Goddess Words 66: Loveliness

OK, so I plow on, a farmer sowing as many seeds as I can. And I'm growing and changing even as I write...hopefully the seeds are as well.

By the standards of 2026, "loveliness" is a rather dated word isn't it? I mean, even twenty years ago when I included it on my Goddess list, I suspect it was already passé. The concept of being beautiful to look at (as opposed to sexy or edgy) -- or beautiful in a moral or spiritual way -- may still be relevant (one hopes!), yet even to my own ears (strengthened by two decades of increasing feminism), there is something rather wimpy about the word. If I were to die tomorrow, and the main thing people said about me was, "She was a lovely person", my immediate thought is that I would be fuming from the heavenly realm! Think of all those 19th century portraits of beautiful women in white dresses, languishing on sofas or window seats, staring into the distance. Women perceived of as being lovely because of stillness and inaction. Heck, I used to resonate with such images, and wished I could be transported back about two hundred years so that this would be all that was expected of me. I could be myself, think deep thoughts, and not have to pull myself together every morning to tackle the NYC subway system, grab a bagel, take an elevator far up a skyscraper, and deal with the news of the world. "The real world". 

Of course, if being a lovely woman painted in a moment of leisure was "the real world" for anyone, it was only for a handful of privileged women, not for the vast majority of women worldwide who labored ceaselessly, often enslaved -- literally or figuratively. And, of course, I have barely ever heard a man being complimented on his "loveliness". So there is an overlay here of female niceness, insipidity, powerlessness, maybe even superficial prettiness, that is not very appealing. Having said that, coming from my particular background, I am a little ashamed to confess that "loveliness" is still a kind of tentpole for me, a safe energy to fall back into when the world overwhelms me, much like being nice and mute.

Yet I trust my inclusion of the word in my Goddess list all those years ago. Why and how did I associate loveliness with the Goddess?

If I go to the heart of the word and shed all my personal random associations, it is a little easier to embrace loveliness. First of all, the word's core is "love", right? True loveliness surely starts within, in the heart, in the ability to love. That ability to love leads to a moral and ethical solidity vis à vis other people, animals and the earth; and the ability to embody love, compassion, generosity of spirit, power sharing, even gentleness. When these qualities become a person's core identity, it is inevitable that it shows "without", in a person's face, bearing, and general energy. Their love shines outward from the core, in a ripple effect. These people are so love-filled that love is flowing out of them. They are genuinely love-ly.

If you accept the proposition that love is the most powerful force in the world, a lovely person (female or male) isn't actually powerless, or languid, or inactive. They may be some of the most powerful people in the world no matter what they are doing or not doing. A more Goddess-centered community construct would honor loveliness, not only with appealing oil paintings, but with true respect and attention. What do these spirit-rich people think? What is their world view? How do they treat other people? If love is their core value, what would love-based institutions look like and function like? Why don't we listen to them?

Far from being limp dishrags staring out at the landscape, lovely people have an active energy, a valuable gift for the world. They can be exquisitely powerful. They are a fractal manifestation of the Goddess. On second thought (an hour into writing and editing this essay!), I would be honored if I were praised for my "loveliness"!

New Moon, Eclipse, and Meteors

What with one thing and another, this is a powerful day. So once again, I will keep this shortish.

My new moon resolution is to re-frame how I express and experience love in the rest of this lifetime. I've alluded to this already, but today seems like a good day to declare it. I haven't lacked the ability to love: if all my positive emotions toward English church music and England had been used as a power source over the years, I could have lit up every state I've lived in! But I haven't yet experienced sending that love in the direction of another human being, or experienced it returning to me in that kind of personal way, and that is the new path I'm finally ready to explore. Over the next month, as the moon slowly becomes visible and brightens again, may my new intention light the way. If my path still looks a bit old on the outside, may I remember that the crucial change has happened within--curiosity. What would it be like to have a true life/spiritual partner? What can I do today to open myself to this?

And a quick note about Anglican chant. I went online yesterday to hear a few versions (from some of the top cathedral choirs) of Psalm 22, with its "roaring lion". And I am so proud of myself!  I listened to these different variations with pleasure, amusement (at the creativity of the organists and choirmasters) and, literally, joy. I love, love, love Anglican chant, as hard as many of the words of the Psalms can be these days. But there was not one ounce in me of bitter-sweetness, homesickness, or any mixed or negative emotion. For an hour, I was simply filled with delight. It appears that cleaning out the crevices is working!

If there is some new path showing itself to you in the sun or the moon's mysterious half-light, or in the sparkle of meteors, may you at least look at it with curiosity. If it is right for you, you will probably know it!

A Roaring Lion

Saturday was the Lion's Gate, a concept I had never heard of before sometime last year. (I'll let you look it up, because even now, after about eighteen months of listening to astrological talks, I still don't understand the actual astrological pieces of any of it, just the general energies.) This whole month, what with 8/8 Lion's Gate and then two eclipses, is apparently particularly powerful, astrologically and spiritually, and a portal for those of us women more fully embodying the Divine Feminine.

