threads of the spiderwoman

Masks of the Goddess Proposal 2012

2012-01-27T21:15:00.001-07:00

Here I go! I have yet actually post my Project to my lists, and I already have been blessed with 3 backers!

I have a feeling this will happen for me, and Macha, and for the masks as yet unmade!

Synchronicity and "kickstarter"

2012-01-25T07:45:00.003-07:00

Today I launch my fundraising on Kickstarter for creating a new collection of "Masks of the Goddess"*** Here's the link (more information later) to the Project:

http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/166451574/the-masks-of-the-goddess-mythic-masks-and-theatre.

What I wanted to share is a funny synchronicity that happened yesterday I can't help but feel is most encouraging.

I was frustrated with all the online paperwork involved in setting it up, so I walked to the corner cafe for a bagel. While waiting, I grabbed a magazine, and had to laugh when I looked at the cover! For me it kind of said it all - including an article about "many masks", and, on a personal note, something about Nebraska as well (I wrote an article about spirit contact and synchronicity I called "Angels in Nebraska" in 2005).

I like to think, no, I am certain, that the Goddess has quite a sense of humor. Here's something similar (photo below) that happened to me as I stopped to visit the Roman Baths en route to the Goddess Conference in England last summer.

***The money I raise will also provide funding for the "inaugural performance" of the new collection at the 2012 Women and Mythology Conference in San Francisco, produced and directed by author and ritualist M. Macha NightMare. As she describes it,

"Around the world 'spirits of place' have revealed themselves to us, encounters that generated stories told over the ages. With masks especially created for this event, we propose a ritual performance that offers all celebrants encounters with these goddesses as they have been known in the past, and as they exist today."


At *"The Spiral Dance*" (2006) (Courtesy San Francisco Chronicle

Invoking, Beginning, Procrastinating.....

2012-01-23T09:30:00.023-07:00

"Gaia's Hand" (2012)

I had a dream the other night (it was rather graphic) about getting together with an unknown man with the aim of becoming pregnant. He was quite obliging. Weird......but I suppose, in symbolic terms, it's a good sign..........

The day before I went into surgery in November, I received an email from Prema Dasara, who wanted to knowif I was still interested in creating the 21 masks of Tara we had discussed in previous years - they were to be made in Bali, a collaboration with Balinese artists. I felt very much encouraged by this synchronicity (I often pray to Tara for healing), and said (to Prema and to Tara) that I would be most glad to do it if the results of my surgery were positive. And so they were!

But Prema has had to cancel the project for this year. I reflected on how many women have requested the use of the "Masks of the Goddess" Collection, which was sold at a benefit auction for the Independent Eye's production of The Descent of Inanna in 2008 (I'll write about this powerful play in the future).

Elizabeth Fuller in "The Descent of Inanna" (2008)

So I decided, since Prema's project fell through, that I would make a new collection of 21 masks of Goddesses, which I would hold in trust for all those who wish to use them in the future. To get the funding I'd need to buy the time and materials to make the masks a friend suggested I use Kickstarter.

Mana Young and Cast, Black Box Theatre, Oakland (2002)

But I seem to be having the hardest time getting myself to post and start the 7-week fundraising process. I have to feed the cat, or take a nap, or watch Poirot......my video is good, my writeup is good, my "rewards" items (what people will receive as gifts for donating to the Project) are excellent (among them, the ceramic "Gaia's Hand" Icon above.) I guess it's like turning on the ignition and beginning a trip that will take you across the country. Or taking that first step toward the airline check-in desk. This might be a long trip......

The Road goes ever on and on

Now far ahead the Road has gone,

And I must follow, if I can,

Until it joins some larger way

Where many paths and errands meet.

And whither then? I cannot say.

J.R.R. Tolkien

At "The Spiral Dance" (2006) (Courtesy San Francisco Chronicle)

I guess I just have to close my eyes and take the plunge. Synchronicities have clustered around the idea almost before I began. Almost simultaneously, my friend Macha NightMare (Have Broom Will Travel), who I've collaborated with in the past, proposed a first "inaugeral" performance at the Women and Mythology Conference in May. Something very close to my heart, ideas I've been wondering and wandering about ever since I walked among the Stones in Avebury, and felt the living presence of the Springs in Avalon last summer - the Spirits of Place. Here's Macha's Abstract:

"Ritual studies scholar Ronald Grimes suggests that relearning of ritual ways can help us re-attune to the environment at a time when the ability of our Earth to sustain our lives is imperiled. “The surge of popular interest in the ecological possibilities of ritual is fed by a rich, publicly consumed ethnographic literature, some of which depicts rites as a primary means of being attuned to the environment.” Artists, ecological restorationists, and composers are exploring the use of ritual to enhance our understanding of our interdependence and our responsibilities as a species to attend to maintaining of a healthy Web of Life.

Around the world natural phenomena and spirits of place have revealed themselves to us in anthropomorphic forms. These encounters generated stories that were told over the ages. Employing the use of sacred masks especially created for this event by Lauren Raine, using rhythm and chant, narrative and movement, and current scientific knowledge (physics, geology, biology, ecology, climatology, et al.), we propose a ritual performance that offers all celebrants encounters with these goddesses, as they have been known in the past and as they exist today."

She invites story/voice and ideas from others in the evolution of this piece. I touch the violet amethyst pendant I found in an apple tree in Glastonbury, which I wear around my neck feeling very much that it was a gift from the Lady of Avalon, and try to imagine how I might tell that story..........and what voice the Desert Goddess might have as well.............Well. Time to take the plunge, pull out the threads and start weaving, re-weaving, and spinning.

I'll begin my journey with the only Goddess mask I still have, Flora, the Roman Goddess of flowers, and originator of May Day celebrations (at least in Rome). Florence is also my mother's name, and Flora was the name of my great grandmother. The mask spent the past 6 months with a woman who lost her son, and wanted the mask for healing. I'm sure she has infused the mask with the beginnings of story..........Flowers are a good place to begin, they represent beauty, and the invitation to new life.

Fertility it is, insemination, all that. As far as that dream goes.......at 62, I'm way beyond May Queen. Sometimes I feel more akin to Miss Marple. But Symbolic it is.

** This is interesting! When I went to "Preview" function before posting this, I noticed that there were many links (viewed only on Preview) to a blog called "Dakini Dreams". As I understand it, Dakini's can be seen as angelic messengers, muses, and spiritual guides or workers of energy, although the meaning in Tibetan Buddhism is much more complex and complicated. But it is interesting that this otherwise "invisible" link always comes up, and is usually the only link shown, when I check out "preview", or look up comments from my Blogger Dashboard...... I've never thought much about it, but here's a recent example of how it comes up, although it doesn't show in published comments, etc.:

1 comments:

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Dakini Dreams: What I'm Reading

Great Synchronicity, no?

Honor and Carolyn Myss

2012-01-22T18:36:00.002-07:00

"We seem to be having a crisis of honor............Lying and deceit dominate public politics and public life, business, academics, and even the arts. As a result our children have virtually no valid role models on which to model their own sense of honor."

Carolyn Myss, Why People Don't Heal And How They Can (1997)

I read this morning an article in one of my favorite blogs, that of Rob and Trish Macgregor ("Haunting Synchronicity", dated 1-22) in which they talk about Newt Gingrich, who just might become the next Presidential candidate. They note that:

"Gingrich’s achilles’ heel is his legacy of three wives and the sordid way he left the first two. He was in the midst of an extra-marital affair with future wife three when he was leading the attack on President Clinton for his affair with M.L. This past week, wife two in a tell-all interview with ABC exposed Newt’s request for an open marriage while he was acting outraged about Clinton’s tryst."

I well remember the viciousness of that attack on Clinton, led by Gingrich, which among other things cost tax payers some 40 million dollars as conservatives tried to impeach the President for his affair with Monica Lewinsky. I can't help but equate Gingrich with the loss of honor in government, because he has consistently shown himself hypocritical as well as mean spirited.

Medical intuitive Carolyn Myss is one of the new paradigm's most articulate healers. She has commented that we are becoming a culture without honor, which she likens to spiritual "back bone", what we need to support us, to hold us up. Without a personal and social sense of honor, we are like people without a foundation, without the strength to be sustainable. I'm taking the liberty of copying below from an article Carolyn wrote about honor shortly after the Tsunami struck Japan last year. I think what she has to say is important. And I hope Newt never becomes President.

Reflections on the Power of Honor

by Caroline Myss on Thursday, March 17, 2011

An inspirational story from Japan is being shared, from a sister in Sendai:

"If someone has water running in their home, they put out a sign so people can come fill up their jugs. I come back to my shack and I find food and water left in my entrance. There has been no looting, no pushing in lines. People leave their front door open. People say, "Oh, this is how it used to be in the old days when everyone helped one another."

This small story is touching the hearts of thousands of people. Today on a conference call, someone read this story to an entire group of people, then added, "What an example of love and compassion." She was mistaken. Such actions are not just motivated by love and compassion. The absence of looting is not the result of love and compassion. Nor is the choice to stand in line patiently, waiting your turn. This is the result of having a deeply rooted sense of honor. The choice to not steal from a person who has already lost nearly everything in a catastrophe comes from realizing that such an act is the ultimate dishonorable choice. The Japanese come from a society rooted in a long running code of honor, of not losing face. Nothing would be more dishonorable to a Japanese person than to steal from another person who has lost home, business, or family, much less much of the nation they share.
An honor code is power - period. And we are witnessing that power holding the social fabric of Japan together.

In schools in the United States, words such as "morality" and "ethics", much less "honor" are practically banned. Fundamentalists and other such lunatic extremists consider those subjects "religious". The result of listening to what in fact are the politics of these people has been, ironically, morally devastating to the generations that have since followed the ruling that banned the use of these words or courses involving discussions of that subject matter. Who now can speak about the importance of refining a personal honor code or the importance of studying ethics or learning how to navigate one's way through a moral crisis?

The lack of instruction of such essential soul knowledge is now evident in that we rely upon law suits to fill in the absence of honor. We just assume the lack of honor in another person, considering it foolish to do business without a contract or a lawyer. Even if we know them, when it comes to business - well, you just can't be sure honor stretches into that area of a person's character. Right? I mean, come on. Why? Because the other person might just lack a sense of honor - you just can't be sure these days. Why take a chance?Never mind refining our personal sense of honor. We would rather have our sights locked onto to the other person's lack of honor and that's that.

The truth is we have become an obsessively litigious society precisely because we are no longer an honorable one. Or, as Benjamin Franklin would say, we are people without virtue. Trusting another, doing business with a handshake, honoring one's word - why, that's just considered old world. Who keeps their word these days?

We don't respect this entire spiritual wisdom to either demand it be taught in our schools - and NOT as a religious topic but as a HUMAN ESSENTIAL - or to insure that such sacred knowledge is passed within the home. The handing down of a personal honor code is not a weekend course. It is taught through the example of an elder, a parent. Children inherently look for that instruction. They have a yearning to be schooled in honor because it requires something of them. It demands that they rise up to a certain standard of self-respect and from this standard, self-esteem awakens.

As I write this, memories of the disaster of Hurricane Katrina are flowing through my mind. Vividly I recall that the National Guard was called out immediately due to looting while streets were still soaked with water. Rescue teams poured into the sea of confusion (no pun intended) while the chaos grew exponentially by the hour. Unlike Japan, panic, anger, and outrage soon followed. FEMA was more than disorganized and unprepared, as people were ushered into a stadium. But my purpose is not to recall those familiar details. Rather, details of how we responded under crisis versus how the Japanese are now responding strike me as worthy of note......

......The people of New Orleans were told that the levees would hold back the water. As a result the much needed funds to repair them were denied. Structural engineers warned authorities that the walls were in desperate need of repair but would we consider our politicians honorable individuals? Do we really believe they are even capable of telling the truth? We now assume we are lied to in this country far more than we assume we are spoken to with respect, which is to say, told the truth.

We are treated with dishonor and we accept it as normal. How incredible is that? Is it any wonder then that the Earth is so dishonored or nature or that endless policy decisions are made that lack any sense of honor or evidence of human dignity?

Living an honorable life comes at a cost. You have to be willing to stand for something, for values that mean something to people other than yourself. Your values have to make a difference in the world. They have to count, especially in a crisis or when the outcome of your choices - your word - matters to the lives of others.

