want to do that in ways that I consider healthy for him.  But, maybe by healing my own inner masculine, helping my inner masculine to grow up in a healthy balanced way, with a mature inner feminine to help him, there may be hope.

Family constellation work has shown me that there is no such thing as space and time…that healing can occur for all involved when all the factors are present.  Perhaps if I heal and mature my own inner masculine, my father in some way is released from his own pain, and healing can happen for him (and others).

But first, I must peel back the face I have placed on him, the veneer of goodness, the stories of heroism that I have projected onto him, and believed.  I must see what is underneath.  Better get out the drills, hammers and chisels.  It’s time for the idealized father to die.

Who knows what is going on in the larger collective?  Lots of folks claim to, but I tend to think that we each have a slice of the pie, rather than the whole pie….a peek at the global story through our own filters rather than a completely objective viewpoint.  My subjective experience is valid for me, but not necessarily the truth for everyone!

My subjective experience has been telling me that there has been some extraordinary energy moving through the collective these last few days.  What I’m hearing as I report in from my corner of reality is that many are feeling this larger wave of energy, but some experience it as very difficult and others very lovely.

Thursday is when I started to feel that rise begin…it feels to me like being in the ocean, out beyond where the waves break.  You can feel that a wave is coming because you get lifted off the bottom of the sea, and your body bobs up to the top of the lump that begins a wave, then you are dropped down and toes make contact again with sand.  The wave continues onward towards the shore, where it crests and crashes down, becoming one with the larger body of the ocean again.

Thursday some extraordinary things happened in my life.  My beloved husband confronted an oooolllllddddd habit passed down to him by his ancestry and brought it into consciousness, breaking the pattern and freeing himself (and us, his family).  When it happened, there was a palpable feeling of something having changed.  Our whole family felt it.  A few hours later, a professional opportunity came his way, literally dropped in his lap, which has invited more good feelings in our family. 

Then, Friday some folks looked at our house in Colorado, the one that’s been on the market for 1.5 years, and promptly feel it love with it and made an offer.  We signed the contract yesterday, the day identified by astrologers in the know as a profoundly lucky day of 2010 due to Jupiter and the sun being in alignment.

The current energy wave is intense, don’t get me wrong.  It’s not all sunshine and daisies; the recent earthquakes would indicate that there are folks who are in great distress as a result of the energy movement.  And I have been hearing that some folks are having difficulty navigating the current energy.  They feel anxious, pregnant, full, like they are ready to explode.  Sometimes it feels just plain bad, and we want to hide under a rock until it’s over.

I do believe that what is within is also without, and vice versa, so to me it makes sense that we would see manifestations in the physical as well as emotional worlds of the internal or invisible universal energy waves that wash through us.  I don’t think this is going to change; my sources tell me that these kinds of experiences are going to continue, and that the intensity will lessen a bit as we cycle through, until we get to the next wave. 

Are we being cleansed?  Are we being shown where we are putting energy that doesn’t serve us?  Are we getting the opportunity to trim out the deadwood and let go into a life that we are truly meant to live?  And why is it easy for some and not for others?  Is the difference that sometimes we cooperate with the flow of the energy and other times we cling to the rocks, refusing to let go into that larger life?  What keeps us attached to those habits and beliefs that threaten to take us under, even those that we love? 

My sweet husband has had direct information for 3 years (via myself and my invisible helpers) that his unconsciousness was causing a major energy drain on himself and our family, creating havoc and despair, putting him crossways to his own soul.  But he wasn’t ready to hear it until Thursday, and when he let it go, the energy wave that was building already bobbed him (and our family) up to the top of the wave, instead of holding us down at the bottom.  The relief and feeling of rightness is unmistakable.

So now we are coming through this wave…the full moon today feels like an apex to me, and perhaps things will smooth out a bit for awhile to allow the next wave to build. This will allow us time to integrate the changes that have been made during this last part of the cycle; the deadwood having been trimmed (don’t go trying to pick it up and stick it back on the trees!), we will hopefully find our ground and center in a new way.

The word “rebirthing” has been in my psyche quite a bit of late; perhaps in part due to the immanence of spring (around the corner, I hope!)    Perhaps in part due to the “collective sloughing off” that’s going on for so many people, in our country and beyond.  And perhaps in part due to the changes I have seen in my own life.

It is a hard thing to describe in quantifiable terms when deep internal change is happening.  It’s like trying to put words on a moving, invisible target made of mist.  The way I know change is happening is that I can feel it.  Of course, I see behavior changes, but that is after the changes are integrated.  The first way I know they are happening is that I can feel motion inside.

I’m not alone.  I’ve been talking to some kick-ass women, women who don’t always have words for what they are experiencing, either, but trust themselves enough to know that something is going on, something big and good and life changing.  They sometimes think they are alone, and they experience such relief when they realize that they aren’t. 

These are the women I want to surround myself with in my life.  These are women who are strong, have been through some things, have survived hardship, or pulled themselves up by their bootstraps when no one else would give them a hand.  These women are feeling something inside of them, too, something that is calling them home.  And they are choosing to listen.

Rebirth is a term that seems perfect for what is going on for me right now.  I feel myself returning to a more childlike remembrance of my soul.   I am having body memories of what it felt like to be me before I learned how to cover up my light.  I am remembering certain qualities of myself that I’ve not really touched in some time.  The experience is like, “Oh, yeah, I used to feel that feeling when I was little.”  It brings tears to my eyes sometimes!