Because this portal appears to be coinciding with my reaching deep into myself to heal some remaining bitterness and pain around church music, it was interesting to remember words from Psalm 22, which I used to hear on recordings (and also sang at Royal Holloway and possibly also at St. John the Divine): "they gape upon me with their mouths: as it were a ramping and a roaring lion." In fact, this is such a classic psalm, giving creative organists leeway to literally mimic (musically) the roaring lion (and bulls and hounds, among other traumas!) Our choral Anglican chant would proceed in such a controlled fashion, while the organist decorated/word painted ornately around us. 

In my personal life, I haven't been a roaring lion. And yet just now, I re-read the last three or four posts, and realized with surprising satisfaction that the roaring lion in me is coming out. By telling some of these stories, I am no longer in hiding. I am no longer as scared. The real me is becoming more and more visible. Roar.

A Few Notes

Today, just a few notes, I promise.

I had a dreadful night's sleep. It sounds ridiculous, but I think I am waking up when the moon comes out, wanting to accompany it through the night, out of fear that "we" will do something to obliterate it.  In those wee hours I am full of energy, now, not so much.

Another thing happening is that some of the gunk referred to yesterday isn't waiting for me to find it, it's almost literally jumping out of the crevices saying, "Here I am, deal with me!" The cutting remark that haunted me last night came from when I wanted to audition for a choir and was told, "We have more than enough excellent potential countertenors. Why would we need to scrape the bottom of the barrel to audition you?" Countertenors are men who sing in the female alto range, which I sing. It doesn't matter that it wasn't really personal. It still cut to the quick.

In our emerging Aquarian Age, someone throbbing with love for a form of art -- and talented in the field -- simply will not be turned down. Period. The world needs love -- and beauty -- too darned much.

In the last few days, I'm still seeing and hearing too few birds. However, I have seen two rabbits, one woodchuck and one squirrel. I also saw one half of a rainbow last night(!) Oh Lordy.

It is Intense

It is intense to hit such a mother lode of unresolved issues and pain, although it is also a relief. The only way to clean out my crevices is to actually see the gunk clogging them up, not to mention clogging up my body and soul. As far as shame goes, I'm a bit ashamed that I have not been able to immediately hold the men and boys' choir tradition in a greater place of love and forgiveness, but at least (to mix metaphors entirely!) pulling the dirty laundry out from the corners helps me to see what needs cleaning...at least I am no longer afraid of facing these stale emotions, or of revealing them to others. This wandering mystic has never been a saint, and this week will be proof!

Having said that, I continue to be encouraged that Gaia is arguably going through this exact same process, in her own way. She is cleaning out the crevices of her body, the places where her own anger and frustration at poor treatment have gotten stuck. She's bringing old gunk to the surface, rolling over, turning things over, cleaning things out -- not to lash out at humanity but simply to wipe the slate clean enough to start anew in this era of higher energies. In a similar way, ultimately, I'm not writing what I have written (or will write) to assess blame or criticism. These constructs are of such long standing that there is no one person to blame! But up until now, I could perhaps protect myself by avoiding dealing with certain pain and shame...now avoidance will only weigh me down. The time to fully feel is now.

The other thing I am trying to remember is that, from a Goddess perspective, my journey was perfect. From the perspective of trying to discover and embody values that are the utter opposite of those in our current paradigm, my journey was perfect. It was natural that I tried so hard to engage with that paradigm in the way that would have been most fulfilling for me, and natural too that my passion and talent being consistently blocked was so devastating. But when I gaze at the lifetime of experience from Her eyes, I completely get why it was the way it was. No, I don't want to use that to gloss over a lode of anger. I dearly need cleaning and healing. But it does take a little of the edge off.

Incidentally, I'm having a harder time walking through my emotions around the apparent crash of space junk into the moon. It's like, it's exactly the same kind of disrespect. Ugh.

This is an intense time. If it becomes intense personally, then the "only way out is through", right? 

Memory

This is a case of, I woke up feeling that I wanted to share a memory of an event in my life, but initially nothing came to mind (that I haven't already written about, anyway!). Once this particular memory popped to the surface, I tried mightily to push it back down, but in the spirit of cleaning out the crevices (July 22), I'll forge ahead, although it terrifies me.

Yup, several key memories of my attempts to enter the world of English church music remain quite close to my chest. Why? Well, for a long time I kept hoping that I might still make a name for myself in that field and I didn't want to burn any bridges. A second reason was that I felt a deep sense of shame at having been so unsuccessful. It's absurd, of course. There simply were no girls or women in the field during my formative years of the 50's, 60's, 70's, 80's, and just trickles by the 90's. By the early 2000's, it was changing in the UK, but virtually not in the US. A few British women of my generation made a little headway around the edges during that 50-year stretch, but my early intention to become the first woman conductor of the Choir of King's College, Cambridge and devote my entire life to this singular musical genre could never have happened, no matter what Herculean efforts I might have made. The fact that I still feel ashamed about my lack of success is almost as heartbreaking as the fact that I lived a life so far removed from that world. It's all heartbreaking, it still is, every day.