Dishonorable people could care less about whether safety standards are actually met in nuclear plants or coal mines or in air traffic control towers. Their interest is the corporate bottom line - profits. Never mind if the "losses" are human beings. But the power of honorable people committed to making a difference in the world actually have the power to make a difference.

Consider that one paragraph from the woman from Sendai, writing about how the people of Japan are sharing everything in this time of crisis. Her words are piercing the hearts of thousands because they are true. They make each of us want to share, to keep our doors open, to be gracious, generous - to be honorable down to our souls. That's the power of one person. I look at the people of Japan with prayers in my heart and gratitude for the example of an extraordinary people who have entered into the beginning of their dark night. I know ours is coming. I pray we learn from their example.

Love,
Caroline

Update on the Temple of Sekhmet

2012-01-20T08:26:00.003-07:00

I'm delighted to have been given a residency at the Temple of Sekhmet in Nevada (not far from Las Vegas) on the 17th to 26th of April.

I'll be teaching a Masks of the Goddess mask making weekend workshop there for women. (I love especially doing workshops where the participants can stay overnight, and "incubate" the work together).

Looking forward to meeting the people at the Temple, which is also a major center for Peace Activism, and meeting the Goddess of the Desert.

Image of "Sekhmet" courtesy Abbi Spinner McBridge

"Om Sekhmet" Invocational Music by Abbi Spinner McBride

Urgent: Stop Censorship of the Internet before 1 - 24

2012-01-18T11:10:00.008-07:00

We've seen many erosions of our democracy in the past decade. And to control the media and transmission of information is THE most significant way to control people. Millions of Americans oppose SOPA and PIPA because these bills would censor the Internet and slow economic growth in the U.S. Two bills before Congress, known as the Protect IP Act (PIPA) in the Senate and the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) in the House, would censor the Web and impose harmful regulations on American business. Please take the time to understand how misleading these bills are, and how they could be used to control and censor the Internet in disatrous ways before it is too late. Here's where you can sign a petition sponsored by Google:

https://www.google.com/landing/takeaction/

Supporters of PIPA and SOPA:

RIAA, MPAA, News Corp, TimeWarner, Walmart, Nike, Tiffany, Chanel, Rolex, Sony, Juicy Couture, Ralph Lauren, VISA, Mastercard, Comcast, ABC, Dow Chemical, Monster Cable, Teamsters, Rupert Murdoch.........and more "major brands"...........

Opponents of PIPA and SOPA:

Google, Yahoo, Wikipedia, craigslist, Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, eBay, AOL, Mozilla, Reddit, Tumblr, Etsy, Zynga, EFF, ACLU, Human Rights Watch........

Here's how you can sign a petition by the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU):

https://secure.aclu.org/site/Advocacy?cmd=display&page=UserAction&id=3859

And here's from the staff of Craig's list:

STOP PIPA and SOPA

S968 and HR3261 are threatening CL and the rest of your Internet. Most of the web sites you use strongly oppose these bills. Find out why, and how you can help put a stop to this madness before it's too late!

★ ☆ ★ ☆ ★ ☆ ★ ☆ ★ about SOPA:

Corporate supporters of Senate 968 (PIPA) and HR 3261 (SOPA) demand the ability to take down any web site (including craigslist, Wikipedia, or Google) that hurts their profits -- without prior judicial oversight or due process -- in the name of combating "online piracy." PIPA and SOPA authors and supporters insist they'd only go after foreign piracy sites, but Internet Engineers understand this is an attempt to impose "Big Brother" controls on our Internet, complete with DNS hijacking and censoring search results. Incredibly, many Congress Members favor this idea.

Tell Congress you OPPOSE Senate 968 "Protect IP Act" (PIPA) and H.R. 3261 "Stop Online Piracy Act" (SOPA):

Phone your Member of Congress via nifty Progressive Change app
Contact Senators who are refusing to meet with constituents about PIPA.
EFF Action Center - Strike Against Censorship - Congressional Emailer
ECA Congressional Emailer - Don't Censor Our Internet!
OpenCongress Congressional Emailer - Oppose SOPA
Generic Congressional Emailer (You'll need your Zip+4)
Petition Congress - Protect Innovation, Dump SOPA (Progressive Change )
Outside the US? Sign Petition Opposing US Censorship of Global Sites (EFF)

Where does your Member of Congress stand on PIPA and SOPA? PIPA and SOPA Are Too Dangerous To Revise.....they Must Be Killed Entirely .
Congress needs to hear from you, or these dangerous bills will pass - they have tremendous lobbying dollars behind them, from corporations experts say are attempting to prop up outdated, anti-consumer business models at the expense of the very fabric of the Internet -- recklessly unleashing a tsunami of take-down notices and litigation. Don't believe it? Monster Cable has labeled craigslist a "rogue site," earmarked for blacklisting and full-takedown under PIPA .

**(Note: Are we ready to lose Craigslist so Monster Cable can improve its profits?)

There is still time to be heard. Congress is starting to backpedal on this job-killing, anti-American nonsense, and the Obama administration has weighed in against these bills as drafted, but SOPA/PIPA cannot be fixed or revised -- they must be killed altogether. Learn more about SOPA, Protect IP (PIPA), and Internet Blacklisting:

Growing Chorus of Opposition to PIPA and SOPA
Open Letter against SOPA from 83 Prominent Internet Engineers
Why SOPA and Protect IP (PIPA) are Bad, Bad Ideas (Techdirt)
Piracy not a problem, PIPA and SOPA are unnecessary (Tim O'Reilly on GigaOM)
PIPA and SOPA News (Google News)
PIPA Wikipedia entry ::::: SOPA Wikipedia entry
SOPA FAQ (CNET)

As Bill Moyers has famously pointed out (you can see him speaking about Media and Democracy on Link TV at: http://www.linktv.org/programs/special_moyers) democracy is not possible without freedom of information and speech. Below is an excerpt from his 2007 speech on media and propaganda.

Temple of Sehkmet in the Desert

2012-01-16T16:50:00.001-07:00

There's a Temple dedicated to the Egyptian Lioness Goddess Sekhmet in the Nevada desert.........a wonderful place that offers retreat and ritual.

The Temple of Sekhmet was built in 1993, and continues to thrive. Candace Ross is the resident Priestess, since 2007.

There is a lovely song dedicated to Sekhmet, and to the Temple in Nevada, by Abbi Spinner - the link below will take you to it:

"Om Sekhmet" by Abbi Spinner McBride

As an aside, as I was browsing for contemporary devotees of Sekhmet (after, of course, Wikipedia) I ran across this:

'This is an Informational/Devotional site concerning what the ancient Egyptian lion-headed Goddess Sekhmet–as the Goddesss of Synchronicity–is doing during THIS Space/Time."

From All Things Sekhmet

The Goddess of synchronicity............hmm........I hope to learn more about this Goddess and her temple in the desert!

Try our slideshow creator at Animoto.

Andrew Harvey and the Goddess

2012-01-12T08:58:00.003-07:00

"Hands" by Lorraine Capparell

"At the end of his life, the great Indian mystic Aurobindo said, “If there is to be a future, it will wear the crown of feminine design.” Unless we awaken to the mystery of the sacred feminine, and allow it to glow into, irradiate, illumine and penetrate every area of our activity, we will die out and take nature, or a large part of it, with us. Unless we come to know what the sacred feminine really is — its subtlety and flexibility, but also its extraordinarily ruthless, radical power of dissolving all structures and dogmas, all prisons in which we have sought so passionately to imprison ourselves — we will be taken in by patriarchal projections of it. The Divine Mother, the fullness of the revolution that she is preparing, will be lost to us. We must understand that comprehending the sacred feminine is a crucial part of surviving the next terrible stage of humanity."

Andrew Harvey

I'm preparing to work on a new series of Masks of the Goddess, and will do some fundraising for the time and materials I'll need to finish the project this year, and I also just proposed a paper for the conference held by the Association for the Study of Women and Mythology. I've been thinking about this for a while, and have had so many requests for the masks, that I feel it's time to make another collection, and hold them in trust for any who may wish to use them to explore and tell these important, worldwide stories. Whew........big project, but it's time. And because I conceive of the masks as not just for theatre, but as tools for invocation, for changing consciousness, I need to do some serious preparation internally before I can begin the process. There's a kind of collaboration going on here, a clearing out and inviting in.

As a student of mythology, I'm not sure it's possible to separate theology from mythology, or sometimes to separate mythology from "magic", which Starhawk defined as "the art of changing consciousness at will". We conceive of what is sacred, or not, through symbol systems, the play of the archetypal powers in the country of myth. The sacred speaks to us continually, but is translated through story and image. We personify ideas, personalize the Divine in order to experience the Divine......our artwork, our meditations, our prayers, activate the gods. And as we experience them, they experience us. I know this sounds strange, but I don't know how to express it. As Jung wrote, the archetypes have their own collective lives within the collective consciousness of humanity. There is reciprocity.

So, as we in-voke the Goddess, She joins with us to shape and change us. I agree with Andrew Harvey , whose mysticism I greatly admire, that now is the time when the Dark Goddess is needed, the one who reveals the shadow that illuminates the light. So much of my own empowerment in the past few years have been "shadow work", the often painful process of uncovering what is below the surface. One thing important to remember about the Black Madonna, for me, is that She is pregnant. She is no gentle mother, but she does carry within the new birth, the child of the future, the embryo. Like Kali, She is the one who clears away and reveals, in no easy way, that which must leave in order for this birth, this new generation, to come into the world. So I think that will be the first mask I make.

Theologian Andrew Harvey has written passionately about in the sacred feminine. the Dark Goddess, in this crucial evolutionary time, which is now 2012.

Black Madonna (2005)

"There's another kind of crucifixion going on (today): crucifixion of purpose and hope. Everybody is totally bewildered. They know that the world is potentially on the brink of apocalypse. There's a tremendous danger that as people wake up to the horror of what is going on, they will run into political extremism or into fundamentalism of one kind or another.

So it's extremely important that the wisdom of the 'dark night of the soul' gets across, because if people understand the necessity for this crucifixion, and understand that it's preparing a resurrection and empowerment, then they will be prepared to go through it without too much fear, trusting in the logic of the divine transformation.

The Benedictine monk Bede Griffiths shared with me his experience of the dark night of the soul. He said he was sitting outside his hut one day when he felt as if a hand hit him on the right side of his being. He had suffered a massive heart attack that destroyed what he described as his
patriarchal mind and gave him access to a much deeper elaboration of Oneness with all things.

He said, "It's a very strange thing, but when I thought of surrendering to the Mother I of course thought of Mary--I often say the 'Hail Mary'--but it was Mary as the Black Madonna that came into my mind. She is the mother of the earth as well as heaven, of the body as well as the soul, the mother of the subconscious, the hidden, of all those powers that the 'masculine' mind represses; the Mother of the sacred darkness. In Her the Western Christian vision of the Divine Mother and the Eastern one merge and meet; you can think of her as both Mary and Kali, both preserver and destroyer. From that time on, I have turned to Her again and again.
Invoking Her strength and grace, I find, makes the 'birth' go so much faster and more cleanly."

from BLACK MADONNA RETURNS, by Andrew Harvey

The Virtues and Vices

2012-01-11T12:14:00.005-07:00

"Generosity"

I'm in a show next week at Raices Teller Gallery, and the theme for the show is "Virtue and Vice". According to the dictionary, the 4 traditional cardinal virtues are prudence, justice, temperance, and fortitude, which are derived from Greek philosophy. The Church added faith, hope, and charity. The 7 Deadly Sins are Pride, Envy, Gluttony, Lust, Wrath, Greed, and Sloth. If you want to know more about them in particular, there's a handy website called Deadly Sins.com, which informs me that "you probably commit some of them every day without thinking about the rich tradition of eternal damnation in which you're participating."*

That's enough to cause me to pause as I reach for that 4th chocolate chip cookie.

"There is, I believe, in every disposition a tendency to some particular evil— a natural defect, which not even the best education can overcome."

