owl & crow

Posted By Stephanie on July 30, 2010

Welcome to the SoulCollage® blog party where you can see what SoulCollagers have been assembling. Thanks, Kathryn Antyr at True North Arts for hosting! I had a great time putting my SoulCollage® cards together–some old, some new–and creating a story of Heartwork…

Work of the eyes is done now.
Go and do heartwork
On all the images imprisoned within you:
For you overpowered them:
But even now you don’t know them…

~ Rainer Rilke

“When you look back on a lifetime
and think of what has been given to the world by your presence,
your fugitive presence, inevitably you think of your art,
whatever it may be, as the gift you have made to the world in
acknowledgment of the gift you have been given,
which is the life itself…
That work is not an expression of the desire for praise or recognition,
or prizes, but the deepest manifestation of your
gratitude for the gift of life.”

~ Stanley Kunitz

(Thanks Mili Dillard for making these poems available.)

Let the blog roll begin…

Category: Myth, SoulCollage®, Totem Aninals, personal | 9 Comments »
Tags: Blog Party, chakra, SoulCollage, spirit guides, totem animals

Posted By Stephanie on July 26, 2010

I created this shadow box — which was meant to be literally about an aspect of our own shadow; that part of ourselves that we don’t want to look at, let alone own — and I feel that in making it I have unlocked a fearful part of me that I have been struggling with for some time: The little girl who is afraid of not having enough, who lives with a sense of lack and thinks it’s all she deserves, and who struggles to create and feel abundance as her right. In pondering when this little shadow sub-personality may have been born, I recalled a year in my life that is full of memories both dark and vibrant, a time when my consciousness awoke and I became much more acutely aware of other people’s feelings and yearnings, as well as my own.

When I was a little girl about 5 years old, we lived in a small apartment at the beach in California for a year. It was lean times in our family as my father took a temporary job while continuing to look for something more permanent in his line of work in the aerospace industry. I was a whirligig of motion at that age, always running, skipping, and flitting from place to place. Thus I earned the nickname “Butterfly” from one of my mother’s friends. During this time my mother got a job, the only time in my childhood when she worked outside the home, so I was left to my own devices a little more than would probably be encouraged these days. I remember being invited to another girl’s birthday party and I had some cheap, paltry gift that I was ashamed to bring to her. I walked by myself down the strand to the girl’s house and on the way I stopped at a neighbor’s and burst into tears about my pathetic gift. My neighbor somehow magically was able to give me some items that made my offering seem much more bountiful–I seem to recall a big box of new crayons and a brand new set of paper dolls to add to what I remember as a single, thin coloring book. It rounded out the gift I had nicely, I thought, and not too proud to accept these gifts from my neighbor, I went to the party with my head held high. I don’t remember how my gifts were received or much else about the party, but the feeling of not having enough and perhaps not being enough lingered.

As I placed the figure of the little girl inside my shadow box I felt her vulnerability as she stood before an image of a great swath of pavement with a single penny in the middle of it. There were also two empty fishing baskets hanging on a post in front of the vast ocean.  The instructions for making the shadow box included bringing in a warrior spirit to help the shadow part transform. I was excited when I heard about this element because in marvelous synchronicity, just the day before, I had received in the mail my beautiful warrior guardian doll as part of the paper doll swap I took part in at True North Arts. She was the perfect goddess of abundance with her golden sash, boots, and sword (created by Tana Vaughan, Thank You again, Tana!), and I knew she was to be part of my shadow box.

I was drawn to her butterfly/moth headdress, and with the theme of transformation in mind, I began to bring butterflies into my shadow box, the magical creatures who shape shift from creeping caterpillars to winged gossamers of beauty, and recalled the peripatetic child I once was. As I draped the little girl in tiny butterflies and added three-dimensional butterflies to my once barren shadow box, I began to feel the relief that transformation brings when we allow ourselves to see things from a different perspective, when we change our thoughts. I now saw a shiny penny on a dark, empty surface — a glimmer of hope, a beginning. I saw the empty baskets next to the wide expanse of ocean, teeming with fish (symbols of spirituality), as vessels of rich possibility, waiting to be filled. I saw the little girl, who before had seemed so alone and bereft, as now cloaked in butterflies before a girl meditating, serene in her own knowing about the world, protected by a magnificent golden warrior of abundance who will always guide her to knowing she has nothing to fear. The Universe has always provided and will continue to provide all that she needs.

I would also like to invite you all to take part in a SoulCollage® blog party that Kathryn Antyr of Collage Diva and True North Arts is hosting. On Saturday, July 31st, the unveiling of SoulCollage® cards will take place on many sites, including this one. (If you come here, you will be able to see the others from here.) So if you have some SoulCollage® cards and a blog or Flickr page on which to show them off, please join the party! There are lots of great ideas on Kathryn’s site for how to present your cards and your story.