So here's a memory that I've been trying to bury to spare myself just a little of that heartbreak. It illustrates the incredible strangeness and paradox of my whole life.

My two years in Helena, Montana were, in most respects, among the hardest ever, even though I was near family. For much of the time, I lived at the YWCA, and I struggled to get any kind of work, much less anything that would have had meaning for me. Singing in two choral groups helped save me, as did starting to do research about my favorite composer, Herbert Howells. My first article about him was accomplished simply by sending emails and letters to some of his former students. My laptop was perched on my lap on my rather saggy twin bed in my nun's cell of a room at the Y, and I was surrounded by scribbled notes and drafts. If I remember correctly, my computer died at some point in the process, so the bulk of my work (emails, research, article drafts) ended up being done at Helena's public library. (I mean it when I stress the centrality of public libraries to my journey!) "Herbert Howells, the Teacher" was first published by the British Music Society News in January of 2013, then reprinted by The American Organist later that year.

Around that time, I was invited to teach a class about Howells at Helena's Episcopal Cathedral. Inevitably I discussed, and played a recording of, the motet "Take Him, Earth, For Cherishing", purportedly sung at John F. Kennedy's funeral. I had always thought this to be a dubious story, and several students in the class pointedly asked how (and why) on earth a piece by a British composer would have been sung at the funeral three days after the president's completely unexpected death. Why wouldn't an American composer have been chosen? More to the point, we all wondered how, in the early 1960's before the era of faxes and email attachments, a piece of music could have made it from Britain to Washington in that time frame. There was something clearly wrong with the story, and I promised attendees that I would look into it.

I started to dig. It was slow going at first, but I stumbled upon the name of a former organist-choirmaster who would help me "crack the case". On a hot summer afternoon, I was walking through the Y's living room towards the staircase up to my room, when my cell phone rang. It was the organist, happy to tell me what he knew. I grabbed a pen and a piece of paper with some open space to write on, and at first sat in a comfortable chair, trying to scribble down notes and ask him questions. Eventually, the loud sounds of TV ("Law and Order: SVU") and general conversational hubbub forced me out onto the porch, where I continued the interview. Even as I spoke with him, I thought, if this organist knew the conditions under which I was doing my research, he might never have called me!

(Please, don't misunderstand...moving into the Y was by far the hardest thing I had ever done. Slowly but surely, though, the place became a safe haven, and a place of growth and solidarity with other women. Sometime soon, I'll write more about the experience, for which I am profoundly grateful.)

"To make a long story short", my second article "'Take Him, Earth' Revisited" was published by The American Organist in September 2014. Howells's motet was, in fact, first sung in Washington a year after Kennedy's death by a Canadian men-and-boys' choir. This update by no means diminishes an extraordinary piece of music, but it was a big revelation which should have met with a fair amount of hoopla in the music world. To my knowledge, this never happened. 

I'm full of trite sayings today: "What came first, the chicken or the egg"? Is it the fact that I was female (not male), Smith- and Royal Holloway-educated (not Oxbridge), and ahead of my time that led to my gaining no life traction at all and ending up living and working in the most inappropriate circumstances for my goals? Or is it because I started in the proverbial wilderness (as far as this tradition is concerned) and kept ending up there, that I couldn't eventually gain a little deserved respect or attention? Perhaps both. At this moment when all these traditional constructs are beginning to collapse, perhaps it doesn't matter.

But remembering this story has stirred up some long-hidden anger, humiliation, and frustration. It is hard to imagine a human being with my level of intellectual, spiritual, musical and artistic skills being more thoroughly swept aside -- except, of course, there have probably been hundreds of thousands over the centuries, women and men of the wrong background, or gender, or educational accomplishment, or religion, left "homeless" and invisible. And for a woman in a patriarchal construct, nothing was in place to support my actual thriving or success. I guess what keeps me going even today is remembering that I've never been as alone in this silencing as I have felt. Every day that I am still alive is an accomplishment, hopefully not just for me, but for so many others. 

Yes, today's memory is bringing up a lot of negative emotion, but I hope bringing that to light will lead to eventual healing. That's all I can say today.

Rabbit, Rabbit...

Yes, after all these years, those are usually the first two words out of my mouth at the beginning of a month. I don't really believe in "luck", but for some reason the tradition sticks.

And yes, there has been a small uptick in the presence of animal and bird life. At this moment, I hear crickets or peepers of some kind and the occasional bird call, and I saw one squirrel on my walk earlier. Yet it remains creepily, eerily quiet overall. I believe enough in the intelligence of all life on earth to know that this means something, even if I cannot personally interpret it. Some message may have come to animals on the surface from the inner planes, or the outer galactic ones, which undoubtedly we could interpret if we were more alert.

