Reawakening

I'll report regularly on my "bus trip" down and in (!) this pivotal week. I mean, even if I had never watched any astrological videos, I could tell that big things are currently happening just from what my body is telling me.

So, yesterday was sort of a classic "Liz" day from the standpoint of experiencing an early high point, and then the bottom dropping out. I have to believe that this kind of thing may be why, for many people, a life rich in mysticism is hard to sustain.

Early in the morning, I wrote the following in my personal handwritten journal (I love this short piece for many reasons, not the least of which is that it shows that, deep down, I am following my path on behalf of all women. Even I worry that this isn't the case, sometimes...) (With the exception of deleting two repetitive words, I'm presenting this as written.)

I am imagining -- not just me -- but every woman alive, reawakening from the inside out. Becoming her inner Queen, be it of the place she loves, or the people she loves, or animals, or stars...some facet of this world. Every ache within her is a growing pain as the trauma or invisibility or pain deep in her bones turns over, awakens from hibernation. Every iota of fatigue, of numbness, of listlessness, is flipping over into life. Even women who somehow managed to thrive or lead or "play the game" are sensing a big energy shift where they are losing interest in what worked in the past, and they are waking up and looking at the stars and realizing, there's a bigger, more beautiful world out there that we women are intricately connected with (and intimately!) and we don't really have to do anything except let our cells flip over and let Gaia's cells flip over -- and watch what happens!!!

I love this, and am very excited by it. Not that it's saying something new, really, but I love how I am increasingly channelling material like this quickly and spontaneously (usually in handwritten form). It's hard for me not to edit and proofread, and work it over (which it probably needs) but for the moment, it is what it is. Of course, what happened a little while later in the day was a deep, dark, dive. Inner critics, imagined outer critics, and that energy that always seems to swing me like a pendulum took me to a really hard place. How dare I? How dare I express what is coming from my deepest place? That's always what it boils down to.

Late in the day and early this morning, I was pondering power, and the difficulty of defining what that power looks like for me (and perhaps other women) as we leave the old paradigm's "power over" focus. That may have to be another post for another day, but for today, power is defined by me daring to express what I find in my deepest place. Yes, I dare. And we'll see what deeper inner destination the bus takes me to today!

 

The Inner Landscape

About 18 months ago, when I made the decision to return to this part of the east coast, I did it, in part, because it represents possibilities. Duluth, which I still love and miss in many, many ways, is almost literally the "end of the road". It is at the north end of Interstate 35. It is also at the western end of the Great Lakes and that key shipping route. Whenever I see Duluth's Aerial Lift Bridge, I feel I have come home, and there is a strong pull to nest there forever. But in 2024, I realized that because of my income, I might end up living well out of town with no car, on one of the very minor city bus routes. I suffer from a form of claustrophobia in that regard, a fear of being trapped, and somehow instinctively I knew that this wasn't a great "energy" for me at age 70.

New York's Capital District is the opposite to this in so many ways. It is the hub in a wheel of highways heading south to New York City, east to Boston, north to the Adirondacks and Montreal, west to Buffalo, Chicago and beyond, and southwest to Binghamton/Scranton. When you don't have a car, buses and trains make a lot of destinations doable. Even the area city bus takes you remarkably far. I have done some of this travel, when I have known exactly what I want to do.

And therein lies the problem. For several months, I have been about as antsy as it is possible to be, and I was sure that by now I would have moved on, found more permanent housing, or at the very least, set off on a temporary adventure. I cannot tell you how many times I have just wanted to leap up, stick a pin in a map, buy a train ticket, and head off with only one roller bag. Yet with the exception of England, my old destinations do not call me -- and England no longer calls me in the same way. I don't feel particularly curious about new places either. It's like I have travelled over an event horizon into a dense black hole. This hole isn't scary, really, and from what astrologers are saying about this time period, what I am experiencing may be about the huge transformations happening in the stars. I may be on some kind of spiritual elevator, and need to be patient until the bell rings and the doors open. Whatever the metaphor, my instinct to go out and explore the outer landscape is being completely neutralized at the moment.

