Thanks to Infinite Shift for sharing this thought-and-inspiration-stirring article by Trevor Malkinson from UpliftConnect. Since the reblog function formats inelegantly, here's an excerpt, and then a link to the full version of Trevor's article. "If the world is to... Continue Reading →
See how you respond, or react, to this quote, and then read on … it’s what this musing is about. “In fact, (Professor Miranda) Shaw learned that … women were to be worshipped, honored and revered as the bringers of... Continue Reading →
Albert Einstein said that we can't solve the problems we face using the same mindset or consciousness that created the problems in the first place. Countless wisdom traditions have said as much -- that it takes a change of heart... Continue Reading →
“Transformation begins at the point where there is no hope.” ~ James Hillman, Suicide and the Soul “At the core of the spiritual journey, religious traditions recognize the inevitability of darkness. Transition from “one degree of glory to another,” as... Continue Reading →
"Life is a mystery, a blessing, and a challenge. It is exciting and full of adventure, but can also be overwhelming or even tragic." "We are reaching several thresholds in our journey as human beings on earth. We need intentional... Continue Reading →
The ‘Milky Way’, photographed near Lake Titicaca in Peru. Image courtesy of NASA.
The ‘Wild Bee Wisdom‘ from Fiona MacLeod and David Wagoner spiraled up again to the surface in a conversation this morning with a fellow Via Transformativa sister.
I have deep appreciation for just how timeless this wisdom and inspiration is, so wanted to share that again in this freshly updated piece from the Sophia’s Children treasure-vaults.
If you’re of ‘this little clan’, as Fiona MacLeod wrote, you’ll recognize yourself in this.
Most of us have experienced it at some point: “There’s no going back.”
That’s one of the big differences between change and transformation.
With transformation, there is no ‘back there’ to return to, because ‘back there’ is rubble. Probably smoking rubble. Well-burnt toast.
We’ve been places, created things, experienced relationships, lost much, and have left (or been wrenched from) things and people as Life took us into radically new territory and explorations.
If we’ve been traveling a transformation path, our very way of perceiving and believing has been irrevocably altered.
We’ve crossed through threshold after threshold.
Sometimes these Wisdom-initiating shifts and transformation detours come via more radical means: the archetypal ‘shamanic lightning bolt’ (and shamanic ego ‘dismemberment’ and/or death), or by way of what the vision-poet writer Fiona MacLeod called the ‘dark and starless roads.’
If we’re lucky, in hindsight we see these life-altering events and seemingly meandering paths…
"We are the early adopters of a revolution of values." ~ Pancho Ramos-Stierle, Occupy Love, in a YES! Magazine interview. In the Spirit of Cultivating, Being, Embodying, and Spreading the Big Love, Jamie
The Ninth Wave, 1850, Ivan Konstantinovich Aivazovsky (1817-1900). Image courtesy WikiMedia.
The Blesstival Blessing Wave continues and gathers momentum.
Thanks to Sylvia (multiple times), Linda at LiteBeing, Sue Dreamwalker, Ka@FiestraEstrella, Jack@Jackspottings, Mary@Walking MyMyPath, Debbie@Spaceships China for adding #Blesstival blog posts so far to the Blessing Wave.
Thanks, too, those of you who are on the roster for upcoming Blessing Waves … Bridget, Brad, Maddie (times 2!), Sylvia (you go, Blesstival Queen!), Sri Devi, Joanna, and … you?
I’ll add your Blesstival post link to the Blesstival main page as I see the ‘ping back’.
And many thanks to those of you who have shared ‘behind the scenes’ blessings and Blesstival-wave support … it all ripples into the shared field.
You’ll find the recent additions so far on the Blesstivals main page … a growing sea of beautiful blessings in word, image, and spirit.
Love’s Messenger (1885), by Marie Spartali Stillman
I invite you to join me in a Blessing Sadhana, or Blesstival … sharing blessings into the collective via blog, website, Facebook … wherever you connect.
It also offers the possibility of rippling out the energy and spirit of blessing from within us, to the field immediately around us, and beyond, then, into the wider shared energy and psychic field.
Want to help create the Blessing Wave — and sow plus reap the ‘good medicine’ of Blessing?
Here are the Blesstival details:
Blesstival Timeframe:
January 1 – February 22, 2016
Blesstival Gist:
Commit to creating at least one blog post to share a blessing into the blog-o-sphere.
Your blessing can come from an inspiring blessing-oriented quote, bit of sacred text or scripture, or a wish or blessing you’d like to gift out into the shared field.