I went somewhere yesterday guaranteed to keep us less alert -- a mall. People wonder, why would I go there, when I basically hate them, don't like shopping, and find the "energy" to be overwhelming? Well, I guess in a nutshell, it involves having no car and (at the moment) little freedom of movement. When I have the chance to take the city bus on a small adventure, this is one thing I do. I eat the same food every time, wander the air conditioned spaces the same way, go to the big bookstore to find a crossword puzzle book and sometimes sit and sip iced coffee, and once in a blue moon make a small purchase of the kinds of clothing or footwear that I can't buy used. People talk about being in a bubble -- the mall is the ultimate bubble. One is essentially unaware of everything outside, from weather conditions to animals to local news to national and international events, to, heck, your friends or family and what they may be going through. It's all about "shopping". Distraction. I'm actually stunned that malls still exist, although this specific place seemed remarkably crowded. There are cities where the local mall has closed, but the structure remains, an eyesore and a nuisance.

Malls aside, human activity aside, it just feels as if the Goddess is taking a deep breath. A calm before many storms. The Capital District area discovered the other day that it is not immune to climate chaos...but two days later, people seemed to have moved on. I guess if I didn't have some spiritual understanding of the path we are on, I'd "move on" too. Gosh, I might have better "moved on" thirty years ago! But for this weekend, I'll join the Goddess in a deep breath. Breathing, love, and connecting with animal life if they find you. That's all one can do. 

It is Already Friday

Between the fact that time is supposed to go faster as you get older, and the fact that we are evidently entering an era when we will experience time differently, and the fact that parts of this week were so unprecedented, weather-wise, I guess I shouldn't be surprised that it is already Friday, but I am. (On top of that, I am waiting for a bit of personal news that is slow to arrive -- a watched pot, I guess.) Today's post will be a true catch-all.

Birds and animals seem to be slowly returning to the area. In the last 24 hours, I have heard a Carolina wren multiple times, and seen one squirrel and one rabbit. A strange black bug landed on my book yesterday, and, of course, mosquitos never really left. It's not the norm, but it is something. I have tried not to be fearful about this apparent wildlife disappearance...trying to use the old curiosity solution. Where have they gone? Do they have some kind of underground meeting place? Did they just travel a few miles away to avoid an energetic glitch due to solar flares or wildflower smoke? Or is there an even more metaphysical explanation -- can animals change form entirely, at will? I don't know any of those answers. All I know is, in upcoming weeks I'll be more relieved than I have ever been to see any bird, insect or animal.

I'm still trying to internally acclimate to the notion of being a person "in partnership" -- still not knowing who with, or where, or when it might happen. I realize that this wouldn't have even happened if I had not reached a point (at 70!) of self-acceptance. Of finally realizing the immense value of my journey down and in to the heart of the Goddess, to find my worth outside of the norms of the construct in place, to find a "place" of being worthy of nourishment, protection, cherishing. I finally want to nourish, protect, and cherish myself! It's the first time I've ever seriously thought that it might be possible for someone to find my pioneering efforts in the world of English church music endlessly interesting and discussion-worthy, even if they personally know nothing about it! It's the first time I've been able to envision talking with someone about every possible aspect of my life -- and theirs -- from a high enough spiritual perspective to keep it interesting for me. (I realize, in effect, how bored I have been much of my life, not able to function at the level that is right for me.) None of this would have happened without finally accepting exactly who I am...and according to some of my online astrologers, none of this might have happened before now anyway, given the unusually powerful moment we are in. It is allowing all of us the chance to transform.

So this partnership thing is still mostly a case of, imagining what it would be like to share this present moment or this spiritual insight with another person. Imagining what they might be experiencing at any given moment. Trying to imagine what it would be like to grow spiritually in tandem with another. Curiosity. It's hard to do, given this singular lifetime, and yet I know I surely must remember previous lifetimes on a deep, unconscious level. I can draw on this wisdom even when it seems buried. July was a month of unearthing a lot of buried treasure. Now, on to August, which they say will be even more transformational. Blessings, readers.

What a Difference a Few Days Make...

On Monday, I was seriously concerned that our area might be the next one to experience wildfires. By Tuesday evening it had started to rain, and as some of you may have seen on the national news, Wednesday brought a full day of torrential downpours. I awoke to a blaring alarm on my phone, urging people not to go out. In the end, we had over five inches, but some local areas had as much as a foot. Things came to a screeching halt, with flooded roads, cars, and houses, and delays, detours and stoppages on public transportation. Rivers overflowed their banks. It's strange to be locked indoors in midsummer, much as if it's a winter blizzard or stretch of -20 degree weather...

On the animal front, I still hear next to no bird calls, but of course part of that today may be due to the deluge. I finally saw a woodchuck yesterday, and a little moth landed on me indoors. Perhaps because I'm seeing so little "fauna", each small encounter is more meaningful to me now! If nothing else, I realize how completely blind I have been in my lifetime to the natural world...I cannot possibly make up for it, and it's a hard way to learn a lesson, but at least I'm one little person readjusting her perspective.

