Mabon - the Fall Equinox

I am a lover of the steady Earth
and of Her waters

"Let the light be brilliant" She says,  
"for those who will cherish color."

From "Verses at Powis" by Robin Williamson

Mabon is traditionally the 2nd Harvest Festival of three (Lammas in August, and Samhain in October being the other two) and falls on the day  of the autumnal Equinox.   A time to give thanks for the bounty of the harvest,  to give thanks and celebrate all that nourishes us. The Day of Balance,  a time to consider what we have harvested this year, to give thanks for all of that harvest, the bright Blessings and the dark Blessings from which we learned wisdom, patience, or compassion. On this auspicious day of Balance, when day and night are the same duration, may we experience the grace of Balance within our lives, and in the greater life of our common humanity.  

Apple trees in Avalon, the "Isle of Apples" (the Chalice Well garden) 2011

When I lived in the country in New York, I remember a Mabon with hot cider and new apples, and honey mead that was opened for the occasion.  

I also remember an Equinox when I lived in New York City in the late 80's, and was invited to be part of  a performance organized at a small theatre in the East Village.   She asked me to do some kind of ritual for the  occasion. I couldn't think of anything,  and felt quite intimidated with the prospect of creating a ritual for an audience of New York sophisticates. 

I was visiting a friend upstate at the time, and I  happened to be standing near an apple tree by the road.  I can still see the green grass under the tree, and a brilliant  circle of ripe, freshly fallen red apples,  lying in the grass around the tree.  I picked up all the good ones, and took them back to the City with me.  

When I gave my short performance, I took out that basket of apples, and said something to the effect that "This is Gaia, ever generous, ever giving us what we need."  And then I invited those present to come and take the apples.  I was amazed to see that the audience took every one of them and ate them right there!

As I sit writing, the sun rises over the Catalina mountains that surround Tucson, where I live now.  Many years and miles away from that theatre in Manhattan.  I look up to  orange, magenta, violet, mauve, and a continually changing pale, cerulean sky, the canvas for this magnificent painting the sky makes, created anew twice daily.  I'm grateful indeed for this moment of Beauty, and grateful for the stories of my life.  Especially, today, those that are about Mabons.  

This is one of my favorite songs, Robin Williamson's love song to Mother Earth.  Seems a good time to share it again............  

https://youtu.be/yK5IWgsdqCg?si=SrIbBPp728FMXERs

John Steele, Kali Yuga, and Temporal Density

"Kali is the Goddess of the dissolution of time and structures.  She clears the way for those impediments of evolution that have arisen.  The Tibetan translation for "Kali Yuga" means literally the  "dregs of time", the bottom of the barrel of time.  Time has acquired such "temporal density" that it can actually be felt in the body.  And the definition of "Temporal Density" is that we have too many units of events in each day to fully or effectively assimilate them.........Another aspect of Kali Yuga   which is related to temporal density is that there is seasonal disequilibrium.  The climate and the seasons go out of whack."

John Steele

I've been wanting to post this talk by John Steele for a while now.  I met John Steele in 1989, at the Symposium on Art and the Invisible Reality at Rutgers University, sponsored by Dr. Rafael Montanez Ortiz.  I wish there was another such conference!  I presented a performance piece called "When the Word for World Was Mother", and not too long after John kindly sent me his amazing book Earthmind: Communicating with the Living World of Gaia, in collaboration with  Paul Devereux and David Kubrin.  It remains a very important book for me. 

John J. Steele is an aromatic consultant, archaeologist, author and visionary.  His work, whether with aromas or philosophy, engages questions about the nature of memory, time, consciousness and being. He has worked with Terence McKenna and Paul Devereux (The Dragon Project).   Steele  explores Vedic culture, Kali Yuga,  geomancy and what he calls "geomantic amnesia", geobiology, time out of balance, shamanism, the effects of geological formations on human consciousness, cross state retention, and the importance of sacred sites and spaces. EARTHMIND explores ways of interfacing with the earth for planetary healing. And Planetary Healing is also our healing.

 In this collection of audio recordings and seminars, John Steele gives an overview of how geomantic traditions have influenced human awareness, psychology and ways of life. He explains how sacred geometry can grant us access to "Present Time", the great and infinite place where silent knowledge flows into our consciousness unrestricted by the objects that surround us, and in many ways, "own us".