Jane Austen, Pride and Prejudice

But the show has me thinking about what virtue and vice actually mean to me. Often without thinking about it, we predicate much of our judgement of others, and ourselves, on externalized and internalized ideas of what are virtues or vices. And virtues and vices vary from culture to culture and individual to individual in their importance or lack thereof. And, unlike the world of Jane Austen, so full of moral certainties which gave a comforting "backbone" to the lives of her characters, our is a time of tremendous confusion. I've been thinking about what my own thoughts on virtue and vice are in these strange times, so forgive me if I ponder them for a little while.

HONOR

Although it's not on the "big list" of Virtue, what I find myself thinking about a great deal is HONOR. And it's diminutive expression, COURTESY. Honor..........The circulation of goods in a local economy is obviously not the same as the massive, impersonal world of Wall Street. Capitalism as we experience it is based on manipulation of others, with little regard, if any, for the moral consequences. In fact, people get advanced degrees in how to manipulate the market and people to buy things they don't really need.

When was the last time you saw something for sale for $1.00?
$5.00? $10.00? Long ago someone figured out that if something is priced at $1.99, people can be manipulated into buying something because is seems to be $1 and not what it really is, which is one penny short of $2. So absolutely everything has a 99 on the end of it - this dishonesty and lack of respect for those who engage in the exchange of money for goods is written into virtually every mercantile exchange we make. It's worth thinking about what that means in terms of the notion of honor, and business.

Here's something else we take for granted as "the way things are". We have labor unions to protect the workers, to provide fair wages, pensions at retirement. We have laws that protect against child labor, hours that are unfair, and that protect the environment. All the way it should be - but very little is made in the U.S. anymore. Every time you go into Walmart you are participating in a hypocrisy. There's a chance that that tee shirt, or beaded bag, was made in a sweatshop by a 14 year girl working 13 hour days in an environment that spews toxins into the local river with impunity. And we're paying for it big time. I think of how many sad, impoverished, abandoned down towns I've driven through, whether Herkimer, New York, or Beatrice, Nebraska, or Lordsburg, New Mexico......and on the outskirts of each, the Big Box stores. If money is the basis for what we value, and how we determine worth, then honor falls by the wayside, or moves to the outskirts of town, sucking up the prosperity that should be at the center, and giving little back.

Anyway, the hour is getting late, and I must ramble on virtue and vice later........

______________________
* They have an excellent, updated section called "The People's Choice: Nominate a New Deadly Sin". I admire them for their efforts to keep up with the times.

Evolutionary Humor

2012-01-09T20:46:00.001-07:00

My friend Charlie comes up with some funny ones........

"Thrive" Movie

2012-01-08T10:35:00.000-07:00

Here's an interesting movie that a friend recently passed on information to me about (thanks Joyce!). I haven't seen it fully, so can't really comment about it, but plan on seeing it soon.

The author of the movie, Foster Gamble, begins his introduction with the question "What happened? What can account for the staggering deprivation and suffering on this planet?" ..... he has his own conclusions, and conversation, within the movie. I can't help but add my own comment, which is to say, I do believe the first solution arises from a profound understanding of inter-dependency, that on virtually every level, socially, environmentally, psychically, energetically..........we are all related, and interdependant. From that much can be accomplished. If we can evolve to internalize such a basic truth.

Hands

2012-01-07T08:16:00.000-07:00

To feel abandoned is to deny
the intimacy of your surroundings.
The stairs are your mentor of things
to come, the doors have always been there
to frighten you and invite you
Put down the weight
of your aloneness
and ease into the conversation.
Everything is waiting for you.

-- David Whyte

from Everything is Waiting for You

©2003 Many Rivers Press

I've been in the studio making hands with roots again........I never seem to get tired of that image. This excerpt from a poem came to mind. Perhaps that's one of the meanings of my obsessive hands - the rootedness of our lives in all other lives, the past and present and future, poised in an open hand. It seems a beginning place for me, an icon I need to begin the new year with, to help me remember that we live in a relational world, a "Conversation".

2012!......Spider Woman's Time

2011-12-30T11:46:00.006-07:00

“What might we see, how might we act, if we saw with a webbed vision? The world seen through a web of relationships…as delicate as spider’s silk, yet strong enough to hang a bridge on.”

Catherine Keller, Theologian, "From a Broken Web" (1987)

"We do not need to invent a ground of connectedness, but only to realize it. Inter relatedness has been experientially grasped in myriad cultural contexts - yet the force of modernity continually denies and degrades it."

Charlene Spretnak, from The Politics of Women's Spirituality

Where will the "5th World" begin? Will Spider Woman, called also Tse che Nako, "Thought Woman" in some Pueblo traditions - will She come again, to help humanity find our way once more into the Next World?

I believe so, truly I do. It seems important to honor Spider Woman today, so I felt like sharing some little of what I know of Her again, on the advent of 2012, this great moment, this "Fifth World", this New Age. I feel her threads, brushing against my cheek, my hand, these days.

As I sit in this internet cafe, the buzz of electronically connected and connecting people all around me with their laptops and devices....I can't help but feel that, ever inventive and working with the times, the World Wide Web....is Spider Woman's latest appearance. She's weaving all around us, waking us up.

Pueblo mythology tells that when each of the 3 Hopi worlds ended, it was Spider Grandmother who led the people through the sipapu, through the kiva (or birth canal) into the next world, the "4th world". Now, according to the Hopi and Mayan calendars (and this is no coincidence, since they are related cultures)....the 4th World has ended. The Fifth World is beginning. With so many people tuned to the "2012" myth, which has reached almost archetypal proportions thanks to Hollywood, it seems strange that so few know of Spider Woman, the universal midwife.

But, that's kind of Her way. She stays hidden, until people are ripe to listen. She doesn't waste her time. She comes when the time is right, the labor pangs have begun.

"It is through the poetry of myth, mask and metaphor Spider Woman comes alive. The rock surface of an ancient petroglyph site is merely a veil between the observer and the other transcendental realms; it becomes a portal through which to enter the world of Spider Woman. As others have written before me: "She is with me now as I tell you these stories."

Carol Patterson-Rudolph, "On The Trail of Spider Woman" (1997)

As anthropologist Carol Patterson-Rudolph has written, to the Navajo Spider Woman ((NA ASHJE’II ’ASDZÁÁ) represents an initiation into a mature, integrated way of being. It could be said into a more interconnected way of seeing, a "webbed vision". She is able to bridge the sacred and prosaic dimensions of life - but for those who are not ready, Grandmother Spider will remain invisible, just as invisible as her powerful but transparent threads, as insignificant as a tiny insect, so small she can sit on a shoulder, or patiently wait in her web, and never be seen.

And yet, for those with eyes to see, her Web is everywhere, and she will offer wisdom with a still, small voice, carried in the breath of the wind.

Hopi legend tells that each previous world was destroyed when humanity fell out of harmony with the divine plan. Not unlike the Biblical Great Flood, in some versions of the legend, the world became, once again, full of chaos and war. At last a terrible deluge destroyed everything, and only a few survived, led by Spider Woman to the next higher world, changing in many ways as they as they emerged. In the most prevalent version of this story, Spider Grandmother caused a hollow reed to emerge into the Fourth World at the sipapu, the hole in the earth (I think of the Omphallos, the world navel of ancient Greece) from which the people emerged as they climbed up the reed into this 4th world.

The earliest "Spider Woman" image is found among the Mayans, and she is clearly also identified as Mother Earth. Among the Pueblo peoples of the American Southwest, Grandmother Spiderwoman is also called "Thought Woman" ("Tse Che Nako"). She is a Creatrix deity as well, and can be found among the Navajo, the Lakota, the Zuni, Hopi, Cherokee............she is ubiquitous. Images of the "Spider and Cross" are found everywhere among prehistoric peoples throughout the South and Midwest, the Mississippian mound builders.

In Navajo rugs, “Spider Woman’s Cross” is a symbol of balance or completion. To this day, a bit of spider web is rubbed into the palms of infant girls, so they will become a good weavers. Spider Woman's threads weave from the center of life. We are all Relations......."look" she seems to instruct, "see the pattern, see the threads, the symmetry. Weave your lives from there."

In his book on Hopi religion, John Loftin writes that:

“Spider Woman was the first to weave. Her techniques and patterns have stood the test of time, or more properly, the test of timelessness – because they have always been present. It makes sense that one would follow the instructions of a deity who helped to form the underlying structure of the world in which one lives…..…..Weaving is not an act in which one creates something oneself – it is an act in which one uncovers a pattern that was already there.”

Thought Woman as creatrix spins the world into being with what she imagines, with the stories she tells about the world, spun from her very substance, her silken threads that are invisible, yet stronger than steel. Threads organize into patterns, ever expanding in complexity and scale. Tse Che Nako weaves, sharing the creative power with all of her descendants. We are all "Spider Woman's hands", weaving, bringing the imaginal, transparent web into being. There is a contemporary Hopi prophecy circulating on the web these days that says "the time of the lone wolf is over." I agree. The esoteric knowledge of our inter-dependancy, and of our quontum creative power, is no longer hidden, it's right here, before our very eyes.

Tse Che Nako, Thought-Woman, The Spider
is sitting in Her room now thinking up a good story.
I'm telling you the story She is thinking."

Keresan Pueblo Proverb

A spiritual paradigm is founded upon mythic roots - the "warp and woof” from which ideas grow. Following the metaphor Katherine Keller has provided in her book "From a Broken Web" - can we can find contemporary mythic models that allow us to envision our world as it really is – a shimmering web of interconnected relationships, an ecology of being. Can we find ways to "see the world with a webbed vision”? Can we take Spider Woman's gift, and emerge collectively into the 5th World?

As we each rub a bit of spider web into the palms of our hands at the New Year, wishing all my friends strength, vision, and loving Relations.

"The question is not so much "What do I learn from stories" as "What stories do I want to live?" Insofar as I'm non-dual with my narratives, that question is just as much, "What stories want to come to life through me?"

David R. Loy, "The World is Made of Stories"

References:

Loftin, John D. , Religion and Hopi Life, Second Edition, Indiana University Press, 2003
Keller, Catherine, From a Broken Web (1989), Thames & Hudson
Patterson-Rudolph, Carol, On the Trail of Spiderwoman, 1997, Ancient City Press

Winter Poem

2011-12-27T06:06:00.000-07:00

From "The winter of Listening"

All this petty worry
while the great cloak
of the sky grows dark
and intense round every living thing.

What is precious
inside us does not
care to be known
by the mind
in ways that diminish
its presence.

What we strive for
in perfection
is not what turns us
into the lit angel
we desire,

what disturbs
and then nourishes
has everything
we need.

Inside everyone
is a great shout of joy
waiting to be born.

Even with the summer
so far off
I feel it grown in me
now and ready
to arrive in the world.

All those years
listening to those
who had
nothing to say.

All those years
forgetting
how everything
has its own voice
to make
itself heard.

All those years
forgetting
how easily
you can belong
to everything
simply by listening.

And the slow
difficulty
of remembering
how everything
is born from
an opposite
and miraculous
otherness.

Silence and winter
has led me to that
otherness.

So let this winter
of listening
be enough
for the new life
I must call my own.

. . . . . . . . . .

by David Whyte

Life Between Life - Michael Newton

2011-12-26T10:48:00.001-07:00

I woke up at around 5:00 this morning because I heard my cell phone ringing loudly. Not fully awake, I lumbered around looking for the darn thing. When I finally found it, it showed no history of any call whatsoever. So, awake now, I crawled back into bed, and picked up the book I'd been reading the previous night, which I opened to a page about how spirit guides contact their embodied students.....and I couldn't help but think, "well, if you're going to call, can you please leave a message?" That's one "wake up call" I'll remember!

"Journey of Souls" by Michael Newton Ph.D. has been around since the 90's, and there are several other books he's written about his many years of research as well. Dr. Newton began as a hypnotherapist, and as he recounts, stumbled on a patient who "re-membered", from a transpersonal state, being in the spirit realm, between lives on earth. He, and his colleagues, have since worked with hundreds of people to explore the subject, and the "between life therapy" he's developed aims to help people understand better the "soul purposes" of why they incarnated. Now retired, Dr. Newton has founded the Michael Newton Institute, which trains practitioners in past and between life therapy.

