Speaking with the Goddess

I am back from my weekend. On Saturday I battled my demons. On Sunday I spoke with the Goddess. Or I should more properly say, she chose to speak to me.

I stayed for the weekend at the home of the woman who was hosting the workshop (see my previous post for details). On Saturday evening, all of us women attending the workshop dressed our Goddesses. I chose to dress sweet and sexy, when I usually choose elegant and safe. My demons arrived in the form of “cleavage envy.”

Every other woman in the workshop displayed her breasts to very sexy advantage. If my own breasts were a bit larger, I might have had cleavage in the outfit I chose to wear. I did not. When I compared myself to all the other women, I felt decidedly un-sexy and deeply inadequate. I ran and hid in another room while the rest of the women danced.

With some help from the workshop leader, I worked through my tiny-breasted demons and rejoined the group for the second half of the evening.

I went to bed at 10:30 that night, which is extremely early for me. I woke up at 4:30 Sunday morning and was unable to go back to sleep. I stayed in bed for another hour, and got up just as the sky was beginning to grow light. The workshop was ending that evening, so I packed up my things and got them ready to carry out to my car. That was the moment the Goddess spoke.

“Sit down and watch the sunset,” she commanded.

“But I need to carry my bags out to the car,” I protested. “I’m busy. I have more important things to do.”

“Sit down and watch the sunset,” She commanded again.

I acquiesced and set down my bags, making myself comfortable in front of the large double windows. From these windows I had a stunning view of the sky, framed by pine trees in the foreground and in the distance. There were gently sloping hills off to my right, and at least one non-pine tree with gorgeously yellowing leaves. Everywhere I looked I saw beauty, which became ever more splendid as the light increased.

Directly in my line of vision, astride the horizon, floated a very large cloud that resembled a woman’s head, with long greyish-white hair streaming out behind as though lifted by strong winds. As the sun came up, this cloud bloomed deep rose.

“How beautiful,” I breathed, speaking aloud into the silence.

“How are you less beautiful?” the Goddess asked.

Awe. Transcendent awe awakened in my soul and moved throughout my body. How, indeed? I am, I realized, as much a part of the natural world as every leaf, branch, cloud, bird, and blade of grass I could see from those windows. And of every part I could not see.

But the world also holds ugliness, I thought.

“That which you call ugly are the shadows, which give definition,” said the Goddess.

So they are also part of the beauty, I thought.

“How are you less beautiful?” asked the Goddess again.

I thought about this for a while. Then I spoke my conclusion aloud: “I am less beautiful when I believe I am less beautiful.”

As I spoke those words, I saw deep truth in them. That I appear to others the way I believe myself to be. And if I believe that I am ugly, or that tiny breasts are not enough, I will be and they won’t be.

I made the decision in that moment to look into my mirror and always find what is beautiful. Even if I’ve been camping and haven’t showered in four days. Even when I’m looking at myself after I’ve just had a fight with my husband. Even when I’m depressed and wish the world would go away. And there will always be beauty, because I believe there will be.

May you know the beauty in all things.

~Love and Blessings,
Selene~

A Few Short Words

  I’ll be away this weekend, so I must make this short. I’m in the middle of about 700 different things, and must somehow get them done and leave the house by 6 pm. That gives me about forty-five minutes to finish this entry, paint the toenails on my right foot, pack up my food for the weekend, load up the car, set my hair, wash the dishes, put out extra food for my kitties — well, you get the idea.

I’m attending a workshop called “Awakening Shakti,” which is designed with the intention of helping women rediscover their sexuality in a positive way. I’m terrified of what will happen, and I’m also aglow with excitement! This weekend will change me in some profound way, I am certain, because I am ready to receive such a change. I am tired of having so little confidence in myself and such a difficult relationship with my body. This weekend, I am stepping fully into the realm of self acceptance.

 Well, that’s really all I have time for. Now I have just over 30 minutes to do everything listed in the first paragraph. I will give a full report on my weekend when I return, though I may not have a chance to post it until Monday.

See you all soon (whoever you are — I feel your presence). Have a great weekend.

~Love and Blessings,
Selene~

Nose Full of Wheat

  In the dream I was having last night, I was writing a play. The title was Nose Full of Wheat, and no, I have no idea why. A friend was in my dream, which is significant because I’ve known her for years but never dreamed about her before. She was in a large, mostly empty room with stone floors and metal grills set in the floor at regular intervals. My friend moved from grill to grill, stopping and bowing at each one in veneration.

A metal or wooden (I’m not sure which) slab was set upon each grill, and each one contained a carving of either Baubo or Sheila Na Gig. I will not include links here, but feel free to do your own research. Both Baubo and Sheila are Goddess figures representing (among other things) the female genitalia. Don’t even need Dr. Freud to anaylze that!

I followed behind my friend as she venerated each grill and Goddess carving. Then we sat down together on a loveseat upholstered in white silk and I opened up the book that magically appeared in my arms. I pointed to the words “Nose Full of Wheat” on a page and told her I was writing a play. Actually, the words were “Nose Full Wheat,” and she asked me why I left out the “of.” She pointed out that people might have difficulty understanding my meaning unless I gave them everything. So I added the “of” back to the title of my play.