When I think about it from a pattern perspective (I’m always seeing patterns), I’d have to say that my core self is re-emerging after trying on a suit for some years.  The suit worked well for awhile, even though it was uncomfortable at times.  But now, I am done with that particular suit, and I want to try on one that is a better fit for me.  A roomy, silky, blue and green, flowing suit.

I feel some fear and anxiety at times because I don’t quite know what is around the corner.  But at the same time, I feel an anticipation, an eagerness…like the joy I felt at special times when I was a younger person.  Like the whole world is my playground.  I can’t wait!

Rebirth.  Re-emerge.  New/Old identity.  Who am I becoming?  I think it’s more ME.

Dear Women!

What a year it has been, and it’s only early February! Many of us have felt both the exhilaration of the new year energy and deep intensity as the purging and transformation of our consciousness continues.

It’s only 10 days until my teleclass “Faces of Her: an educational and experiential exploration of the Sacred Feminine Within” begins on Thursday Feb. 18th.

If you are anything like me or the rest of the folks I am hearing from lately, you will understand that the old way of the world is not working any more. Many of us can feel internally that a new era is beginning.

What is happening? Why do so many of us have an inner knowing that the world is changing? What can we do to midwife a smooth rebirth? These questions and more will be explored in my “Faces of Her” teleclass.

If you FEEL and nod your head to the writings of Clarissa Pinkola Estes, if you DIG the art of Frida Kahlo, if Starhawk’s sweet words whisper into your very heart, if Jean Shinoda Bolen makes you want to jump up and create a women’s circle, if you admire and say YES to any strong, wise woman you hear speak her truth…then you will want to register for this 3-part class starting Thursday, Feb. 18th.

These women are shining examples of having integrated the Sacred Feminine qualities with their inner masculine qualities (the qualities in ourselves we are all taught to live from in western culture). Can you imagine if all of us brought the fullness and balance of the Sacred Union of the feminine and masculine to this world?

This teleclass will show you how by exploring:
• What is the “Sacred Feminine”?

• What is the “Light/Solar Mother”?

• What is the “Dark/Lunar Mother”?

• How do these universal energies show up in our lives?

• How is the Sacred Feminine already within me? How do I recognize Her?

• How can our lives be richer, more magical, and more alive by consciously experiencing these universal energies?

• How can I cultivate a relationship with the Sacred Feminine in my own life?

• Why is the embodiment of the Sacred Feminine important to our continuation as a species?

This class is designed to be appealing to the heart as well as the head, to be full of interesting information as well as an invitation into personal experience of the Sacred Feminine Within.

Personal experiences of the Sacred Feminine Within will be encouraged, inspired, and supported with images, story, poetry, meditations and exercises as well as educational material. You will leave each session FULL and looking forward to MORE.

This tele-class takes place on the phone in the comfort of your own home-you can wear your pajamas and fuzzy slippers!

Join me in this enlivening new/old experience! Choose now to step into your role in this amazing time of rebirth!
Come Home to Mama!

Register here!
http://www.liciaberry.com/Faces%20of%20Her.htm

Can’t wait to talk with you!
Licia Berry
Faces of Her
Creator of the Circle of WiseWomen (FaceBook women’s group)

As I’ve said in the previous entry, every new cycle is an opportunity to look back and celebrate how far we’ve come.  I don’t like the idea of beating ourselves up because we didn’t accomplish certain things (although I am guilty of doing that with some frequency).  What I DO like is taking an inventory of the life lessons I’ve learned, because that tells me I am alive.

2009 is one of those years I am hearing plenty of folks ready to say goodbye to.  As one reader put it, “2009, don’t let the door hit you where the good lord split you.”  I understand, it has been a banner year for hard lessons, an intense alchemical cauldron, a trial by fire.  What is left after the purifying flames?  What will emerge from the ashes?

I am still discerning the answers to those questions…and so far, I am very excited with what I am discovering.  The “me” that is emerging is the one I have been wanting to get to know.  May she continue to come forward in grace. 

In the mean time, I have compiled the short list of lessons I have been taught (and am incorporating) by the great teacher of the year of 2009.  I offer them here to inspire you to acknowledge your own lessons of this last year, and to thank the year for the reminder that you are alive, too.

~Licia’s 2009 Life Lessons~

2009 Lesson #1-When I align with what is right for me, change goes very smoothly because I am so supported by the larger energies of the universe.

2009 Lesson #2-Even when something happens that looks absolutely awful, I am still being supported. I will know this if I am open to this possibility. If I approach the “awful” thing with an open heart and ask to know the lessons, they will be given to me.

2009 Lesson #3- Love is all that matters. Love illuminates the path, makes life a joyful adventure, full of meaning. Absence of love breeds uncertainty and fear, makes the journey a scary, unpleasant question.

2009 Lesson #4-  Receivership. I was forcibly disabled, kind of a “Sit down and be quiet!” My usual running around, trying to be in control of various aspects of my life, was taken out in a hurry. My inability to do for myself + for others created an opening for me to receive assistance, to practice being taken care of.

2009 Lesson #5- Things don’t always happen in my time frame….in fact, they often don’t. There is a larger reality at work than the one I think up with my own mind and desires….and that reality will be the one that has the last say. In the end, it will be for my highest good.

2009 Lesson #6- Go where invited.  If you are not wanted, seen or appreciated, leave.  Go to where the love is.

2009 Lesson #7-  Some decisions need to be made that defy logic.  It may not “make sense” to follow a course of action, but truly supportive, growthful and loving decisions frequently don’t fit into a rational model for life. 