Category: Myth, goddess, personal | 6 Comments »
Tags:

Posted By Stephanie on July 4, 2010

I don’t know about you, but I have been feeling some strong energy shifts since the summer solstice on June 21, the full moon lunar eclipse on June 26, and the solar eclipse/new moon in Cancer that’s coming up on July 11. For me it’s stirred up creative energy and fiery passion to get things done and take some leaps in my work both as a therapist and an artist and writer. I have always been interested in astrology and the psychological understanding that going into the depths can bring. I seem to approach it on more of an intuitive level and don’t always understand the mechanics or details of it. I think that’s typical of my psychological type (INFP or Intuitive/Feeling type) as well as my Aquarian sun, Scorpio rising, and Sagittarius moon. All I know is I’m feeling something and I’m noticing bubbling and rumblings. I have so much creative energy I don’t know what to do with it–so many ideas and projects, not enough time–because I also crave rest, a need to feel grounded and balanced. I’m not quite sure what to make of it all yet.

A week ago I went to a SoulCollage® facilitator gathering of 12 wonderful women (and one soulful man) in Charlotte that allowed me to play and make cards that had been percolating inside and needed to be birthed into being. The two solar eclipse cards seen here came out of that. Since learning about all of this cosmic movement taking place — a grand cardinal cross of 7 planets on or about July 14 — and the effects of this energy apparently lasting several weeks, I noticed some fear coming up. This is going to be a big planetary shift, I’m hearing, so fasten your seat belts.

The first image I gravitated to when I saw it was of Green Tara, a Buddhist protector goddess. Once I combined her with solar eclipse images and was able to see or sense the bigger picture, I felt the fear melt away. I saw this fear as shadow material that I was feeling on a deep level, but did not need or want to stay in. Fear rarely serves us.

Connecting with the divine feminine that Tara represents helped me feel centered again, enveloped in her good graces and compassion. The message to me was: What do I need to know? Both awareness/knowledge and love are the antidotes to fear. Just creating the image made me feel that I was loving and caring for myself by invoking her protection for all of us. So what do I need to know about this time?

Here’s what I’ve gleaned from reading and listening to others speak about this Big Cosmic Event that starts with the Solar Eclipse on the 11th:

Eclipses, in general, allow us to see what has been hidden from us (Me and My Shadow), to review what has come before (our lessons, what is coming to fruition), and to let go of what no longer serves us so that the alchemical change and rebirth can occur.

As Astrologer Steve Nelson puts it, “A solar eclipse is positively transformative as we learn to detach from what is breaking down and shift attention to what is breaking through… The more shadow patterns are transformed the more energy is freed for new creation. So continues the cycle of death and rebirth, destruction and recreation. The world is ready for change. A total eclipse of the Sun is an opportunity to change whatever we wish at the deepest level. All that’s needed is to be still, slow down, and go within to the creative source of transformation in this special time.”

Astrologer Rhea Wolf says: “Eclipse cycles happen on the Full and New Moons approximately every six months and act as a kind of energetic bridge through time. We may find ourselves coming to terms with actions we took six months ago, and can even find resolution or illumination about events in our lives from 19 years ago – the last time these specific eclipses would have occurred. Eclipses always heighten and intensify our world. They are like super-charged Full and New Moons. This month, we have the opportunity to create intentions related to the energy of Cancer and Capricorn, setting the stage for the coming six months and beyond. Some general advice for the eclipse season is to leave some open space in your schedule. Eclipse periods are full of the unexpected – projects, people, opportunities and ideas show up suddenly. If you already have a packed calendar, you will definitely get exhausted by the extra attention these surprises require.”

And finally, Astrologer Jessica Murray explains, “The key configuration in the sky this summer is the Grand Cross, the most stressful configuration in astrology. With Saturn, Uranus and Pluto in a T-square, and the quickly moving lights in Cancer supplying the fourth piece of the puzzle, the energy we are feeling is tense and insistent. We may miss the mellowness of previous summers; we may feel nostalgic for years past, when the world wasn’t being blindsided by critical issues peaking all at once, as it is now. But this summer’s stresses are exactly what humanity needs to motivate phenomenal bursts of growth.

The solar eclipse on July 11 puts the spotlight on Cancer, the sign of mothering, empathy, caring, and connectedness. On a personal level, it highlights the importance of simple kindness in our life. High-level Cancer inspires us to treat every sentient creature as if it was a treasured child of the universe. To relate in a Cancerian style is, at its best, to open our hearts towards every being as if they were as bonded to us as a treasured family member.

On a global level, the Cancer archetype is putting the emphasis on our connectedness with Mother Earth whose ongoing defilement by the oil industry raises many troubling questions. Blaming the rapacious profiteers of Big Oil (Pluto in Capricorn is one corner of the Cross) is easy enough to do; as is pointing the finger at the corrupt government officials whose failure to protect our environment can be traced to deep-pocket corporations (Saturn square Pluto).