"The memorial capacity is the key to the strength of a computer, and our computers are valued by their increasing capacity to store memory.  There is an emphasis upon the acquisition of memory that can be stuffed into a computer..........What happens after a while is that the system becomes constipated by too much hoarding of memory.  This hoarding of memory (in human terms)  sets up a kind of psychological density, and as the system becomes clogged it becomes brittle.  That is to say it cannot react quickly to crisis situations because it is overloaded with information."

"The density of objects in the environment creates a corresponding density of memory necessary to record objects, and this density of memory creates temporial density.  Temporal density is a function of memorial density and memorial density is a function of object density.  You will notice that those cultures that have the fewest objects live in the dream time.  You look at the Australian aborigines with their minimal object array and you see that they live in a completely different time frame. The Bushmen the same.  As temporal density occurs it sets up this extended unconscious array of time - time is generated."

As I listened to the above, I thought of an article Geomancer Sig Lonegren wrote a year or so ago, in which he commented that he believed the great Megalithic structure of Stonehenge was a "last attempt" to retain right brain, or "dreamtime" consciousness, as human culture began to change during the Neolithic.  In a sense, he was saying that a greater contact with "the collective mind of Gaia" was gradually being lost.  Perhaps it is now time to regain that contact, in a new way.

I feel John Steele, and his colleagues, are so important in understanding our place on the planet, and as always, I'm saddened that they are so little known.

(I saw that the original utube interview I posted here has been removed from Utube.  I found something similar, and post below.)

http://youtu.be/r1h4fB5HCd4




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‘Earthmind: Communicating with the living world of Gaia’ by Paul Devereux with John Steele and David Kubrin 

 "The authors make much of the effect on mind of the electromagnetic properties of the Earth and its rocks. They believe that communication with the Earthmind or anima mundi can best be achieved at sacred sites, facilitated by the crystal structures within the dolmens there. However, the authors believe there are hopeful signs of a revival of belief in paganism and in Earth’s spirituality, which would contribute to lessening our desecration of our planetary home. The key to such a consciousness revolution rests, in the opinion of the authors, with acceptance of the existence of a universal field of consciousness and our spiritual integration with it – what Peter Russell (The Awakening Earth)" described as the Gaiafield and which Devereux calls Earthmind.

for a great review:   http://greenspirit.org.uk/bookreviews/2013/05/earthmind-communicating-with-the-living-world-of-gaia-by-paul-devereux-with-john-steele-and-david-kubrin/

International Women's Earth and Climate Initiative

 

The International Women’s Earth and Climate Initiative is a solutions-based, multi-faceted effort established to engage women worldwide to take action as powerful stakeholders in climate change and sustainability solutions. For Our Earth and Future Generations A project of Women's Earth and Climate Caucus and its partner eraGlobal Alliance 

Global participation in the Women's Earth and Climate Summit:

Join us September 20th-23rd! Participate in the Summit from your home, office, university or community.

Learn more about the IWECI Summit Live Stream and Vision Hubs »

 http://www.iweci.org/

About IWECI

MISSION—A GLOBAL WOMEN’S EARTH AND CLIMATE ACTION MOVEMENT

IWECI engages women grassroots activists, Indigenous and business leaders, policy makers and culture-shapers in collaboration. Our goal is to stop the escalation of climate change and environmental and community degradation, while accelerating the implementation of sustainability solutions through women’s empowerment, partnerships, hands-on trainings, advocacy campaigns, and political, economic, social and environmental action.

IWECI was created to accelerate a holistic Global Women’s Earth & Climate Action Movement. Our five-point plan for the first two years’ of action in 2013 and 2014 includes:

1. Online Action ; Networking Platform (launching on International Women’s Day, March 8, 2013) - to spark project collaborations, sustainability business opportunities, and campaigns designed to advance long-term cross-cultural, cross-sector, cross-generational and cross-socioeconomic networking and mobilization.
2. International Day of Action - creating a global photo mosaic of women promoting the slogan “Women for Earth and Future Generations”.
3. The International Women's Earth and Climate Summit (20-23 September 2013, New York) - an unprecedented gathering of women leaders dedicated to addressing solutions for climate change and environmental degradation.
4. Solution Spotlight, Projects and Action Campaigns - promoting best-practice solutions, on the ground sustainable projects , business and trainings that deliver benefits to both women, communities and the environment, and engaging in action campaigns focused on the most pressing issues.
5. North American Regional Gathering - To engage women in the United States to mobilize together in support of concerted climate change solutions for the US.