And whether it is due to yesterday's powerful full moon, or the changing nodes, or just my life path at 70, but I have had another huge inner shift. (I alluded to its preliminary whispers last week.) I seem to have moved from the self-image of being a contemplative nun/hermit/wandering solitary mystic to the self-image of being in partnership. Something in me has broken through my inner shell and I can at least imagine the potential of connecting with a kindred spirit, and, in the future, walking the path ahead together. Truly, this is the most radical transformation that I could possibly ever experience, far bigger than finding a permanent home, or a new way of using my creativity, or a new form of leadership. And I know this isn't something I can orchestrate. It's more about, tending to the feeling of partnership within me, nurturing it, facing my fears about it, and just watching what unfolds...Yikes.

What a difference a few days make...

Animal Update

Good morning. I have a quick update to yesterday's post about the disappearance of animal life. Since writing it, I've had three surprising encounters or sightings.

First, I was sitting outside and there was a loud "klunk" next to me -- it was a stubby caterpillar, brownish-green, maybe about 4 inches long, that evidently fell off the tree above me and missed me by about two inches. I'm not 100% certain what kind of moth or butterfly it will eventually turn into (he was re-placed on a bush, hopefully to survive) but I've never had a caterpillar nearly fall on me before.

Then, another first. I went swimming in the rapidly-drying Mohawk River, and kept feeling like I was being tickled. When I finally stood up and looked down under the water, darned if there weren't one or two dozen 3- or 4-inch minnows nipping away at my legs! It was so comical that I burst out laughing, although not quite knowing if I would receive actual "bites" I hurried out of the water. Again, a totally new experience. I remember tiny minnows up on Lake Champlain when I was young, but not these teenage ones.

Lastly, there is a glut of one kind of birdlife in the area -- seagulls, and they are congregating on sandbars being created by the lowering of the river level. It seems odd, so far from "sea" -- but hey, they follow ships and boats up the Hudson, and west on the Erie Canal, no doubt. 

I realized this morning that I haven't seen (or heard) a crow in weeks. In the summer, no matter where I have lived, they usually congregate and create quite the racket. It is absurdly quiet. 

I guess it is emblematic of this time that when I am having encounters with wildlife, they are novel, strange, not the norm.

Where are They?

This is going to be a very short one. 

Early in the summer, things seemed relatively "normal" in this area of NYS vis a vis animal life, bird life, etc. Squirrels, chipmunks and rabbits abounded, as did woodchucks. I wasn't seeing as many raptors as last summer, but there were a lot of smaller birds, I saw an early hummingbird, and there was a fairly good showing of early moths and butterflies. But in the last two-to-three weeks or so -- certainly since the bad wildfire smoke in mid-month -- it is as if animal life has all but disappeared completely. Yes, I saw a hawk killing a rabbit from a little ways away a week ago -- and if I sounded a little dispassionate about that, it's because I am trying to remember not to place a human ethical construct on top of such an event. Inwardly I was heartbroken for the little bunny! Other than that, I have seen the odd moth, one monarch, and a few chipmunks. 

This morning, I was awake entirely too early, and realized that not only was there not a "dawn chorus" at the appropriate time, with the exception of one bird chirping for about ten seconds, there wasn't even a trio or duet. The whole early morning sunrise time from 4 to 6 am was dead silent. At other times of the day, it is similar -- only a few individual bird calls here and there. It is positively creepy.

Where are they? What has happened? Do they know something we do not know?

Off the Top of my Head: Fires

This is one of those mornings when I feel called to write, despite having no idea what about. It's like, I still have this freedom, so I must use it. This is coming out of me as I type it. 

The smoke condition that was so hard and extreme last week (much more so in northern Minnesota than here in this part of upstate New York) seems to have dissipated for the moment, but from what I can see, the Canadian and Minnesota fires themselves continue to burn, in addition to ones in the Western U.S. and around the world. There is so much being said, from the sensible to the absurd, that part of me hesitates to comment, but...

Fire is literally a force of nature, and for generations and generations it made life on earth possible for human beings. So I think it is really important, above all, to honor fire. To respect it. To understand its role in all senses, even metaphorically. I've often told the story of my childhood dream of the tornado of fire, and how I've begun to see that tornado not as a fearful event, but as an expression of passion. Unfortunately, when human passion turns ugly, we "ready-aim-fire" on other humans, drop bombs that start fires, and otherwise use fire to attack and kill. "Fire" became an essential part of the war vocabulary. Ugh.