Which leaves the inner landscape. Now, I'm the kind of person who will never balk at introspection (as you have no doubt noticed!), but I think what I am being asked to do this last week of May is some deep digging the likes of which even I have never seen before. The word "power" keeps coming to me...this is not about the power to travel to see some new part of the world, or to see wonders created by powerful people, or about the power of the modes of transportation themselves. This is not about seeing new destinations outside of myself, and having the power to experience them. This is about the power within me. This is about peeling off yet more layers, and finding the power plant at my core, the passionate landscape within me, because the energy of that landscape will magnetize my new experiences. 

Various teachers are suggesting that all of us figure out what new skills or directions we wish to follow at this pivotal time. I see it not so much about taking on something new, but rather uncovering the power of what I already am. Even here in this blog, I'd like to to open up my connectedness to the Goddess, and speak ever more clearly and more forcefully. To be, at times, less tactful and more courageous. To remove blocks to my leadership ability, and be more willing to validate my own preferences. To truly, fully, embrace beauty, love, and this new age we are entering. Today, may I buy a bus ticket as far into my inner landscape as I can manage, just to see what I find!

Housing Solutions

We're hearing a lot about finding solutions for "the housing problem". One of the ones I hear the most is, to build more housing, affordable and otherwise.

Oh, brother. The hardest part about becoming so Goddess-centered (and also so Gaia-centered) is reaching the point where I simply can see no solutions to society's problems within the mindset that created our current paradigm. The issue of housing seems to illustrate this so poignantly. 

From a Gaia standpoint, this is what building tons of new housing does: it further degrades earth's landscape, and uses increasing amounts of toxins, plastics, and diminishing resources (water, wood, metals). It further spreads out neighborhoods, requiring more cars, more use of petroleum, more reliance on energy. It underscores the notion that individuals and small families need separate houses, separate spaces -- and the larger and fancier, the better. That all of us need to then furnish our spaces with more and more consumer items, more high-tech gadgetry, more "things" of all kinds. Solving the housing problem this way causes infinitely more problems for Mother Earth.

And speaking for myself, I do not wish to find a solution to my housing problem. My challenge has always been finding a home, a place where I (with my very specific passions of English church music and women's spirituality) would be completely welcome, no matter how much money I do or do not have. Finding a place where people speak one or both of my languages, so I feel like I am in my element. (How privileged I am to even be able to consider such factors!) And I don't think we can even envision exactly what housing will look like, say, 25 years from now. Because of environmental, spiritual, and societal changes, we will be living so utterly differently that -- at the very least -- pouring money into contemporary living solutions that may be going extinct within a decade is counterproductive. Goddess communities will be built on love and deep belonging. They will be predicated on taking into account the needs of the earth before one shovelful of dirt is moved. Honoring the earth and one another, wanting people to find places where they will be loved and accepted, finding ways to live healthily and lightly on the earth, gradually phasing out all concepts of money and profit -- that is ultimately the only way to find longterm human (and humane) housing solutions.

Bringing Stories out into the Light

Several times in recent months, I have heard or seen the quote from the Gnostic Gospel of Thomas to the effect that if you bring out the treasure that is within you, it will save you, but if you do not, you will be destroyed. Actually, when I first read this years ago, it sent rather a frisson through me, although at that time, I wasn't sure why. Even then, I didn't like the dualism of the thinking or its expression, of course! Like there are two lanes of this life highway, and either we are going to experience salvation or damnation. And there is a certain fear-mongering in, in effect, threatening people to "get with it" and find their true treasure before it is too late. Ugh.

So I guess the first thing to do is really, really analyze the statement and express it from a more Goddess perspective. I agree that we all have, deep within us, a key gift or insight, or perhaps an action that we were meant to do in this lifetime. Some spiritual gem of truth that -- if we can find it -- only we have the ideal capacity to articulate or act on. If I had a young person in my life, I might definitely suggest that their main purpose, early on, be to find this treasure, and uncover it. And then if they came to me a few years later and said, gosh, I've discovered what my true gift is, but I'm kind of freaked out about acting on it, I'd want to sit down with them for a few deep conversations about what is blocking them. 

More often than not, I suspect it would be fear -- the fear of feeling strange, the fear of being attacked for an unconventional view or condition, the fear of criticism or failure. And yet the answer to that fear isn't to mirror back the fear, and force people to give birth to their treasure "or else"! In a more Goddess-centered construct, the person would be gently walked through a process of facing their fears, envisioning possible scenarios if they bring out the best that is within them, and finding a way to commit 100 percent to their inner worth. An advisor would try to help them get to a place where they were ready to shine.