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Commentary:

Our basic relationship with the natural world has been distorted. Humanity is systematically destroying our home and undermining the ecosystems of our Earth. We are in need of a paradigm shift.

Global climate change is no longer a distant warning but is rapidly approaching a tipping point of no return. Scientists warn that the opportunity to prevent the worst impacts of climate change will be “lost forever” unless the global community changes course by 2017. This means we have four years to cap global emissions in order to reverse the current trajectory and change the deadly course we are on presently.

It is internationally recognized that women are critical to implementing climate change and sustainability solutions, yet there is currently not enough prominent mechanisms to wield a united effort into a defined movement. IWECI is engaging women's organizations worldwide, inside and outside the environmental arena, to join together and create a groundbreaking movement.

Icon by Betsy Porter

Signs Out Of Time: Marija Gimbutas Documentary

    





I often try to explain to others what is the focus of the Goddess events I attend, what, in other words, do I believe.  That question is not easily answered.......when I listen to people like Vicki Noble, Joan Marler, Mirrium Dexter, Starhawk, or Kathy Jones speak, it comes together in a great visionary whole, a hopeful paradigm shift that never fails to inspire, provoke, and challenge the long standing assumptions, so deeply embedded, within our culture.    So I take the liberty of sharing here the first two parts to SIGNS OUT OF TIME,  a 2004 documentary by Donna Read and Starhawk, narrated by Olympia Dukakis, based on the work and life of  archeologist Marija Gimbutas, who found that Europe's prehistoric origins lay in a cooperative, peaceful, Paleolithic and Neolithic culture whose universal prime deity was a Mother Goddess. Her theories challenge conventional archaeology, history, spirituality, theology, and religious studies, while inspiring artists, feminists, environmentalists, permaculturists,  and activists to explore a revolutionary paradigm of  peace upon Mother Earth.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ozaeuULrLjM&feature=share&list=PL42DD8748183C9B11



http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OmjghytJDtQ&feature=share&list=PL42DD8748183C9B11

Motherworld - A Vision from Avalon

Banners by Lydia Ruhle

The Vision of the Motherworld

by Kathy Jones 

Motherworld is where mothers and the values of mothering - love, care and support for each other, and for our Mother Earth and all Her creatures - are placed in the centre of our lives, rather than being left out on the periphery. 

The Motherworld is a vision of a society in which creative and life-affirming values, actions, insights and awareness are honoured and encouraged in women, men and children. It is the society that is grounded in the fact that we all live upon our Mother Earth. She is the source and foundation of all that we are and all that we have. We need to take care of Her, of each other and of all life.

The primary values for the new Motherworld are:

Honouring Mother Earth as a living being. 
Love for each other, kindness, support, respect, care, and compassion. honouring all forms of mothering, honouring fathers, and the celebration and nurture of children and young people. Protecting and taking care of the earth, water, fire, air and space in Her world.

Suggested values for the new Motherworld include:

Honesty, personal integrity, authenticity, relationship, diversity, choice, discernment, inclusion, trust, beauty, emotional expression, listening, clear boundaries, reflection, soul development, empowerment, shadow-healing, the pursuit of wisdom, the encouragement of self-responsibility, self-worth, self-respect, self-confidence, self-discipline and self-reflection, prayer, ceremony, service, connection, partnership, generosity, sharing wealth, gifting, receiving, humour, creativity, education for all, non-violent methods of resolving conflict, honouring and protecting Mother Nature and all living beings, ethical production of goods and services, the protection of the vulnerable, and valuing the Wisdom of the Elders and of the Ancestors.

The Motherworld is the society where the patriarchal structures and values of dominance, ‘power-over’ control and coercion, greed, excessive profit, destructive competition, violence, rape, war, slavery, suffering, hunger, poverty, and the pollution of Mother Earth and Her atmosphere, are recognized as shadow expressions of humanity which need to be challenged, deconstructed, transformed and healed. In the Motherworld, healing practices are encouraged and made readily available to all.

In the Motherworld it is recognized that all human beings, women and men, carry wounds from our patriarchal conditioning – emotional and mental patterns which may be activated as we try to change our world. In the Goddess community we are particularly aware of our shadow material, which includes envy, jealousy, judgment, competitiveness, collusion, resentment, undermining, back-biting, blaming, naming and shaming, projection of negative emotions, such as anger, shame and rage, fear, loneliness, lack of self-love, lack of self-esteem and lack of self-confidence, all of which are the result of individual cultural and karmic life experiences.