As Earth heats up, it is inevitable that there will be more and more fires. I don't believe that this is a case of Gaia attacking us, although undoubtedly some people will see it this way. She is beyond that kind of duality. No matter how fires start or how they are "fought", it will be a hard journey for human civilization, just as floods, earthquakes, and volcanos have always been and will increasingly be. As ever, though, I have to put the Goddess first. Her passion, if you will, is Her own body, and maintaining its safety, sovereignty and livability. We humans have generally not put Her first, so She must do that now Herself. For those of us who can rise above duality, it means embracing the phenomenon, not fighting it or the paradigm that created it. I mentioned the word curiosity the other day, and perhaps curiosity would be good here -- just kind of an open-hearted wondering. In future, how will we need to live, to power our lives, to feed ourselves? What are the fires burning away? What new passions will emerge out of the ashes of the old? Can we grasp that the world is being completely changed right now and that we cannot envision exactly what it will look like and operate like? What role are the fires (and their smoke events) playing in effecting change? How are they changing us, as people? Can we sometimes just observe, be a witness?

I have been keeping a "fake" plastic candle alight next to my workspace these last few days, just to remind myself that somewhere in all this, there is something good going on. Light and passion and power can be good things, things we want in our lives. And somehow, it's necessary to try to stay as unreactive to real fires as we are to little decorative ones -- even if we are fleeing a conflagration. I mean, to try to take one second to honor the fire's power, even as we throw a few belongings into a car. Fire is a potent reality, and in the bigger picture, long down the road, all will be well. The Earth that emerges in coming years will be the Earth that needs to be.

Cleaning out the Crevices

Half a lifetime ago -- and I am not sure whether this was when I was in New York City in the 1980's or at Pendle Hill in 1990 -- I consulted an energy healer. She said that, while the life energy around my head was vibrant and rich, from my neck down, there was virtually nothing there. The rest of my body was barely alive, energetically, and I wasn't grounded to the earth at all. She encouraged me to bring my body along for the ride -- and yet after all these years, I still haven't done that particularly well, or with any regularity or deliberation. While I have been extremely fortunate in having largely avoided disease, not surprisingly, I've had three significant falls in the 21st century, leading to serious sprains and breaks.

Over the last few weeks, these injuries (which I had considered long "healed") have been speaking with me. All three of them took place when I had no health insurance, so in addition to the trauma and pain inherent in the actual falls, there were significant added layers of rejection (of assistance), shame, fear and uncertainty. In the middle of the night last night, I realized I was being called to clean out the crevices into which I'd swept all these negative emotions, at a moment when I understandably had to focus on restoring my ability to walk and use my arms. I scanned the old injury events, forgiving myself and those who fearfully kept me at arm's length or tried to deny me medical care. I also remembered with appreciation that there were beautiful angels in each case who stepped up and helped me, easing the process.

And of course I couldn't help but remember the really quite remarkable fact that all three falls took place in the context of cathedrals/cathedral music -- either in a cathedral, or as I was heading to a cathedral to volunteer/sing or attend a major service. It is hard to know whether my joy was so "heady" that I couldn't focus on my feet, or (darker spin) whether this music tradition set up an energetic roadblock to prevent my entry. At this late date, it really doesn't matter. I have done my best to forgive and release this yucky stuff in the crevices, but I will undoubtedly need to do more healing and forgiveness in weeks to come.

My online peeps speak of embodying joy, embodying love, and embodying the Goddess. For someone like me, this is really, really hard. So much of my passion remains in my head, but I'm starting (with the encouragement of my body) to allow passion to move down through all my cells, organs, bones, and tendons. I think I tried to sail through life as if I didn't have a body...no longer an option in these times of ascension. Paradoxically, we have to be fully present, body and soul, in order to rise. My primary spiritual focus at this point is the Goddess. She has a body (Earth). She is waking up from numbness and trauma, and so -- apparently -- am I! Perhaps you are experiencing something similar?

I Won't Lie--A Ramble through Sunday

I won't lie. I had an extremely hard day yesterday. Extremely.  After three distressing days of wildfire smoke (discussing the levels of distress on this topic will have to wait for another day), it was actually beautiful out, sunny, windy, coolish. I was privileged enough to spend much of the day outside, reading and writing, savoring relative weather normalcy.

Still, I crashed emotionally. Really crashed. This so often happens after making a spiritual leap forward -- I feel honor bound to talk about this for the sake of other mystics experiencing the same thing. What was the major leap? Possibly my "Womb" essay last week. I stumbled on something very new, and expected an immediate backlash. But it seems to have taken a few days...combined with the smoke, the sense of truly going alone through the eye of the needle...

Because in the end, the aloneness was what slammed into me. Yes, I am safer than most people in my financial situation, and I was surrounded yesterday by trees, flowers, water, and a strong south wind. Nature was its own womb. But here is the dialogue I finally wrote down on my yellow legal (!) pad, word for word, just as my emotions tumbled out. "What the Sam Hill am I doing in Schenectady? I outgrew it 50 years ago! Where in the world are the people who think and act like me? All this moving around, and to this day my kindred spirits seem to be mostly online, and I don't even like going online! I'm not drawn to my former homes. I'm miserable about the situation in Duluth and the upper midwest, but I cannot help them and do not feel drawn to returning, even for a short visit. What draws me forward? Meeting like-minded wise Goddess spirits in person, only that high level of connection has yet to be made. Thinking about a likely upcoming move makes me feel lonely. My body doesn't feel like it belongs to me any more...Oh, how I wish I had a companion on my journey!"

