cedar_grove | Entries tagged with spiritual

At dawn, you brighten the day.
At evening, you are radiant.
At noon, you stand majestic,
and strong, and brilliant.
You are more lovely
than the sun and moon
shining in the sky together.
You are the priestess of heaven,
whose wonders are sung
by those above and those below.
To you, Inanna, we sing!

--Sumerian Song to the Goddess

This is the time for planting, deeply and tenderly, all that we wish to flower in the coming seasons of our lives.

Before I left Home, Mir and I were talking about the yard, and specifically the grass in the yard. About how she wants the kind of mower that is 'man' powered, that is - you push it, the blades turn around and cut the grass... and the stems of the grass get chopped off, the seed scatters, more grass. I hope so. The yard is already looking so must better than it did when it was all covered in leaves, and it's all due to Mir's hard work at clearing the yard. I feel warm, and loving and proud to call her my guy!

Yes, I know that's a physical thing - a physical want, but in many ways it embodies so many of the emotional and spiritual wants she and I have... our 'seeds' for the coming seasons of our lives.

We have London... and Aslan in London, and then summer together, hopefully some of which will be spent outside in the hammock, or lying on a blanket said grass, enjoying the sunshine... finishing up the burning of the sticks in the new firepit, reading... doing all of this together. The summer is a time for also, little by little getting things straight - especially the kitchen - making things 'puppy ready' sure, but generally making them so that there can be spiritual peace in the house... a house that can have everything in its place all neatly - ordered.

And our first July 4th together. How that warms my heart.

Then we have the cruise... a time together on the water... a time with friends, (and hopefully to see a wonderful new play too).

I have hopes for Christmas, and Easter next year as well. But those are 'pre-seeds' right now. Thoughts that I would like to happen, but I don't want to reach too far ahead. Plant too many seeds and there is too much to nurture, too much to spread the focus of the spiritual reaching for such wishes.

But to top it all... the seed in the pot that is the most important, moving to be with my wonderful guy, and if that has to be via Charlotte and the international school there, or through any other route - and petitioning the Universe to give us some relief from our overlong separation is an 'as above, so below' kind of addition to the work I'm putting in to get there - then so be it.

Deeply and tenderly - we will be together one day.

In the heart, a merry fire burned, or cedar and of sandalwood, so fragrant that a visitor smelled it from afar. Calypso sat there, busy at her loom, her golden shuttle darting and her light voice lilting with song. A thick forest surrounded her home, with alder, poplar, and cypress, whose sweet smell hung in the air like smoke. And in the trees great birds had nested: owls and hawks and crows of the sea. efore her door grew a massive vine so hung with grapes it seemed the fruit would break the branches. Four streams passed neary, irrigating beds of violets and flowering herbs. Even the gods were charmed when they visited Calypso's home.

--Homer, The Odyssey

Within each of us, too, there lies a dream of home, of a place where we can e at peace and at rest.

The cliche, 'home is where the heart is' is particularly poignant for me. And home has multiple meanings each of different significance.

Home is where I come to after a day at work, where I can throw on house clothes or PJs, or lie down and take a nap, or rail, or cry, or put on loud music, or soft, and just be. I have a place such as this in my apartment in Cairo... and when I was not there, it was my bedroom in my parent's house in Leicester.

Home is where my parents have a home - a place I know that if all else falls, I can come to, find solace safety and a place to stay. Yes there were a couple of occasions when I have made the call, to ask, "can I come home." Even knowing that I didn't need to ask, still I asked anyway. When Alec and I separated in 2003, that was the last time... and as always I received the answer, "of course you can." Whether that is a place called home or a 'people' called home I'm not so sure. The nurturing and protection of parents, and particularly of Mother.

But Home... true home that truly is wherein my heart dwells. Ironically it is the one place where I am not allowed, as yet, to stay for more than 90 days. Home is the love, and the jobs, and the games and the activities and the space that I share with Mir. It is where I feel safe, and loved. Where I know I will be accepted for who and what I am with all of my faults as well as my virtues alike - and where I do the same. It is the combination of both of the first two 'meanings' of home, and yet is more than either - far more - because there is a sense of the 'inner' in the Home I share with my beloved... with the one that holds my heart and my life in her hands that defies definition because to do so diminishes it, and yet at the same time has a spiritual dimension that makes it truly a part of me on a deeper level than just coming back to a space in which I am safe and loved.

I think it is that inner notion of Home that defines a part of who I am both together with, and apart from my wonderful guy.

Into her secret chamber the goddess Hera went
to dress her sacred beauty. To her hand only
opened the golden lock her son had made,
the doors unfolding like a flower at her touch.
She bathed herself in luxury and fragrant oil,
and the scent of her perfume filled the air
of heaven so that gods swooned in delight
just from the fragrance of her bath.
Then Hera dressed her hair, some high
atop her head, some flowing golden down
her milky shoulders. And now a robe:
she selects on that Athena made,
woven with great skill and artistry.
And now some jewels: tiny triple stars
in each her ears, and a golden breastplate
that reveals her rich endowments.
But it is not her jewels and clothing
that make this goddess lovely.
Plain sandals, on her feet, are beautiful,
a plain white veil, upon her head, is beautiful.