The interesting things in this dream for me are as follows: I am allergic to wheat, and always have been. I no longer eat it in any form, although I did for many years. I suffer from systemic candidiasis as a result of my lifelong consumption of wheat and other foods to which I am allergic. I have (for the most part) given up these foods. Wheat is one of those that I feel I can never allow back into my diet, because it has caused me too much trouble. So I think that the title Nose Full of Wheat is suggestive of something. When I ate wheat in the past, I would feel it first in my sinuses, then next in my vagina. In case you haven’t heard of candidasis, it is basically a body-wide yeast infection. And a very nasty one, I might add.

Perhaps the message of my dream is this: In the temple that is your body, worship all of yourself. And if there is any part excepted from this worship, look more closely at why this is so.

Thanks for reading. Sweet dreams.

Herbaceous Goodness

Dill is my favorite herb. Cayenne pepper runs a close second, and that actually surprises me. I am a lover of hot and spicy food from way back, so I always assumed hot pepper of any sort would be my favorite. Yet dill, green, feathery and distinctive, is definitely the one I like best.

I’m eating a meal just now, and two out of the three items on my plate are enhanced with dill weed. My broccoli and cauliflower saute was generously sprinkled with dill while cooking, and my side of brown rice was decorated with dill after cooking. I used cayenne pepper on the cabbage/kale/shitake mushroom/garlic saute–and I must admit, I was tempted to use dill as well!

I love to cook, and have played with ingredients and made up my own recipes for as long as I can remember. As a little girl I picked wild blackberries for pies, used my mother’s mixer to turn heavy cream into butter, and cut translucent slices of cooked potato to make my own potato chips.

Even today, I rarely cook from any recipe in a book. Sometimes I start with a written recipe and make something completely new. Cooking is a creative act for me, one that lets me nourish my body with the results. Now that my diet consists mostly of vegetables, I am learning new ways to put them together and to make them taste outrageously delicious.

If there are any other vegetarians out there who want their diets to be even healthier while remaining (or becoming) more scrumptious, I am happy to share some of my cooking secrets. This one I’ll share right now: remember to have fun.

If you ever read the book Like Water for Chocolate, or saw the movie by the same name, there’s a deeper truth there. When you love to cook, you cook with love, and whatever you cook tastes that much better as a result.

Thanks for reading. Bon Appetit!

Funky Town

  Some mornings, waking up is hard to do. I’ve got the blues a little bit today, because everything seems to be on hold. I’m supposed to start work soon, and I don’t know if it’s this week or next. The work could also disappear, because the whole project is up in the air, so whether I have work or not is iffy. I’m looking at yet another of my writing workshops being cancelled, because no one has been signing up for them since September. I had to decline a featured reading I was recently offered, because I felt that the proceeds from my intellectual property as an artist belong to me (the venue wanted a guaranteed–their word–25% commission on any book sales I made).

So I keep having to cancel things, and say “no” to things, or be told “no.” Perhaps what I need to do is find the “rightness” of the fallow period in which I seem to be. Being stuck, being on hold–these are states as necessary as the periods of frenetic activity, when everything happens at once, or the times of feeling happy and fulfilled, or the times of grieving and trying to make sense out of the darkness we all experience.

If I must experience this–and I must, being human and embodied and living on this Earth–then this is the perfect time of year to do it. The waning of the year, the approach of Halloween, of Samhain, the time when the days run shorter and the nights deepen and expand. I must remember to grieve if needed, to dance when called, to honor the struggles and passions of my soul.

Thank you for reading and witnessing my struggle. Putting it down here in words has lightened me somewhat.

Letting Go

  I am a different adult from many you will meet, because I believe in magic. I cast spells with my thoughts and create–moment by moment–my experience of the world. I manifest things in my life on a regular basis. This works only if I want them without greed, without desperation. Only if I speak what I want, or write what I want, and then let it go. It has taken me more than forty years to learn to do this, and it helps that I never really grew up; the child part of my soul finds it easy (and LOTS of fun!) to believe that magic is real.

Today I went dancing at Ashkenaz in Berkeley. Every Sunday morning from 11 am until 1 pm they have Soul Sanctuary Dance, and I highly recommend it! If you love freestyle dance, and are a Dance Jammer or a Barefoot Boogier, you will love this, too.

Whenever I dance, I feel the presence of magic, and I felt it today. At first, I only danced. Then the music and the magic took over and I stopped thinking about how I was going to move my body and just moved it. I danced for an hour without stopping, something I have lacked the energy to do for a long time. I jumped up and down, I spun, I leaped, I sang. I let go. Over and over and over. Tears are welling as I remember, as I dance and twirl and leap inside my head.

If you want to open to magic in your own life, I recommend going out and doing something you have never done before. Ideally, this will be something you have always wanted to do, something wild and creative. At first it need only be a little wild and a touch creative. On the day you have chosen to do this activity, give yourself a short while to meditate or just be alone–about 30 minutes will do. During this time, check in with yourself and see how you’re feeling. Refrain from judging yourself or trying to stop yourself from feeling any particular way–just feel it. If you want, journal about it.