2009 Lesson #8-  Community has become very important to me.  Whereas I have been fine to be a loner and independent before, now I feel a strong pull to give and receive in community, seeking and finding and relishing my soul tribe.  Allowing myself to be “part of” is related to how willing I am to open up and be human with other humans.

2009 Lesson #9-  Deep rearranging, sloughing off, gathering and healing is happening for me this year.  So much subconscious process, the evidence of which is in my dreams and in the sensation of being underwater or in deep caves…a reminder for me that there is a whole lot more going on than meets the eye or than I am aware of consciously.

2009 Lesson #10-  In the past I have been hung up on “evidence”.  This has been a way for me to deny my inner wisdom.  Evidence does not have to look like something I can see, feel, touch or remember consciously.  It can include what emerges in dreams, the feelings and the body…these are also evidence.

2009 Lesson #11-  There is a collapsing of worlds occurring within me, and it is happening faster and faster.  This brings me great bliss when I align with it, and anxiety when I resist it.  I feel I am getting closer to cohesion within, Sacred Union Within.  The lesson for me?  All is in order….Let it be. 

Thank you for the lessons, 2009, and a blessed 2010 everyone!

Christmas is done, and I have this urge to take down all of the decorations and put the tree out for recycling.  I am interested in how many people I have heard express the same sentiment.  I am ready to move forward with my life!

2009 has been a banner year for hard lessons, hasn’t it?  Between relationships falling apart, health crises, job changes, geographical moves, and all of those INTERAL moves we’ve been making, 2009 was the year that rocked and rolled all night long.  Many of us woke up to a new reality within ourselves, and noticed that the world looked different.  It is amazing to look back and see all of the changes, and what a different land we live in now than just one year ago.

For me, this reflection is cause for celebration, and is done for the purpose of patting me on the back because I got through it (sometimes with grace, and sometimes NOT).  Another purpose of this reflection is to make sure I have given a respectful nod to the forces of the universe that were conspiring to help me learn something.

In ceremonial work we know it is important to thank what has been before letting it go, incorporating the lessons it has brought us…2009 has been a year FULL of learning opportunities for us.  It is kind and respectful to say thank you, just as we were taught in kindergarten.  You know how it feels to be properly thanked…it feels like acknowledgment.  This is a good practice, and one we frequently forget when we feel victim of some larger doing.  But the gift to us in remembering to thank even the hard stuff for what it brought to us is that it helps us incorporate the lessons into our psyche and breathe that hard-won wisdom into our lives.  

I am spending some time making a list this week of lessons I have learned; I think I will make some art about it, too.  My friend Elizabeth Barbour and I are also hosting a retreat on New Year’s Day to take some women on a journey to see what they are becoming, to honor what has passed and allow the new butterfly to emerge in 2010.  We’ll be making collages to ground our inner visions, and to hold those intentions for the entire year.  The larger energy is ripe for this self examination.  Can’t you feel it?  2010 is truly a year to begin again.

But if you can’t make the retreat, held in Tallahassee FL, you can still honor New Year’s Day intentionally and ceremonially.  Here are some suggestions:

Licia’s New Year’s Rituals:

• This week, sit quietly with your thoughts.  Ask yourself these questions, and journal about what you discover.

1. What were some life lessons taught to you this year?
2. Who/what were the teachers?
3. What wisdom have you gained?
4. Fully look these lessons in the eye…feel them stretch throughout your body and consciousness….breathe them through you.  These lessons are part of you, if you will let them be.  You can live a more authentic life because of them.
5. Fully acknowledge the teachers that brought these lessons to you…whether they be people, circumstances, spirits, elements of nature….whatever and whoever they were, they gave you a gift.  Thank them.

• On New Year’s Day, honor this new beginning by setting aside time to create something new to look forward into the year.  I meditate, journal and make a collage that I can display in my workspace.  Here are some questions I ask myself in order to make this time special and meaningful for the new cycle:

1. Who am I, really?  Who is the me that has been uncovered, scrubbed clean, by this past year’s events?  Who is the me that has emerged from the cocoon of my becoming?
2. What does my heart, my soul want to do, to say?
3. How will I live as the truth of who I am this year?  How will I live my life differently because of what I have learned?
4. What does my heart truly want to offer humanity?  How can I show up in this world that is experiencing so many changes in a way that supports the goodness in this world?

 I find these activities to be soooooo supportive to ending and beginning a cycle in a more intentional and loving way.  Taking the time to meaningfully take inventory and express my thanks as the old cycle ends helps me to welcome the new cycle in with fresh, eager and open arms.  I hope that you will give this gift to yourself as well!

by Licia Berry, April 2007

 

There is a lot of talk these days in progressive thought or spiritual communities about the “return of the feminine” on the planet.  If you type “re-emergence of the feminine” into an internet search engine, you will find endless articles and quotes about how the feminine is coming back to the earth.  Where did she go?  If this talk is true, it seems the Sacred or Divine Feminine left for a period of several thousand years and has now decided to return from her holiday!

The human suppression of the feminine powers has been a symptom of an era of exploration of immature masculine power.  Through brute force, rape and murder, witch trials, shaming of women’s sexuality, relegation of women to second citizen status, the view of the feminine as a “weaker sex’, and the choice of women to give away their power, it can surely feel as if there is no Divine Feminine present in a world that fosters these beliefs.  It is no wonder that so many have felt abandoned and betrayed by their mothers, whether Divine, planetary or biological.