But the deeper we look at this spring and summer’s transits, the more likely we are to find our own oily footprints in the sand. There are many stories hidden within the chart of the Deep Water rig explosion on April 20, 2010, as well as the charts of the transits during June, July and August, that suggest how ordinary people have accepted and maintained the ecological mess we find ourselves in.”

And so that brings us back to who we are, where we are, and what responsibility we take for what we have, if not created, certainly allowed. It seems that Mother Earth has been shaking and quaking this year, starting with the earthquakes in Haiti and Chile and other places, the volcanic eruption in Iceland, and then the BP spill in the gulf, which continues to pollute and contaminate our precious resources with no end in sight. How do we turn this around and start to heal ourselves and our planet and do so in a compassionate way?

I believe it starts with a 180 degree shift from the masculine principle of domination, control and plundering to the feminine principle described above in which we work together, treat each other and ourselves as precious beings, and become whole. We are all responsible for making this shift in our own lives. Like Green Tara we can offer empathy for all beings as a mother does for her children, seek to provide protection from the unfortunate circumstances we encounter in the world, and provide healing. As such, we become the World Dancer, the final archetypal figure in the Major Arcana of the Tarot, who has reached a state of conscious awareness that allows us to do the Dance of Creation and both redeem ourselves and our beautiful planet. The question is: What are we each willing to do to bring about this change and redemption?

Category: Myth, goddess, personal | 2 Comments »
Tags: astrology, grand cross, Green Tara, lunar eclipse, solar eclipse, SoulCollage®, tarot, World Dancer

Posted By Stephanie on June 16, 2010

Saturday I had the privilege and joy of getting together with a group of soulful women and a wonderful spirit-filled teacher, storyteller, and outsider artist, Cher Shaffer, who guided us through the process of making what she calls “time cage dolls.” Our somewhat cryptic message from Cher in advance of the workshop was this: “Be thinking about the women who have influenced your life. Bring a pen, and paper to write a message to them… Time is convergent. Past, present, and future, all merge in all of us. We become Time Cages. We are the embodiment of all that has gone before us, all that is, and all that will be. We are part of the great circle of life. Please contemplate this, and be mindful of any messages or words you get before coming to our gathering.” I was intrigued as I have been contemplating my place on the wheel lately, the past, present and future converging, being a mother in the middle between a teenage daughter and my own 92-year old mother. I just knew I really needed to make a time cage doll.

One of the first things Cher talked about when we met at the charming Hillsborough home of Margaret, tucked in the woods on the Eno River, was the existence of the Little People. Cher was very matter-of-fact about this and talked about their presence in the forest and the likelihood that they were watching us right now: We might not be able to see them, but they could surely see us. As she spoke, distant rumblings of thunder could be heard and the weather changed from a hot, humid, sunny day almost instantly to a darkening sky that eventually erupted with cleansing rain, enlivening us as we sat in circle, our imaginations awakened. Cher’s mother was Cherokee and the stories of the Little People who lived deep in the forest were a part of her heritage.  I felt time collapse as I sat listening to her tell stories about how as a little girl she grew up playing in the Appalachian woods and catching glimpses of the little creatures. I felt a thrill as she spoke, as if I had come home. For that was my childhood, too, in Kansas, where I spent many hours alone, roaming through the woods on fairy hunts, conversing with the invisible ones, of whom I occasionally caught glimmerings and shimmerings, rustlings and murmurings.  There, my imagination and intuition were nurtured and my love for all things mystical, magical, natural and sacred took form.

My mother encouraged these sightings and endless talk about the creatures I built houses and left offerings for. Once I pointed to the door-shaped bottom of a giant tree in our yard and my mother went out and painted it red so the fairies could find it. Now I could watch from my window and perhaps catch their comings and goings through this portal from their world to ours and back again. Since childhood, I have felt the deep need to be surrounded by big trees and lots of green and gravitated to these settings. It feeds my soul and keeps me close to the nature spirits I feel are like guardian angels to me. Now I have a 14-year-old daughter who thinks it’s funny that my computer screen saver photo is of a wise tree spirit — a wizened face in a tree that is there for everyone to see if you truly look.

And that was the message of making the cage dolls. To truly look at nature and be with it and create from it, bringing you close to Spirit and the ancestors, who speak this language of knowing, of seeing, of being.  The women who had gathered here were all open to seeing with new eyes, it seemed, open to creating a nature spirit, a soul doll, a reflection of themselves that captured time in the cage of her body, connecting each of us in a personal way to our own ancestors, and in a universal way to Spirit and to one another. Together we made a coven of 13 (tee-hee), a magical number of magical women whom I had never met before but who all seemed like long lost friends. In no time we were laughing and sharing our stories of marriages, divorces, children, grandchildren, maidenhood and menopause, and what one of us heard as “sinning” instead of singing–both had meaning depending on how you looked at it.