My friend and compadre, Dayna, shared this Parabola Magazine interview yesterday (thanks, Dayna!). It's good holiday-time and Season of Lights inspiration, to be sure, and well beyond this season, too. This particular interview features the wisdom, inspiration, and sharp insight... Continue Reading →
Sir Galahad Discovers the Grail, c. 1890, by Edwin Austin Abbey (1852-1911). Image courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.
This seems a very fine time for anchoring ourselves in the sovereign “ground of All Being” and rejuvenating our discerning Spiritual Warrior juju.
I’ll be sharing a few musings on just that “ripe timing” in a day or two (maybe even today), since the Virgo-Pisces archetypal energies are getting activated in a big way moving forward.
In the meanwhile, I’m happy to share this blog post from blog-sister Laura Bruno, since it speaks to this Spiritual (Shambhala) Warrior archetype that many of us are ‘here to be’.
Check this out, and read on for more:
Morihei Ueshiba meditates on top of Haleakala, Maui, 1961. Shared in Spirituality & Health magazine and sourced from the photo archives of Maui-Ki Aikido.
“Budo (way of the warrior) is not a means of felling the opponent by force or by lethal weapons. Neither is it intended to lead the world to destruction by arms and other illegitimate means.
True Budo calls for bringing the inner energy of the universe in order, protecting the peace of the world, as well as preserving, everything in nature in its right form.”
That’s what my Qigong Grandmaster called healthy yang or the Sacred Masculine, which is very much in alignment and partnership with and honoring of the healthy yin or Sacred Feminine.
Power with versus the toxic old Dominator Culture norm of power over.
That’s what I’m talking about (whatever the spiritual tradition from which you gain Wisdom and inspiration) — and it’s the energetic we’ll have plenty of cosmic and Earth help with as we move forward, starting now. Stay tuned …
Thanks, Bill! This video arrived so very synchronously, just seconds after I hung up the phone from a “Healing Skills Reclamation” Session discussing the spiritual path of the Warrior. I had just described this very dynamic of becoming so strong that you bypass the “need” for violence.
This video gives a passionate description of the differences between a Warrior and a soldier, as well as why our world needs a return of the Warrior. Lately, I’ve felt led to read both “The Upanishads” and “The Poetic Edda,” and both traditions share an appreciation for the role of true Warriors. It’s not about bashing heads or bombing civilians into oblivion. Reclaiming the values, courage and skills of the Warrior has deep implications for spiritual development, human sovereignty and, indeed, the fate of our world. This is 22 minutes well worth the listen:
"A compassionate or loving consciousness has ancient roots, but it is taking on a new importance as our world becomes integrated ecologically, economically, and culturally." "Because we now share one another’s fate, it is increasingly clear that promoting the well-being... Continue Reading →
Fog meets the Golden Gate, San Francisco. By Sandiegoguy30, generously shared via Creative Commons and WikiMedia.
“Another world is not only possible, she’s on the way and, on a quiet day, if you listen very carefully you can hear her breathe.” ~ Arundhati Roy*
There’s something compelling about being reminded that a new story is trying to be born into being — and be born into the world through us.
Have you been feeling that …the uncertainty, the pressure, the pull of something trying to be born through you, to be midwifed into being by you and your fellow midwives?
It may be something you’ve been feeling, following, and stepping (or stumbling, or getting dragged kicking and screaming) into for quite awhile now.
A sense of purpose that sometimes you can see and feel clearly, and sometimes not, as if you’re moving forward step by step across a bridge between old — what’s passing, and new — what’s being born — in one of those thick San Francisco fogs, in which you can see maybe one step, one foot in front of you?
On the cusp between two worlds, two ways of being, with a bridge in between, as showed itself in a vision I saw in meditation some years ago.
Bridge in the Woods (1885-86), by Rafail Sergeevich-Levitsky (1847–1940). Image courtesy WikiCommons.
I feel that way, a lot, as I know some of you do.
I love the places of clarity and certainty, of course; who doesn’t?
It often seems so much nicer than that seemingly perpetual uncertainty, doesn’t it? Yet uncertainty is what we’ve got, in boatloads.
More often than not, it’s that step-by-step feeling and sensing my way over the bridge — with the uncertainty keeping me company all the way — through the thick fog, not wholly seeing what’s ahead, just knowing that’s just the direction to walk.
It’s so different from what I was taught, and most of us are taught, in the ‘Western’ culture: to ‘make it happen’, to push, muscle it through, ‘conquer life’. Ha ha. What a bizarre and somewhat delusional control-freak fiction, and it does take quite a bit to be shaken loose of it!
But the new story will be born, bizarre, delusional fictions of cultural conditioning (and a rather big side-dish of pride!) aside.
A wee, green oasis in Death Valley, CA [Photo courtesy of PD Photo via Creative Commons]
As Llewellyn Vaughan-Lee shares, this is:
“… a new story, arising from deep within the psyche of humanity and the world soul at this moment in our and its evolution.”