I confess, it's a strange book, written in such a dry, academic style, that I sometimes have to laugh, considering the vastness of the subject. But impossible to put down. And my own "wake up call" may very well be about getting back to work...........

Quotes for a Quantum New Year

2011-12-22T16:02:00.004-07:00

"Storyteller" by Lorraine Capparell

"God needs us as much as we need God. We need God because we are God's stories. God needs us because we are God's way to make new kinds of stories."

David R. Loy, "The World is Made of Stories"

People who deny the existence of dragons are often eaten by dragons.
From within. ”

― Ursula K. Le Guin

"Progress might have been alright once upon a time, but it has gone on for too long."

---Ogden Nash

"Stories are not abstractions from life but how we engage with it. We make stories and those stories make us human. We awaken into stories as we awaken into language, which is there before and after us. The question is not so much "What do I learn from stories" as "What stories do I want to live?" Insofar as I'm non-dual with my narratives, that question is just as much, "What stories want to come to life through me?"

David R. Loy, "The World is Made of Stories"

"As you read a book word by word and page by page, you participate in its creation, just as a cellist playing a Bach suite participates, note by note, in the creation, the coming-to-be, the existence, of the music. And, as you read and re-read, the book of course participates in the creation of you, your thoughts and feelings, the size and temper of your soul.”

― Ursula K. Le Guin

"With every passing hour our solar system comes 43 thousand miles closer to Globular Cluster M13 in the Constellation of Hercules, and still there are some misfits who continue to insist that there is no such thing as progress."

---Ransom K. Ferm

"What's a day without a good rationalization?"

---Fred (Bartender at the Crystal Korner Bar, Madison, Wisconsin)

"Our job was not to just re-tell the ancient myths, but to re-invent them for today. Artists are the myth makers."

Katherine Josten, The Global Art Project

"Tse Che Nako, Thought-Woman

The Spider
is sitting in Her room now
thinking up a good story.
I'm telling you the story
She is thinking."

Keresan Pueblo Proverb

Winter Solstice

2011-12-19T09:36:00.037-07:00

Photo by NASA

When language was young, when even the gods and goddesses had not yet entirely taken human form but still ran with the deer in the forest, or flew with the wings of crows, or were glimpsed the depths of a numinous pool........ even then, I think this was a holy day. The Sun was returning to the sleeping world.

Fires were lit to welcome the Shining One returning from the underworld. Stones aligned with the Sun's journey made a pathway, and food and drink were left to give the young god strength. Perhaps they danced through the long cold night, helping him on his way, keeping vigil.

Planet Earth turns her face toward her star again, she circles round, and we turn with her, every creat(e)ure within her fragile, azure skin. Happy Solstice!

I pledge allegiance

to the soil of Turtle Island,

and to the beings

who thereon dwell

one ecosystem in diversity

under the sun

With joyful

interpenetration for all.

Gary Snyder

Creativity, Art and Shamanism

2011-12-17T09:22:00.003-07:00

untitled (1970)

"We slowly pull focus, lifting up and away from being embedded in our lives until we attain an overview. This overview empowers us to make valid creative choices."

Julia Cameron, "The Artist's Way"

I've been thinking about the blog entry I wrote on Depression, thinking about it on two levels. First, I've been considering what the gifts of that depression may be, what I've needed to look at, change, grieve, or accept. I haven't made any art since my residency at Wesley 2 years ago, and so I took out The Artist's Way by Julia Cameron, intending to begin her course.

The other thing I considered was the need to remember the trans-personal nature of creativity - of mind. Spider Woman's Web. What came to mind recently is a group I belong to who are mostly practicing and retired therapists. Although I have great respect for them, I've been feeling ill at ease in the group. Psychologists can tend to "pathologize" - they often see others in terms of an assumed standard of mental health and normalcy. I understand why, and I honor the experience they bring to the group. And yet..........something is missing for me, there is not enough room in the group for the mystery, I find that I am often censoring myself.........

Untitled (1972)

There's a thin line between trans-personal, trans-formative, "non-ordinary states", and madness. Sometimes "madness" is also brilliant insight. Sometimes creativity arises from a liminal zone that should not be explained away or dismissed because it's outside of an "acceptable emotional spectrum". Just because we can't see ultra-violet with our eyes doesn't mean it's not there.

Carl Jung, who formed the concepts of synchronicity and the collective unconscious, had "spirit guides" that he considered a source of crucial insights, aspects of his psyche, "which he could produce, but which could also produce themselves, as having their own life". Among his "guides" were the archetypal mentor figure Philemon, an ancient Vedic scholar, and Basilides, an early Gnostic teacher in Alexandria., Egypt. It's also not well known that Jung's family included members who were known locally as mediums.

"Inspiration may be a form of super-consciousness, or perhaps of sub-consciousness....I wouldn't know. But I am sure it is the antithesis of self-consciousness."

untitled (1985)
Aaron Copeland

Recently I was talking with someone about artists as shamans, and as in the past, I both agree and disagree with this comparison. It's highly presumptuous for most artists to call themselves "shamans". Traditional shamans, while their practices and symbol systems may vary widely, do universally have a great deal of structure within which they work - they have cultural and tribal support, traditional systems that go back through many generations, systems of "visioning", containment, ordeals or initiations, and means of psychic protection that have evolved for hundreds of years. They have a lot of "invisible support" as well, a "strong container" within which their responsibilities are clear, often hereditary, and they are generally expected to be mature and richly experienced before they can begin practicing as shamanic healers. It's not a random, chaotic process at all.

"In the case of the Sami, my Shaman teacher was trained in her culture for thirty-five years before she could practice hearings on people outside of her extended family. When I pondered this, given the fact that she was born into a prestigious lineage of Shamans and that her talents were obvious when she was a child, I wondered why she had to study for so long before treating those outside of her kin group............My Shaman teacher was not only a healer, but she was also a student of folklore. This is important, because she always insisted that the three principal sources of her shamanic knowledge were Sami folklore (tales, legends, and so forth); teachings from the ancestral lineage-from her father, who was her mentor, and from other ancestral spirits, who spoke to her from the spirit world; and teachings from spirit entities (what we might call "spirit aides" or "power animals."

THE PLACE OF SHAMANISM IN ECOFEMINISM, Gloria Feman Orenstein

I was once privileged have a conversation with one of the founders of Eco-feminism, Gloria Orenstein.* Dr. Orenstein is a Professor of Comparative Literature and Gender Studies at USC in Los Angeles. In the 80's she became friends with, and worked with, a hereditary Sami shaman. (I have an article about her work with the Sami, and can't seem to find it on line - I'll try writing to her and see if she'll let me print it in this blog.) I always remembered the story she told me about the first time she went to visit her mentors' family in Finland. It was winter, very dark, and they had driven for many miles into the countryside, at last arriving at a house where she was given a room to sleep in. She said that she lay in bed wondering if she was crazy, coming all the way from Los Angeles in the dead of winter. Then she heard voices outside the window. They seemed to be calling for "Caffe, Caffe". In the morning she asked her hosts why people were outside in the freezing night, asking for coffee. They responded that this was a good sign, it meant she would receive help. It seems that in Samiland, like flowers and food in Bali, or whiskey to the Orishas of Cuba, coffee was an offering made to the spirit world.

I don't mean, of course, to negate the work of many contemporary shamans, such as Sandra Ingerman ("Soul Retrieval") or Michael Harner, who have studied traditions from around the world and evolved new forms of contemporary shamanism.

'St. George and the Dragon" (1969?)

I think I'm digressing. I wanted to demonstrate that making even the most visionary art does not make one a shaman, however, art process can be shamanic within it's healing capacity, and the way it can reveal the seamlessness, the weaving, of our inner lives. There is a liminal dimension to the creative process one can hardly fail to notice.

Going over some of my very old drawings, I was amazed to find the one above, which I did when I was about 18, of "St. George and the Dragon". I knew nothing whatsoever about feminism, the Goddess, or mythology ...... and yet I can read what became my life purpose, like hieroglyphics, in this little drawing. Here is a divine female figure, which I symbolized with wings, who seems to have a snake around her waist and in her hand. She's merged into the rather tragic looking figure of the dragon about to be slain by George, who looks nothing at all like a saint to me. (In fact, he looks kind of like my abusive boyfriend of the time.) This is a classic heroic tale - so why did I make "George" so un-noble? Behind him is a barren, rocky land, in contrast to the depths below the dragon figure, with vegetation bubbling up from the dark earth, and even something that looks like a dark moon shape as well.

The meanings I can now draw from these symbols represent many years of study and discussion as I became a feminist, and became involved in Eco-feminism and Goddess theology. In 1968 or so there might have been people like Merlin Stone thinking about the banished Goddess, the Earth Snake***, and the development of patriarchal religions, but I sure wasn't exposed to it until well into my 30's.

The drawing really is a kind of "future memory".

"Skin Shedder Mandala" (1985)

**"Synchronicity and The Shaman of Samiland" in UNCOILING THE SNAKE: ANCIENT PATTERNS IN CONTEMPORARY WOMEN'S LIVES (A Snakepower Reader). Edited by Vicki Noble. Harper & Row, San Francisco, 1993.

***I just noticed that the article above is a "SNAKEPOWER READER"..........!

Plant Healer's Magazine & Anima Center

2011-12-16T11:35:00.000-07:00

Back in June the survival of New Mexico's Anima Center was in question, as the terrible Wallow wildfire of 2011 drew near. It is perhaps a testament to the power of prayer, sweat, and intention that at seemingly the last moment, disaster did not happen, the rains came, and Anima's beautiful land was saved. Now I feel very honored to have two my works on the cover of their Plant Healers Magazine, a wonderful journal of art and thought on co-creation with the natural world. Thankyou, Wolf, Loba, and Kiva Rose. Wishing you and Anima many more inspired years of teaching us all "rewilding".

Plant Healer: A Journal of Traditional Herbalism

Enlivening the practice, culture and art of folk herbalism

Featuring experience-based adventurous writings by teachers, practitioners and plant lovers.
Combining inquiry, inspiration and skills in artful celebration of the evolving folk herbalism culture.

“This is the first publication I’ve seen in my 38-year career that captures the wild diversity of herbalism in North America while still reflecting excellence and high-level practice… points of view from many regions, traditions, and schools of North American thought.. for the practicing herbalist from entry level to advanced, inclusively.”
-Paul Bergner, North American Institute of Medical Herbalism

“Plant Healer is amazing… the most beautiful magazine I’ve ever seen, bar none!”
-Phyllis Light, Appalachian Center for Herbal Studies

Plant Healer 1 Year Subscription (Standard Membership)

Full membership includes not only 4 electronic issues of Plant Healer, but also access to over $200 worth of bonus downloads and other benefits such as audio recordings of TWH Conference concerts and classes, video recordings of classes, plant walks and concerts by respected TWH teachers and many beautiful full color handouts, posters and ebooks by Plant Healer authors and artists!

To learn more about Plant Healer Magazine: http://planthealermagazine.com/

To learn about Jesse Wolf Hardin, Loba, Kiva Rose and the Anima Center: http://animacenter.org/

Halleluiah!

2011-12-14T08:32:00.001-07:00

I just had to post this again! Happy Holidays!

Mass of the Moon Eclipse

2011-12-13T09:19:00.004-07:00

Lunar Eclipse, photo by Howard Brannen

Not more slowly than frayed

human attention can bear, but slow

enough to be stately, deliberate, a ritual

we can't be sure will indeed move

from death into resurrection.

As the bright silver inch by inch

is diminished, options vanish,

life's allurements. The last silver

lies face down, back hunched, a husk.

But then, obscured, the whole sphere can be seen

to glow from behind its barrier shadow: bronze,

unquenchable, blood-light. And slowly,

more slowly than desolation overcame, overtook

the light, the light

is restored, outspread in a cloudless pasture of

spring darkness where firefly planes

fuss to and fro, and humans

turn off their brief attention

in secret relief. No matter: the rite

contains its power, whether or not

our witness rises toward it;

grandeur plays out the implacable drama

without even flicking aside our trivial

absence, the impatience with which we

fail to respond.

And yet

we are spoken to, and sometimes

we do stop, do, do give ourselves leave

to listen, to watch. The moon,

the moon we do after all

love, is dying, are we to live

on a world without moon? We swallow

a sour terror. Then

that coppery sphere, no-moon become once more

full-moon, visible in absence.