My cage doll hummed to life for me when I put little paper scrolls with the names of the women in my family written upon them inside her rib cage of twigs and grapevines. She was now a sacred vessel of remembrance, of childhood memories of playing in the woods with the invisible ones, creating worlds I would revisit later in my adulthood and introduce to my own daughter, memories of my grandmothers who read to me and told me stories of their childhood, of my mother who knew how to laugh and who gave me the gift of Believing, of my big sisters, guiding spirits throughout my life, and of my own daughter, who was a little baby girl just a few blinks ago and is now a young maiden who teaches me as much about myself as about her own unique way of being in the world, both innocent and wise at the same time — all converging in a time cage of my own creation, showing me the way to the sacred feminine, the great circle of life.

Thank you, Cher, and Margaret, and all the women and the Little People who showed up on a certain day, at a certain time, at a certain place, to share precious time together.

Category: Myth, personal | 5 Comments »
Tags: cage dolls, Cher Shaffer, Little People, magic

Posted By Stephanie on June 6, 2010

…Have this wish I wish tonight.

My book club group of fab femmes from Carrboro got together and made shrines after reading The Wishing Year, sub-titled “A House, A Man, My Soul,” a memoir by Noelle Oxenhandler. If you haven’t read it, it’s a great read and tres inspirant, even as the author grapples with her fears and skepticism. I have been making goddess shrines, but taking a page, literally, from Oxenhandler’s book, I thought it was time to put it out there, a concept she learns from the maven of wishing, the artist,  Carole Watanabe, who practices and extols the virtues of living life as an art form. She believes that if there’s something you want to manifest, you make a shrine to it, or of it, and believe.

While there are many lofty things I wish for, such as world peace, healing of our selves and our planet, and the greater empowerment of women worldwide (for we are the mother-healers), I felt the need to make a shrine to manifest something tangible, something for me (and my family) to enjoy… a beach house. My whimsical beach house has wings so it can fly anywhere in the world, meaning I’m not that picky about which beach at the moment. It could be North Carolina, New York, Hawaii, the south of France–It could be a one-story cottage or a 2-story villa–I’m open! There is a portion of a map of France as well as lots of money collaged as part of the horizon behind it. For me having more money means freedom to travel and to live in an idyllic spot of my choosing. I’ve lived in the mountains of California, which was wonderful, and now I’ll take the beach, thank you. It says “Happy Girl” right on the roof top and that is what I’ll name it when it becomes mine. And you’re welcome to come visit.

Along the same lines, I took part in a paper doll swap over at True North Arts, where we created guardian or healing art dolls. I chose to make Stella Maris, Star of the Sea, which is just another name for one of my favorite goddesses–the West African creator goddess, Yemaya. Ever since my husband, Rob, brought me back a handmade Yemaya doll (see Mother’s Day blog below) from New Orleans some years ago, I have been taken by her mother-creator powers. She is a moon goddess of dreams and secrets, childbirth, and the collective unconscious. She is known as Mama Watta in Africa, where it is believed that all of the oceans, seas, lakes and rivers were formed when the waters from her womb broke and spilled out across the earth. She is a fitting goddess for this time of year, as she is celebrated on the eve of the summer solstice (June 21st), when offerings are made of flowers, blessings, and messages in bottles asking her to grant wishes and fulfill dreams, and then cast into the sea.

The Stella Maris guardian doll I made has felted hair woven with tiny sea shells, wings that say “desire,” a girdle made of shells, her head and torso from a National geographic photo of a sunken ship’s figurehead found at the bottom of the sea, blue acetate, foil and textured papers, and mermaid paper doll form from The Enchanted Gallery (yes, you too, can get free paper doll forms to play with there). On her back it says, “Dreams really do come true.” If you do create a guardian doll, please post a comment here with a link so we can share our creations.

Kathryn Antyr at True North Arts will be offering a paper doll e-book of guardian art dolls made by those of us who took part in the swap.

And so I ask you, what do you wish for? Be bold, be brazen, be unapologetic, be daring, even selfish in your dreams and wishes. It’s okay. I am embracing the idea that the universe is abundant and expansive and that there is more than enough for everyone.

Dream big.

Category: Myth, goddess, personal | 1 Comment »
Tags:

Posted By Stephanie on May 8, 2010

Happy Mother’s Day! To each and every one of us. The mother goddess exists in every culture and mythos. She is revered as having the power to both create and destroy, to bring life and death, to nurture, protect and guide us through the light and shadow of human existence. She is the fertility goddess of creation who carries the dark, watery womb from whence we came and to which we long to return. The mother goddess is enacted when we give birth to or adopt a child or pet, when we create a work of art, start a business, or see a creative project through to fruition. She is the first teacher, the first attachment, the first initiator into life. She is the alchemical vessel herself, her womb the holy grail, the place where pure essence takes form and becomes living matter. Through her body each of us come forth, unique beings with our own life force and purpose. She is the great magician and we are her magic. Don’t forget the magical nature of your very existence! Celebrate the mother who gave birth to you and the mother goddess in you.