Interesting, huh? For seventy years, being alone has seemed inevitable, and yet in the midst of a serious dark night of the soul, the truth cracks something open. This isn't about an old paradigm marriage-house-children partnership, but a very specific kind of intense spiritual sharing and daily interaction. I'm proud of the fact that I used "feeling" words more than "thinking" ones in that writing, and that somehow in subsequent hours I avoided a complete meltdown by remembering curiosity: What would it be like to have a real life companion, completely on my wavelength? Is it possible that such a person is on the horizon? What would it feel like to meet them and communicate deeply? How would my soul -- and my body -- react?

Thankfully, this curiosity made it possible for me to loop out of depression and say "yes" to attending a bluegrass concert in Schenectady's Central Park. I actually like this music a lot, it brought me back to life, and there was great people watching. 

And in honor of being less left-brained (and not feeling the need to go back and re-write this post), I suddenly remember how Sunday started, which may have entered into things. I take a 10-12 minute walk about three times a day (it's on a very busy road, and for safety's sake I prefer a few short walks). I did the usual at about 7 AM, but when I turned back into the driveway, there was a remarkable sight ahead of me -- a huge hawk (becoming aware of my presence I guess) lifting up off the driveway, its four-foot wingspan circling up and out of sight. First of all, it was only the second hawk I've seen this summer at all, so to see it on the ground was remarkable. Secondly, there was a dead bunny rabbit on the driveway. Not a surprise, but I said a heartfelt blessing for it. Lastly, starting the day with hawk (messenger) eating rabbit (fear) was, itself, interesting. A large part of this whole black hole is fear, the fear of continuing into later old age still alone, my authentic self still feeling invisible. Perhaps my message was to pay attention to this, and to what may now be my biggest wish of all -- deep, meaningful connection with one other human being. To leave the "Liz path" and enter the "Liz and (someone) path". That's new! Hmm...

Orange Sky

Talk about things that weren't on my radar screen four days ago or so...orange sky. This morning as I speak, our upstate NY sky is actually relatively normal and blue, but I understand it won't be for long. Yesterday was all orange -- strange, creepy, yes, as everyone was saying, apocalyptic, yet nothing like in my beloved Duluth/Northern Minnesota. I don't dare even to text my friends there whose lives must be upside down. They need to focus their energies on the moment-to-moment where they are. Certain climate issues can be ignored or kicked forward, but this is not one of them, is it?

It is interesting that orange is the complementary color to blue...this may be relevant right now, just in the sense of things being turned "pear-shaped".

In the midst of it all, I seem to be having several strange new physical symptoms...they are minor enough to see in the light of metaphor and symbolism, but I suspect that just as Mother Earth is being turned inside out, we are too. For the moment, I am trying to immerse my body in the relatively new sensation of joy, when I can feel an iota of it!

Lastly, speaking of wombs, as I did the other day: what if each day is a womb? What is being nurtured and protected today for birth by tomorrow?? 

There is something exceptional and good in all this, as hard as it may be to believe. Take care, all, wherever you are.

 

Goddess Words 65: Womb

This word is newly added. It wasn't on my original Goddess list, interestingly enough. It has come up in several talks I have listened to recently, and having lived mostly like a nun all these years -- and never having conceived or carried a child -- that part of my body has been kind of a black hole. An empty space where nothing happens.

Interesting, too, that my old Concise Oxford Dictionary lists "womb" directly after "womanly". Not that they are connected -- it is just an accident of spelling -- but my mind makes the connection, as in, if you have never given birth, can you be "womanly"? (And do I fully resonate with that dated definition of "womanly" anyway?! Looking up words online doesn't give you this same opportunity to ponder neighboring words...)

What brought this on? I think, indirectly, it was the gratitude I have started to feel so intensively toward my body. Somehow, out of a great deal of numbness, I recognized that day-in and day-out, month-in and month-out, for nearly 30 years, my body patiently prepared for the possibility that I might become pregnant. (And while it was patient, it was not uncomplaining -- I used to have very painful periods!) I mean, how remarkable is that? Even if there were no other aspect of my physical existence to note with thankfulness, this one merits daily songs of praise for the rest of my life!

Then to move beyond my own womb and start to see all of the Earth -- heck, all of the Universe -- as the womb of the Goddess, my limited mind is boggled. It is as if all of creation, from the smallest life forms we know of all the way to the furthest edges of our galaxy and beyond, is taking place within Her womb, a place of unlimited conception (in all senses of the word!) Life is being sparked and held and nurtured and sent out to play its role for a life span, in so many forms and such infinite variety and speed, it is far, far beyond human understanding.

Clearly, this is an "inconceivable" Goddess word. Yet still another awesome related thought came to me. What if my 70 years of life were, themselves, a womb? A (reasonably) safe container in which to be fed nutritious food and experiences to get me ready to actually be born? I mean, I'm only now beginning to feel ready to go out into the world!