However imperfectly presented, this teaching did affect me deeply. I've known for years that there was something deep within me that had to be brought out into the light. I knew that I was fearful of my own power, and perhaps by continuing to sweep it under the rug, I was burying myself down there too, in effect "destroying" myself, continuing a cycle of homelessness and invisibility. In this blog, I've tried, post after post, to dig further and further down and in.

Several posts ago, I referred to the fact that I have three hand-written stories that I've been sitting on, kind of stuck. And then the other day, I wrote about my three rabbits, which might represent my three greatest fears. I did some journaling about those rabbits, describing and analyzing three general fears I have and even making a color drawing of them! And yet it wasn't until this very moment that I realized -- my three greatest fears are the three stories, and the prospect of bringing them out into light! One of them, particularly, scares the heck out of me with its potential power. 

That's about as far as I can go with this today. But it just goes to show that the realizations are coming faster and faster...

Two Rabbits. Make that three...

This morning, when I went outside to start my walk, there were two rabbits in the driveway. They were standing stock-still, facing each other. I have rarely, if ever, seen two rabbits at a time, and I tried to speak with them softly and comfortingly, sort of, "Hi sweethearts, don't be scared. I am a friend." And as long as I continued to be still, they didn't move. But the minute I started to walk out toward the road, they bolted. A little while later in a different spot, I saw another one!

I still keep several "bibles" by my bed, one of which is the classic 1988 Medicine Cards book, by Jamie Sams and David Carson. The powers and medicines of 44 birds and animals are beautifully and succinctly described...when I purchased the book and cards in 1990, I used them in a loosely divinatory manner, but these days I basically just consult the book when I have an encounter with an animal or bird. Here, Rabbit's medicine is "fear", or a tendency to call one's fears to oneself. Seeing those rabbits run this morning was a reminder -- you could see them shaking, terrified, even though I had tried to reassure them. There are a number of other spiritual meanings for bunnies, from intuition to renewal. But being given the opportunity to address fear -- to see where it is working in my life -- always seems to be rabbit's message for me.

Where is fear showing up in my life today? I mean, there are so many fearful, out-of-control things happening in the world that if I felt fully engaged with them (and the need for human solutions to them all), I would be almost catatonic. I may be saved from that by the fact that I've seen so much of this coming for so long, I would have felt even more fearful if they hadn't happened! Still, I know my own personal life is on the verge of changing again, and no matter how often it happens, I never really face it calmly. By now I should, but I don't (!) This time, though, there is an energetic difference. I know that we are shifting into the all-love Age of Aquarius, that the divine feminine is re-emerging, and that increasingly, after a lifetime of being out of my element, I'm going to be in my element. I know and believe that without a shadow of a doubt. 

Nevertheless, it is important to face the fears. It's sometimes so tempting to slide through them, or talk myself out of them. But three rabbits appeared, so in my personal journaling I'll address the three biggest fears that come up. Write about them, talk with them, embrace them, maybe even draw them. Try not to run away...

Goddess Words 62: Money

Talk about Goddess list words that I have been avoiding! When I glanced at my chart this morning, one word popped out: Money. For four years, I have been putting it off and putting it off in the context of this list (although I have certainly spoken of it frequently in other posts) so today seems to be the day. Just for the record, I have not gone back to look at past essays, so I suspect I may repeat some of the things I have said before. My apologies to regular readers.

And I guess I should also tell you that I came "this close" to removing "Money" from my Goddess list entirely, as I recently did with "Worshipped". This is because nowadays, I don't think that money will exist in any form in a future Goddess- or Love-centered paradigm. Even twenty years ago, I'm pretty sure I was already at that "place", so I am not quite sure what I was thinking -- perhaps I still saw money as a way of expressing the potential for bounty. Perhaps I was hoping I would still find some way to earn or attract a good income...I'm not sure. Today, I think we have a few years left with money systems in place. It might be premature to completely discount it as a building block to the new paradigm. Might.

Almost thirty years ago, I attended kind of a free-for-all workshop where attendees could offer talking circles on any topic they wanted. It still stuns me that I had the courage to do this, but I did: I called my circle something like "The Future of Money"-- and a bunch of people showed up. Basically, I spoke for about ten minutes about how I thought money's future was limited, and my reasons why -- and what ensued was a completely fascinating discussion! I mean, right down my alley, non-"partisan" and visionary, people trying to imagine a world entirely without money. 