All of the mother goddesses inspire awe and deep respect. Which mother goddess do you most resonate with?

Yemaya, African goddess, Mother of the Sea, of Dreams and Secrets, the Womb of Creation. She is the mermaid, the full moon, mysteriously deep and reflective. She rules the house and nurtures the child in the womb, the creative aspect ready to be born. There is no mountain of trouble that Yemaya cannot wear down, no sickness of heart she cannot wash clean, no desert of despair she cannot flood with hope. Her watery womb transforms us; through her, our tears flow, cleansing, releasing and anointing us so that we may swim through life with greater ease. She is a great nurturing mother and friend to all women.

Kali Ma, the Hindu goddess of Creation and Destruction, also known as the Dark Mother. She is more well known in her Destroyer aspect and revered in India as the Great Mother whose creative, powerful, life-giving force is integrally connected to death and destruction. She carries both the Good, Nurturing and the Terrible, Devouring Mother aspects. In Hindu mythology, she is the creator of the world. In essence, it is Kali who brings about the one thing in life we must all come to terms with: Change. For without the ability to change and let go of the old, we would not grow and evolve. Without Kali we remain stagnant and superficial. She prods us and dares us to move through trauma and pain and get on with life. Kali women have been through the fire.

Demeter is the Greek goddess of the harvest, of wheat, personifying the renewing cycle of life and the seasons. She is the Roman equivalent of Ceres, goddess of the grain, from whose name the word cereal is derived. Demeter is mother to Persephone, the maiden. It is said that you cannot know Demeter without also knowing Persephone. They represent the mother-daughter bond. Demeter is closely associated with the mysteries of Eleusis, which held the secret of eternal life. Persephone’s descent into the underworld represented the buried seed that burst forth each spring to bring new life and return to the Mother. Demeter women have a deep need to be mothers, to nurture, and to stay connected to their offspring. To Demeter women, being pregnant as well as being a mother is the greatest fulfillment of her femininity and brings a sense of deep satisfaction and inner completion.

Isis, the Egyptian mother goddess, is almost the opposite of the Demeter mother in that she regards herself as more of a channel for new life to be born and is not as identified with her child as is Demeter. She was considered a “virgin goddess,” which in ancient times did not mean what it does today, but meant she was one unto herself and did not depend on another or need a man to complete her life. Isis was a queen who was equal to her husband, Osiris, and in fact, put him back together after he was dismembered. She is master of her own destiny and may be perfectly content to live alone and be a single parent or run her own business and find fulfillment as a mother to those who work under her or as a mother-creator, giving birth to many ideas and projects under her own direction.

The Virgin Mary and Mary Magdalene could be seen as embodying the earthly and the spiritual realms of the goddess. Mary, mother of God, much like Isis with Horus, is often portrayed nursing her child. She represents the good mother, the spiritual mother who we can look up to for guidance and protection. Mary Magdalene, said to be the consort or wife of Jesus in the gnostic gospels, and even to have given birth to their child, a daughter named Sarah, is the bodily form of the mother. Once said to be a prostitute, a claim that has been overturned by the Catholic church, she is the sexual embodiment of the Christian goddess, a flesh and blood woman who was also a disciple and feminine counterpart to the son of God. Together, these two Marys carry the body, soul and spirit of motherhood that is sometimes split, but together create wholeness and balance. This goddess may be most apt for women who identify with pregnancy and childbirth as a spiritual experience and are deeply attuned to their child’s soul essence.

Gaia is the preeminent Earth Mother goddess. Often depicted as giving birth to the world or carrying the world in her womb, she is the mother of all of nature, of humans, animals, plants, trees, mountains, rivers, oceans, and the entire cycle of life. She is the nature goddess and the one who patiently awaits each birth in its own time. She has the gift of overview and yet can lose herself in the details of accomplishing simple tasks. She is at home planting a garden or tending to a newborn kitten, while pots cook on the stove. She is as comfortable watching over others’ children as her own children. She may, in fact, have several children with different fathers or be an able step-mother or grandmother. She welcomes all into her home. She is a multi-tasker earth mama who is not easily flustered or phased by the ups and downs of life as she goes with the flow.

To honor the goddess, make a SoulCollage® card, a painting, a doll or an altar to the mother goddess you hold dearest. Post a link to your creation so we can share in the collective images of the mother goddess in all of us.

Happy Mother’s Day to you!

Category: Myth, goddess | 2 Comments »
Tags:

Posted By Stephanie on April 19, 2010

I’m just resurfacing after a 5-day trip back to see my mother, who is 92 years old and suffering from dementia. She got pneumonia and was released home from the hospital the day I arrived in Oklahoma to see her. I went to visit her two years ago, thinking it might be the last time I saw her and here I was back again, two years later, thinking the same thing.  My mother had to be on oxygen at home and take antibiotics, something she is not used to doing. My mother was a Christian Scientist and barely took an aspirin her entire life. Having dementia makes deviating from the norm worse. She was very confused and kept angrily asking why she had to “do all this crap” and wondering if she got pneumonia from something she ate. Needless to say, I explained things to her many times and found my best bet was to try and change the subject. Sometimes it worked and other times it was like Groundhog Day, the Sonny and Cher song starting the day, and everything repeating, conversations and all. One of the ways I tried to stay centered (did I mention there was also dysfunctional family drama going on around me as well?) was to read a book I brought with me called The Motherline by Naomi Ruth Lowinsky, Ph.D.