In the Motherworld, one of our first works is to love and support each other in taking responsibility for our repressed and often hostile emotions. These shadows undermine all our best endeavours to change the way we act in our personal and social relationships, in our lives as Goddess-loving people living in a patriarchal world, as Her priestesses and priests, as Her melissae, and in our personal commitments to Goddess. They often prevent us from experiencing true empowerment. Amongst many of us we already have developed skills and techniques of emotional expression, such as really listening to each other and offering reflection and support so that we may heal these wounds. This personal healing work needs to – and can - accelerate at this time with the help of the Motherworld community, which can help hold us in compassionate safety as we work to heal our wounds.

Although the name ‘Motherworld’ comes from Barbara Walker’s novel about an ancient fictional matriarchal society, this is not a return to such a society. It is a forward movement to a new kind of mother-centred community, where all are valued, supported and appreciated, and where we can experiment together with new ideas and forms. ‘Motherworld’ evokes a loving world where we are held safely in the Great Mother’s embrace.

Kathy Jones is the Founder of the Glastonbury Goddess Temple, and the annual Glastonbury Goddess Conference.  It was inspiring indeed to hear her talk this past weekend.  For more information about Kathy and the Temple, visit:  

 http://www.goddesstemple.co.uk/index.php/the-vision-of-the-motherworld

Vicki Noble at the Conference

  Back from the Goddess Spirit Rising Conference in Los Angeles, inspired, and with so much to think about.  I was able to find a speech, from the 2009 Motherworld Conference in Toronto,  very similar to the speech Vicki Noble gave this weekend  on UTube, and take the liberty of sharing it here. Listening once more to Vicki,  Mirrium Dexter and Joan Marler, all former students and colleagues of Marija Gimbutas and teachers at the Institute of Archaeomythology, I was renewed in my understanding of the importance of the radical paradigm shift their work represents.  I was especially fascinated with the way Vicki wove the work of Dr. Shelly E. Taylor into her talk.  Dr. Taylor wrote   The Tending Instinct:  Women, Men and the Biology of Our Relationships  which skillfully re-examines the biological basis of human relational identity:

For generations, scientists have taught us about the fight or flight response to stress. But is this instinct universal? Renowned psychologist Shelley E. Taylor points out that fight or flight may only be part of the story. Humans - particularly females - are hardwired to respond to stress differently. As Taylor deftly notes in this eye opening work, the tend-and-befriend response is among the most vital ingredients of human social life.
Drawing from biology, evolutionary psychology, physiology, and neuroscience, Taylor examines the biological imperative that drives women to seek each others company, and to tend to the young and inform, bestowing great benefits to the group, but often at great cost to themselves. This tending process begins virtually at the moment of conception, and crafts the biology of offspring through genes that rely on caregiving for their expression.

 http://youtu.be/-EisR17foaQ

http://youtu.be/S3Oc77ZTqXI

 

 http://youtu.be/jW_Vlse2HJw

Shaman Masks, the Songhai, and Yemeya

As I prepare to go to the Goddess Rising Conference  it occurred to me that it will be occuring at the edge of the Pacific Ocean, in Malibu.  And I remembered that just a few weeks ago I was making offerings at the lip of the Atlantic Ocean, and the Hudson River, because an Ifa priestess, Joy Wedmedyk,  told me to do so this summer.  In order to honor Yemeya,  who she called "The Mother of the World".

There is a poetry in this, a "Conversation" , and I felt like exploring it a bit more here. 
In July I visited a friend who has been a medium since childhood, and has also pursued shamanic and Spiritualist training.  Spending time with her has, truly, taught me so very much. Wendy has been both clairvoyant and clairaudient since childhood, and has worked with spiritual mentors since childhood that she speaks of with intimacy.  In the course of my visit with her, I had a "visitation".   I have been thinking about it  ever since.  

We were sitting at the table drinking coffee on a sunny morning,  and Wendy paused and said "Excuse me, but someone is here".  Her eyes had misted and tears ran down her face, which she said happens when there is powerful energy present, usually the presence of a spirit with a message.   She said that a very tall, thin, black man wearing a very flat disc like mask patterned in  black with a white band across the eye holes and a red spot on the forehead was standing right behind me.  She said she saw him  put his hands on my shoulders. He told her he was something that sounded to her  like "samarai", and that he wanted me to help in some way.  