The true presence of the feminine is a strong one, a presence that cannot be denied, ignored, made invisible, or rendered powerless.  Where has this strong presence been?  Why have we felt her absence?  Why did she leave us?

She didn’t.  In actuality, the Sacred Feminine has been here all along.  While we have been playing out the various and important human dramas and stages of development, she has been right here with us.  It is our awareness of her that has been away.  The presence and integration of the Sacred Feminine into our daily lives slipped away from our consciousness for several thousand years, but now our consciousness has evolved to a point that we are becoming aware of her again. 

Even though humanity has been through some pretty painful experiences as a result of the full exploration of the immature (and sometimes wounded) masculine aspects (or patriarchy), everything is in order.  After several thousand years of full exploration of the feminine (the Stone Age is thought to have been matriarchal), it was time to stretch out into the opposite pole and check out the masculine for awhile.  But now we have come to the time on our planet when it is all about balance.

She is not outside of us.  The idea that the Divine Feminine could have been “gone” all these years is a projection onto the outer world of what is occurring inside of us; it is true that she has been absent from the collective human consciousness for a long time.  And it is also a projection that she is returning in the outer world…truly what is occurring is that she is returning in our inner consciousness, and therefore we feel her in the outer world.  But she has been with us all along, waiting dormant in our inner awareness until we were ready to unearth and embrace her in a deeper, more encompassing way.

 

As a woman, I have had my time of anger and outrage about the “plight” of women and the dominance of patriarchy in our world.  I have felt women to be the victim and made men out to be the bad guys…….and I needed to fully explore that anger in order to come through to the other side of it, so I have no regrets about spending time in that place.   And I will again and again.  As I heal the wounds in myself, I will feel the anger anew, and more deeply, until I am cleansed and feel healed and in my power about my feminine face and ways of knowing being fully valued in the world. 

However, I have grown much beyond my place of powerlessness.  Now what I am finding is that the more I fully claim all of the various faces and aspects of my inner feminine, the more I see her in the world.  The more I embrace ALL aspects of my inner feminine, the more I see ALL aspects of her in my life.  So I see feminine faces of compassion and acceptance, I see strength and ferocity, I see softness and embracing, I see deeply and highly charged sexuality, I see raw power and I see infinite knowing.  And the more I am ready to claim ALL aspects of her in myself, the more I am ready to see and claim her in the collective experience.

My feeling, sense, cellular memory and perhaps other lifetimes of experience tell me that the feminine ways and feminine power needed to go underground for the safety and survival of women as a physical gender.  It was a necessary burial of our dearest treasures, much like the Tibetan monks destroyed their precious ancient manuscripts to keep them out of the hands of the Chinese.  It was what we had to do.  No regrets.  The world was not a safe place for the daily existence of the feminine powers.

In addition, men as a physical gender buried their inner feminine.  This can be seen even in modern times (although it is indeed shifting), where a man who is not physically strong or acts dominant is labeled as ‘weak” or “girly”.  It has not been safe for men, either, to be softer, embracing, intuitive, sensual, accepting and wise from a deep inner sense.  Can you imagine what the world will be like when the men claim and embody there inner feminine selves?  WOW.  Those are some men I want to get to know!  I am seeing this mature feminine as well as masculine emergence in my own beloved husband; it makes him courageous and warrior-like when needed, yet intuitive, discerning, deeply wise, willing to allow instead of push, and a sweet and tender lover.  Whoo baby!

Time has marched on, and humanity has evolved, and we, having fully explored the dynamics of the wounded or immature masculine in ourselves and with each other, are letting go of old concepts of the feminine and making room for larger ideas about the feminine.  We are allowing the blunt edge of dominance and suppression of the feminine (both inner and outer) to fall away under the brilliant light of clarity.  And this is occurring in each one of us in our own perfect timing.

It was in 1993 that Marianne Williamson wrote in her book A Woman’s Worth: “There is a collective force rising up on the earth today, an energy of the reborn feminine … She remembers our function on earth … This is a time of monumental shift, from the male dominance of human consciousness back to a balanced relationship between masculine and feminine. The Goddess archetype doesn’t replace God; she merely keeps him company. She expresses his feminine face.”

At that time, the way I read this statement was that men were going down in flames and women were going to grab their fair share of the power.  I was mad as hell and thinking and acting from my own inner wounded, immature masculine and feminine aspects.  My wounded feminine identified strongly with being a victim, and my wounded masculine was how I survived and made my way in the world.  I thought the only way the women would ever be treated with respect again was if we acted like the men who suppressed us.

But over the years, as I grew and softened and became more myself, I began to understand the feminine ways as powerful in and of themselves.  I began to open that cache of treasure that was buried in my psyche underneath all those years of heaviness.  I found an endless, boundless resource of love.  I understood that a truly healed, mature masculine and a truly healed, mature feminine made the perfect compliment to each other.  In fact, they were beautiful together.