And still without haste, silver

increment by silver

increment, the familiar, desired,

disregarded brilliance

is given again,

given and given.

Denise Levertov, "Mass of the Moon Eclipse"

from This Great Unknowing: Last Poems,

1999, New Directions Press

Certainly the Lunar Eclipse of the past weekend was a Rite of Passage for many. What came to mind, as I digest the kind of internal voyaging I've been doing was this magnificent poem by the late Denise Levertov. And wonderful as well, her title - to imagine an Eclipse as not a phenonomena, but a Mass, a celestial event that moves us all in its orbit into the sacred. Blessed be.

Depression - visiting Saturn's Shrine

2011-12-10T09:29:00.009-07:00

"Age", 1986

"Today we seem to prefer the word depression over sadness and melancholy. Perhaps its Latin form sounds more clinical and serious. But there was a time when melancholy was identified with the Roman god Saturn. To be depressed was to be "in Saturn", and a persona chronically disposed to melancholy was known as a "child of Saturn"......melancholic thoughts are deeply rooted in Saturn's preference for days gone by, for memory and the sense that time is passing. These thoughts and feelings, sad as they are, favor the soul's desire to be both in time and In eternity, and so in a strange way they can be pleasing."
Thomas Moore, "Care of the Soul"

"The Well of your Joy is as deep as the Well of your Sorrow."

Kalil Gibran

The past week or so I slipped into a depression. I've been so busy taking care of everything for so long, it was "unexpected". As if such things could be expected, put into the calendar. I became depressed because I'm living in a house alone where my mother and brother once lived, their cats and noise and lives, and they will never return. I became depressed because I remembered that tigers, and polar bears, and so many creatures are leaving the world, and it suddenly was very real to me. I became depressed because a lot of people have come to my house recently, and not one commented on my art, or even my orchids, but all of them talked, exhaustively, about money, and it sickened me. I became depressed because........

My depression fell over me like a heavy grey blanket, making it hard to move. What I found depressing as well was how very little permission I had from others, or myself, to experience it. Spiritually oriented acquaintances I tend to avoid at such times, because depression is not very positive or uplifting, and you can feel like a leper. Even my former therapist (seemed) to look at me like was a kind of lapsed alcoholic, and suggested a self-help book by a popular psychologist, and to begin her exercises right away.

To be honest, I thought wistfully of a long ago bar I used to go to in a long ago town, and the fine therapy of crying in one's cups with a fellow sympathizer. In retrospect, there was some real use to that.

In a culture that demands an impossible standard of constant economic growth and individual productivity, where pharmaceuticals promise relief, and a better, newer, probably more expensive self-help workshop to transform your higher consciousness and find lasting bliss is in order........I miss simpler times when I had the Mole's Eye Bar, and a vodka tonic.

So I stayed home alone, and let my depression be, and invited Saturn and Hecate to visit.

That intense time before the Solstice, it seems to me, is "Saturnine", the month of endings, celebration of the dead, composting of the year, going underground, dreaming, life review.........age. What does "age" mean? Memory, slowing down, reflection, loss. Sometimes wisdom, sometimes depression.

Why must we always "keep up"? Should we feel shame, failure, if we "fall behind"? I recognize that we have responsibilities, obligations.......but inner life doesn't always respect such timetables. Where can people "falling behind" go? Retreats, dream temples, monasteries, where the "fallen" can go to rekindle their souls? Is there a garden shrine at least, a compassionate space, a psychic allowance within the whirlwinds of our lives where we are not punished for "falling apart" just a little, for being "depressed", where some inner or outer voice isn't telling us we're "losers"?

I find myself in increasing retreat from the continual "stimulation" of our time. Some days I look at my computer with a kind of terror, because it represents such an overwhelming vista of possibility. I now allow that.

And I don't despise my depressions anymore, rather, I consider them worth listening to. In fact, they sensitize me, restore my empathy, and compassion.

As everything seems to accelerate and accelerate, I, at least, find it harder and harder to touch things. To touch the depths of the stories of our lives, to touch anyone, to relish and taste within the onslaught. Somewhere beneath the pavement there are still those layers of history, layers that belong to lives that preceded us, old bones, old trails, leys and currents and the ghost of the hidden sea. I sleep on all these stories, they want me to dream them, to open the conduit.

The pace, and of course the urban disconnect from natural cycles........leaves little room for the kind of Saturnine composting of spirit that a good depression can give, the cyclical return to the dark that is, I believe, reflected in all organic systems...........to "compost". To rot, fall apart, not know, slow down, fall by the wayside, re-form, be re-formed by the organic, collective forces we are woven into within the cycles of the planet, and within our souls.

Roman gardens used to have lots of little shrines, and a special shrine was devoted to the morose god, Saturn. A place, it was understood, one went to be alone, to brood, perhaps to grieve. A place to be melancholy. The word "melancholy" derives from a word that meant "black bile", believed in the middle ages to be one of the four "Humours", the four (like the four directions or cardinal points) whose balance was believed to determine one's emotional and physical state - those humors were: blood, phlegm, yellow bile and black bile. So here is the idea of balance, and that balance must include the dark as well as the light, the depressive as well as the enlivened.

As I get older, and my personal energy reserves are more concentrated and precious, I have come to believe that giving melancholy its due, discovering what the gifts of depression, taking time to allow the uncomfortable depths sometimes, not always, revealed in Saturn's solitary corner of the garden - is essential to nourishing, indeed sustaining, my spirit. Just as Romans understood the need to have a shadow-dappled seat dedicated to Saturn in the gardens of their lives, I have my own seat devoted to Saturn, devoted as well to Hecate, goddess of the underworld. To make offerings before a shrine is a invocation, and invitation. To "take a seat" is another kind of opening.

Hecate, like Saturn, represents age. She's an old woman, past menopause, past ambition, close to the door that separates this world and the other world. In the story of Persephone, Hecate is the one who bears a torch, illuminating her passage through the dark caverns of the underworld. I've always loved that metaphor.

"In us is also a dark angel (Hekate was also called "angelos") - a consciousness (she was also called "phosphoros") that shines in the dark and witnesses such events because it is already aware of them a priori.........Part of us is not dragged down but always lives there, as Hekate is partly an underworld Goddess."

"The Dream and the Underworld", James Hillman

Hecate is the patroness of women (and men) who are no longer producing hormones. Hormones are very potent drugs that induce us to want to reproduce, and thus carry on the evolutionary, planetary urge. When estrogen or testoserone is gone one's consciousness changes. I've heard lots of women say that life's illusions seem to peel away. Veils that have muffled all kinds of personal illusions, beliefs, and ideals and drive fall away ..........and there you are. Depressed sometimes. Revealed. Clarified. Ignorant. Thankful.

Occasionally, I even notice phosphorescent threads of wisdom, gleaming, candid in the dark and lovely mystery of it all. I think any new mask of Hecate might be both black, and white. Maybe Hecate, in her mask and role as old woman, may represent the SOUL aspect of self. "Part of us is not dragged down, but already lives there........." as Dr. Hillman said.

Already lives there, the gestalt, the storyteller as well as the story. Looking at the yin/yang symbol I wear on a ring, I remind myself that somehow the various parts of my being are, like the dark teardrop and the white teardrop, in flux and co-creation. This weaving of story is not only enlightenment, it is also "endarkenment", the self that waits, is circular, un-named, yin. That "already lives there."

I think to honor her, to honor Saturn, we have to stop blunting the descent, which is hard in a culture that so powerfully rejects the idea, no longer even has a recognizable "god" or a "goddess" to help initiates find their way. We don't see "melancholy" as about balancing the humors, we see it as something inconvenient, wrong with us, we're ashamed, we're guilty of being "negative", we want it to go away as quickly and efficiently as possible so we can "get back in the race".

The Chinese Pyramids

2011-12-05T19:10:00.010-07:00

From friends who are fascinated with the discovery of the pyramid complex in Bosnia, another megalithic mystery - a pyramid complex in China. Very little is known about the "White Pyramid", or who built them, although it appears they were incorporated into the monuments of China's first emperor. Did he build it, or did he take advantage of a much older phenomenon?

History of The U.S. Dept. of Peace

2011-12-04T15:02:00.005-07:00

We all know where a whole lot of our national resources go. That's right, the Department of Defense, which, judging from the invasion of Iraq and Afghanistan, isn't all that "defensive". And even though we're in deep financial trouble, and Obama promised to end the war(s) when he was elected, the wars go on, and still get a big, big piece of the pie that might fund the environment, schools, the jobless and homeless, etc.. I'm not going to rant about patriarchal mythos (yet), but in asking why we don't have a "Department of Peace", I was kind of amazed to learn the history of people and times who have, in fact, tried to create just that. It was first proposed in 1793, along with the founding of the Constitution..............It looks to me like this is an idea whose time has come - and gone - and come - and gone - and come.....***

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia:

The history of legislation to create a Department of Peace

The peace movement in the United States has a proposed legislative history that dates to the first years of the republic:

1793: Dr. Benjamin Rush, Founding Father (signer of the Declaration of Independence), wrote an essay titled "A plan of a Peace-Office for the United States". Dr. Rush called for equal footing with the Department of War and pointed out the effect of doing so for the welfare of the United States in promoting and preserving perpetual peace in our country. First published in a 1793 almanac that Benjamin Banneker authored, the plan stated (among other proposals):

--Let a Secretary of Peace be appointed to preside in this office; . . . let him be a genuine republican and a sincere Christian. . . .Let the youth of our country be instructed in reading, writing, and arithmetic, and in the doctrines of a religion of some kind; the Christian religion should be preferred to all others; for it belongs to this religion exclusively to teach us not only to cultivate peace with all men, but to forgive—nay more, to love our very enemies.
--To subdue that passion for war . . . militia laws should everywhere be repealed, and military dresses and military titles should be laid aside. . . .

1925: Carrie Chapman Catt, founder of the League of Women Voters, at the Cause and Cure for War Conference, publicly suggested a cabinet-level Department of Peace and secretary of peace be established.

1926/1927: Kirby Page, author of A National Peace Department, wrote, published and distributed the first proposal for a cabinet-level Department of Peace and secretary of peace.

1935: Senator Matthew M. Neely (D-West Virginia) wrote and introduced the first bill calling for the creation of a United States Department of Peace. Reintroduced in 1937 and 1939.

1943: Senator Alexander Wiley (R-Wisconsin) spoke on the Senate floor calling for the United States of America to become the first government in the world to have a Secretary of Peace.

1945: Representative Louis Ludlow (D-Indiana) re-introduced a bill to create a United States Department of Peace.

1946: Senator Jennings Randolph (D-West Virginia) re-introduced a bill to create a United States Department of Peace.

1947: Representative Everett Dirksen (R-Illinois) introduced a bill for “A Peace Division in the State Department”.

1955 to 1968: Eighty-five Senate and House of Representative bills were introduced calling for a United States Department of Peace.

1969: Senator Vance Hartke (D-Indiana) and Representative Seymour Halpern (R-New York) re-introduced bills to create a U.S. Department of Peace in the House of Representatives and the Senate. The 14 Senate cosponsors of S. 953, "The Peace Act", included Birch Bayh (D-IN), Robert Byrd (D-WV), Alan Cranston (D-CA), Daniel Inouye (D-HI) and Edmund Muskie (D-ME). The 67 House cosponsors included Ed Koch of New York, Donald Fraser of Minnesota, and Abner Mikva of Illinois, as well as Republican Pete McCloskey of California.

1979: Senator Spark Matsunaga (D-Hawaii) re-introduced a bill to create a U.S. Department of Peace.

2001: Representative Dennis Kucinich (D-Ohio) re-introduced a bill to create a U.S. Department of Peace. This bill has since been introduced in each session of Congress from 2001 to 2009. It was re-introduced as H.R. 808 on February 3, 2009 and is currently supported by 72 cosponsors. In July 2008, the first Republican cosponsor, Rep. Wayne Gilchrest (R-MD) signed on.

2005: Senator Mark Dayton (D-Minnesota) introduced legislation in the Senate to create a cabinet-level department of peace a week after Dennis Kucinich introduced a similar bill in the House.