When I asked (the energy in the room had become intense, and I felt quite vulnerable) what I could do to help,  he told her that I would help to "revive Yemeja".   I, of course, neither saw nor heard any of this.   Wendy said she also perceived a  number of people with him, she felt they were his tribe, and she saw them by the ocean.  They were showing her images of the ocean, and how they made offerings  with baskets of fruit, flowers, and small shells.  Tears were running down her face (Wendy says that when the energy is very intense this happens) and she said that he was thanking me. 

Then they were gone.   I thanked him and said that I would do what I could to the best of my abilities.  I do not know what that is though, except to keep doing what I have been doing, which is to tell the stories of the Goddess with Her many faces through my masks and through my writing.

Songhai women 

After the Visitor left, the energy in the room returned to normal breakfast, Wendy's tears ceased, we made some more coffee, and talked about it.  We couldn't figure out what the "samurai" thing was about, and so we looked up "African samurai", etc.  Here is where it becomes extraordinary:  there is a people, once an ancient nation, the Songhai Empire,  that extended into Burkina Faso, Mali  and parts of Western Africa, including some lands to the west that met the ocean.  

They would most certainly have had contact with the Yoruba people of Western Africa and  with Yoruban religion.   These people have a rich history, and cultural heritage,  among which are also arts and traditional elaborate masks, decorated with patterns in black, white and red, that are associated with shamanic, ancestral, animal spirit  and ritual practices.  The masks are called "plank masks" because of their flatness (I assume), and the people are called the Songhai.  Something neither of us knew anything about until we   learned about it on Google.

Plank mask from Burkina Faso

I've been thinking about this astonishing visitation ever since.  I reflected that Yemaja, Mother Ocean, originates among the Yoruba religions of  Western Africa.  Yemeja became especially  important in the Americas as the slaves were brought to the Caribbean and to South America, where  admixtures of the Yoruba religion and Catholicism became Santeria and other admixtures. Yemeya was especially  honored because She  carried the souls of their homeland in her waters.

Shortly after leaving my friend's house, I went to the Starwood Festival, where I ran into Joy Wedmedyk.   I've known Joy for years, having met her at workshops she leads at Brushwood and elsewhere.  Joy studied with Malidoma Some in this country and also in Burkina Faso in Africa.  Since then she has also become an  initiated Priestess of Ifa,

Joy is  dedicated to Yemaya,  and when I saw her at the Festival to attend a workshop she was giving there, she opened her work with us with a prayer to Yemeya:  and she called Her  "The Mother of the World".   The Goddess.  At that moment, I think I understood the meaning of the mask shaman's message!  

Joy told me that I needed to go to the ocean, and make offerings to Yemaya.  This I will do  when I find myself on the Pacific Ocean for the Goddess Conference  I will be attending in, of all places, Malibu, in a week.  "Reviving Yemaya", from Joy's perspective,  is reviving reverence for  Our Mother, the divine Feminine,  our living Earth and Her Waters. 

 I looked on Google for flat disc masks such as a tribal shaman might wear, and found that there are indeed many such among the peoples of Mali and Burkina Faso. I did discover as well that there is an extensive group of people, in these lands as well,  with a long cultural history,  called the "Songhai", which sounds quite similar to "Samarai", and some of their domain touched the western ocean on Africa's shores.  I learned about the  Bwa masks of Burkina Faso when I Googled "Songhai shamans".   

http://www.uiowa.edu/~africart/Art%20of%20Burkina%20Faso.html

"Bwa masks are believed to possess special powers which are controlled by those who wear them.

These masks are plank shaped with a circular face at one end and a crescent moon at the other. Their wearer looks through a hole in the mouth...........The plank section is decorated with geometric patterns which are an essential design element in many African masks and carvings.

Geometric patterns create an external rhythm which echoes the internal spiritual energy of the artwork.

It can also be used as a coded language where the design communicates secret knowledge to those in the know. The designs on this Bwa Mask, which is used to celebrate boys' initiation to adulthood, represent information about myths and morality that the boys must learn before they can be accepted into adult society."

 http://maskofworld.blogspot.com/2011/09/african-masks-bwa-mask.html