It is interesting to note that if we dig into the story of humanity’s past, there are many, many examples of very strong and powerful women; queens, warriors and goddesses whose names didn’t make it to the “his-story” books.  It was a revelation to me to learn about and find that the strength of the feminine was even around in the physical form of actual women and that we just weren’t taught about it.  Let these few names of strong women (who actually existed-this is not a complete list) reverberate in your mind and heart:

Isis (Egyptian Goddess of All of Creation)

Mawu (African Goddess of the Moon)

Songi (African Protectress of the Bantu)

Nukwan (Chinese Goddess)

Danu (Irish Goddess and Protector)

Breo Saighead (Irish Goddess)

Ix Chel (Mayan Goddess of the Moon, Healing and Childbirth)

Xbaquiyalo (Mayan Goddess)

Coatlicue (Aztec Creator Goddess)

Xochiquetzal (Aztec Goddess of music, dance and love and Patroness of women’s sacred sexuality)

Queen KuBaba (Sumerian leader of war of independence)

Trung Trac and Trung Nhi (Vietnamese Sister Queens led battle against the invading Chinese)

Boudicca (Queen of Iceni, a Celtic tribe in ancient Britain, who led rebel armies against the Romans in Britain)

Hatshepsut (Egyptian, declared herself “Pharoah” rather than Queen)

Wu Zetian (Chinese, declared herself “Emperor” rather than Empress)

And these are just a scant handful of the women whose feminine strength propelled them forward into a larger vision.  Even now, consensual reality has some belief that women today are in a state of weakness and subjugation, but there are women (and men who are healing and strengthening their inner feminine) in our modern world who are changing reality every day with their strength and vision.  It is the media and the immature collective consciousness that devote their energies to the message that “feminine equals Paris Hilton”.  You have a choice about whether to buy into that message.

“Men are not the enemy, but the fellow victims. The real enemy is women’s denigration of themselves.”

- Betty Friedan

The more we step up and claim the inner feminine in ourselves, the more she shows up in our lives.  The feminine has many aspects, some of which we recognize as docility, forgiveness, and surrender, such as we see in the Christianized Mother Mary figure.  But these traits are only a small fraction of the totality of the Sacred Feminine.  She is ALL, and she is not being fully expressed until we embrace ALL of her.  It is wise to be alert to judgments and beliefs about what it means to be feminine or masculine.  Qualities we typically associate with the masculine, such as courage, ferocity, strength, and intelligence, as well as the “softer” sides of those such as passion, sensuality, deep wisdom and intuition, are all part of the Sacred Feminine as well.  In actuality, all qualities are universal, found in both masculine and feminine essences, but the ways of accessing and expressing these qualities is different in the masculine and feminine.

 

“Darkness precedes light and she is Mother”

Inscription in the altar of the Salerno Cathedral in Italy.

We see evidence in the collective psyche of the awareness of the “darker” aspects of feminine power in the global fascination with and re-emergence of the Black Madonna (be sure to look that up if you don’t know anything about these fabulous images of the pre-Christianized Sacred Feminine.)  In the wonderful book, The Secret Life of Bees by Sue Monk Kidd, the presence of the Black Madonna is central to the story of personal enlightenment and reclaiming of power for a young girl.  In the story, three symbols of feminine power constellate throughout: the Fist, a representation of feminine authority, voice and autonomy, fierce outrage at injustice, dignity, substance, being both level and wild, with an ability to shake things up, the Heart, a representation of profound connection to one another, the big, wide lap of the great mother, a lap so big there’s room for everybody, inclusiveness, nurturing, unity, compassion for what is lost or undervalued and left out, refuge, and deep and beautiful wisdom, and the Moon- Madonnas have been marked with moons since the origin of humanity, and is a representation of cycles, women, women’s cycles, tides, oceans, earth, behavior of animals, fecundity of plants, the body, the rhythms of death and life, fertility, creativity, earth’s aliveness and holiness.  Certainly in these three symbols we see examples of the diversity that is represented in the feminine!  In terms of the collective awareness of the diversity of the feminine, I have a theory that Oprah Winfrey is personification of the ancient symbol of the Black Madonna.  Think of how she aids others in getting their message out, giving them permission and a platform from which to speak.  Think of how she creatively successful she is, but especially in the ways that the masculine world considers successful (money, power, resources).  And yet she has not appeared to lose other aspects of the feminine in her rise to fame.

 “The way to true and creative life is thru the dark feminine.”

-Carl Jung

 When I set an intention to fully claim my feminine power on Winter Solstice of 2006, I set in motion a process in which she has come forward in her totality, and it is blissful and amazing to feel the power coursing through my veins.  In reclaiming my feminine power, I also recognized that I am the one who has been thinking like a victim and I chose to cease that habit immediately.  When I cease to see myself as a victim, I stop playing that role with others in my outer world, even with men and women who may prefer to see me that way. When I stop buying into that drama, I force everyone I interact with to stop, too, even if for a moment.  It is like throwing a wrench in a well-oiled machine…the machine has to stop until the wrench is removed.  And if enough wrenches are thrown in, eventually the machine doesn’t work anymore.  It has to be adapted to the new situation.

“You take your life in your own hands, and what happens? A terrible thing: no one to blame.”

- Erica Jong

      My theory is that, as humanity has evolved, we have been moving through developmental stages, just like a baby does.  In the beginning, humanity as a whole was exploring pretty basic animal nature…a denser vibration of physical life.  As we learned and grew, we explored a stone-age era of matriarchal worship….perhaps women were seen as all powerful because we were able to give birth.  Then, we moved into a developmental stage where we grew our intellect and reason and learned ways of controlling nature to guarantee our survival.  There was a time when there was a balance of reverence for women and men, a sense of some stasis and equality.  Then, in the middle ages, we went deep into the age of Christianity and colonialism, defiling woman as evil and the downfall of man, as well as the earth as the mother/planet upon which we all depended for our lives.  This out-of- balance approach took us crashing headlong into the industrial age, in which we developed commercialism and the credo that the one with the most toys (money, power, resources) wins. It was during this time that we explored the worship of the male aspect. 

The anger we see today in our world, in both women and men, could be construed as a deep grief and rage at the seeming lack of presence of the feminine on the planet.  We have fully explored the masculine aspects of power…..wounded as that masculine may be.  As a collective, humanity has explored colonialism, industrialism, over-use of resources and the plundering of the planet, power-over rather than power-with, brute force instead of cooperation, and the giving away of inner power to outer sources.  We have explored victimization, blame, guilt, sexuality as degenerate and dirty, shame, doing what others want us to, and belief in lack and therefore competition to get what we want.  

But this is an era which is dying….we are still seeing the last throes of this dynamic as it senses it’s imminent departure, but make no mistake, it is on its way out.  And now we are coming into an era of balance again, but a little higher on the vibrational scale; we will explore faces of the feminine and masculine that we have not seen before in human existence.  Each time we moved up the ladder of vibration, we explored a different aspect of the masculine/feminine dynamic.   We are see-sawing our way up the vibrational scale, ultimately to a perfect union of the highest aspects of each the Sacred Feminine and Sacred Masculine, the marriage of the Divine Queen and King.

I had an experience just the other day that played this out for me.  I called on the strength and depth of my inner feminine, and it felt so satisfying, like taking a long drink of sweet water after being thirsty for a long, long time.  As I enjoyed feeling the immense feminine in me, I saw in my mind a scene of the wild, fierce and powerful feminine aspect personified by a naked woman with long, wild dark hair.  Her presence was strong, primitive, shamanic, almost animal-like, yet very empathetic and discerning.  She stood before a pile of bones heaped in a corner, and I knew immediately that the pile of bones were my inner broken masculine.  She stood over the bones, breathing life into them and singing to them, gathering them into her strong arms.  As she breathed and sang and rocked the bones, flesh began to grow onto them.  Over a few minutes, the bones had become a beautiful man with light brown hair and piercing blue eyes.  She put the man down, where he stood on his own two feet, and looked at her with an illumined face.  As I watched, his beautiful body became clothed in the finest splendor, and a crown of gold lay atop his head.  His face shone with love and understanding as he beamed at her, my inner feminine.  And I knew that they were in love beyond any limits.  She had, by coming forward in her greatest strength and power, held the space for healing and embraced my masculine’s brokenness, and therefore brought forth her equal.  He was already there, but a pile of bones, and through her love and desire and feminine ways of knowing, she had opened her arms and encouraged him to come into himself.  The missing complete man was made whole by the love, strength, compassion and power of the woman who desired her truest partner.  And now the inner feminine and the inner masculine could join together in ecstatic holy union.  The two were again one.

As this scene played out, I felt energetic shifts in my body and feelings swirling around.  Breathless, I watched the glorious masculine come into the flesh and meet the feminine’s gaze, and I cried with recognition and joy.  I know this beautiful man!  I aspire to be him, just as I aspire to be the highest aspects of my feminine self!  As they embraced each other and began a long eon of passionate tangling, I wept with relief that my inner selves were indeed making love and becoming whole.  It was remarkable.  

Here is what I know; what we are ready to allow into our consciousness, appears.  What we are ready to put our focus on suddenly makes sense to us and we begin to see more of it.  What we are ready to embrace in ourselves, we are ready to embrace in the outer world.

The feminine has always been here, has never truly “gone away”….there is no “return”, but rather a remembrance and recognition of the strength of the feminine and its grace and its wisdom and it’s all-encompassing acceptance and it’s ways of power and knowing.  SHE IS RIGHT HERE and has been all along.  There is no tragic loss of the feminine….no departure or abandonment….it is just us humans, going though our growth process, who lost our awareness of her.  Our awareness of the presence of the feminine is what went underground; our conscious knowing of ourselves is what went underground, not the feminine itself.  And we are ready to internally embrace her again.   

 

“When they are equally present, all is calm.  When one is outweighed by the other, there is confusion and disarray.”

-central tenet of Taoism

Do you ever get the sense something big is about to happen?  Sort of a building of energy feeling, like gears are turning…but not turning just to turn….turning because it will lead to something.

I have had this feeling today that is similar to the way I felt before I went into labor with my boys.  I noticed when I awoke spontaneously at 5 a.m. that I felt funny, very internal.  An eerie quiet, while something moved deep inside.  As if I was a very still, black lake with an ancient sea creature traversing its muddy bottom.  It is a difficult feeling to describe in words, but I can safely say ”pre-labor” is no ordinary feeling. 

As the morning progressed, I noticed I did something very bold that I have been trying to do for 5 years (I printed out some of the stories I will be publishing in my next book).  I just up and did it!  No talking myself into it, no wringing my hands, no over-analyzing.  Just pulled up 50 pages worth of my heart and printed them out on paper.

You might wonder why this is so significant.  It doesn’t seem like a big deal at all!  But it IS.

I realized today that I have safely secreted away my deepest revelations in my trusty computer (and what I didn’t, I trusted to put in my journals), but never brought them into physical form by printing them.  I kept them nice and safe in the etheric realm of my electronic gadgetry, where I could not show them to anybody.  Or publish them.

You know me, I’m a pretty intense person and a deep thinker.  I figure that I have at least 8000 pieces of writing that I “intend” to put into books stashed on my computer.  I seem to be a collector of my thoughts, and if I write them, I tell myself I doing what needs to be done.  But I am starting to see that there is another half of the equation. 

The other half is putting it out there for folks to read.  My big AHA this week has been that I actually feel that if I don’t DO anything with my writing (except offer it for free on my blog, websites, FaceBook, famous emails, articles published worldwide in several languages, etc.), then no one can criticize me for what I have written.  And certainly I won’t be a failure for not making a living being a writer.  No, if I just keep all my most fabulous work secreted away on my computer, I don’t have to take the risk of playing big.

Well, all that is getting challenged this week.  Between healing my inner masculine (my “DOING” side), revealing my beliefs about my relationship with money in my coaching group, and having the realization that I avoid DOING in order to avoid failing, there is a whole lotta shaken goin’ on. 

I actually sent an introduction piece out to a trusted friend with whom I will begin a writer’s group….she gasped into the phone, “I want to read the book.  NOW.”  Oh boy.  She wants the book NOW. 

I feel intuitively that the fire that is under me about publishing my writing is a good thing.  I feel I am being prodded by the universe (in the most supportive of ways) to get off my arse and TELL MY STORY.  I did always plan to do it, but somehow the years have ticked off and I never, well, got around to it.  I’ve been BUSY!  (ahem)

In my inner guidance this morning, I received the words, “What will it take to put your Self first?”  I can think of so many things to do that are in service to my children and family and home and hearth….as well as things that are not of service to anyone such as playing a computer game (she admits sheepishly).  But to REALLY live my life as it was intended to be lived, that is a different kind of priority.  It will require a shuffling of priorities, a greater discipline, and a very deep devotion to my truest Self to allow that life to be expressed.

I think that is what is shifting.  I think this is what’s happening in my life right now.  I’m choosing to trust that this pre-labor I feel so intently right now is going to take me into a labor of love, one that will birth the me that has been waiting to emerge.  

 

 

For someone who is known for her “spiritual” work, I sure have spent a lot of time preaching to folks about embracing their humanity.  “Divine Human” is a phrase I have used many times over the years that I have been privileged to assist others in experiencing their personal divinity.  But it has been a long process for me of embracing my own humanity.

 

When I was very, very little, I got the message early that the world was not a safe place, but instead one of pain and confusion.  What is normally natural wonderment with the marvel of the physical world in most children became wondering what the hell I was doing here.  I remember looking up at the sky and asking “why me?”… Fully expecting an answer, and hoping to be called back up to the safety of my angelic family.  I did try to leave several times over my life, but apparently I am supposed to stick around.  Due to what I was experiencing in my life, it was not an option to stay psychically open and at ease.  Out of necessity, I left my body.

 

When I started recovery work at age 23, cognitive and group therapies as well as some body work were the next logical choices.  In 2 years of therapy twice per week, I learned the names for what was done to me and that the problem was with them, not me…which was a huge awakening because I had always been held responsible for the dysfunction of my family.  I look back now on those years as coming to a mental understanding, which was a good place to start for someone who could not access her body or emotions or spirit any more. 

 

The body work I did was with a gentle soul of a massage therapist, Judy, who saw my fragility and brokenness, and treated me with such care.  Her work was one of coaxing me back into my body, a little bit at a time, with soft and nourishing caresses rather than deep tissue work.  I found her after going to a sports massage therapist, who tried to beat my muscles into submission by digging ever harder with her manly hands; I was not yet in a place to tell her to stop, so endured it and just never went back.  Finding solace and safety with Judy was a major beginning in finding my way back to my body.

 

I went in to therapy for “tune ups” periodically over my life when I felt there was something that I needed objective assistance with; but as I birthed children, I felt my spirit crack open the shell I had put around my heart, and I began reclaiming my spiritual connection in earnest.  So, the mental component of awareness now joined with the spiritual awakening that was occurring in my life.  I studied several types of healing modalities, read some esoteric material, studied world religions, and started to re-build my communication and cultivate the relationship with my larger self, guides and teachers, and my angelic family that had sustained me during childhood.

 

In 1998, I met a woman who would become my spiritual teacher for 7 years.  Over that time, she helped me learn to meditate, sit still, listen for inner guidance…she gave me names of things I had experienced but didn’t know what to call.  Specifically, she was able to tell me the words for all that I had understood about the world of subtle energy and the way energy moves.  This was more mental/spiritual understanding and development.  Her teachings were to transcend human egoic life and emotion, to reach higher and prepare for “ascension”.  The message was the same as all of the world patriarchal religions; earthly life is to be suffered through, and when we die we will get our reward.  You may not be surprised that this escape from my body and feeling feelings was a great fit for someone who did not fully inhabit her body.  I learned so much from her and don’t regret our time together; however, there did come a day when I realized I had grown past her in her willingness to be in human existence, and we parted ways.

 

Since that time, I have been on a determinedly physical/emotional/mental/spiritual (PEMS) learning curve.  I WANT to be a full human being, feeling the feelings, expressing my emotions, being present to the unique qualities of physical life, FULLY INHABIT MY BODY, all while developing and exploring my mental and spiritual conceptualizations of what it means to exist on an earthly plane.  I guess that is part of why I feel compelled to write about it…I am putting thoughts together to help me answer that question I asked myself when I was so young.  

 

Every time I go to that place of trying to explain away my life through high falutin’ spiritual concepts, or detach myself from my physical experience by analyzing myself through my acutely developed inner therapist (mental capacity), I am trying to remind myself that those aspects of me are only PART of me…that my animal body and my raw emotion also need expression time, because they are part of being human, too.  While those spiritual and mental concepts may very well but true, there is more to the story.

 

Don’t get me wrong…all of the time I have spent exploring my mental and spiritual aspects was important, and I won’t dishonor myself by dismissing those parts of myself.  In contrast, I will explore those aspects of myself in tandem with becoming more fully physical and expressing my emotion.  It is full ON.

 

Being a Divine Human means being HUMAN.  Fully, 100% claiming our human existence….feeling it, living in it, being present in physical life.  We ARE spirit, that is what we come from….it’s a given.  And we came all this way into physical to bring our spirit into this marvelous, complex, messy playground called physical life, not to escape from it. 

 

Sure, we can learn and play around with mental or spiritual concepts about how we got here and what goes on “at a soul level”…there is value in those awarenesses….as long as we don’t do it to the exclusion of our physical and emotional experience, ‘cause we came to experience those, too.  Otherwise we could have just stayed up there in the clouds playing non-physical bocce ball with our angelic friends (hmmm, wonder how you play ball with no ball?) 

 

We wanted to come here to experience what it felt like to be in a body.  IF we don’t allow for that in our lives, we might be missing the whole point.  This is an aspect of the journey I am on, and will continue to write about. 

 

I am currently doing “rage work” now (finally-it was suggested by therapists over the years, but I was too scared to allow myself to feel those awful feelings of powerlessness I had buried deep within my body memory). 

 

The things I am learning from my body as a result of this work are pure revelation.   I am learning that emotion is a message that must be heeded- it is energy in the body that is feedback from a physical experience, and it must be expressed or it will be trapped in the cells of the body and create havoc.  I am learning that it is never too late to express emotion, even if it has been trapped in your body for 40+ years.  I am learning that when I get brave and actually FEEL those feelings and scream or beat up pillows or yell at the top of my lungs, it frees up space inside of me to live more freely, to be more ME.  It feels like alignment, like things coming together that have been apart.  I am learning it takes energy to hold parts of myself apart…and that when I surrender, they will go back together. 

 

This is a good thing-my creative self is coming out to play, I have more energy available to get things done, my focus is getting sharper, I feel as though I am coming into the life I was meant to live….but the big payoff is that I am joining the human race.  My further embracing of my humanity is changing who I am in the world…and I think, for the better.

 

I had a conversation recently on FaceBook that was prompted by Former President Jimmy Carter’s statement that the root of much of the violent opposition and derision towards President Obama is based in racism.  It was a risky thing to talk about, surely, in that it is a controversial topic and a particular hot button here in the south where I grew up.

 

One of the very thoughtful responses that I received was a rejection of that statement by Mr. Carter and a concern that when we make broad statements such as Mr. Carter did, we are in fact projecting our own biases onto other people.  I felt this was a worthy consideration.  Here is my response to that response:

 

“Of course, you raise a wonderful point.  There is no one answer to the dilemma of why we behave in hurtful ways as a collective, and to imply that because folks disagree with Obama they are racist is obviously over-simplifying and generalizing, which consistently seems to be a trap.

 

However, I do feel some truth in what Carter is saying.  Being a native southerner, I know the pervasiveness of racism (and what is called “reverse racism”, which is just racism in my book), and I DO feel it is a significant possibility that the furor over Obama that we see with SOME folks is (perhaps unconsciously) a deep outrage over the fact that he is African American. 

 

My point is that we, as human beings, frequently operate from places of unconsciousness.  What we are not conscious of in our own psyches still act as filters through which we perceive others, and those unconscious filters also cause us to behave in certain ways. 

 

The wound of racism is alive and well in some folks, perhaps especially so here in some places in the south…..but the wound can still be under the surface of their ability to know it, call it by its name, and therefore heal it so that it can be released as an issue in their lives. 

 

I tend to think of unconscious things in my own life as “ghost drivers” that sometimes hijack the train of my life…if I am not aware of them, I can’t predict when they will show up to cause a train wreck.  If I AM aware of them, they dissolve into the light of my consciousness.

 

If, by second guessing, you mean having inner reflection capabilities, I would say that there is a balance between being neurotic about doubting very single thing you say or feel or do…and a healthy self reflective process in which we thoughtfully examine our motives and intentions. 

 

My personal intention is to walk that thin line of balance; of course, I stumble either way of that line….but the line is my center point and I hope and pray its gravitational pull will not let me stray far from it!”

 

In further reflection (which is what I just love about these kinds of civil conversations-they really make me think), I think it is a very astute observation that we can easily point to racism (or any other unconscious thought pattern or behavior) in others and not yet be claiming it in ourselves. 

 

I have experienced being annoyed with the way someone is disorganized in something they do, and not “owned” my own lack of organization or focus.  And I have experienced being projected upon, in which someone else was asleep to their own darkness or insanity and projected that onto me.  Of course, in some instances, such as what Hitler projected onto Jews, not claiming one’s own darkness can lead to violent, hurtful or even fatal consequences.

 

We can also project onto folks that inspire us….we might know some fabulous woman who just seems so together, so intelligent, so savvy…and just marvel at her abilities.  But some of what we are most enamored with about her might actually be something inside of us that we are not claiming.

 

It is easier to see those traits that both annoy and delight us in others, both positive and negative, before seeing them in ourselves. 

 

This is, I feel, the nature of consciousness; waking up to ourselves and recognizing those things about ourselves that we project onto other folks…then, once we wake up to them, we can examine whether those things are a fit for our highest potential in our lives.