And we still don't have a Department of Peace.

***

Here's in remembrance of Peace Pilgrim, who devoted her life to peace.

Healing with Masks in New Zealand

2011-12-03T16:29:00.000-07:00

I wanted to introduce some wonderful people in New Zealand who are using their "Multi Mask" system to heal and renew hope..........I take the liberty of just copying their ezine, since they can describe what they do better than I.

Website : Subscribe : Unsubscribe : Forward to a Friend : Web Version

About
Maskworx

Home of the
Multimask System
since 2004...Maskworx is a "one-stop-shop" for Anyone who wants to make an articulate mask - a vivid mask that speaks volumes visually!!

A user-friendly system based on
the Multimask,
a neutral face shape made from paper
with embossed
cutting lines on the back.

Find out about our
9 step
Mask Making System and our range of
Multimasks
How-2-Guides
Resource and Tool Kits
Visit our Website

Showoffs
Photo Gallery
Be inspired now!

View a stunning array of masks made by our community of mask makers – young and never-too-old.

Visit our Photo Gallery

The Maskworx team has developed a ‘family’ of Blogs for user-support and for sharing mask ideas from around the world.
Visit our Mask Blogs

Contact Details

Crown Road
Paerata
Auckland
New Zealand

T: 64 9 272 2981
F: 64 9 274 0142
E: Email
W: Web Site

MULTIMASK eNEWS

Emerging from Emergency:

Mask-making transforms kids, classrooms and communities in Crisis

Butterfly Quake Mask by Manning Intermediate

More and more we are discovering the value of making masks in times of crisis, stress and loss...

And when personal loss (Loss with capital 'L') starts leading us around on a leash, then it's time to do something practical and mindful...
Research shows it may take up to two years before symptoms of post traumatic stress disorder show up in survivors following a traumatic episode or disastrous event. To address the largely unseen "aftermath injury" (the emotional fallout that remains long after the physical injuries have healed) why not make a mask to tell your story?

Bus image supplied by Tall Poppies

Mask-making works like a tour bus - you revisit what has happened (whatever the devastation may be), you plot a pathway through it (using the Multimask® starter base, plus a map of the creative pathway), then you arrive at some form of resolution (a step closer to recovery).
This final enews for 2011 samples some of the "emerge from emergency" mask projects covered thus far in classrooms and communities here in New Zealand and overseas...

Quake Masks in Canterbury

Treasured Quake Mask by Riccarton Primary

This year a good proportion of our mask-making projects were done in the Canterbury quake zone where, in February, "a giant eraser" earthquake wiped out the central business district as well as much of the eastern suburbs of Christchurch.
Through making Debrief & Development Masks in schools we have learned so much we put together a not-boring-or-sad-guide to emergency mask-making (publication pending).

"Congratulations on developing and delivering the emergency mask-making model to Christchurch school children. The earthquakes have inspired a great variety of creative responses, which has brought real comfort and support to our city."

Bob Parker, Mayor, Christchurch City

Top

Black Saturday Bushfires in Victoria

Bushfires Story by Mount Martha Primary

Eighteen months after the tragic bush fires of 2009 in Victoria, 7 Australian schools made myths & legends masks, and whilst not strictly 'crisis masks', some of these mask stories referenced the terrible bush fires.
Studying local myths and legends is a good way to prepare for the next natural disaster. Disaster preparedness is a HOT topic right now!

Top

At Risk Girls in Cambodia

Mask-making in Phnom Penh

Cambodia was once the heart of a great empire in South East Asia but the Khymer Rouge communist regime lead by Pol Pot from 1975-78 changed all that with the savage deaths of 21% of the Cambodian population in "The Killing Fields". The regime destroyed the protecting framework of traditional Khymer life leaving young girls easily preyed upon.
Today Cambodia is emerging and the image above shows young women are bringing a new face to the reconstruction. Even the security guard made a mask in this class!

Top

Goddess Masks in India

Mask-making in Jaipur

Early marriage, early pregnancy, illiteracy and life-long poverty all contribute to an early death, issues still continuing to face young Indian women today.
The above image shows a class in one of the slum districts of Jaipur making "goddess masks". Annette's sister Lynne is the project leader.

Top

Domestic Violence in Nicaragua

Mask-making in Nicaragua

A group of Nicaraguan women were each given two Multimasks® with which to portray how it feels to be on the receiving end of abuse.
The image above shows how abuse leaches the colour out, diminishing one's potential. We can also see how creative expression brings back the vibrant colour.
The mask is a larger than life representation, and it's through this kind of symbolic work that women begin to show and grow their potential again (after abuse renders them smaller than life meant them to be).

Top

Gang Wives in Christchurch

Mumzy Mask in Christchurch

The Mumzy's Group in Christchurch make 'identity' masks together.

Top

Lifting the lid on Pandora's Box

Pandora's Box Mask by Meadowbank School

While Canterbury was sifting through the "rubble of trouble" following real life disaster, Meadowbank School in Auckland made Pandora's Box masks to portray disease, sadness, despair and death.
Students chose dark colours, black, grey blue, purple and brown to symbolise SADNESS (above). Some children chose the tear drop as symbol of despair, while others chose the rainbow as symbol of HOPE (below)...

Pandora's Box Mask by Meadowbank School

Top

Hands-on Practical & Emotional Literacy

When grief and loss, fear and uncertainty come into the classroom it is possible to look deeply at "curly topics" not covered by the curriculum. If left unexamined these curly topics may morph into a "hidden curriculum".

And yet the 'monster' force melts quite easily if tackled early with the creative force!

Children prefer to get their issues out into the open. When we offered quake kids the option of expressing their feelings on the reverse side of the mask so no-one could see it, none took up this offer. Totally unabashed they all wanted to strut their stuff!

The Mask is the primary hands-on practical and emotional literacy tool for "facing the unthinkable". Just because IT is unthinkable, does not mean it is unpicturable!

Mask-making activities can capture the complexities of the difficulties being faced. Recovery is just around the corner...where you can put your "happy face" back on!!

Pippy the Hippie by Columba College

If your class or community needs a helping hand to face the 'unthinkable' email Annette at multimask@orcon.net.nz and she will put a Starter Pack together to help you kickstart the creative response to crisis.

Alternatively, visit our website maskworx.co.nz/shop.html

Don't be shy, anyone can do it (with a good measure of support from us)!!

Melanie and Annette wish you a happy summer holiday break and look forward to assisting many more smart mask-making projects in 2012...

Magic....

2011-12-02T10:51:00.007-07:00

"Magic" painting by Rob Schouten

"If you do not believe in magic, your life will not be magical. Magic like the power of Stonehenge is part of the unknowable - that which you cannot describe, but which exists and makes your life extraordinary. It is that mysterious and intriguing part of your spiritual life. Magic is what we are all looking for, but if you try to hold it and name it and describe it, you will lose it. You must talk around magic, describe what led you there, and give thanks for that part of the universe that is unknowable and full of color and strength and magic. Out of relationship comes magic. Out of the friction of forgetting and remembering comes magic. Out of the mists of dawn and the mysteries of creation comes the magic that we call life. Out of your passion for existence comes magic."

The Power Deck by Lynn V. Andrews
with paintings by visionary artist Rob Schouten.

Recently I've had a (bevy? myriad? cluster?) of synchronicities around "magic". Last night I found myself telling a friend to see a movie called "The Color of Magic". In my last email with Prema Dasara she closed by saying "magic sometimes happens".

I have always prayed to Tara when I'm in trouble. How I "met" Tara is a magical story. So, prior to my surgery in early November to remove a tumor, I prayed to Tara. The day before going to the hospital, I was delighted to receive an email from Prema Dasara. More than a year and a half ago we had discussed making masks for her Mandala Dance, "The 21 Praises to Tara". She was inquiring if I still wanted to make them. I took this as great encouragement before I went "under". All is well now, and I feel I kind of have a promise to fulfill to Tara, although, unfortunately, Prema has had to put her project off because of health problems.

Prema Dasara and "The 21 Praises to Tara" Mandala Blessing Dances

But the idea came to me - why not do a second collection of my own Masks of the Goddess? Ever since 2008, when the masks were sold at a Benefit Auction, many people have contacted me wanting to use them for events, rituals, dances. I have thought about creating another collection, in new ways and forms, to be held in trust for those wishing to use them "in a sacred manner."I do not believe I have the energy to create community events myself anymore, but there are many who would use them to do so.

As I rolled this around in my mind yesterday, I thought I'd pull a card from one of my decks - and behold, up came "Stonehenge and Magic". Ancient monuments, the womb of the Great Mother, seem to be what I write a lot about these days..........and what happens in the womb? Well, things get incubated prior to being born. Or re-born.

I love what Lynn Andrews wrote about magic above. Perhaps magic is like the Dark Matter that surrounds and penetrates everything, the infinite backdrop upon which we're all unknowing organizing our lives, filling out our weekly calendars. Synchronicities, like dreams, are sometimes hard to understand. But......I think I'll initiate the birth of a new collection of masks. It won't be the same as the old project, because I'm not the same. But I'm going to trust in a bit of Magic.

My project (1998-2008) "The Masks of the Goddess"

In the Belly of the Goddess - Gobekli Tepe

2011-11-27T08:28:00.009-07:00

Since posting about the Bosnian Pyramids, I received an email from my friend Susan about another megalithic mystery I was not aware of, the buried temples of Turkey, Gobekli Tepe, a ceremonial landscape that may very well be 12,000 years old. Gobekli Tepe means "Belly Hill" or "Hill With A Navel". According to Wikipedia,

"Göbekli Tepe is the oldest, human-made religious structure yet discovered. The site is located on a hilltop, and contains 20 round, (now) subterranean structures, four of which have currently been excavated. Each building has a diameter of 10–30 meters, and is decorated with massive (mostly) T-shaped limestone pillars that are the most striking feature of the site. That neolithic people with such primitive flint tools quarried, carved, transported uphill, and erected these massive pillars has astonished the archaeological world, and must have required a staggering amount of manpower and labor. In the structures, two pillars were placed in the center of each circle, possibly to help support the roof, and up to eight pillars were evenly positioned around the walls of the room. Many of the pillars are decorated with carved reliefs of animals and of abstract enigmatic pictograms. The pictograms may represent commonly understood sacred symbols, as known from Neolithic cave paintings elsewhere." Wikipedia

The structures on this site were built about 12,000 years ago (10,000BC) during the last ice age, and intentionally buried about 8,000 years ago. No one knows who these people were, what the massive buildings were for, or why they were buried. After 13 years of work only an estimated 5% has been uncovered. Amazing........pyramids in Bosnia, and stone circles in Turkey, of such great antiquity.***

Turkey is near the area called the Fertile Crescent, until recently regarded as home to the earliest human civilizations of Mesopotamia, the "Cradle of Civilization". These lands now so disturbed by conflict, revolution, war and the struggle for diminishing reserves of oil , the source of power for our civilization......are also the homeland of the ancient Great Mother, the lands of Innana, Ishtar, Astarte, Lilith, and the Shekinah, the feminine face of God in Judaism.

As so often happens, a synchronicity, a thread from the Great Web,was thrown my way when I received an email from a colleague, Israeli artist Dorit Bat Shalom, inviting me to join a group of artists exploring peacemaking in the Mideast on the same page with Susan's link to "Belly Hill". What came to mind immediately was a conversation Dorit and I had long ago, a conversation that has a resonance for me with this mysterious site.

We were speaking of the degradation of the feminine throughout western culture, religion, language. When even God is gendered male to the exclusion of the other half of the human psyche, and further, defined primarily as a warrior god, we are split and divided. Humanity is divided against itself, and the Mother archetype is degraded. Speaking beyond politics to an ancient wound, Dorit asked,

"How can there ever be peace without the Shekinah? The Shekinah, the Goddess, has been driven away from the holy lands. We can not heal without Her."

The Goddess has many faces - the Trilogy of Maiden, Mother, Crone, the Divine Feminine, the Dark Goddess, and Mother Earth. Archeologist Marija Gimbutas pointed out the cultural bias of our time when she suggested that so called "fertility fetishes" (read that "paleolithic pornography") such as the famous Venus of Willendorf were not

just fetishes, but probably represented instead the prime Deity, the "Great Mother". Here is the immeasurably ancient womb/tomb idea, the original source of burial ritual, as well as death/rebirth ordeals of being buried alive in shamanic societies. New life, the primal mystery, our ancestors observed, comes from women, thus, life comes from Mother Earth as well, and returns to her womb again for rebirth. The Belly of the Mother.

Once again, one can only ask in awe, why would ancient peoples go to such difficulty to create vast megalithic ceremonial structures, charting and coursing the land with circles, pyramids, avenues, creating sacred landscapes that were, perhaps, hundreds of years in the making, and thousands of years in use? Gobekli Tepe, and possibly the pyramid complex being discovered in Bosnia, make Stonehenge, and Avebury, and the strange Callenish stones of the Hebrides.....seem modern. Still, there seems a continuity. I speculate that these sacred landscapes were sited with a knowledge of, and reverence for, the energies of the earth, the geo-magnetic and spiritual forces. They sited them to contain and utilize the "Geomantic Source" for their spiritual life, which might very well have included the primal mystery or enactment of the birth-death-rebirth cycle ( a relatively "recent" example of this was the Eleusinian Mysteries which lasted some 2,000 years, and whose origins may go back to Minoan, and even Neolithic times. ****) The site's Turkish name, which means "Belly Hill" or "Hill With A Navel" is an interesting coincidence when one considers this so ancient site in the "cradle of civilization". "Navel of the World"......certainly, a site with revered circled enclosures, which could have imitated the circles of planetary, seasonal life, perhaps, the round womb of the earth Mother. Perhaps, a complex dedicated to the first and most ancient of human rites, coupled with an experiential understanding of the power of earth energies that we need to reclaim.

"Ancestral Midwives" (2009)

The author of one of the articles about Gobekli Tepe I read made some (annoying) conjectures about the "Garden of Eden".

("Do these mysterious stones mark the site of the Garden of Eden?"

By Tom Knox Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-1157784/Do-mysterious-stones-mark-site-Garden-Eden.html#ixzz1eRkv1W6r)

I wish mythology was a part of all curriculum, because so few people take the time to explore some of the origins of the very mythologies that inform our culture and religions. But then, people don't like to have their myths disturbed, because, after all, it's quite disturbing. You just might end up having to change your worldview!

Long before there was a "Garden of Eden, original sin, or snakes that seduced Eve and hence left her responsible for all the miseries of mankind" there was the Great Mother and Her circular rites. Gimbutas has suggested that before the Goddess was even personified as Hathor, or Isis, or Inanna, She was the mysterious place and force of birth and death, Mother Earth.

In Biblical lore, the snake is "Eve-ill". Sometimes the evil snake is personified as Lilith, the shadow Goddess who is a temptress in the Tree of Life, talking Eve into disobeying God. When Patrick drove the snakes from Ireland, he drove out the earlier Druidic religion, and their reverence for the magical forces of nature. But what is the snake in antiquity, why is this symbol so very ubiquitous, once sacred, then with the advent of Patriarchal religions, profane? In ancient Egypt we see the snake mounted at the forehead (the third eye or vision center) of all images of gods, goddesses, and royalty. In fact the most ancient word for "goddess" in Egypt was the same word as that for cobra.

The snake (sometimes represented as dragons) represents the sinuous, serpentine, moving energies of the earth - which move across the land like the passage of the wind, the passage of water currents, like rivers undulating across a plain. Since apparently early cultures always identify the Earth with the feminine, with the Great Mother and Her womb/tomb/rebirth cycle - hence the relationship between goddess and snake. I believe the snake was also identified with geomagnetic phenomena, the leys and invisible movements or currents of esoteric earth energies.

It may well be that we lost "Eden" not for disobeying the rather arbitrary rules of a God who often displayed a bad temper, but rather, when human consciousness changed, along with the mythic structures that supported culture. What might the ancients teach us now, in the 11th Hour of a civilization that is not sustainable, and has lost its primal reverence for the Great Mother, for Gaia?

*****

"Eleusis" probably derives from a pre-Greek (Cretan) Goddess of Childbirth, Eileithyia or Ilithyia who was adopted into Greek religion. "According to some authors her name does not have an Indo-European etymology, which for R. F. Willets strengthens her link with Minoan culture. "The links between Eileithyia, an earlier Minoan goddess, and a still earlier Neolithic prototype are, relatively, firm," Willets wrote. "The explanation is as simple as it is important. The continuity of her cult depends upon the unchanging concept of her function. Eileithyia was the goddess of childbirth; and the divine helper of women in labour has an obvious origin in the human midwife". Wikipedia

***

I never rains but it pours, and another friend brought to my attention another possibly 12,000 year old monument complex, discovered off the coast of Japan. What do we really know of history?

Thanks Giving

2011-11-23T20:12:00.000-07:00

How marvelous is that garden, where apples and pears, both for
the sake of the two Marys,
are arriving even in winter.

Those apples grow from the Gift, and sink back into the Gift.
It must be that they are coming from the garden to the garden.

.....Rumi

Beautiful little video with quotes about Gratitude from Shakti Gawain, Osho, Rumi, many others.

Revisiting the Bosnian Pyramids

2011-11-20T17:14:00.001-07:00

When I was in Glastonbury, and attending the Symposium, everyone was much excited about the Bosnian Pyramids, a topic that has only become newsworthy for the past 5 years or so. I had never heard of them, but the prospect of a huge ceremonial complex, consisting of 3 pyramids and some other possible structures in Bosnia is now becoming acredited by the archeological community, thanks to the work of Dr. Osmanagic, a Bosnian archeologist who has studied extensively the pyramid complexes of South America. He is currently teaching in the U.S. as well as excavating in Bosnia, and he is responsible for naming them the "Pyramid of the Sun", and "Pyramid of the Moon".

Apparently (surprise!) some studies have shown that electro magnetic energies are different around, and within, pyramids than normal earth energetic fields. It could be possible that when ancients built pyramids, a phenomenon found throughout the world, they were demonstrating an understanding of geomancy we've lost, an understanding, perhaps, of how to focus and utilize geo-magnetic forces and "earth currents", possibly to promote shifts in consciousness, facilitate trance states, and for health benefits as well.

What's surfaced recently about the Bosnian pyramids is that they may not only include the largest pyramid in the world, but also their antiquity may be astoundingly ancient. Dr. Osmanagic has sought extensively some kind of organic material on or within the pyramids to be used for radiocarbon dating, in order to determine the approximate age of the structures. Finally, in 2010 excavations, organic materials have apparently been found (at Sonda 20) on the "Pyramid of the Moon" Pyramid. The remains were found in the surface layers of some of the large stone blocks that had been uncovered and were sent to labs for radiocarbon dating at the Silesian University of Technology in Gliwice, Poland.

Radiocarbon dating showed the organic material to have an age of 10.350 years........which could mean that the terrace of the pyramid might have been built 10.000 years ago. "This could completely change our understanding of what European history and the first advanced civilizations were" Osmanagic remarked. For myself, I've always been fascinated by the legends of Atlantis, the mythic civilization Edgar Cayce said had its final demise 10,000 years ago. It's been pretty much established that the legend of Atlantis stems from the ancient explosion of the volcano Thera in the island of Santini, an eruption that sent a devastating tsunami throughout the ancient world and was probably responsible for the demise of the Minoan civilization, about 3,600 years..

But if these pyramids are indeed 10,000 years old..........how astounding. Perhaps they did represent a truly ancient civilization that had advanced knowledge, advanced enough at least to comprehend earth energies and how to focus them. Fun to speculate............

Article from: bosnian-pyramid.com

What Our Feet Don't Hear

2011-11-18T09:12:00.000-07:00

I talked about summer, and about time. The
pleasures of eating, the terrors of the night. About this cup
we call a life. About happiness. And how good it feels, the
heat of the sun between the shoulder blades.

He looked neither up nor down which didn't necessarily
mean he was either afraid or asleep. I felt his energy, stored
under his tongue perhaps, and behind his bulging eyes.

I talked about how the world seems to me, five feet tall, the
blue sky all around my head. I said, I wondered how it seemed
to him, down there, intimate with the dust.

He might have been Buddha - did not move, blink, or frown,
not a tear fell from those gold-rimmed eyes as the refined
anguish of language passed over him.

Mary Oliver (from "The Truro Bear")

Old pond,
frog jumps in -
splash.

Basho

We have been underground too long,

we have done our work,
we are many and one,
we remember when we were human.
We have lived among roots and stones,
we have sung but no one has listened,
we come into the open air
at night only to love
which disgusts the soles of boots,
their leather strict religion.
We know what a boot looks like
when seen from underneath,
we know the philosophy of boots,
their metaphysic of kicks and ladders.
We are afraid of boots
but contemptuous of the foot that needs them.
Soon we will invade like weeds,
everywhere but slowly;
the captive plants will rebel
with us, fences will topple,
brick walls ripple and fall,
there will be no more boots.
Meanwhile we eat dirt
and sleep; we are waiting
under your feet.
When we say Attack
you will hear nothing
at first.

Margaret Atwood, from "You Are Happy"

Meanderings on Mortality and Creativity

2011-11-16T12:15:00.013-07:00

"Green Heart Icon"

I've been in the hospital having a tumor removed...........that sounds so dramatic, but it's not really. It's a long process of visiting doctors, X-rays, waiting, researching, etc. I've been aware of the situation for almost a year, and it's one of the reasons I went to Glastonbury. There is nothing like the prospect of a life-threatening disease to put things in perspective, and quickly! Everything is colored with a light more brilliant, sweeter, revealing how precious each fragment is, each memory, each familiar voice, object, taste. When it seems that that familiarity, that stream of thoughts, contacts, experiences we call our lives may be endangered, the privilege of it all taken away in the forseeable future...........one's priorities change quickly.

My friend Ro has come up with the term "SWE" - stupid waste of energy. You evaluate where the power leaks and "SWE"'s are.

Anyway, I've been in a kind of stasis, waiting to find out. Now the tumor is removed, and my biopsy is really good. That was the news I got on 11-11-11, and I can't help but think that's a very magical day indeed to get the "go-ahead" with a new year! I'll take it!

My great gratitude to my friends, who so generously offered me their prayers and encouragement........it would have been so much harder without you.

One of the things I meditated on as the scary day of surgery approached (11-9-11) was creativity. Creativity, and our unique expressive gifts in life, which come down to the same thing. One is the eternal, seamless source, the other the mortal (and hence not immortal) means.

Creativity, to me, is the Divine made visible. When we are Makers, the Divine expresses through each of us, whether we're making a mathematical theorem or a new recipe for lemon cake. How can anyone look at an orchid, shamelessly pretending, in the hope of being pollinated, that it is a beautiful bevy of magenta tipped butterflies in flight......without seeing the Goddess at Her easel? Without appreciating the gorgeous humor, and creative intelligence, behind all things visible?

When I was a kid in a long-ago Bible class, I had an "ah-ha" experience. I could not understand the "God" that was so often put before me as we plowed through the Book, a God of terrible vengence. Even now, I shudder to think of children internalizing some of these stories as divinely inspired. How about this, for example, from the Holy Book?

"And the Lord spake unto Moses, saying "Avenge the children of Israel"..............and Moses said unto them, "Have ye saved all the women alive?.......Now therefore kill every male among the little ones, and kill every woman that hath known man by lying with him. But all the women children, that have not known a man by lying with him, keep alive for yourselves." Num. XXXI, 1-18

I remember reading this, and trying to fathom how the noble Moses, made so visible by Charleton Heston delivering the Commandments......could be involved in what was actually being described here.

All those women, old ladies, babies and little boys hacked up with swords, the little girls carried off to be raped, sanctified by "God" and His prophet. How could I reconcile this horror? Other options were needed.

And how sad that a fragmented history of the bloody genocide practiced in ancient battles, fought beneath the banner of a tribal war god sometimes called Yahwah........should appear within the same book as "Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you" (Luke 6:27). Or, and this passage, a favorite of mine, which is not from the Bible at all, but rather from the long hidden Nag Hammedi Gospels, attributed to the Gnostic Gospel of Thomas (the Twin)*** :

"If you bring forth what is within you, what you bring forth will save you. If you do not bring forth what is within you, what you do not bring forth will destroy you."

There it is! The Divine Creative Force, expressing in everything and everyone. Early Christians called it "gnosis", knowledge of God within. Joseph Campbell called it your personal "bliss"......... it's the joy of creation, and if we bring it forth, it energizes and informs and expands our lives. If not, the energy contracts, turns self-destructive, dark, stagnant. Maybe, that's even one of the places tumors can come from.

Be that as it may, I think it's so important to not "give your power away", which can mean appreciating, in fact thoroughly enjoying, the gifts that life has put on your banquet plate.

There's a wonderful passage in the ancient Sumarian stories of the goddess Inanna where she goes to visit Enki, the head of the Gods. In a celebratory mood, he calls forth some heavenly beer, and the two get drunk together. Enki gives Inanna many empowerments or gifts (called a "me") - from the art of sexual seduction to the governing of cities to the making of cheese. At a Witchcamp I attended this cycle was ritually enacted. As Enki offered each "me" (I always found that ancient word for gift or power interesting), Starhawk, in the role of Inanna, said loudly with conviction and gusto:

"I'll take it!"

I think that's what you have to do, and it's not always easy. There are so many forces that discourage both creativity and talent - one does not necessarily get love or acceptance for being "gifted". I think of my own small dysfunctional family, and the kind of "dumbing down" I've always had to do in order to be tolerated by my envious brothers, who felt that any form of success on my part somehow diminished them. I've seen this operate in groups as well, groups that do not know how to facilitate or address this unconscious collective shadow aspect (a friend who prefers to remain anonymous calls it the "mediocrity prerequisite"). I do not mean to sound harsh, but many people live in toxic spheres where they are being energetically rewarded for being stupid, uncreative, or a "victim", and punished for not being so. For not using their divine "Me"'s. And I guarantee that if you live that way long enough, you will demand the same currency from others. It can take a long time to heal.........

Well..........I have a lot to be grateful for this coming Thanksgiving. Most of all, all the inspiring people I've been privileged to encounter who are busy expressing the Divine Creative Force***** joyfully - may we all, like Inanna, loudly proclaim: "I'll take it!"

**** Elaine H. Pagels further commented that:

"The Gospel of Thomas also suggests that Jesus is aware of, and criticizing the views of the Kingdom of God as a time or a place that appear in the other gospels. Here Jesus says, "If those who lead you say to you, 'look, the Kingdom is in the sky,' then the birds will get there first. If they say 'it's in the ocean,' then the fish will get there first. But the Kingdom of God is within you and outside of you. Once you come to know yourselves, you will become known."........Here it says, "It's inside you but it's also outside of you." It's like a state of consciousness. It's hard to describe. But the Kingdom of God here is something that you can enter when you attain gnosis, which means knowledge.....The secret of gnosis is that when you know yourself at that level you will also come to know God, because you will discover that the divine is within you."

Read more: http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/religion/story/thomas.html#ixzz1dtGPBd2t

**** Here's a link to Cultural Creatives TV - enjoy.

"A Small Act" Movie

2011-11-14T20:14:00.000-07:00

I sponsor a little girl in Nepal through Plan International, a non-denominational children's sponsorship program, as well as assisting village girls in Nepal to remain in school through the Nepal Youth Foundation. I love this film because it reminds us of the great good a simple act can do.

Vision Questing

2011-11-08T21:56:00.000-07:00

FOLLOW YOUR BLISS

The divine manifestation is ubiquitous,
Only our eyes are not open to it.
Awe is what moves us forward.

Live from your own center.
The divine lives within you.
The separateness apparent in the world is secondary.
Beyond the world of opposites is an unseen,
but experienced, unity and identity in us all.
Today the planet is the only proper “in group.”
Participate joyfully in the sorrows of the world.
We cannot cure the world of sorrows,
but we can choose to live in joy.

You must return with the bliss and integrate it.
The return is seeing the radiance is everywhere.
The world is a match for us.
We are a match for the world.
The spirit is the bouquet of nature. . . .
Sanctify the place you are in.
Follow your bliss. . . .

~ Joseph Campbell

"The Sacred Mirrors" (http://www.sacredmirrors.org)

Joseph Campbell in his "The Power of Myth" interviews with Bill Moyers famously said "Follow your Bliss.......and doors will open where you don't expect them to." Bill Moyers agreed in his own way, commenting that he felt sorry for people who seemingly "had no invisible means of support".


"Spiral" by Catherine Nash

Thinking of Catherine Nash's project (in the previous post), I'm reminded of my own journey that began with a book I wanted to write just after I finished my MFA, a project that took me across the country as well. Perhaps the reason I feel like telling this winding story on my blog is two-fold: I'm encouraged by Catherine's project, and it seems important to pass on the good news that we so very often, if we undertake that which we feel passionate about, find that doors open where you least expect them to. When I look back at many of the creative undertakings in my life, I have to admit the presence of the miraculous. If there is any point to sharing this journal, it may well be my effort to affirm this perception, express my clumsy gratitude. Life really is far more magical than we can imagine, and we're usually too busy to notice.

"First Chakra" by Beth Ames Swartz

"Life is what happens when you're making

other plans."......... John Lennon

In 1987, I graduated from the University of Arizona, feeling very unsure of what it might mean to be an artist. I found many aspects of the art world cynical and devoid of depth or relevance. I remember the conversations Catherine and other fellow students had about New Age spirituality, my fascination with tribal arts, pouring over Kandinsky's "Concerning the Spiritual in Art", or Jose Arguelles "The Transformative Vision", my utter delight at seeing Alex Grey's "The Sacred Mirrors" in Art Week for the first time. Now there was something that truly moved me.

"You develop your skills and technical expertise, and then trust the process. You learn all you can learn, and then go into the studio and forget everything. There is an emptying out, being willing to confront not knowing. We really do not have a language in this culture for these kinds of experiences."..... Beth Ames Swartz

So I boldly, if naively, announced that I would go on a Vision Quest to write a book based on interviews with transformative, spiritual artists. I made a book outline and proposal, interviewed my friends, and then made a list of some of the artists I wished I could interview, among them Alex Grey, Ingo Swann, and others. I had one small problem: I was a virtual unknown in the arts world. How could I get anyone to take me seriously enough to let me interview them?

Synchronicities are like touchstones, you follow one and it leads to another. Around this time I had a memorable dream - I was in construction gear with a hard hat on, and I was working on a big steel bridge. Next to me was a black man in similar gear, and after a while he put down his tools, and said to me "we're just going to have to go to the authorities for help." The "authorities"? But amazingly, a few days later I received a little booklet in the mail, which I have no memory of ordering, from, I believe, Lucis Publishing. It was an Alice Bailey pamphlet titled "Building and Bridging: The New Group of World Servers". Bridges, I thought, there it is again.

The following week, I was invited to a party, where I met an artist named Beth Ames Swartz, whose installation "A Moving Point of Balance" was soon to be on view at the University Art Museum. I didn't really know anything about her, but at the party I shyly introduced myself, and rather audaciously told her I was writing a book about spiritual artists, and could I interview her.

Beth not only agreed, but told me she was one of the founders of the Transformative Art Movement, was organizing a conference, and would I like to have her list of contacts! "I'm into bridge art" she told me. That evening, when I looked through the papers she had given me, I found myself with a list that included a number of the artists I had been thinking of, including Alex Grey. Now I had a personal introduction from Beth!

So I booked a crafts booth at a Renaissance Faire near New York City to pay my way, and off I went, on a journey that took me to NYC, and later Los Angeles, San Francisco, and points in between. So many surprising things happened! I got my interview with artist Rafael Ortiz about his Physio-Psycho-Alchemy, for example, not because I sought him out, but because a co-worker at the Renaissance Faire mentioned that she knew him, and he was organizing some kind of conference about spiritual art at Rutgers. Which is also how I became involved in Rafael's Art and the Invisible Reality Symposium, where I met many other artists pursuing spiritual expression. And the Quest continued.

"The problem is we’re so skimpy and stingy, so timid about asking. The Universe is willing to give; its there for the asking. When I work, I feel that ‘seamlessness” every much, because half of the time I don’t know where the ideas actually come from. They come in all kinds of forms. An idea can be formed in a sound, or in a very articulate kind of language….but it’s all part of the same thing. This comprehension of holism is very important at this point in time. I think it is also very important to the planet for us to be able to think in those terms"...........Rachel Rosenthal

I tried for a quite a while to get my book published, but was never successful. To be honest, I think it was my own fault this was so - I had an underlying lack of confidence in myself that, in retrospect, undermined me every time. Perhaps someday I'll go back to the project, with new perspective and much greater confidence.

And I know Catherine's "vision quest" to her book, like everything she has done, will be a journey that will connect and inspire many.

Catherine Nash

2011-11-07T07:45:00.004-07:00

"Vespica" by Catherine Nash (www.catherinenash.com)

I wanted to introduce a long-time friend of mine, and a truly visionary artist, Catherine Nash. Catherine has achieved international recognition as a paper, and encaustic, artist, and has taught internationally for many years, gathering friends and fans along the way. She's currently fundraising for a matching grant that will, if she meets her quota by the deadline, allow her to pursue her project Contemporary Paper and Encaustic, an e-publication surveying international artists who integrate paper and encaustic in innovative and inspiring works.

"My focus is to present artworks that push the boundaries of paper and encaustic while simultaneously creating a relevant contribution to the contemporary art world."I think it will be an important book, one that will further artistic community as well as inspiring many students and colleagues."

Here's where you can find out about her project, watch an informal video, and contribute if you feel moved to:

http://www.unitedstatesartists.org/project/contemporary_paper_and_encaustic_international_trends

I've been a fan of Catherine's for many years, ever since we met in graduate school at the University of Arizona.

Catherine has always, I think, been looking up - Among my favorite of her recent works are "Secret Skies".

"Sky Within" by Catherine Nash

"The sky holds the ultimate touchstone for me, representing the infinite, a spaciousness, the big mystery. Looking out into space brings levity and perspective to my day....I need a reminder that we are tiny beings on a continent, on a spinning planet, in a solar system, within one galaxy among multitudinous galaxies. Levity. May I carry that around with me, please? Secret Skies are a recent series of artist books: paintings of the sky are created within a closable wooden box, game board or the like. I am playing with a physical way of bottling up, translating, of trying to comprehend the unfathomable with a bit of humor."

"Have portable sky, will travel~"

"Navigation by Night"

Invoking Creativity

2011-11-04T12:55:00.001-07:00

I learned to turn my creativity over to the only god I could believe in, the god of creativity, the life force Dylan Thomas called "the force that through the green fuse drives the flower." I learned to get out of the way and just let that creative force work through me."

Julia Cameron, "The Artist's Way"

Image courtesy Catherine Nash

"The position of the artist should be humble. He is essentially a channel."

Piet Mondrian

"We are the Great Work of Art in progress. We, ourselves."

Rafael Montanez Ortiz

Dreams of Half Dome

2011-11-03T12:48:00.000-07:00

The birds have vanished into the sky,
and now the last cloud drains away.

We sit together, the mountain and me,
until only the mountain remains.

Li Po (701-762) from The Enlightened Heart

Ansel Adams, "Half Dome and Moon"

I've been dreaming of mountains lately, of Yosemite, where I spent so many summers, climbing Half Dome, Half Dome Mountain Goddess, who presides over the beloved valley. Perhaps, I go there in my dreams sometimes, to see her blue in the moonlight, or white in snow, to touch her hot/cold granite face. Here's another poem that came to mind today, thinking of mountain dreams, by New Mexico poet Nancy Wood.

~My help is in the mountain~

    Where I take myself to heal
    The earthly wounds
    That people give to me.
    I find a rock with sun on it
    And a stream where the water runs gentle
    And the trees which one by one give me company
    And so I must stay for a time
    Until I have grown from the rock
    And the stream is running through me
    And I cannot tell myself from one lone tree.
    Then I will know that nothing touches me
    Nor makes me run away.
    My help is in the mountain
    That I take away with me.

    Earth cure me. Earth receive my woe.
    Rock strengthen me. Rock receive my weakness.
    Rain wash away my sadness. Rain receive my doubt.
    Sun make sweet my song.

      ~Nancy Wood~
from Hollering Sun (1972)