“… the story of life evolving, recreating itself anew, but we are needed to midwife it into existence.”
A new story that requires us to remember and reclaim the ancient, ancestral wisdom, even as the new story that’s being born pulls us forward.
Thanks to Anna Lin from Healing Streamsfor sharing the following snippet from Llewellyn Vaughan-Lee today (continue on to see the excerpt, and a link to his full article).
I felt glad and deeply appreciative for the reminder of Llewellyn’s words … that something’s being born, and the birthing process isn’t without moments of discomfort.
No matter how long I’ve immersed in the Wisdom,or how long I’ve been step-by-stepping across that bridge in the fog, letting the new be born through me (and the old to be shucked off and die from me), I appreciate the reminders, always.
Can you feel the bit of that new story pulling you, nesting in you, drawing you forward through the fog?
Another world-story is possible … can you hear her breathing?
* Arundhati Roy’s quote is from a speech entitled Confronting Empire given at the World Social Forum in Porto Allegre, 28 January, 2003. (Source: WikiQuote – Arundhati Roy)
“There is a new story waiting to be born, waiting to redeem the planet and nourish our souls. It is a story of a oneness that includes the diversity of creation in a self-sustaining whole, a story that can bring back the magic within nature that is needed to heal our damaged planet. It is a story of co-operation rather than competition or conflict. And it includes the mystery of life as well as the understanding that science can give us. It is also a new story, arising from deep within the psyche of humanity and the world soul at this moment in our and its evolution.
We are not the sole creators of this story, because it is the story of life evolving, recreating itself anew, but we are needed to midwife it into existence. As with all births it needs to come from the inner to the outer…
"A culture falls apart when its sense of youthful imagination disappears at the same time that the wisdom of the elders is forgotten." ~ Michael Meade Thanks to a few evocative posts and links from my fellow blogger at Elegant... Continue Reading →
Demeter Mourning for Persephone, 1906, by Evelyn de Morgan.
Thanks to Laura Bruno for pointing the way to this excellent article in Waking Times, “Is Matriotism the Future of the Divine Feminine?” by Ethan Smith and Lucy Morales.
This is an important read and reflection for anyone who’s concerned aboutthe horrible, Life-diminishing imbalances that have been crawling their way across the globe like some sort of living toxic-tar, whether that be what the authors call the poisonously violent “radical patriarchy” or the co-opted, “controlled opposition” feminism that the authors note and define.
It’ll also be an encouraging read and reflection for the many of us who’ve been changing our ways, radically simplifying, living into these questions, reclaiming the Sacred Feminine and thus tending the fertile ground for the Sacred Masculine, and embodying and seeding the shift to a healthier, more respectful balance.
Laura also mentions one of my Feminine Mojo Show episodes — series, actually — that I did a few years ago with John Lash.Though I don’t resonate with some of John’s more recent work, I still highly recommend his book, Not in His Image, some of the great resources on Metahistory.org, and the first couple of Feminine Mojo shows we did together on the Sophia Myths, Mysteries, and Gifts to us.
You’ll find the link in Laura’s post, but do click through to the Waking Times article she mentions as well — it invites some perspective-shifting.
I’m happy to see a creeping acknowledgement of the importance of a major shift in gender relations and a return to appreciating the Goddess energies. This latest post on Waking Times asks important questions and explores evidence of a much more universal Mother culture than modern society likes to admit. As the world teeters on the brink of annihilation, may more and more people begin to recognize this much needed shift.
This post also reminds me of an old John Lash interview on Feminine Mojo with Sophia’s Children blogger and Goddess lover Jamie Walters. I cannot say that I endorse everything John Lash has moved into in recent years; however, this 2011 talk beautifully articulates why –for the survival of humanity and any semblance of a healed, livable Earth — we need to reconnect with the living energies and Divine Wisdom…
“Many were born for a world that is just coming to be. If you have felt lost before and been frustrated in realizing your purpose here, this is your time.” ~ Steve Nelson, Gaiastrology, August 2014 It is a time... Continue Reading →
How have the past few weeks been for you? Or months? Years? We're dancing through our days amidst a bevy of high-frequency Energies of Now: The ongoing Uranus-Pluto square (Sixties, Part 2 ... the next rung on that spiral); plus... Continue Reading →
Smoky Path from PDPhoto 
Love’s Messenger (1885), by Marie Spartali Stillman 
![A wee, green oasis in Death Valley, CA [Photo courtesy of PD Photo via Creative Commons]](https://sophiaschildren.files.wordpress.com/2014/02/pdphoto_death-valley_17_bg_082303.jpg)