Because, apart from any other issues I've had with our specific financial system, here is my core problem: not understanding why something that (in my view) really doesn't exist is so central to our world view, our politics, and virtually every aspect of human life. Every definition is essentially the same, that money is a medium of exchange. It's a ghostly ether between two tangible things or beings.

There's me. There's a dozen eggs. If I want those eggs, I need to pay money. I need to exchange some dollars for eggs. Yet I've never really "gotten" this. Why even have this strange, insubstantial middle ground? I mean, all right. It's part of the old ownership paradigm. The farmer's eggs belong to him or her, and in our current construct, giving the eggs away will lessen that person's personal worth. So if I (the buyer) do not have some other object or service to offer the farmer that is the rough equivalent of a dozen eggs, something that the farmer needs, say, a skein of wool or a small toy, then I need to use the common currency.

Let's back up to the moment before the very first use of money in the modern sense -- no matter how many thousands of years ago that might have been -- and imagine a completely clean slate. There is no sense of human ownership of land, animals, plants, or other people. Let us say it is commonly accepted that such ownership is impossible, as is human ownership of Gaia or The Goddess. Everyone and everything is of equal value as part of Her, a reflection of Her. If everything is done from a place of Love, and that Love is all-existent and all-replenishing, then nothing I give away will leave me diminished. There needs to be no medium of exchange, monetary or otherwise. If everything on this planet is an expression of Love, my actions are done lovingly and freely. Love draws to all of us a modest roof over our heads, and meal on the table. Love draws to humanity the best that the earth has to offer, for free. But individuals in the new paradigm don't seek to take too much for themselves. People in the new paradigm are far more community oriented than now.

In a sense, this lifetime has been a practice run for me and the new paradigm, whether or not I ever "live to see the day". I am living proof (and I am sure there are others like me!): you can survive with little money, occasionally even thrive, although you may be seen as using people or being a bloody idiot. And I couldn't have let this experiment go on for so long if I had been responsible for children. I am thankful that I remained relatively free, and that I gained at least the feeling place of what will be the norm not too long from now: Love as "currency". The construct of "earning a living" has gone by the wayside. Ownership has gone by the wayside. "Money" -- in whatever form or system -- will be in museums, if we even have those in the future! For the moment, I'll leave it on the list, but not for long!

Middle of the Night

Recently, the middle of the night seems to be the time when I am able to access a place of bliss, love, connectedness with joy, and belonging to the great, deep scheme of things, (In the past, it could be the opposite, feeling completely adrift in the dark!) If I wake up and I find myself happy, then I stretch it out absolutely as long as possible, as tempting as it might be to fall back asleep!  Back on April 18 ("Too Big for the Small Boxes"), I spoke of having been in a blissful state for an hour. Two nights ago, not to become competitive with myself!, I stayed at a pretty high energy for over two hours, literally, again, smiling from ear-to-ear. I don't try to do or create anything, although sometimes I do a crossword puzzle simply to keep my left brain occupied.

Actually, it has seemed important not to create or plan in this state. In previous years, a positive state of mind seemed like a good time to try all that marvelous "creative visualization" I was reading about. I would envision a beautiful house (who wouldn't when you've never had a permanent home?), a nice car, a job that would both engage and pay me well. I visualized getting to the UK permanently, attracting acclaim as a Howells expert, even marrying and having children or stepchildren. I was singularly unsuccessful at these visualizations. It is a good thing that I didn't spend much money on gurus or courses, because I would have had to go back over and over again! I now get it that the problem wasn't that I wasn't visualizing or focusing properly, or even that I wasn't coming at the visualization from a high enough energy. My theory now is that these goals were too old paradigm for me, energetically representing a system that is currently passing away. They were the manifestations of a now-crumbling foundation. My energy at its highest was not resonating with the energies of these goals.

Even if I wanted to use these current middle of the night moments to create, it's complicated by not really knowing what a 5D, love-based world will look like, function like, or feel like in its solidity. Perhaps it is a good thing that I don't know, that we don't know. It forces us to lead from the heart, not follow our brains to as many external goals. If I say anything in the middle of the night, it is to my heart: "Simply guide me." May the love spilling over be my path forward, my exhilarating boat ride down the river. May we feel which lights on shore are beckoning us, where the love shines brightest.