This book caught me in just the right place. Before I left for Oklahoma, my 13-year-old daughter went on her first week-long trip away from us with a friend to the beach. I have a lot of faith in my daughter and know that she is strong and capable and has good sense, but she’s also 13 and my only child. After I gave birth to her I was surprised to notice that I had intense and somewhat morbid fears of her being hurt or dying. As I would hold her and walk past our swimming pool I would clutch her tighter and walk as far away from the water as possible as if some unknown force would pull us both in and I would be unable to save her. It was the awesome power of motherhood, of the mother goddess Demeter, that had me in her grip. I knew I was responsible for not just keeping her alive, but caring for her and raising her with care and attention and the kind of nurturing I felt I didn’t get when I was a little girl. I was getting the chance to do it differently, to give my daughter what I felt deprived of: a mother who truly saw me and tended to my needs and feelings with tender loving care.

But I grew up feeling emotionally abandoned. My mother was an artist, a former dancer, and her head was in the clouds much of the time. Many times she would forget to pick me up at the time she had said she would be there; she would tell me my feelings of anger were too upsetting to her and I needed to stop being angry or sad–negative emotions were to be replaced by positive ones in her religion. I grew up stuffing my feelings, trying to please her, yearning for her attention, until I stopped caring and turned all my anger on her.

Many years and much therapy and healing work later, I finally got to raise my own daughter with the love and care and nurturing I knew I once needed and craved. But it’s never perfect, and as my daughter began the process of individuation and pushing away, I was shocked at this turn of events. I was not ready. I was unprepared. What happened to the little girl I poured so much love into–why didn’t she want me anymore?

Then I remembered. It slowly dawned on me: the story of Persephone and Demeter was playing out. The daughter is snatched from the mother and the mother grieves until she is reunited, but she only gets her daughter back part time, for during the other part she must carry on her own life. Only now I am not Persephone, the daughter, with whom I had related for so long; I am now Demeter, the mother. And as my daughter left for the beach on spring break, I worried what would happen to her out in the ocean without me, the mother goddess, to watch over her. What if a riptide pulled her out to sea as happened once when she was seven years old in the very same waters she would be swimming in now. She cried for me and I swallowed my panic and struggled with the elements, feeling the adrenaline pulsing through my body, reached her, and pulled her in with me to safe waters.

All these watery symbols of emotion, of the feelings I was denied, I am now swimming in, caught between the young daughter who is becoming a woman and my own mother who is like a child, near death. And I can’t help but see my mother differently, now that I have forgiven her for not being the perfect mother I needed, now that I understand how I can’t be the prefect mother to my daughter. Now that I can see how my mother was orphaned, too, and her mother was orphaned, and back it goes, this generational pattern that I have not played out in the same way. I have not orphaned my daughter, but in some ways I have orphaned myself. For many years I denied myself the artistic soul that my mother lived out because I was afraid I would sacrifice my daughter the way I felt I had been sacrificed by my mother. Only recently, since my daughter has started the individuation and separation process have I allowed myself to consider that it is a part of me, just as it was a part of my mother, and to deny it would be to allow a vibrant part of me to wither and die.

As Ruth Lowinsky says in The Motherline, “a daughter longs to be mothered by a mother like the potential woman in her… there will always be mourning for the mother we didn’t have… Further difficulties arise because we mothers also have great expectations of ourselves. Most of us are determined to differentiate from our own mothers by being better mothers. We raise our children as we wish we had been raised; we bring to them the values of the generation that formed our consciousness. We pour our love and our passion into this work, and therein lies the rub. Our children are not impressed. No child is grateful to her mother for not visiting upon her the sins of the mother’s mother. The young one simply suffers the empty places left unmothered in her own childhood. ” As I read these words I felt their truth as much as I wanted to wish it wasn’t so. But, of course, it was so. My daughter will have her own wounds, will see me through her own eyes.

Lowinsky says, “we must be able to face the ways in which we failed them. We must release them from our yearning to be affirmed as good mothers and let them be people living in a time we [may] find difficult to comprehend. The wrestling between mother and daughter takes place in many arenas. Among them are the struggles to differentiate bodies, to differentiate style in clothing, lifestyle choice of career and mate, to sort through differences in temperament, and to sort out what has been the mother’s responsibility for the child’s pain. Both mother and daughter must wrestle with the cultural prejudice that at once devalues female experience and projects impossible power on mothers. And they both must wrestle with the real archetypal power of the mother: the power to give birth, to nurture, and to destroy…. But because every mother is also a daughter, the wrestling goes on and on.”