--Greek poet Home, The Iliad

Each spring the earth is like a new place.

Is this not true of each new day?

The truth of the matter is that I think half of the time we walk around with our eyes closed - figuratively speaking - and do not see what is there before us. Nothing really brought that home to me like the other day, when Mir and I were finding things to photograph - new angles, new perspectives, but also I saw things (probably because I was looking for them) that I would not have seen before. It has been quite the revalation - and a pleasant one. So yes... while the advent of new life, newly grown flowers, green leaves budding on the trees amid the spring blossoms, baby birds in their nests and other young animals (if we are lucky enough to see them, hidden away as their parents keep them), all serve to being us beauty and renewal, with just a shift in our thinking, and in our perception, we can enjoy the same kind of rebirth of energy with each and every living day.

We could take it even a step further, and say with each new experience we are renewed, and indeed we are, but for an average day, and an ordinary person, perhaps that is a little close to living an enlightened path - even though that is what we are meant to strive for after all - which can perhaps seem a little much. Good to make the assay though. Always good to try and perhaps a way to counter the feeling that everything is always the same, if the routine of daily living, or what happens when you are in a specific place seems to become always the march of the same steps. Remember, each experience, each moment in a lifetime is unique, and cannot be repeated. We cannot live backwards. Only forwards.

The women knead dough
to make cakes for the Queen of Heaven,
and our out drinks unto the gods.

--Jeremiah 8:18

What makes goddesses necessary? If the divine exists beyond our human dualism, why can people not accept that any image is but a shallow and limited vision of what cannot be pictured?

This is in essence an existential question that goes beyond the human necessity to 'picture' god in order to reach out to the divine, at least in my mind it is. If we, as humans, were able to accept our own divinity, that we are, in essence, the image of, and a part of the creative force of the universe, perhaps we would not be so reliant on such images to anchor our understanding of that which cannot be imagined.

Authors from many genres have attempted to address this issue in many different ways, yet two of my favourites - for different reasons, one I love to love, and one I love to hate - have summed it up in deeply perfect ways. Heinlein, (thou art god), and Herbert, (He /is/ the Quizatz Haderach). Both authors explore the concept of divinity and the quest for divinity and divine understanding. They give no answers, which is most refreshing, because it leaves us, as readers to think, and to enjoy the journey of discovery of ourself and our own place in the universe when we empathise with the characters.

My favourite of all ideas from the Dune series, however, underlines the dual nature of divinity and self awareness as a part of the divine, as Chani turns to Paul - knowing that she is destined to sacrifice herself to bring forth transformation, she tells him, "My love, you may have eternity, I have only now." and perhaps, that is the key to accessing that divinity within, the dichotomy of male and female, yin and yang, light and dark... to know the eternal and the finite within each of our selves.... rendered here in Arabic on which much of the Fremen language is based: Ana andi dilwati bass.

There is an island in the sea, and on that island is a grove of trees which has never felt the sting of an axe. There within that grove a chariot is kept, veiled carefully with sacred weavings. Sometimes the priest who tends the grove becomes aware of the presence of the goddess. There is much rejoicing then, for it means she wishes to visit her children. Cows draw her chariot forth from the island, and there is much merry-making wherever she goes. Arms are left aside, and even iron knives are locked away, for there must be no war when she is abroad. Peace descends upon the world until the goddess has enough of us and, believe it if you will, retreats again to that secret island far away.

--Roman Author Tacitus Germania

She is indeed always among us. She is still with us. Even when we do not acknowledge the goddess, even when she is hidden from us, she is alive within the world.

There are time I feel her presence almost as a physical touch. The warmth of arms around my wandering soul. There are times I feel her breath flowing through me as the air that empowers me, gives me life, and voice, and energy. There are times I taste the sweetness of her upon my lips; her love within my heart, and stirring the passions of my body - and my mind.

And there are times when her face is turned from me, the moon dark above my head; her blood coursing from an empty chambered womb - spirit raised in righteous, strong anger against injustice... intollerance, against malevolence; wrongdoing.

For each breath of peace the Lady brings, there is the balance, the opposite, the call to action, and I feel each part of her - the innocence and passion of the Maiden, the love of the mother, and the gathering-in of the crone. Each face has its place within my heart and in my soul.

Even the hidden fourth face... that which is everything and nothing, life and death, peace and violence both together.

That which is

If a mountain could shine like the sun,
if its brilliance could penetrate the world's dark quarters,
if all the worlds joined together into this brilliance
and if this brilliance became a woman:
That would be a goddess. Devi: The Goddess.

I am that goddess. I am the force of the universe
in the shape of a woman. Nothing exists
that is not me, and nothing but me exists.
All women are but manifestations of me.
And I am the manifestations of all women.

And all women praise me thus: Devi, eternal
embodiment of the universal feminine,
you who create the world and sustain it,
we wreath you with flowers and incense,
and we beg you to bring us virtue and richness.

--Devi Mahatmyam, Indian song to the goddess

In meditating upon her vastness, we encounter it within ourselves.

I am unique, and I am infinite.

Caught up in the rigors of living in the rat race, it is all too easy for us to forget and to under-value ourselves, or worse, to deny our own self worth altogether, and hand in hand with this state of being, is the denial of our own unique nature and personal power.

The affirmation above can help to remind us of those two things only if we are also able to engage in self belief. Another symptom of modern living is the errosion of self belief through the pressures and judgements placed on us and passed about us by others. It's all too easy to sit and say to someone, don't listen to x, y, z, you are a powerful individual, and you have a right to believe in yourself, when on the other hand, and in the next breath you take, someone is putting you down for something you have, or have not done, or for assumptions they have made about you... and by the same token it's all too easy to be the one to pass judgements on other people. It's not even always done with intent or vidictiveness. Many times it can be done simply to assuage our own insecurities, unconsciously... or because we ourselves are hurting through someone having done the same to us, lashing out in self defence, a wounded reaction.

As fragile as my own self confidence can be at times, the above affects me a great dea. It only takes a small criticism to commpletely dissolve my self belief, and I find myself right back at square one, so I'm constantly reminding myself of my uniqueness, and my connection with the infiinite. As such, I am also, or try to be also, conscious of my interactions with others to try and minimise instances where I might inadvertantly impact on anothers sense of self worth, and to in fact positively support the maintenance of others self confidence. In a sense that helps to bloster my own, so it's not all altruistic I suppose, but it is practical, and loving and that is the kind of individual that I try to be.

Maiden goddess, holy one,
protector of hills and forest,
protector of mothers in labor,
protector of the buds of infancy,
triple goddess, I invoke you:

bless the trees around my home,
the ones that shade me,
the ones that screen the wind,
the ones that perfume the air.
May they protect me as you do.

How will I thank you?
When I eat flesh, I will thank you.
When I eat fruit, I will thank you.
When I drink clear water, I will thank you.
Your trees will never lack for offerings
as long as I live and breathe,
maiden goddess
triple one
my protector
as long as I live and breathe.

--Horace

Thus most ancient cultures had ritual of thanksgiving, in which the goddess is thanked for the protection she generously affords us. What such ritual will we each perform today?

I always heard my teachers saying, "Please and Thankyou are also words of power." It came up often because so many newcomers to working 'magically' and/or with earth's energies so often forget that, or perhaps assume that, such ordinary words carry no weight in magical circles, (literally).

The assumption is that because there is no grandiose ritual involved in the speaking of the 'thanks' that it doesn't count. Because there is not occult hocus pocus involved in the 'please' that nothing will come of thinking with intent and speaking the simple word. Neither assumption could be further from the truth.

The truth is that thanking the powers, thanking the Old Ones begins with the intent that we carry in our hearts, thus even the most grandiose ritual of thanksgiving means little to nothing if the feeling and emotion of such thanks is not carried witin us. It's like when we talk to the people in the world around us. We can say 'please' and not mean it, or we can say 'thanks'and in the back of our minds, in our human arrogance believe that it is something we deserved anyway, so why should we speak words of thanks. Sadly, many of us are - as a human race - very arrogant, believing we deserve many things that would be better realised if we understood and lived our connection with all life. The need for it is expressed within the line of that charge that urges us to remember 'humility' as well as 'honour' in our lives.

To live humbly, to tread gently upon the earth, to give as well as take, and to remember our Ps and Qs is the essence of, and the heart of, living as a fully connected, fully spiritual individual, and the nice thing about it - the thing most often forgotten - it does not matter what our path, or which is our faith, please and thank you are still words of power.

At that time, the angel Gabriel was sent from God to a town of Galilee named Nazereth, to a virgin betrothed to a man named Joseph, of the house of David.

And the virgin's name was Mary.

And when the angel had come to her, he said, "Hail,
full of grace, the Lord is with you. Blessed are you among women."

And when she had heard him, she was troubled at his words.

--Luke 1: 27-28

Like Artemis, she is a virgin whose role includes motherhood; she is an apt successor to the nymph of the greenwood as the one to whom this day is dedicated.

I've been asked before now how I got on teaching in a Catholic school as a pagan. I have to say the above fact - the subsumation of Artemis under the guise of Mary - is in part what made it eminently easy.

I think unlike any other branch Christianity, it is the Catholic's veneration of Mary, that made it easier - for me at least. I mean, forgetting all of the other things, except perhaps the ritual involved in mass... I mean don't really go into the whole confession and absolution thing... but the whole thing with Mary - there was something there that spoke to me.

I used to have to attend mass with the children as part of my duties. And I didn't mind so much... loved the singing (a lot of the children's mass was sung, and say what you like about religion, but the music involved is often beautiful), and wasn't averse to going to receive the deacon's blessing. To me all paths lead inevitably to the same truth, it's just the way we get there that's different. The reason I mention mass is that on more than one occasion, I was moved to tears by a sense of divinity that came over me while I was in the church. No, I'm not saying I was 'touched,' or 'found' by God, just that, whether it was simply that particular church, or maybe just the energies of all the children joined in common 'communion' that was overwhelming (in a beautiful way) to one with my sensitivities.

