Posts Tagged ‘integration’

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.

I’m not a scholar on Christian holy days; I observe spiritual traditions that make sense to me, that have personal meaning to me.  Until yesterday, Epiphany flew by unnoticed. 

The 12^th day of Christmas, Epiphany is the oldest of the Christmas festivals and originally the most important.  It is the day traditionally celebrated in Christian culture as the day the Magi arrived to behold the Christ child.

“The word epiphany comes from the Greek noun epiphaneia, which means “shining forth,” “manifestation,” or “revelation.”  In the ancient Greco-Roman world, an epiphany referred to the appearance of one of the gods to mortals.  Since Hellenistic kings and Roman emperors were considered by many to be gods, the word epiphany was also used as a term for divine majesty.”  (source: http://www.stpaulskingsville.org/epiphany.htm)

Yesterday was a day in which it felt like many veils were lifted between my eyes and the larger spiritual container I live in.  I had so many revelations, and indeed, one very important “manifestation”, that I once again feel affirmed in my belief that there is a larger energy that holds us all, and that if we align with it, magic can happen.

I sat in the morning for my inner guidance time, which I typically create several times per day (and always at night before bed so that I can bring my consciousness to anything pertinent while my body sleeps).  This is my time to be still, listen and feel my connection to the Whole and a larger perspective on my life. My usual pathway of access opened up, and I felt the familiar alignment click into place.  As I awaited the presence of higher consciousness in my mind, I felt a new (yet very old and familiar), somewhat different presence move in from the left of center, supplanting my usual interface with the Divine.

“Who is here?” I asked.  A vast, deep silence, a feeling of gravity, immense power in my belly and sweetness in my heart was the response.  I sat quietly straining to hear with my inner ears, but I couldn’t quite make out the name.  I asked, “Are you here to aid me in my highest good?”  Yes, I was told, and I felt a rush of goodwill pouring through me.  “Are you accountable to the light?”  I asked.  I heard, No, I am accountable to the dark. 

This is when I started squirming; my early Christian preschool indoctrination formed my young, developing mind into a good versus evil bent, and I struggle to this day with unconsciously perceiving light as good and dark as bad, even though I know consciously that this is not true. 

My resonance lies with the yin/yang symbol, in which the darkness and the light are simply two halves of existence that balance one another, and are therefore necessary for the Whole.  It is our small, human minds that place judgments on qualities of energy such as light and dark, calling them names and putting them in little boxes so that we can feel more in control. 

I have also studied the Goddess traditions extensively, and know that darkness, a symbol for the womb, for the void, for the night, for the face of the new moon, has been vilified ever since patriarchy reared its adolescent grab for power on the planet.  I know from hard won experience that anything we demonize warrants a closer look to see what we are projecting onto it.

I heard this Being that had entered my holy space speak that it was accountable to the dark, and took a breath.  “Who are you?” I asked again.

I am the Dark Mother, She answered.

I sat quietly, stunned at the simplicity and precision of this revelation.  I then proceeded to ask several clarifying questions, the first of which were asked to make sure I was safe to be interacting with this powerful yet benevolent energy, and the latter of which resulted from my increasing feelings of bliss and excitement.  Many moments later, I was in tears as accepted Her, and felt myself in the arms of my truest Mother.

Over the course of the day as I opened further to this awareness, my epiphanies ranged from seeing how the Dark Mother had been in my life, (very clearly had I eyes to see Her) for several years, to feelings of being Home.  The work I had begun in 2005 to embody the Divine Feminine was inspired by Her.  Images of the Black Madonna, which I’d written an extensive article about in 2007, flashed through my mind.  The many essays and radio shows and personal experiences of the Sacred Feminine that I’d processed and offered to the world as a road map fell into place. 

As a woman who resonates deeply (as well as recognizes within myself) the Sacred Feminine energies, I have spent time getting to know the several faces of the Goddess.  I remember in 1999 that Mary the Mother was the first face of the feminine I began to interact with as an adult.  She was safe, a clean symbol of goodness and light, and a good start for a woman fearful of her own feminine energy.

As a child, Isis was a frequent companion, but over the years I lost my sense of her.  She came roaring back into my life in 2001, when I got the tap on my shoulder to come out of hiding as a healer, and opened my energy work practice in downtown Asheville NC. 

Then other faces of the Goddess began to emerge in my consciousness.  Astarte, Diana, Hecate, Demeter, Kali, Innana, Brigid, Tara, Cerridwen, Persephone, Sedna, Lilith, Mary Magdalene, Amaterasu, GrandMother Moon, Spider Woman and more.  As each of these treasured and varied Faces of Her visited me, I interacted with their archetype and integrated them into my own awareness, making those aspects within me conscious.  It has been a remarkable journey of awakening. 

However, my names for Her never included the Dark Mother, perhaps because of my subconscious association of dark with evil. 

I had heard of the Dark Mother as a name for the fierce Goddess Kali, She who oversees death and rebirth, and so I had approached the Kali archetype with a large perimeter and a considerable dose of respect. 

I knew the acknowledgement and appreciation of the darkness that comes with shamanic practice, in which the journeying through the various inner worlds must be discerningly and powerfully navigated. 

I had experienced the darkness of entering initiations, and coming through into the light, being reborn. 

And I had experienced the darkness that came with fully exploring the archetypes of some of the previously mentioned faces of the Divine Feminine….darkness in the sense of exploring in unfathomable places in my psyche, such as deep, winding caves and caverns, traversed along with my sister Innana, and at the bottom of the sea, along with my underwater kin, Sedna.  Darkness in the sense of moving through what cannot be seen with the eyes, but must be felt and experienced through the inner worlds, where great treasure is yielded for those who have the courage to undertake the journey.

How magical that on this day of January 6^th, 2010, which I have just now learned is called Epiphany in the Christian tradition, that I would be visited by my own “magi”, or sage, in the manifestation of the Dark Mother, bestowing gifts upon Her child.  Thank you, All That Is.

Everything we shut our eyes to, everything we run away from, everything we deny, denigrate, or despise, serves to defeat us in the end. What seems painful can become a source of beauty, joy, and strength, if faced with an open mind. Every moment is a golden one for him who has the vision to recognize it as such.

-Henry Miller

It seems to be in the media everywhere right now!  Between Mackenzie Phillips, Oprah Winfrey, five men in one family arrested, and the movie “Precious”, it seems the collective mind is attempting to bring up the heinous topic of sexual abuse. 

I hear many saying how disturbing it is and wanting it to go away.  I understand that, for sure.  It is ugly, uncomfortable, and unbelievable that sexual abuse goes on.  But as a survivor, I know it does, and I also know that the culture of secrecy around it is why it continues to infect people’s lives.  It must be talked about, it must be SEEN, in order for it to stop happening.  Children’s lives are at stake, RIGHT NOW.

The below article is something that I found some years ago that was helpful in knowing what adults can do to stop sexual abuse. Source- http://www.darkness2light.org/KnowAbout/adults_responsible.asp

Child sexual abuse: the hidden epidemic

Child sexual abuse is a hidden but significant problem in every community in America. Experts estimate that one in four girls and one in six boys will be sexually abused before their 18th birthday. Less than one in ten will tell. Research clearly shows that individuals who are sexually abused as children are far more likely to experience psychological problems often lasting into adulthood, including Post Traumatic Stress Syndrome, depression, substance abuse and relationship problems. Child sexual abuse does not recognize region, race, creed, socio-economic status or gender; it crosses all boundaries to impact every community and every person in America.

If child sexual abuse were like most childhood diseases, the prevalence and consequences of it would lead to telethons to raise money for its cure every weekend. But child sexual abuse is one of the last cultural taboos. With the exception of child-focused personal safety programs, almost nothing is being done to address it.

Darkness to Light believes that adults should be taking proactive steps to protect children from this significant risk. It is unrealistic to think that a young child can take responsibility for fending off sexual advances by an adult. Adults are responsible for the safety of children. Adults are the ones who need to prevent, recognize and react responsibly to child sexual abuse. Yet, the statistics clearly show that adults aren’t shouldering this responsibility. Darkness to Light believes that adults just don’t know how.

What adults need to know about child sexual abuse…

• It happens more than you think. A lot more - one in four girls and one in six boys will be sexually abused before their eighteenth birthday.
• It can happen right under your nose and you may never know – less than one victim in ten will tell.
• The perpetrators aren’t usually “dirty old men hiding in the bushes” – 34% of those who sexually abuse children are family members. A further 59% are friends and acquaintances of the child and his family.
• You probably don’t realize how big the problem is – 67% of the victims of all sexual assaults (including adults) are children.
• And we’re not talking about young teenagers having consensual sex – the median age for sexual abuse is just nine years of age.
• Child sexual abuse is not just a bad experience. Child sexual abuse wrecks young lives – victims of child sexual abuse are at far greater risk for all sorts of psychological disorders including PTSD, depression, substance abuse and relationship problems, often lasting into adulthood.

The personal pain of child sexual abuse…

• Adolescents and young adults with a history of childhood abuse are 3 times more likely to become depressed or suicidal as compared to those without such a history. ( Brown, Cohen, Johnson & Smailes, 1999 )
• Women with histories of childhood abuse report a greater number of physical and psychological problems, and lower ratings of their overall health than their peers. ( Moeller & Bachmann, 1993 )
• 34% of children who are either physically or sexually abused, and 58% of children who are both physically and sexually abused meet the criteria for Post Traumatic Stress Syndrome. ( Ackerman, Newton, McPherson, Jones & Dykman, 1998). Untreated, PTSD is a chronic disorder. The residual emotional, behavioral, cognitive and social symptoms persist and contribute to a host of psychiatric problems through life. ( Ferguson & Horwood, 1998 )
• Adolescents and adults who are abused in childhood are significantly more likely to drink alcohol and/or use illicit drugs than their peers. Adolescents and adults who were victims of childhood maltreatment have been consistently found to be more likely to engage in high-risk sexual behaviors.

And the cost to us all…

• A 1996 National Institute of Justice study estimated that each year child sexual abuse in America costs the nation $23 billion
• Victims of child sexual abuse generally spend more on psychiatric care and medical services throughout their lives. Some victims of child sexual abuse require more expensive special educational services. Child sexual abuse causes lost potential and productivity. These expenses, which would not be necessary if not for sexual abuse, are a financial drain to each and every one of us.

So, what is happening to prevent child sexual abuse

• Preventing sexual abuse with child-focused programs… There are several well-known and successful programs that teach children self-protection skills and techniques, as age-appropriate. These programs also teach children about physical boundaries and about discerning types of touch. These programs are valuable to children. The skills learned by children in these programs have thwarted some abductions and sexual assaults. However, we must not fall into a trap of thinking that these skills are the only protection children need.
• Think about it. It is unrealistic to expect a six-year old to fend off sexual advances from an adult relative. A six-year old can’t recognize sexual advances for what they are. And a six-year old has been taught to “mind” adults who are authority figures. It is unrealistic to think that a six-year old can or even should protect himself in this situation.
• Adults are responsible for the safety of children. We strap children into car seats, we walk children across busy streets and we ask our teenagers questions about where they are going and who they will be with, all to keep them safe. Adults should also be responsible for protecting children from sexual abuse.
• Why don’t adults do a better job? Child abuse statistics show that adults do not adequately protect children from child sexual abuse. There are a lot of reasons why, but the main one is THEY DON’T KNOW HOW!!!
• Research suggests that adults are unaware of effective steps they can take to protect their children from sexual abuse. Most do not know how to recognize signs of sexual abuse and many do not know what to do when sexual abuse is discovered.

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.