And so the motherline appears to go full circle and connect back again, perhaps it is the symbol of infinity. As I sat with my mother and allowed her anger over what she was powerless to comprehend, much less control, the tears rolled down my face. I understood her feelings. Despite her confusion, my mother was able to comfort me when she saw my tears. She said, “Everyone has to go some time.” I asked her if she was ready. “As ready as I’ll ever be,” she spontaneously answered, but then took it back, “but I’m not sure I’m quite ready just yet.” Yeah, I know, Mom, it’s hard to let go.

Category: Myth, personal | 8 Comments »
Tags:

Posted By Stephanie on March 25, 2010

Now that spring is here, the time of birth and rebirth, it’s a good time to consider what new ideas, projects, aspects or changes we want to bring about. And as we ask that question, we may want to consider what do we want to throw out? What no longer serves us and needs to be cast into the fire to be transformed through the alchemy of consciousness?

For me, I want to birth a more playful artist aspect as I embark on a project about goddesses that I will be giving birth to soon. I have enjoyed working with goddess energy and reading up on it so much that I want to create a guide that everyone can use to access the goddess archetype, explore the inner goddess aspects, connect with the divine feminine, and manifest this in the world. To do this, I feel I need to enter into this creative world playfully and have fun with it. I am calling forth my inner Magician as well, the archetype that has come up for me most in the past year. So I have made SoulCollage® cards for both, as you can see below.

Ostara is a spring goddess from the Anglo Saxon/Germanic tradition from whence the word Easter comes. Ostara is a fertility goddess and a moon goddess, and her totem is the March hare. She symbolizes a fresh start, new birth, or rebirth. The maiden in us comes forth now (Catch you later, Crone). She is also associated with the Spring Equinox, when the length of days and nights are equal. I love this shamanic depiction of her by artist Helena Nelson-Reed. She is not a goddess we hear much about but she evokes springtime ritual, love of nature, and rolling in the grass. All things I want to revel in right now.

If you live in the Raleigh area, and want to learn about SoulCollage®, I’m teaching a “playshop” on April 11 from 1:00 to 5:00 p.m. See tab above for more details. Come celebrate spring and join me in giving birth to (or rebirthing) the playful, inner child artist.

Category: Myth, personal | 2 Comments »
Tags: artist, birth, Magician, Ostara, playful, SoulCollage, spring

Posted By Stephanie on March 7, 2010

How do you feel about the word, crone? How you feel about it may determine how you live it. It’s important to develop a relationship with this stage of life and embrace it.

For many of us crone conjures up an image of a hag, a witch, a bent-over, wizened old woman who spends most of her time in a rocking chair or hobbling around with a cane or a crook. She may be that, but she’s much, much more than that. There are many stages of cronedom, just as there are many stages of maidenhood and motherhood. (Some of us have one foot in two realms. I can’t help but think the crone wisdom helps me be a better mother to my 13-year-old maiden.)

The word crone, which is the third aspect of the triple goddess, often represented by the Greek goddess, Hecate, derives from the word “crown.” As in the queen who wears the crown, the crowning of a life. We enter the crone years at about the age of 50 or when menopause occurs. In ancient times and in many indigenous cultures today, that is when women held their greatest power, because the blood did not flow anymore, and the “wise blood” of life was contained within. The word witch comes from the word for “wise” and the word hag from haggia or “holy.” So, you see, at one time, before the patriarchal religions took hold, the female elders, the women past childbearing years, were considered the wise ones, the healers, La Que Sabe — the one who knows.

It is time we re-appropriated the word crone that was bastardized and demonized by the patriarchy and elevated it to its former status as a good word, a name to be proud of since it represents a stage of life denoting wisdom, experience, power, a place of seeing, knowing, intuiting, understanding. We, who are crones, got here through hard knocks, suffering, loss, pain, as well as through life’s pleasures, joys, creating life and art and words and experiences; by being maidens and mothers (even if we didn’t give birth literally, all women give birth figuratively).

I had the pleasure of leading a group of women on retreat last weekend through a workshop called, “Embracing the Crone — the Crowning of a Life.” These women — now all in their crone years — have been meeting in circle for some 30 years, witnessing births, deaths, divorces, children growing up, graduating, marrying, births of grandchildren — the cycle of life. And through it all they have been meeting monthly, going to the beach together, and going on yearly retreats together, where they laugh, cry, sing, dance, tell stories, play games, share their lives, and support one another through thick and thin.

During this retreat, we gathered and shared our stories, journeyed, made SoulCollage® cards to honor the Crone, danced the NIA Dance of the Crone under a full moon, beat drums and rattled, sang and chanted, made crowns, declared our power and purpose, let go of what no longer served us into the fire, and crowned ourselves with a naming ceremony honoring the Crone within.