That wasn't the only spiritual 'experience' I had while in the church there - nor was it the most profound - that would have to be the time I did actually feel some invisible presence touch me. I had just returned to my place after the 'blessing' and felt a touch on my shoulder, so I turned to speak with the teacher behind me, whom I assumed was trying to attract my attention. It had not been her, she said, and honestly I trust her word. She's not the kind of person to be a 'prankster' or anything of the like. So I turned back around, and the touch was there again... sure and steady, and that time I felt the power of it - familiar and strong... though even today I hesitate to 'name' it, since labelling something confines it; constricts it... and I'm not prepared to do that.

She is mad, her lover ismad, and I am mad for loving her!
This world is bewitched by the lovely goddess.
No one can describe how lovely she is, how glorious,
how perfect her gestures, how sudden her moods.
Her lover, poisoned with love for her, calls out her name
endlessly, singing Kali's name over and over and over.
Life has currents, cycles, tides which ebb and flow.
She looks upon them all with equanimity.
Nothing is opposite in her mind: not life, not death;
not love, not hate; not the self, not the void.
Your raft, the poet said, floars upon the sea of life.
It drifts up with the tide, and down with the ebb.
But the goddess is there. The goddess is always there.

--Indian poet Ramakrishna

What she offers us is not a gray mixture of black and white, but a paradoxical world in which both exist in all moments, at all points, in all ways. Life is both pain and pleasure, love and hate. Kali is beyond both, but includes both.

The little acknowledge 4th face of the goddess, to me, is what this particular meditation is all about. I've always had an affinity with this occult aspect of the goddess - hidden even to many women, though I'm not arrogant enough to think that I have in any way mastered any kind of deep connection or knowing of her in this aspect.

Different than simply the 'dark' of the moon, the relationship with the Hindu's Kali is perhaps one of the better representations that I've seen. But even that is somewhat flaws by perceptions of Kali as a sword wielding destructress.

The Fourth Face of the Lady is everything and nothing. It is the cry that comes in the dark when there is no more hope left, and the sweet laughter of the deepest joy. It is a woman who is in tune with her destructive side as much as her creative one - the impulse to devour as well as nurture. It is simply balance in the extreme - and not always gentle about it... and I would say it is the ultimate honour a woman can give to herself to come to know the goddess' fourth face, and to love and embrace it for what it is... a woman's strength.

Current Mood: cold

Minerva - or, to call her by her other name,
Pallas Athena - was thinking to herself
about the connections between praise and virtue.
Praise, she thought, is what we offer when
we think someone has acted for the hightest good.
But is that enough for actions of that sort?
And if it is, why do we not praise ourselves?
Why, she asked, do I not praise myself, my dignity,
my special virtue? All excellence, Minerva thought,
demands respect and praise - even our own

--Ovid, Metamorphoses

Our bodies' difficulties tell us a great deal aobut the condition of our inner life. As we learn to attend to ourselves and our body's messages, we grow toward wholeness.

As a practitioner of Reiki, as well as as a Wiccan, it is odd to me that people need telling these things; to be reminded that mind, body and spirit are one and that whatever happens to one will affect the others. Even so...that comment there down in black and white, there are still times when even I 'forget.'

Like everyone else - dare I say 'normal people' - if I feel sick, or my head aches, I'll reach for medicines to heal the 'outer' The tangible and very few and far between look for a deeper cause - and emotional one, or a spiritual one, maybe both, and it's a hard habit to break. The quick fix - treat the symptom, not the reason... going for the holistic approach, though better in the long run, takes time. And it's time we are losing even more of, day by day under the pressures of modern society.

The solution of course is to listen to our bodies. If we are tired, lie down to take a nap, hungry - eat something, preferably something healthy; that can help to feed not just the body. And I think it also pays to remember, when we feel ill, that the word, disease can be separated from it's prefix, dis-ease. Perhaps a place to start in treating what ails us is to find a sense of ease - then perhaps we can see, and treat the cause, and not just the symptoms.

At the fireside
I want to sing.
At the fireside
I want to call spirits.

Here among you
my body will rest
while my soul travels
to the center of the earth.

When I return, I will sing:
children, here is what
I have learned, here
is what you need to know.

Children, children!
Go with the sun!
Direct your steps to her,
to the mother of morning!

--Siberian shaman chant

The almost imperceptible extension of daylight has barely been noticeable... In the dark, in our dreams, in our deepest selves, we grow and change. Yet these changes are not immediately visible to those around use - or even, sometimes, to ourselves.

Changes both ways, works both way... sometimes we also fail to notice an inexhorable slide into darkness. T happened with me, and like Kore or Persephone I had dwelled too long in the dark - awaiting spring - awaiting the time when I would, when I could ascend again into the light, into the self I long to be.

Today, I notice a ghost of myself reflected in the pale face, strung with resisted tears and silent, casting aside a shield of defensive anger, I offer myself; my shoulder; my hand. I offer my ear and my confidence. This is apart from self pity, self defense, self importances... self, self, self. This is answering another's call, another's need. Another... another, an other. Light glimmers on a far distant horizon, a memory - and I reach.

Breaking bread - literal friend to Maslow - Chicken Noodle Soup of the Soul. Hard earth softens, breaks, and a single snowdrop peeps from my heart. Call me if you need anything - and the words are said not because they are what I should speak, but because they are what I mean.

Heart of heaven, heart of earth,
let our children and grandchidlren
live on this earth as long as the sun
moves across the blue sky above.

Let the sun come! Let the dawn come!
Let all people have peace,
let all people have happiness.
Let us all have peace and happiness.

Goddess, mother of the sun,
Goddess, mother of the light,
let dawn bring peace and happiness,
let your light shine in our hearts forever.

--Mayan prayer

We are never separate from this world in which we live. For this our foremothers gave constant thanks, and we should as well.

I'm sensing a theme here... and I don't mind that so much, except it sends me on a circle, or spiral of meditation that doesn't really go anywhere except over old ground.

I spoke yesterday about my thoughts on the connectedness of ourselves, as humans, with the Wheel of the Year... or rather on our lack of it. Will I repeat the same today or simply speak on the same with a varying theme?

I've spoken about recycling, and looking to conserving the world in which we live because we are all connected with each living thing and when we waste - we waste within and for ourselves as well.

All of these things have been the focus of my meditations before now, but what about our connection to other people, each other... our pets?

My mother is a strange one... there have been times in the past when she has known that there was something 'wrong' or that I was upset, even if we didn't live in the same house and see each other every day, (it occurs to me now as I type this that she may even have done so again now). I recall one time when I was living across the city from her and out of the blue she had called me up and asked if I was okay. I wasn't, and when I asked her how she knew, she said she had had a dream about me coming into her bedroom and standing at the bottom of her bed like I used to do when I was little and had had a bad dream or something.

Mir always knows too, through the manny connections on many levels that we share, when there is something going on... bad dreams, bad feelings - worries, but then again, she's one of the most 'connected' people I know. She is the rat-whisperer, she talks to the deer and they listen, interacts with the squirrels and other wildlife around - I envy that connection, that expression of love that pours from her in all these things. It makes sense to me then that with someone whom she loves and who loves her, she would feel the connection. It breaks my hear too, that she's so connected to everything that she can't stand to see even fictional depictions of injuries to animals - in a movie for instance. I'm not saying it's a bad thing, not by any stretch of the imagination, but it certainly can't be easy. When we saw Warhorse recently, for example, there were many tears shed - and being closely interested in racing, if any of the horses are truly hurt, it is a heartbreaking thing to see.

It is an sure indication of a heart and mind connected with the world, with all life, and honestly something to be aspired to. I envy that connection, I wish that I could feel so deeply as that... even for all the pain that it brings - because the joys too, must be as intense.

Greetings to you, moon, our guiding jewel!
I kneel to you, I offer love.
I kneel to you, I raise my hand to you,
I life my eyes to youm
O moon of the seasons!

Greetings you you, my darling one! Greetings to you,
O graeful one!
Steering tides as you journey, you light up the night,
O moon of the seasons!
Queen of guidance, queen of luck, queen of love,
O moon of the seasons!

--Traditional Scottish invocation to the moon

Before the calendar measured time, we marked the year by observing the planets in their stately parade across the night sky. We noted the tides and the moon's phases and the length of days. We attuned ourselves to the seasons. We did not grow angry when there was snow in winter or rain in summer. We recognised that nature is more powerful than we are, and honoured her strength.

Maybe this is part of what is 'wrong' in modern society. We have lost touch with the natural rhythms of the world and of ourselves... become dislocated from our part in nature and our relationship with the heavens and the earth.

How many of us read our horoscopes in the daily newspapers, or have our astrology chart drawn up and then go around saying 'Oooh, better watch out, Mercury is in retrograde this week," as if it means the beginning and the end of the world... compare that with how many of us actually raise our faces to the sky and observe the movement of the moon and stars and [i]feel[/i] how their presence make us feel.

I used to have this issue a lot more when I was running a pagan group, especially around festival times... which have, through the march of the years, become fixed on the calendar instead of just being in their place in the year. With that, and with the pressures of society and other commitments weighing on groups and individuals, Imbolc has become a festival that is observed on the nearest weekend to the 2nd February... and there in lies my beef...

The phrase, never on a rising tide was drummed into me during my training. We don't know what the incoming tide will bring, so inviting it in might cause issues that we aren't equipped to face... so... if the closest weekend to Imbolc happens to fall before 2nd Feb, then shouldn't we say that we will observe Imbolc on the first weekend after that date? But then, the date is artificially imposed anyway - would not our ancestors have been observing the length of days - watching for the first signs of spring and watching for the nearest full moon? Think of the moveable Christian feast Easter, for example. Easter falls on the first Sunday, after the first full moon, after the spring equinox! How pagan is that?! So if the Christians can do it, shouldn't we pagans time our festivals by that kind of count... in which case, should not Imbolc fall on the second or third full moon after the Winter Solstice? (I say the third for those years in which the full moon falls within days of the Solstice).

It's a thought I have - maybe I should try it one year and see what difference it would make.

And while we are on the subject of dates and calendars, can I just say how much it annoys me that everyone says that the first day of spring is on the day of the spring equinox - that the first day of summer is on the summer solstice (um... it isn't called 'midsummer' for nothing), and that autumn, or 'fall' begins on the autumnal equinox? Come on people... equinoxes and solstes are the mid points, the points of balance... the fulcrums... How dis-eased are we making ourselves deliberately misaligning ourselves so with nature?

Earth, holy mother, source of nature,
you feed us while we live, yu hold us when we die.

Everything comes from you, everything returns to you.
What else could we call you but Our Mother?

Even the gods call you that. Without you
there is nothing. Nothing can thrive, nothing can live

without your power. Queen and goddess, I invoke you:
you are all-powerful and my needs are so small.

Give me what I ask in exchange, I will give you
my thanks, sincere and from my deepest heart.

--Roman prayer to the earth.

How infrequently, however, do most of us today acknowledge this web that supports and sustains us? In many cultures, the first action each person took each morning was to bow in prayer to the sun and to the earth, expressing gratitude for the warmth and light that enlivens the planet, and for the earth's plentiful food and water. How rarely do we, today, follow such ancient practices?

There's a saying that always stuck with me all through my training and teaching of the Craefte. It was this: "Please and Thank you, are also words of power."

I am one of these rare few in life that has always, in some way, acknowledge these transitional moments. Oh not always with some grand gesture of bowing and scraping, but in some way perform some kind of morning and evening orisons, even it it's just a moment's thought, (and no - 'Oh God is it morning already?' doesn't count. Yes, from time to time, I ahctually stopped what I was doing, turned a specific direction and spoke some words that began, "hail to thee..." but not always. Sometimes its with a simple thought I've welcomed and respected and thanked the Old Ones as they reach out to help give us life.

To that end there's something very special about watching the sun rise, and well as pausing to watch the sun set. This was my morning and evening. Having gotten up early to type and talk with Mir, the sun slowly rising around the conversation was energising - a reminder that no matter where we are in the world, the same sun shines down on us... and to watch the sky darken, knowing that we survive under the same moon and stars. This was my day - my orisons - the memory I will take with me into the next morning.

Only trouble is, is that now, having been up so long - I'm tired.

I am whatever is. What is, I am.
I am whatever is visible. Whatever is visible, I am.
I am whatever is invisible. Whatever is invisible, I am.
I am whatever is alive. Whatever is alive, I am.
I am whatever moves and breathes. Whatever moves and breathes, I am.

I am the very spirit of life. The very spirit of live, I am.
Everything that exists in time, is part of me. I am everything that exists.
When time ends, I will end. I will vanish, disappear, dissolve.
And with me, everything else will vanish, disappear, dissolve.
I alone can create, and I alone destroy, this universe.

Everything that exists is mine. Everthing that exists is me.

--Invocation to Lakshmi, India

There is nothing in the universe that does not partake of the essence of goddess.

Sometimes that's really hard to remember, especially when things and people are annoying you... remember everything is divine; easy to remember when things are cute and pathetic; and a mix of both when it comes to thinking about yourself.

For the last few days - since I got back really, there's been this little tiny mewling sound coming from out in the hallway. I know it's a kitten. There are lots of cats out here in ReHab, but it sounds so lost and pathetic. Many times I've been out into the hallway trying to set eyes on the poor little thing, because I worry that it's gotten itself trapped in the service areas between the apartments or something, and up until today I haven't been able to spot it. Today, I did. It's a really scrabby looking ginger kitten, very skittish. When it spotted me looking at it, it was part way up the stairs to the first floor, and it froze, and looked down at me as if to say, "Don't hurt me, I'm cute... see?" Well, I let it go on its way, because I can't take care of it, I won't be here... poor thing though. That's the second kitten I've resisted since I got here. The first was actually trapped on my apartment balcony when I first moved in. It was so tiny and cute... but anyway. Easy to see the divine in cute and fluffies.

Then there's those moments when you're hard on yourself. I can't possibly be connected with the divine because I'm slow and stupid. No... I don't really believe this, but this is what goes through one's mind when cooking the dinner and the doorbell rings, and there's a guy there talking to you in a language you don't understand. The next thought that went throught my head was 'why haven't I learned Arabic yet.' and the third, 'shit... take the food off the stove top.' and finally 'who can I call that can speak Arabic?' sort of in that order too. It's a cliche that we are all our own worst judges, but it's also very true, and I know I'm incredibly hard on myself. I find it hard enough to be nice to myself, let alone to remember the divine dwells also within me.

However, Imbolc is coming - the return of the spring maiden... perhaps in me that will spark a remembrance, an admission to myself that I am worthy and divine.

Mother, goddess, show me the secrets of my heart.
Show me where I have wandered off my path.
Show me how to find my path again.
Flyt before me, illuminating my path.
Fly before me, showing me the broad road
into my best future. Show me the way!
Prepare the way for my searching feet!
O mother of light, you who dwell in the south
on nine wooded hills, O show me the way!

--Seberian shaman prayer.

On those days when we doubt ourselves (and there will be many), we must put our trust in the goddess to illuminate the way before us. The same inner knowledge that once brought us to her presence will light our path on the dim days when cares and tasks seem to block the way to her.

I woke this afternoon to the call to prayer. I had fallen asleep to the sound of the early morning call to prayer - what a kind of spiritual awakening. Different faith, admittedly, but all paths lead to the divine - no offense intended to anyone. My orisons were missed, but instead I read the words of this prayer, I read them aloud, it's a supplication I have been making for many months, into years by now, finding neither answer from an external voice, nor from myself... until today. Not so much an answer as a thought, and the thought process - as near as I can recall it was this:

Damn it's freezing again, I'm officially sick and tired of being cold. How can I concentrate on anything - how can I even contemplate taking a shower when it's this cold when I'm dry how cold am I going to be when it's wet.

That was when the realisation really sank home. I'm uncomfortable, and thinking only, yearning only for comfort. How can my thoughts be anything approaching spiritual, true to self, when I'm uncomfortable, be that physically or psychologically?

Embracing that truth allowed me to actually move forward. The Goddess, and my path, and everything that I've been fearing I have lost (thus deepening my psychological discomfort), are still with me, still there, and I need to trust in that in order to step forward and find my way back to the middle. It's so ridiculously obvious that to be honest I feel a little foolish, but that said, I also feel a deepening sense of returning calm. No, it's not that everything is just perfect again... I've not suddenly snapped back to where I was those years ago, but I feel more empowered to be able to be myself.

I left the meditation at that point, and began moving about my day. Yes, I did shower, embracing the cold outside of the warmth of the water as much as the warmth of the water itself. I drank tea, while I made a shopping list of the things I wanted to get - including two blankets, to make sure that I stop shivering at night... and food - fruit and vegetable, some tins of tuna, pasta, continuing my mostly vegetarian diet - though for no other reason that I don't really trust the meat out here... then walked to the mall, and back with my heavy shopping.

It was as I was walking that I realised that no, actually I had not left the meditation at all - shifted it to another level, yes. I was going about all of these daily tasks with 100% of myself engaged. Not doing one thing and thinking about another, but thinking about what I was doing. Thinking about the feel of the ground under my feet as I walked; feeling the weight of the groceries in my shoulder bag, and in the grocery bags in my hands; feeling the sun warming away the chill in my bones... and after a frigid week here that was a very welcome feeling... so offering a quiet prayer to the Sun for His touch.

When I got back I was hot, and I was tired, but it was a good feeling. I opened the bottle of water I had brought, and poured myself a glass - it was still icy cold from the refrigerator at the store, and I sat and savoured the refreshing chill, thanking the brothers and sisters of the Undine realms for their care.

It was the first time in forever since I've been this engaged. And I truly feel I have taken a step in the right direction today.

Blessed be.

From The Book of Awakening: Having the Life You Want by Being Present to the Life You Have.

It is not easy to find happiness in ourselves,
and it is not possible to find it elsewhere.
--Agnes Repplier

Then you and I will still be left with ourselves and the world and the treasure at our feet.

I have started reading one of my new books. I quickly read the introduction when I first downloaded them and right then and there I got excited. Here was something that was going to help me reach within, reach to the bottom of my lake and find the gold that's always been within me. Stop running.

So I started reading, and started with the introduction again, a closer and better reading this time, and I didn't get very far before I got to the first part that made me stop and think; the first part that I will meditate on. I'm not going to comment yet on the contents of that – that's for a different post than these – but I will comment on just how comforting, how happy – how much more like myself the whole subject made me feel. No, not an overnight fix, but yes, certainly like meeting an old friend and embracing for the first time in years. It's like that friend – me – has been standing in the shadows on the edges of my awareness since I started meditating for the short while each day that I do, and since I started reconnecting with this part of myself and has now been invited wholeheartedly to step forward into the light for that embrace.

I can't express how profoundly happy and comforted and special that all makes me feel; that all is for me... and while happiness cannot be found anywhere but in one's own self, it might be facilitated, and it has been here, by the gifts of others. In this case that gift was an actual physical gift that was given. Mir gave me these two books for my birthday, and it means so much to me that she did this for me – a long time ago, she said, she arranged it all – and they are both wonderful. The physical gifts are greatly magnified by all of that, by the thought and the consideration and the wondering that she put in to choosing these two books. I can't tell you how much I squea'd when I saw them, but it was a lot... and now I've started working with them, and they have given me the gift of light into which I can step, I'm squeaing even more.

Thank you, my love.

From The Book of Awakening: Having the Life You Want by Being Present to the Life You Have.

There are two ways to feel wind:
climb into the open and be still
or keep moving.

Amazingly, there is great insight in children. And great innocence. They carry a wisdom they often live but seldom know. Ironically, we spend our lives trying to regain that treasured state, where being and doing are inseparably one.

The last time I can honestly say that I experienced this state of being, even for a short time was when I moved the plants from the deck at the back of the house, to the spot between the two trees where eventually I'd like for them to be in their own little garden. I can't explain what it was that connected the two… but they were definitely connected and I felt a sense of peace that was empowering. What was I doing, nothing more than picking up heavy plant pots and carrying them from one place to another… (not to mention evicting the spider from the spider plant), but I was being… earthy and real and vital… sunlight and shadow… connected with the plants… connected with Mir who had been the one to give me the plants, it was just… a brief but special moment.

I find myself wishing, as I sit here, that I knew how to recapture such a moment now; that I even had the energy and wherewithal to do so. I'm feeling particularly down and dislocated today – my doing and being are definitely separated today. Of course feeling sick as anything doesn't help, I realise that – thanks mum for the cold and all.

Current Music: The Painting - Voyage of the Dawn Treader

From The Book of Awakening: Having the Life You Want by Being Present to the Life You Have.

Seeking life everywhere,
I found it in the burn of my lungs.

I have awakened and closed for nearly half a century: have run from and stopped, run to and stopped, climbed and stopped, lifted and stopped. I ask questions that can never be answered and live like an answer to all that is never asked. Like an ant building temporary homes, I keep moving what should be left alone and dropping what can't be carried, and, in the highly charged space between the skin of the world and the skin of my soul, experience rushes.

The whole of the reading for this day is so beautiful that it defies comment. So much is, and should be true, even just in the one paragraph (of the two) that I have quoted. It is the second of such deep kinds of meditations/triggers – whatever you want to call what the words above represent – that has brought me to tears. They are tears of sympathy, or empathy… of belonging to, and being outside of… tears of hope and joy and love… and tears of the loss of being unable to quite reach what is being expressed.

The other is here: http://youtu.be/Pc-Kmx8YOeU

I feel I am a poor pupil for life's lessons, a poor subject for the Universe to take under Her wing and love and protect. I have judged myself and found myself wanting.

From The Book of Awakening: Having the Life You Want by Being Present to the Life You Have.

The higher goal of spiritual living is not to amass a wealth of information, but to face sacred moments.
--Abraham Heschel

Certainly, there is nothing wrong with bettering our outer circumstances, but these constructions mean nothing if we never face the very pulse of life that waits like a kind mother at the edge of our exhaustion.

This is something that used to be a part of my way of life far more than it is at the moment, and something that I want so very much to get back to. What follows is a poem that came out of one such profound sacred moment… and I'd like to share.

PERFECT LOVE

Across endless, timeless waves I drifted in darkness,
Knowing and yet not knowing,
Seeing and yet blind, understanding neither love nor trust,
A truly empty vessel with no direction.
A lantern held aloft, and a voice speaks, stern in his kindness.
Is this your life long striving, to feel nothing?
And from the lantern light a figure
Golden and shining with life,
And with love of life, but I ran for I did not understand.
In that moment I knew fear, and a heart began to beat.
Sit a while within these arms and let me tell you
Of she whom men have long known
Yet most have all but forgotten.
Does he love her?
She is my life.
Moved, I sat with him, his arms enfolded me
Warmth spread through me until it touched my heart
And a voice within me answered to his touch,
Singing many lives and thoughts into my soul.
Then call to me whenever you have need
And I will show you all that you already know
But are afraid to understand.
I am She who would help you to be free,
But only you may tear aside the ties that bind you
To your guilt and fear,
For only naked and alone shall you come to me.
And having healed yourself, then shall you
Show to others understanding of that which is divine:
Ecstasy of spirit and joy on Earth.
When the way is long, remember Perfect Love
And Perfect Trust shall be our call.
Mind that you taint not your ideals and let
None judge them nor call you wrong
And turn you aside.
For only those who are true unto themselves
May hope to be true unto others and so truly know Me.
For I am the Grail and all that it contains.
Vivid colour burst like rain upon my spirit
And I asked of my companion the name of such beauty
He answered with my own and I did not understand.
You are women, Goddess, my daughter.
And you?
I am man, God, your son.
Lie a while with me that I may show you
She who is the Mother of all life.
The heat of creation spread over me
Awakening every cell, to centre,
Hovering over my womb and a song within me answered:
I who am the Land, the Earth and Moon
And the Waters of Life that stir the heart
Call within your soul.
From the waters all things pass
And all return in love.
Therefore give unto yourself you life.
Let me be loved within a balanced heart
Living in beauty with strength,
Power tempered with compassion,
Honour and humility, laughter and also reverence.
And if you strive to know me, listen,
For you shall not find me lets you look within
To find me there.
For I am within you from the beginning
Unto the end, unto the ending of desire.
Words faded quickly, but the song remained
And I truly understood
How one could be everything, yet nothing,
All things to all people. I turned to my companion
Who looked at me with loving question in his eyes.
And will you run no more from me
My Sister, my Love
How can I when you are my life, beloved?
I am also your death
Come then, let us share the circle and grant
New life to those in need.
And at sunrise, as He dawned upon a new world
Born of our love,
We two began to fade,
And only the waters, rippling on the lake
Stood as testimony to our passing.

Current Music: Waking The Witch - Kate Bush

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Welcome To the Cedar Grove

...you are a leaf driven by the wind...

Entries tagged with spiritual

Earth-Seed...

Home Is...

Each Breath a New Breath

I Have Only Now

Inspired

I Am and Try To Be

Words of Power

For All Gods Are One God...

Honouring the Hidden Goddess Within

To Be Whole Again

Stream from Meditation

A Joy As Intense as Sorrow?

We Make Our Own Dis-Ease

Word of Power

Oh So Cute And Fluffy...

*A Step In the Right Direction

The Sleeper Must Awaken

Connections and Missing

Beauty and Truth

Living The Sacred

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April 2019

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