After you have completed the activity you have always wanted to do, check in with yourself again. How are you feeling now? Again, refrain from judgement. Be gentle and compassionate with yourself. What you feel is the beginning of magic, of awakening to yourself and bringing into your life what will heal you. Start planning your next activity, and thinking about other things you want in your life. Who knows what will happen? With magic, anything is possible.

Dreams in the Snake House

  Such a strange dream I was having last night. I was in a Night Stalker episode, one that was never aired because it was one I invented. Had something to do with a massive weresnake, I think. Darren McGavin escorted me and another woman–a snake priestess, there to do battle with the weresnake–into a gigantic entry hall. It was entirely round, fashioned from white marble, with marble staircases curving upward on either side.

Darren (playing Carl Kolchak, of course) led the snake priestess to the staircase on the right side of the hallway. She had very long dark brown hair and wore stained, dirty brown robes. She looked up the staircase and her eyes rolled back in her head, whereupon she collapsed at the foot of the stairs. A large brown snake rose out of her, coming from some inexplicable location on her body (in the manner of dreams). The she-snake then slithered up the steps to do battle with the weresnake, which was waiting in a room on the next floor.

Darren and I heard the sounds of the battle between the two snakes, which included some very unsnakelike screaming, but we didn’t see anything. I remember each of us grimacing and wincing at the terrible sounds coming from above us. I seem to recall that in the Night Stalker TV show, Darren McGavin did that a lot in his role as Carl Kolchak. Wince and grimace at some fresh horror, I mean.

Anyhow, the she-snake eventually came slithering back down the marble staircase, apparently victorious, and re-entered the body of the snake priestess. When the woman opened her eyes again, the only sign that she’d been in a terrible battle was a trickle of blood running from one corner of her mouth.

There was more, but the rest is very fuzzy. I’ve recorded the most vivid parts. I won’t offer an interpretation here, because I don’t have one as yet. I let my dreams ripen throughout the day, until the meaning bursts into my consciousness.

Thanks for reading. Sweet dreams!

Not an Early Riser

   My head is still foggy from waking up at 10 am. For me, that’s early. I’ve read all about natural body rhythms, and how we’re supposed to wake up when the sun rises and go to bed when it sets. Well, my body defies all natural laws (at least in that respect). I have been the proverbial night owl all my life, loving the solitude and quiet that usually exist at three am when no one else is awake.

 Jobs were always hard for me as a result of my body’s rhythms. Jobs where I was expected to be at a certain place at a certain time, that is. Now I free lance and I love it! My brain is most alert in the late afternoon and evening, so I have the option to use that time for working. My life is making more sense these days.

Today a friend and I have an adventure planned. For weeks now I’ve had this crazy urge to just point myself in any direction and drive for two hours, just to see where I end up. I want to go someplace I’ve never been and see what happens when I get there. Of course for me, that means packing food. I have a special diet due to my myriad food allergies–no doubt I will blog about that at some point. Ah! New category! At any rate, much preparation must be done before I can jaunt off on my “spontaneous” adventure, so my initial post today will be short.

Blog atcha later!

So Now I am a Blogger

  This is something I thought I would never do. Blogging, I mean. I am a former techie, and I was rising up through the ranks of system administration during the days when the Internet was still an underground, counterculture pasttime, accessible only to the ultra-brainy or terminally hip.

My friend, BlogLily, got me started on this path. I love reading her blog, and I started thinking, “Hey, I can do that. I’m good with computers, and I love words.” I’m surprised, in fact, that I didn’t begin sooner. Words have always been essential to me.

At the age of four or five, I used to walk around my neighborhood in Binghamton, New York with a pencil and a pad of paper. I made loops and curls on the paper as I watched the people and looked up at the trees. I didn’t yet know how to write, but I wanted to describe everything going on around me, to record it on paper. Writing has, somehow, always been a part of me.

I will never forget the first time I recognized a word I had written for what it was. The word was “sorry,” and I was copying out one of those rote exercises in first grade. I copied down the word “sorry” and all at once the entire universe seemed to coalesce around that single word, to distill itself down into those five letters. I read the word, sounded it out, and realized the power in what I was doing! I understood that I could now make any word I chose, and I wrote a four-line poem, right there on the spot. I have only ever been able to remember one line from it: “Sorry sir, sorry sir.”

This year I went to Europe for the first time, to writing workshops in Scotland and Italy. One of the women in the Italian workshop heard my story and suggested I try to recreate the original poem. My best effort is as follows:

Where are you going, sir?
Where have you gone, sir?
Sorry sir, sorry sir,
sorry I can’t go.

Well, I think that’s enough for a first post to my new blog site. I am happy to be doing this, because I know it will get me to write more. My goal is to post something new every day, even if it is only a paragraph. Can’t wait to see how I do!

Hello world!

Whoopee! Now I am a Blogger!