This is the poem we created together:

Women Are

Women are creators… We make families and string generations together.

Women are weavers… We weave the tapestry of life from the plain cloth of daily existence into glorious brocades of heartfelt expressions.

Women are protectors… We can be fierce in the face of adversity.

Women are healers… We accept and support each other.

Women are lovers… We embrace, nurture, and accept all mankind and Mother Earth.

Women are journeyers… We explore our inner and outer realities.

Women are alchemists… We hold the space for change and carry the story forward.

Women are singers, dancers, prophets, poets… We sing our songs, dance our dreams, intuit what lies beneath the surface, and make poetry of life.

I am grateful for the opportunity to have met these strong, wonderful women and to have shared their journey for a weekend. And I am grateful to all of the women in my life with whom I have sat in circle and who have allowed me to be Me no matter where I was on the wheel — Maiden, Mother, Crone — the full circle of a woman’s life, full of beauty and mystery, ever unfolding.

Category: Myth, personal | 3 Comments »
Tags: circle, crone, crown, hag, wise, witch

Posted By Stephanie on February 15, 2010

Lauri Maerov, my friend, writer, and co-facilitator for the Create Your Vision 2010 Playshop, and I were so pleased with the way we combined the process of making SoulCollage cards and vision boards that we are wanting to collaborate again in the future. (She will soon have a blog with her own creative visions and musings.) Seven wonderful women came to the playshop and spun their magic, dreaming and manifesting powerful, soulful visions, and making a beautiful web of connections between us  by the fire–creative alchemy.

I spent the snowed-in weekend before it making my vision board for 2010 a little different, with elements of SoulCollage–light on words and text, heavier on signs and symbols–creating an interactive mandala or wheel.

The first tarot card I drew on the New Year’s Eve full moon was the Wheel of Fortune, so I decided to fashion a multi-layered circle, with the 12 tarot cards I drew for each of the full moons placed in each of the 12 houses of the zodiac, with their attendant meanings. I am also viewing this as a medicine wheel, with the animals placed in the four directions: Eagle in the east, the place of Spirit, discovery and enlightenment (the eternal); Coyote in the south, the place of the warrior, protector of the children and innocence (the past); Bear in the west, the place of death and rebirth and the sacred feminine (the present); Buffalo in the north, the place of  wisdom, manifestation and the Creator (the future). The three-phase moon wheel in the center can be rotated to show my progression around the wheel with each month’s full moon (coming up on Feb. 27, the weekend I am facilitating a weekend retreat for women called “Crowning the Crone–Embracing the Inner Wise Woman”).

I plan to use my vision board in an interactive way throughout the year. The tags in the envelope in the right hand corner have written on them the meanings of each of the 12 astrological houses as well as the reading for the individual tarot card I drew for each month. At the same time, I placed images or symbols of what I want to manifest in each of the 12 sections of the wheel and will add more during the year as I continue to create and envision what I want to manifest, month by month.

My word for the year is TRUST, but as you can see, I have also added three other important words for this year: love, gratitude and transform. In a year that started out with a devastating earthquake in Haiti in which people with very little have experienced so much loss, I feel such love for humanity, and what we are capable of when we see others in need. At the same time, I feel intense gratitude for what I have, especially my family and friends, and I want to remain in this state throughout the year, an antidote to these often depressing economic times. “Transform” is what I hope to do with regard to my work, bringing in more feminine consciousness and creative expression.  And, there is a little message on my board from Eckhart Tolle: If peace is really what you want, then you will choose peace. So simple, and yet so profound. How do I choose peace each day in every situation in which potential conflict or unease arises? And there are a few hidden messages for myself under the buffalo card flap made by my dear friend, Pixie, she of the magical Animama totem art (she also created the coyote card at the bottom).

Blogging sister, Dee Mallon, asked, “What methods do YOU use to investigate and release negative patterns?” and references Byron Katie, another favorite Truth Seeker and Truth Teller like Eckhart Tolle. This vision board is going to be one of my methods as I chart my progress around the wheel this year, looking for the lessons and learning from my mistakes. I also love making shrines to the Sacred Feminine and creating SoulCollage. I’m going to be delving more into the wisdom of the goddesses and the divine feminine this year. I want to connect more with the triple goddess within–the maiden, mother and crone–whom we can all call upon at any time to help us understand a problem and arrive at a new perspective–ancient feminine wisdom. Just how we can go about doing that will be what my new project is all about. More to be revealed.

Hence my latest SoulCollage card, “The Mystery”: I am one who enjoys the mystery, what lies beneath the surface, soon to be revealed, tantalizing us with possibilities, tempting us with fate, awakening us with dreams. I walk fearlessly through the door into the light of discovery, into the Unknown. I am safe. All will be revealed.”

And I ask you: How will you manifest your dreams and visions for 2010? I’d love to see your vision boards. Send links!

Category: Myth, Totem Aninals, personal | 6 Comments »
Tags: