Testament of our Elders

I haven't written in the blog for a while. It's been christmas.

I have been between death and birth, still. Waiting, treading water. In the between.

I have also been writing my book on dementia.

Funny topic for a trainee doula! Revisiting the past of our elders.

A generation that lived through unspeakable acts of war, and loss.

At a time when our world feels torn asunder by deeper forces again than war.

I am unsure. I am unsure.

I feel such a pain at the grief of war. The pointlessness.

Always look for the helpers, the carers, the witnesses, the bearers.

Steep karma those that tend to the suffering.

Have I hope?

I have neither lost hope in humanity nor in nature. There must be a way.

Dark Moon Goddess

Last weekend I told my mother that I was ready to start healing others again. For 7 years since I received my master attunement I haven't particularly felt that my role was to lay hands on others because I knew that I needed to heal myself first. I didn't see that statement coming but when I heard myself say that I felt myself reeling - am I really that OK? I check in... my body is largely without pain... I am not ill with any infection... I feel light in my body... my emotions and feelings are beautifully wild, real and powerful but I am not identified with them... I like what I see in the mirror, I love the feel of my curves under my palms... my mind is generally still, I am not resentful nor guilty... I feel by and large present to the moment. I feel open in my heart, grounded through my feet and clear in my mind. Check, check, check.

Huh that's weird. Not only am I used to not being in full health but I actually enjoyed it at times. Look after me! Take care of me! Wrap me up and tend to me! Full health means taking full responsibility. Am I ready?

Having performed the attunement ritual laid out in the previous post for myself I also spent time in the ether with my master Morag who also attuned me last night. I asked to be attuned to Abundance, Sacred Intimacy, Full Health, Radical Self Love and Self Care... (In the name of service to others). Already feeling That we sat - Morag near Aberdeen, Scotland and me in Snowdonia and I felt the fire pulse through me. I felt soft and hot and open. Sensual. I held my obsidian yoni egg in my hand (am at menses) and I drank water infused with my clear crystal orb.

I then slept deeply and dreamt of my friend Ian (who in real life is a fellow mentor at the seminary and has established the OneSpirit Ashram Kitchen in the Jungle in Calais - and recently he held me while I experienced a profound spiritual awakening experience - it's detailed in a previous post)... in the dream he was weeping and I held him. He stopped weeping after some time and we were spinning together, then became still and merged. My interpretation of the dream is that Ian represents my animus which takes great action in service of humanity - the weeping of the animus is one of both exhaustion and for being seen. In the holding the balance is achieved and a dynamo spinning occurs of energy.

I was at my Red Tent circle on Saturday and I shared that at the most profoundest level I have yet experienced I feel whole and well. I also feel DARK and am reclaiming "dark" from its association with bad, wrong, evil, sad, lost and the opposite of light (which gets so often credited with goodness).

I am in the winter of my cycle (menses) and started bleeding on the dark moon and am in the winter of the year. I couldn't BE darker. Oh my... how extraordinary do I feel. The menstrual pains are still painful at one level but with my hands on my belly, tuning in I feel this deep groaning swaying primal contraction to nothing - yes, now I can be nothing - and all there is is That that is in All. Like a black hole. I am nothing.

I still feel waves of grief - largely for my black dog - Nero, bless him. But the grief when I hold it tenderly is like the great heaving swell of the oceans. It moves within me and beyond me - I am the ocean. 

I feel tired - but the judgment that that is wrong has died - the tiredness is a delicious settling and resting into a soft bed of moss - the tendrils of earthly roots reaching into my ears and mouth - breathing me and nourishing me as I sleep. I am the earth. 

I feel in Love. That Love keeps breaking me into fractions of grains of sand. My heart is breaking over and over for the pain of those I love, for the state of the world, for the refugees, for the bombs, for the angry ones. My heart keeps breaking open for the elders of our world lost in dementia - tormented by demons. For all the creatures of this world cold and alone, hungry. That Love and Grief are One.

The Love is ecstatic and is excruciating. I am not high. I am sitting calmly on my laptop sharing how I feel. I know what is consensus reality - I am feeling awake and grounded and real.

The Love I feel for everything right now is beyond words.

Claiming Divine Inheritance

Funny thing is inheritance. In all my time working in older people's services I saw time and again how the possibility of inheritance clouded the children and grandchildren's judgement of how people should receive care. Lost inheritance is the theme of my life - my maternal grandmother owned her home and sold it to pay for the renovation of our cottage and outbuildings into a granny flat and offices for my father's business. My father got involved in what would have been a massively lucrative invention which had his name on the patent but when he was declared bankrupt and we lost our home we lost the rights to that patent and my grandmother lost her investment. I never ever expected there to be an inheritance - I don't think its something you think about when you are young but as I get older and friends of mine are coming into inheritances and I see it stabilising their lives I can only wistfully release the now distant half promise that never was. I recently found out a. that there was some savings on the paternal line and b. they are plundered and lost... and I can but wistfully release that half never-promise too.

As I am consciously working on my root chakra and laying down roots and strengthening my security I am incredibly beautifully provided for in the material sense of a lovely home, food and warmth. I don't often share with friends how hand-to-mouth it is for me financially. My bank account recently hit £0 - again - and I was in minute by minute prayer contact with God to check I was doing all I could to bring in the money I needed. 59th minute of the 11th hour - again - the money I needed came in. Just. A friend came over and offered to buy me food and she put at least 3 weeks of food in the cupboards and bought me a christmas tree, bless her. I am surrounded and surrendered to love.

I know that I can expend masses of energy seeking work when the truth is that I need to stop and centre. Go within; recharge from the divine source. When I do that two things happen - I find I no longer need what I think I need and what I thought I need is also provided.

I was massively reassured recently to read in Catherine Ponder book on prosperity that someone who went on to become incredibly wealthy had, for some time, "to pray for her daily supply". I have come to accept that, for now, I have to accept and receive with grace my "daily bread". And relax into knowing that I AM doing all I can - the rest is up to God.

Spotting a looming burnout on the horizon I have stopped frantically seeking work. For the month of December I have made the commitment to myself to do daily self healing, meditate and pray and do yoga and go for gentle walks - and to check in with social media and my emails less. I have nothing t lose and everything to gain in reversing the 1 hour a day meditation 6 hours a day computer time imbalance. 6 hours a day connecting spiritually, 1 hour a day connecting technologically... I'll keep you informed of developments.

I have seen a significant softening in my relationship with my Mum recently which I can only assume for my part is a result of the work I am documenting in this blog. I am building up to asking her if I can perform a blessing way ritual for her to honour her as a mother - she might not like to - but I would like to design and offer it anyway.

Last night I was supposed to connect with my reiki master Morag - she and i spoke earlier in the week and noted that I have been a reiki master for 7 years. I asked for an attunement to mark the milestone and last night was going to be the night. Except Morag's baby wouldn't sleep. I sent them sleepy vibes and it worked for both of them! In the end, at Morag's suggestion, I attuned myself (I know... makes you go blind)... and this is what I did...

I created a circle on the floor in front of my lit fire - with a circle of candles and crystals. The clear quartz globe that I received at the same time as my master attunement 7 years ago was behind me and the green (can't remember name of crystal - got it at same time) earthing was in front of me. I sounded the bells around the circle 3 times, smudged it 3 times and spoke a spontaneous invocation in which I said "this is the space in which I claim my divine inheritance" (just came out of my mouth)... I stepped into the circle and sat down facing the fire - I held up my palms and for each of the reiki symbols in turn my hands were charged and I passed them over my brow, behind my head, over my throat, down passed the heart to the solar plexus, behind my body, back to the navel and down passed the root to the earth. It was incredibly serene.

I then went to bed and slept deeply; dreaming that I was guided around my old school by a man in arabic dress, the walls of the old school were incorporated into its new design, the central quad had spontaneously filled with water and become a lily pond, I went to a class but there was a fire alarm so we all went and sat in the sun by the pool. It was a very chilled and relaxed dream.

This morning upon waking I performed a self healing on myself and then have got on with my day. Watch this space for further developments...

Mother's Blessing (part 1)

If you have never heard this you must

Snatam Kaur Mother's Blessing


 xxx

Spiritual Counselling

I had a really good session of spiritual counselling today. When I say "I had" I mean "I gave"... I was the counsellor... but the thing is... I'm not, really, it's not me doing the counselling. And since this is an unusual concept I thought I would try to explain what the spiritual counselling experience is like and what I do to play my part in something so much bigger than me.

When I know I have an appointment with someone I make sure the space around is tidy and clean, even if I am working on skype as I often do - I always set myself up in my therapy room with a candle lit. I take some deep breaths and release any thoughts I might have about how I might want the session to go. And I take my awareness to my heart and I release any tension by breathing long and slow; I ask inwardly to be guided to be of the highest service.

Then the skype rings or the person arrives for the session. It works the same whether it's in person or on skype it's important that that person feels comfortable. Warm? Comfy? Settled?

I used to ask more upfront about a person's belief system because I wanted to make sure I said "the right thing" but increasingly I only do "small talk" until the client is sufficiently arrived and relaxed enough to start. I don't explain too much about it I just suggest experiencing it. I do say that silence is joyously welcomed as is sharing. That I hold the silence for them as they are likely to be on an inner pilgrimage but I do ask them to stay with the process and to tell me if they mentally leave the room and start planning tonights dinner. This reassures us both that we are "in" for the duration.

I do explain confidentiality and that I have supervision and that the only person I might disclose information to is my supervisor.

We settle into some silence together. Focussing on the breath... breathing... settling... slowing the breathing down...

From the fall of the silence I won't know what I am going to say until I open my mouth. Sometimes I find that I am suggesting to scan the body from the feet to the crown... sometimes we focus on the gut, the heart, the head... sometimes a guided heart opening... something perfect always comes out of my mouth. At the outset the aim is to find comfort with the focus on the heart and to be open to receive guidance.

I might speak an invocation. Using the words that come I acknowledge That which guides, That which loves, That which holds us... I affirm the safety of the space.

What comes next will be an invitation... and each time it seems the invitation takes different forms... "what rises in you to be shared?" "we are at the altar of the heart, what is your prayer?"... and then it is time for the client to hold the "talking stick"... I pass them the metaphorical baton and wait.

In the early days I used to have to actively still my mind while they were silent - I might draw sacred symbols in my minds eye - or have to say silently to myself "God is listening" or "peace" or something... but over time that need to still my mind has passed - now I almost finding myself impatiently waiting for the opportunity to be in the deep listening space with someone, the mental chatter falls away.

They have their eyes closed, most often, but I will have mine open. My gaze resting softly on them. I find that my body might tense at the same time that they shift position. Or I may get a sensation in a chakra as I watch them pass their hand over the same part. I breathe, I remind them to breathe if their breathing has become short.

They speak. Or stay silent. I listen.

The silence is beyond a lack of sound. It is like waiting in the womb, suspended from time and space.

Often they speak falteringly, playing with a concept that is arising - sometimes they talk a lot - sometimes they just start to cry. I don't react. I make gentle soothing sounds and keep listening.

I might feel prompted to interrupt but I rarely do. I never react to the first prompt as it is most likely ego wanting to fix something they are saying. I wait... breathe it away... keep listening.

I am not just listening with my ears I am listening with my soul. It can feel inwardly like floating on the ocean, being one with the ocean and not. Feeling the ebb and flow, rise and fall of the waves.

If the prompt comes through more than once or twice then I open my mouth with confidence (no one wants an apologetic weak interruption!) and I speak what comes out of my mouth without thinking too much about it. A learning edge for me is to keep it succinct, to the point. But almost always the words land well and a deeper insight is gained.

I am sitting with a mirror and in that mirror is me and is my God. And I am a mirror to them, they are in me as is their God. So often I hear issues I am working on in my own life articulated. I can sometimes feel my body reeling with the realisation that this issue I thought was "mine" is being brought to the space.

Sometimes heartbreak is inevitable. This is where the intense training of the seminary comes in. Because my heart is permanently broken open, because I am a griefholder and have released as much pain as best I can, because I have (as best as I can) released my own story I do not fear screaming heartbreak, the utter void of grief.

I might cry. It's my greatest gift I can give is my profound empathy. But it is not about me at all - I don't lose myself in the emotion.

All that the client offers washes through me; like flood water opening me and cleansing me. I am listening but I am not hanging onto their words. This is humanity; raw humanity and I am full of joy to be present to it.

This is about the moment. It is about the vastness of the human experience in that moment.

If the client asks a question of themselves I might pick that up and ask them to put it to God... "why does this keep happening?" "what can't I see?"

I notice if they affirm themselves and I repeat that back to them "yes, you are very good at..."

If they seem to say something that rings the wisdom bell with me but I don't feel they have heard their own wisdom I repeat it to them "the more I surrender the clearer I become" or whatever.

Keeping an eye on time with 10 minutes to go I gently say "just acknowledging we have 10 minutes left... " and I might summarise what I have heard in the session.

Then with 5 minutes to go I invite them back into some silence. Allowing all that has arisen to settle again. Breathing again. Feeling the presence of That which guides and loves and holds us. Offering thanks.

Sometimes I feel prompted to pray for someone as a closing. More often not.

I always thank them because it is the most extraordinary privilege.

Then it's over. There's some light chat and then it's done. They go.

I sit quietly and make a note of what remains with me - both content and feelings. I have fortnightly supervision and I might talk about my feelings or how I felt but rarely about individuals. My supervisor holds the space for me and the incredible dive into the ocean starts again.

So beautiful.

I could have written about what it feels like to receive spiritual counselling but I wanted to share my experience as the counsellor. To outline the process, the container... what actually happens to hold the space.

The inner journey is determined by what the client brings. And their willingness to surrender to the silence and guidance that comes from within them.

They are not broken nor ever were so I am relieved of any responsibility to fix. I uphold. They are perfect in their humanness as am I. They are whole. They are already healed. They have all the wisdom they need within them.

If I am anything I am loyal friend to their higher self... waiting for it to remember.

Dress for dancing!

I believe it was Hafiz that said "come to God dressed for dancing, or be carried on a stretcher onto God's ward"...

It's been a week since I last posted. It's been a week of sadness as our country decides to bomb Syria. I attended a climate change rally at the weekend and a peace vigil in the week. I cried in my welsh class yesterday because my heart broke to see all the babies there and to hold them in the same heart that holds Syrian innocents. It's been a week where meaning has been hard to find and peace has felt elusive.

It's also been a week where the sign on my wall "ask and it shall be given, seek and ye shall find"... has pissed me off so much. Even though I claim to surrender to God's will I can't help but define what form my providence might take. I would, for example, expect that since I earnestly throw myself into service of God that my rent, bills and food might be covered (nothing fancy... just the basics). And I might imagine that, sure, I need to do something for that so I put myself out all over town looking for work. No work comes. The days tick by.

I still my mind and pray about it and what comes to me is that winter would be the perfect time to write my books - how can I write books when I am worried about the rent? I ask my God - "ask and it shall be given" - ask people to fund you to write it, offer them a book in return. So I do... I put out my video, my paypal link, my vision.

And wait... and wait... gentle, beautiful donations come in. I hold them lightly and lovingly and feel so grateful for them. But my ego sees what I don't have and not what I do have. Each passing day nears me to rent day and I can only deeply see and feel the deficit.

This is the same time as I am due to go to Dublin on Saturday and the tickets have been bought by the organisation I volunteer for but I cannot for the life of me find my passport. I turn my house over twice, my partners house, my car and my old workplace. No where to be found.

These are utterly insignificant problems in the grand scale of things but I tell you what it's the little stones in your shoe that gets to the pilgrim!

I found myself raging at God... "I am worth more than this! Why wait til the 59th minute of the 11th hour every time? I am worthy of a home! I am worthy of warmth! I am worthy of food and clothes! Why?!?!?!" and I could feel God smiling and all fear left me. THAT was what my Higher Power wanted to hear - it sounded like self will but actually it was an uprising, upstanding, estimable statement!

And then I realise that while I thought surrender might bring about some nice work so I can pay my bills - the truth of it is that I needed to own for myself the sense of worthiness. I also needed to not have the work come in so that I should think creatively and commit to writing my book. I also needed to not be all holy and self sufficient because unless my hand is forced I never ask for help but do it all by myself (but willing to help others - which is a power/control imbalance if I ever heard one).

I needed to lose my passport so I would sort through my boxes and clear out all my old papers and receipts. 4 bin bags of them.

I found my passport. I have paid my rent today. Not quite the 59th minute of the 11th hour but I had about 30 minutes to spare.

This is only a small example of first world problems but I hope there is some message of reassurance in it - that we may not know what the plan is but there is a plan. It may be that in short term there is suffering so that we rise up to meet our full potential.

To come to God dressed for dancing is to surrender. To resist the dance is to beaten into submission by self will and egoism. The destination is the same.

The only difference is acceptance. what IS is what is. Suffering is created when there is a discrepancy between what we think we want and what we have.

My choice today is to decide whether I want to wear myself down to a sick and exhausted wretch that needs a stretcher... or whether I choose to dance.

Undergoing God

A friend shared with me a reading from Richard Rohr which talks about how "... It's only the wise, broken ones who allow themselves to "undergo God" and willingly trust, "let go and let God"."

I am struck by the use of language of "undergoing" - you undergo an ordeal, surgery or a transformation. The description of God not as the beginning and end, nor as separate, nor even as an entity... but as a process... this moved deeply in me in ways that my mind couldn't comprehend.

My worldview shifted. I am not in a process of living a better life to be closer to God. God is the process.

There was never a time when I wasn't in process and that process was always God.

The unfolding process of creation is God. There is vector to God. God is going somewhere through me and I am going somewhere through God. There is no destination but an infinite deepening.

I have not failed.

I was never in control.

I couldn't have done anything differently - no need for regrets.

I can DO all I like but I don't need to - the organic flow unfurling into deeply resonant depths IS. I can BE that without doing anything.

The actions that arise from stillness is the God-process prompting me.

I feel so profoundly relaxed and relieved. Just to know I never failed and I cannot fail. I can only Be in the eternal unfolding of the presence of God-process.

Wow.

... I got the answer!

The last posting here asked what it would feel like to really trust?

Well.

There is much I can't tell you about my weekend because of confidentiality. But a great healing took place in which I released a sense of carrying great darkness from my ancestral line. There may be sickness there but not evil.

This was a belief I had been holding that was preventing me from really feeling I could have a child of my own.

I saw my Aunt on Friday who lent me lots of great books to help me with my doula journey, and she gave me my paternal family tree and lots of information about the family that I didn't know and I was glad to find out (even though it is dark!)... I then went to play my role of mentor for the training of onespirit interfaith ministers. I mentor 6 students who are in the second year of 2. In the second year we trace our own biography from before conception through birth, childhood, adolescence, relationships, marriage, endings and partings, illness, old age and death and beyond and we learn to perform ceremonies to mark these great rites of passage.

This weekend was about Birth.

So! Armed with my family tree, 6 weeks of persephone underworld explorations thanks to Yoni Egg and a pile of birth books I went to my mentoring duties. The content of the weekend is confidential but I can share with you my experience of what happened on Sunday...

The night before I was reading an account of birth in one of the doula books my auntie lent me and I was overcome with a desire to have a child. I prayed and said to God that I dare not ask in prayer for something that was not God's will... and God said "ask"... and I did, I said "I want a baby" and God said "OK".

On Sunday part of the altar was a shamanic talisman of a owl's wing (the owl had been hit by a car and a shaman had preserved the wing) and one of the students was terrified of it but was brave enough to touch it. I too am phobic of birds and all things fluttery - so in the break time I touched it. It represented my deepest fear to me and when I touched it it was so soft - softer than the cat - unbelievably soft and I picked it up and it was unbelievably light. I felt "something" enter me and I knew that it was a part of me that had never incarnated. I came fully into being. I went and stood by the window out of the way and started to weep and shake uncontrollably. The floor and walls disappeared - again (4th time this year) - and I was bathed in light - I came to stood by the window with my hand on the pane of glass. I was overcome by the beauty - of everything - and I found myself stroking my fingers down the glass stroking the images of people beyond who walked up and down Baron's Court tube. 

I could not stop this weeping - excruciatingly raw and in complete bliss at the same time. I knew I needed to anchor so I saw Ian - a fellow mentor - and ran into his arms - he saw me coming and stood to meet me and he held me while I sobbed and shook. Eventually the tears stopped and I looked Ian in the eye and said "tell you later" and he said "you don't need to".

I don't need to. But it is a tale worth telling.

In answer to my question "what would it feel like to fully trust and surrender?" the answer is "to Be fully alive".

What would it FEEL like to really trust?

I feel profoundly edgy today. A heady amalgam of the storm that has been battering my corner of the world for over a week - relentless wind and rain - leaving me feeling caged; combined with the world stage overrun with melodrama, mass scale suffering, a sick game of chess where the powers that be have forsaken any rules and are just chucking the pieces at each other; combined with my own first-world concerns of having enough money and enough time and enough love.

Ugh.

Why does it feel manifestly impossible to surrender right now? When I ask myself what my choices are I see that I can either trust in my God or I can wallow on through the mud of life on my own will riddled with self doubt and fears, my mind whirling with machinations of solutions to indefinable problems.

The intelligent decision would be to surrender and trust.

"You tried that once" my ego says "and that one time... you didn't get what you wanted" - evidence enough to keep trying the steep route eh?

Why do I resist surrender? Why do I find it so hard to trust?

The answer comes... "I don't trust myself". I foresee myself trusting that everything will be alright financially so I go and blow all my money on "stuff". I foresee myself trusting that I believe God will save me from eating disorders only to then go and gorge myself to death. I foresee myself trusting that I will be loved only to die a lonely death.

I totally need to control these things! I do not want to be skint, fat or alone.

Oh hang on... these are the things that I am fearing will happen if I trust AND if I don't trust. These fears have nothing to do with trust! They are just fears. I try to rigidly control my money, food and relationships because I cannot and will not accept my powerlessness over these matters despite the destructive evidence of my past that prove my attempts at self control futile and my fears self perpetuating.

How would it FEEL to totally trust God?

I guess I wouldn't even need to trust myself because in trusting God I am trusting myself. There is no separation between my trust in God and my trust in myself.

I guess I would feel peaceful. I would feel calmly accepting that come what may I would be OK.

I guess I would stop fretting about paying the bills in favour of trusting that whatever happens I'll be OK.

I guess I would let go of determining what "being OK" looked like, relinquish my interpretation which really means "get what I think I want"...

I guess I would feel relaxed. I would feel alive. I would feel inspired. I would feel connected. I would feel free to take time out and rest if I needed it and guided to work and take action when it was required.

I could listen to my body's signals. I could hear my intuition.

I would respond rather than react. I would feel loved by everything and seek love from nothing.

*Tears come* I see myself freefalling through space with no-thing to define me or reassure me I was good enough - these things I seek to control... they are my benchmarks of worthiness. When I "win" a job, lose some weight, win some affection... oh boy oh boy... I am worthy. If I relinquish the game to prove myself worthy how will I know I am worthy?

How will I know I exist? Without work or reward or love or attention from others... how will I know I exist?

Maybe I won't. Maybe I am nothing.

What's the worst case scenario that prevents me fully surrendering to God and trusting.

My worst case scenario is that I will be let down. That my trust will not be rewarded. That I will fall into rent arrears and be homeless again. That I will be left by my loved ones and be alone. That I will be penniless, homeless, alone.

I fear that I am not worthy enough for my needs to be met. That I cannot do enough to ever be good enough. That I am nothing without love and money. That I am forgotten about in my little corner of this scary world.

After these recent weeks journeying into the underworld; I am about to be re-born. Can I find it in myself to choose to trust? Have I any choice?

The world did not end today

So another day came and went. The sun rose and set, the stars are there... just... behind the silver veils of cloud. The birds sang. The mountains sat unmoved, the tinkling waters of the river sang her tune like she has done for millions of years. The world has not ended today. There is still Beauty to be seen, Love to be given and received, Truth to be spoken. Whatever we are told there is still so much goodness in this world to be breathed deep into our souls. It would be a crime to forget it! Seek it! So much beauty, so much love.

Where do you find hope?

"I want to send a message of hope to the world" says my ego, my little self looking wide eyed and terrified at the mess served to me by the media, my stomach too sore from digesting too much and forced fed I feel I can't take any more. My friends, each dear person whom I love, all grasping and reaching to send messages of hope or cries for help out into the ether. People changing their pictures to french flags in armchair solidarity in the hope that they are making a difference.

Hope. When I was 16 or 17, I can't remember exactly how old I was, I met a spectre of a teacher from another age. He whispered in my ear "give up hope it's toxic". This message came through time and time again throughout my 20s. Give up hope. Give up hope. And naively I took it for a negative message and tried to ignore it.

Now I can see the wisdom in it. I don't believe that hope itself is a bad choice but I guess it needs some refinement. If "hope" betrays the present moment in favour of the belief that tomorrow will be better then all it serves to do is draw us off balance tipping forlong into an unknown future in denial of whatever this moment brings to be acknowledged.

The present moment presents us with the gift to grow and live but by living in hope we are rejecting the gift in favour of fantasy. And ironically the very future we seek is likely to be forever just beyond our grasp.

Hope is toxic when it lies in the future. Let us never pray for a better future! Let us pray to be alive to the moment, now, today in faith that in doing so the course of destiny shifts and changes.

Hope is not found in the machinations of the human mind. For all our cleverness and knowledge humankind is not managing life very well. All these displays of solidarity splitting us asunder, me and you, us and them, them and the other them. Fragmenting like a broken mirror into a million pieces and distracting us from the great lie which is that we are ever separate at all. There will surely come a point when the great rock of humanity is ground down into a billion billion grains of sand and we will come to see the rock-ness in our nature.

Hope is toxic when it is out there, outside of us and in the future. Do not seek there for hope! Hope is healthy when it lies within us, when we take time to check in with our still beating hearts and ebbing flowing breath. Hope is not a vector, it has neither time nor destination, it is a still point. It is unwavering. We need not search for it but stop. Be still and remember the unity of all things and there authentic hope rises.

Reflections on the trouble with Hades

The more I think about it... what was yesterday about?! I was definitely inappropriately touched by I was not "touched"... I am neither offended nor marked in any way. My psychic defences were well in place. I guess I don't know what the man's motivation was. He was very scared. Maybe he was reaching for human contact albeit in an inappropriate way. I feel only compassion, including for myself. What a strange set of circumstances!

And as a mirror of my shadow - wow - it was dark and the masculine was wounded, scared and scary and LOUD. Perhaps I should be glad that my God believes me ready to see what darkness lies in humanity and own my responsibility for it.

The Trouble with Hades...

I travelled to Bristol and back today; no mean feat! I decided not to take work or a book but a pillow so I could sleep on the train. No chance! Between Wolverhampton and Cheltenham even on the way there at not-much-passed-dawn there were blokes drinking and talking loudly on their way either to races or football... I wasn't sure which.

On the way back I did drift off on my pillow for a short time between Bristol and Cheltenham but as we pulled into Cheltenham a thronging mass of shaven headed drunks surged held back by policemen until the train stopped. They flooded the carriage hooting and jeering and singing and leering. I was so pleased when a muslim gentleman sat next to me; a sober buffer and protector, I thought, against the deafening roars of the drunken crowd as the man behind me thumped my seat in rhythm with their chanting.

The chants soon turned nasty. The bitter aftertaste of yesterday's attacks in Paris left opinion on everyone's tongue. Kill them all! One man shouted. Bring back El Cid! The muslim gentleman next to me leaned forward, his right arm (he was on my left) around his head as if protecting himself. My heart thumped in my throat imagining what I might have to do to defend him if the violence became physical. His coat encroached onto my lap and I thought nothing of it.

It took me a little while to realise that it wasn't his coat. His left arm was reached under his right and he was touching and stroking my lap. I could not believe it. Was this really happening?! If I made a scene there and then he would have been lynched. I firmly removed his hand from my lap and blocked him with my bags but he seemed to keep trying, feeling with his fingers to see if he could find a way through my blockade. I coughed, and shifted as far towards the window as I could, turning my body.

His eyes met mine in the reflection of the window and I narrowed my eyes and shook my head (all the time my chair rocking with the thumps on the back of it) and the football crowds cramming the carriage stood over us. His eyes were full of tears. "I'm sorry" he mouthed to me. I closed my eyes.

I stayed like that. Locked, legs jammed together, personal space blocked down, rocking, deafened for another 20 minutes when they all got off at Wolverhampton. I asked the guy to let me out which he did and he apologised again. I gave him a thin smile and sat further up the carriage. He stared at me all the way to Stafford where we both got off. I was prepared for a further advance at which point I would have probably called for help - but there was none - he disappeared.

I got on a train to Crewe. A different sort of man was on that train. Baby boomer golfers, also a bit worse for wear... better spoken than the previous lot but with similar opinions on muslims. I felt unbelievably sad. One of them didn't participate in the islamophobia - but kept saying "we live in a scary world". Bless him.

Changing at Crewe for Chester I, again, attracted the attention of a group of blokes. They gave me drunken compliments and asked me to sit on their laps. They asked me where I had been and I said working. They didn't ask what I do but I was dying to stand up full height shoulders back like Eowyn and declare my priestesshood. Don't fuck with me little men! But I sat down with my pillow and ignored another man staring at me from down the carriage.

They want something lost - womanliness. I look at the waxed, orange, eyebrows on fleek dolly birds screaming with laughter with their bags of shopping and I feel sad. I look around for the good guys; the sober, heart centred, respectful masters of their own urges... and I feel sad.

And I feel desperate longing to be with my man, Robert, a rare and quirky example of what I think a decent man is. Soft hugs, open heart. Although he's watching the Grand Prix tomorrow apparently. Sigh.

Persephone's Medicine

It's not always healthy to rely on other people's opinions but I am getting beautifully affirmed by dear souls at the moment and I thank you for it.

The past few weeks have been a rite of passage it seems; a guided tour of the underworld complete with obsidian guide and exorcisms. Rich medicine! Nothing to fear! I am really ready for the second year training of the Interfaith Seminary to move onto Birth now; my impatient seedling is ready to break the soil!

As a mentor to students on the OneSpirit Interfaith ministry training I am reliving my own training somehow to a factor of 1000! I don't recall feeling in as much exquisite detail every eroded rock of my soil the first time around. That is not to say that this interim phase before the second year got into a swing wasn't profound - in fact it was very shocking - but it came from my unconscious and returned to my unconscious like a surging bubbling flash flood that left me changed and re-shaped with little memory of the water itself.

From starting my doula training, to manifesting a yoni egg, to miraculously getting it inside me (and not being able to get it out), to norovirus, to tussles with my deepest fears in work, to moving house, to unpacking my old life, to All Souls, to reconnecting to my paternal line, to standing up in my integrity against wrongdoing and winning, to facing upto my own "evil" and still loving me, to getting gorgeous cuddles from my Cariad, to manifesting a cat, to last saturday's red tent where I wept for the pain of the World and they wept with me, to starting a threshold choir singing to the dying, to endings and new beginnings... !

Rich medicine indeed. And I;m only a month along.

Something magnificent has gone on my yoni (TMI warning)

Since the beginning of these shenanigans I have consciously working with my Root chakra; aided by my new friend Obsidian Yoni Egg. In the 3 weeks it's been there I have experienced incredible healing crises in waves one after the next. Inner and outer. I believe it is the egg that takes credit for delaying my menses by 9 days so that I start my cycle now on the Dark Moon! I am officially aligned Red Tent ladies, I am aligned with the moon!!!

Anti John Lewis micro-rant

I already have the annual rising bile at capitalist christmas. John Lewis! Ludicrous, manipulative, shallow. Is that what LOVE is? Is it?! No. John. It's not... it's too easy to give presents and call it love. What about presence?

Not much to say

Tonight I am percolating all the incredible root-y things going on.

All about the Roots

My am I red right now; in my root; rustling around in the basement clearing things out.

As this blog is a metaphorical baby then at 3 weeks gestation it is little more than a bundle of cells on pilgrimage down the fallopian tube to make it's home in the uterus. The sex of the baby at this point is set but as yet unknown. The variable factor which determines the sex is the father's chromosome - how interesting!

The genetic code is there but it is yet to take form. Yep... that describes this blog for sure!

What is being cleared out of the basement at the moment is all ancestral stuff. All about the Roots.

I was amazed to hear from my Aunt today - she was reaching out to me from my paternal line - I wept with joy to hear that she has been doing family constellation work and healing - I thought it was just me, on my own, living out the psychodramas of that part of my past. What a relief! And how interesting.

I don't know my wider family. I don't have conscious roots. Trying to BE in a place, space, community, society, world... in relationship, intimate, vulnerable... trying to be me - without those roots - has been an uphill struggle.

What a joy to make that connection. And to feel again that signpost and waymarker that I am on track... and on track to the Womb it seems.

Maltezer Healing

I was really disappointed today to spot a maltezers packet on my front path. This new house of mine is so precious to me after so long without a home of my own that I had a flashback to the daily rain of rubbish that would come over my yard walls in Saltney as people made their way home from the pub. The contempt that people seemed to have for my boundary lines that I never drew. 

As it turned out it wasn't rubbish on my doorstep but an actual packet of maltezers and a milky way - tied together with ribbon - left by a trick or treater I presume as I hid in my bed on Hallowe'en keeping my germs from the populace.

I cried, actually. I concede to being an emotional wibbly-wobbly at the moment but it seemed such a sweet significance that people had not only respected my boundaries but left me a treat.

There is such a longing in me for community and home and acceptance and to feel that I am safe and secure and nothing is going to attack me or displace me. This small gesture by someone I will probably never get to thank healed that in me. I begin to trust.

I am so in my root chakra right now! 

(No surprise to those who talked me into getting an obsidian yoni egg ha ha... it's still there!)

Oh... and as most of my friends know I don't actually eat chocolate so there's some maltezers in the fridge now for the first person to come by for a cuppa! 

Love xxx

All Souls Afterwards

So... the All Souls Ceremony was lovely. A certain weight has lifted from me. I followed the plan outlined in the previous post with a couple of lovely additions - I was given some consecrated oil as gift by the amazing Pearl Kilkenny and I used it to anoint myself after honouring and releasing the spirits to the Light - it was like a baptism anew - free from those bonds. I also made space for and called in healing for my family still alive and prayed for us all individually and as a constellation.

All Souls Ceremony

I feel them pressing on me. I have spent much of the weekend exhausted from being ill and in some kind of liminal state. I heard Snatam Kaur chant the Akal mantra on YouTube yesterday and I felt an immense detachment and release from my heart; I howled and wept. I feel my ancestors with me. And the presence of those unhealed and trapped with me. I tried to "be" with them today but all day people wanted to talk to me - so much for being off sick! When I did clear time to rest my heart was pounding in my throat. I put on my boots and coat and went for a walk in my pyjamas; the first time I have left the house in 3 days. I walked along the Pilgrim Way. I had seen on the map that there is a well nearby and I went to look for it. I couldn't find it but I found a perfect rock to hunker down on to watch the hillsides picked out in bronze through the autumn fog. I breathed. My eyes closed I breathed and called deep on the Mother to sustain me. When I opened my eyes they stood before me in various stages of opacity, like dust turning and twinkling in half light... I focussed, they faded.

I have moved to live on the Taith Pererin! I didn't even know that when I took this house. When I walked it last year I took a variant on the route at this stage. I am obsessed with pilgrimage. It is, for me, about reclaiming and assimilating my catholic/celtic heritage that was not present in my liberal spiritual upbringing.

They are pressing upon me today. All Souls. I am planning to do a ceremony later and it will go like this:

I will gather images of my ancestors and a candle and create an altar

I will light the candle invoking my God and all that hold and guide me

I will smudge myself with sage and lavender, and the house

I will welcome all those to me that are present and I will inform them they are dead

I will recite the Ho'onoponopono 9 times for them

My guide will take them to the Light

In honour of my catholic roots I will recite the Hail Mary

I will then play Akal and chant along

I will smudge again and blow out the candle to close acknowledging, thanking and releasing all those that came to hold the safe space

Healing the Wounded Mother

I dreamt of someone I have a grievance against. I tried to tell her I was making a complaint. She turned and walked away as I was explaining the complaint wasn't really about her it was about them.

The "them" in this scenario are real people - as was the person in the dream. As is the grievance real. 

"They" are people who I might perceive as having created the space and opportunity for an abuse to take place.

I wake up in complete and utter pain. Physical pain, soul pain. I see straight away that "they" were playing the parts of my parents in a psychodrama. The patterns I hold onto replaying in my world.

I journalled it out. I used the step 4 matrix Who do I resent? Why? What it affects in me? What is my part in it?

My mother came in for a lot of schtick. But if I cut to the chase here is the most important bit... what is my part in it all? These are things I can see I could do differently...

1 As an adult I am choosing to relive these dramas

2 I am not practising compassion or forgiveness

3 I am stuck in the role of victim

4 I am seeing my mother as the source of suffering

5 I am taking it personally

6 I am ignoring her own biography and those of the women in my ancestry

7 I am holding her responsible when in fact I am resentful at the wounded Mother (archetype)

You will notice I highlight the Wounded Mother as an archetype and so I then journal into that. I find myself further wracked with pains of the world - of wars, refugees, destruction of the planet. I find myself, yes angry that she is wounded but that she lets herself be wounded. How pathetic! Stand up for yourself woman! Protect the innocent! I am angry at the loss of innocence.

This takes me back to the step 4 process... what is my part in it again? And I find that am not owning nor healing the wounded mother within me... and I am giving my power away and not claiming my own power as a woman and a mother. I am not protecting the innocent. 

I google "healing the wounded mother" and come across a book which I am pretty sure is on the reading list for the doula training "Songs of the Womb" by Benig Mauger. This seems like a clear signpost and waymarker - I am on the right path and this is the way! I shall buy the book and read it. And let you know how I get on!

 

Self Doubt

1st November 2015

It's been a while since I posted. I had commited to a daily blog but two things happened (and they always happen)... the first was a re-read what I had written and trashed it in my mind... the second was someone said something to me that led me to doubt myself... and so I withdrew.

The idea was that I would blog daily over 9 months as self directed study towards becoming a doula. I read my first couple of blogs back and found them rich and wordy and intellectual. What relevance did they have to being a doula?

Then a lady in my welsh class asked me how many children I have and when I said none she didn't hold back "I wouldn't want you as a doula" she said "I'd be screaming at you that you had NO IDEA" (and she laughed and looked away).

I had blog posts planned which seemed ridiculous to post - an anecdote about an eccentric man managing to silence to the Quiet Zone on virgin trains - or the photos of autumn leaves on my daily walk...

And the days have passed. And this project is 3 weeks gestation and I am afraid that it might not go full term.

I doubt I have what it takes. Who am I to do anything like this?

When the lady said that she wouldn't want me as a doula initially I was unfazed... I smiled at her and gently said "I have no bad experience of my own to bring to the birth, I come holding the ideal of a perfect healthy birth intact".

It was only later my heart broke into a million pieces. I have forced it down and down and down... but I want a baby of my own. But I don't think I ought to.

I am comfortable with death and I work with the dying and bereaved. Why? Because I know death. Death and I have talked. And I know Her.

I have a better relationship with death than I do life. I fear life more than I fear death. I fear intimacy. I fear loving and then rejection.

I fear rejection so badly.

At 28 I was told I was likely infertile. 20 years of eating disorders by that time had stopped my periods. I took it quite well then, I guess, I signed up for fostering and fostered young people leaving care. I worked harder. I also did what I could to be healthier. I did my yoga training, my periods returned, my hormones levelled out. I stopped purging... I gained weight... long story short I found a way to arrest the eating disorder and for 5 years now I have been well and healthy (contact me for more info if you need that kind of help and I'll share with you where I went)...

So now I am 35. Despite all that is said about how late in life people are having children now - it's not my fertility that is likely to slow me down. It's the radical all pervading self doubt that I have any genes worth passing on. The absolute guilt I would feel if a child of mine spent their teens and 20s in the grip of addiction.

So I realise that my journey into birth is about my own journey into a love of life. By the time I get "there" in 8.5 months time... I hope I will love life as much as I love death. I hope that I will love my own life as much as I love others. I hope that I will see my "wasted" years as of value.

And maybe this is a parallel to the beginnings of pregnancy. The fragile seed taking to new soil.

And I am sick. A vomiting bug. Cue inbox jokes about morning sickness...

If only you knew how unlikely conception actually is right now.

15^th October 2015 “The dwindling light of sunset in one sphere is the new hope of dawn in the next.”

Photo taken on 15^th October 2015 at Butley Priory “Gazing at the ceiling”

Photo taken on 15^th October 2015 at Butley Priory “Little dog, Big tree”

I was asked for clarity on the points I made yesterday. I love that; what did it mean? If I tell you what it means to me then that’s one thing but what does it mean to you?

It sounds depressing; that human life is a web of stories of brokenness. I don’t find it depressing; in fact I find it incredibly liberating to realize that my personal scripts of feelings of complete inadequacy and untouchability may be the reasons I feel so separate and alone but in fact unite me with my fellow humans; we all feel like that from time to time; it is the human condition. What does it mean to me as I ponder on Life and Creation at the beginning of these 9 months? It means I have to be prepared to accept that whatever is born through my creative endeavours: the metaphorical baby… is not going to be perfect. And nor will it make up for any feelings of imperfection that plague me in the dark corners of the night.

Today I heard the tale of Valhalla and that the ancients believed that upon death they crossed the ever distant horizon.  

I wonder to myself how many people would want a birthkeeper so comfortable with death as I am and yet I feel the two topics inseperable as the dwindling light of sunset in one sphere is the new hope of dawn in the next… and wait the night out long enough and that same dawn will come again in this.

Today we created together. 3 of us in a small studio, a little dog, an “abundance” candle. With no rehearsal nor preparation we just gave each other a nod and did it. An album in a day. Watch this space.