What if we've completely misunderstood the process? What if aging doesn't lead to inevitable decline, illness and "death"? What if it gets us ready for birth?

Thinking on Thursday

When you are nearing 1,160 posts, coming up with clever titles gets harder and harder. I don't know if there is ever a Thursday when I'm not thinking, but thank you, regular readers, for your forbearance!  Sometimes as I start to write, a better title comes to mind, and if that happens, I'll replace "Thinking on Thursday"!

A few days ago, I noted that the Universe seemed to be putting me through a reminder process, a review of my strongest gifts (and their value) so I won't possibly go into these all-important next few years carrying an outdatedly low opinion of myself. So far this process hasn't been surprising: no, "Hey, Liz, did you know you have the capacity for reading auric fields?" or "Hey, Liz, it's time to become a reiki practitioner!" More a synopsis or appreciation of who I've always been -- the difference being that now, these gifts and qualities feel far more solid, the core of me, not the fluff I'm desperately trying to sweep under the rug. Gone, too, is a longtime sense of irony and bittersweet regret over the fact that growing these spiritual gifts effectively impoverished me. I feel lighthearted, almost giddy, about the fact that this old paradigm with its heavy baggage is evaporating, and qualities like women's wisdom, love, beauty and unity are solidifying.

However, I am steeling myself for some kind of big "reveal" in the coming weeks. Whether it will be the impulse to take one of my current gifts much, much further, or a leading to pursue some brand new spiritual power, I don't know this morning. I know that it has not been possible in my current context to be the leader I really am, so I suspect it will be something to do with that, but on this hot summer's day, that's as far as I have come.

One more thing. I am trying to become far more deliberate about thanking my body for its power and persistence. When I think of the gifts it has given me for a full 70 years -- the list is almost endless -- it is truly humbling. Many people do not live to this age, or are limited by pain, inability to walk, see, hear, breathe, think clearly, or be independent. Somehow, underneath a rather modest exterior lies my astonishing physical body, which this morning was able to navigate a long flight of stairs down to the water, take a 15-minute swim, then climb upwards again. For the moment, my daily devotion isn't to the Goddess Herself, it's to my bodily manifestation of Her. If I do nothing else in this lifetime, I hope I will be appreciative every day of this gift above all other gifts. We cannot experience life on Earth without our bodies -- yet, anyway!

That's my thinking on this Thursday...

Reminders

This continues to be a super powerful time, which I probably don't have to tell any of you.

For the last week (and I suspect the process will continue a little longer), Spirit seems to have been giving me gentle reminders of how important my gifts are -- spiritual, artistic, musical, and in creative expression of all kinds, even here. To whatever extent I have allowed myself to believe the world's opinion of my worthlessness, I guess the message now is, no, these gifts are your superpowers, and if there is even the slightest remaining iota of discomfort, disavowal, or disapproval within, it is time to address it now. Now. The world needs these gifts more than ever, in the transition to the new paradigm. 

For the most part, this has taken the form of some channelling in my personal journal, but also some of this work is happening outside, listening to the birds (and even talking with them!) Because, hey, yes, communing with nature is one of the gifts! 

We have been rather oversaturated with rain, but nowhere near as much as further south of here, and once again, I'm reminded that, no matter how extensive the past and present human catalysts to these climate events, we humans cannot ultimately control the details of where, how, and how bad they will be. Nature will bring Herself into balance as She needs to. Over the coming weeks, embracing the reality of that may be just as important as embracing the personal gifts that need to stay visible and viable at this time. 

It is time to listen to spiritual reminders -- on all levels, in all arenas. It is time to keep our ears, our minds, and our hearts open!

Tree Magic

 

Two days ago, we had quite a thunderstorm, after which I went outside and watched and listened as nature got back up and running again. The trees were still "raining", and the birds were slowly starting to make a racket. The quality of the light was very ambiguous, and at a moment when the sun broke through the clouds, I snapped this photograph on my phone, which, I'm sure I've mentioned, is an at least five-year-old flip phone. I don't know how I got these effects of light in the trees, this brilliance. It was the same day that I wrote about brilliance, as it turns out!!! It is possible that there was a little water or greasiness on the lens. And I did utilize some very basic editing -- the image is cropped, and I used a color filter to make the leaves somewhat less bright green. 

Whatever the case, I'm thrilled by this picture, because it communicates what I realize more and more, which is that the trees around us are not only sentient, but actively wise, speaking amongst themselves and with us on all manner of topics. Indeed, this has probably always been the case not only with trees but all manner of flora and fauna, rocks, water, mosses, and the air itself. All of life. I'm not yet in a position to really communicate back (no long conversations!), but perhaps this picture is a start. Like, "I see your magic, and your beauty below the surface. I honor it, and honor the same within myself. May we start to communicate more and more."

Goddess Words 64: Brilliance

It seems fitting to end the month, under a full moon, with another Goddess word: Brilliance. 

Intense lightness, color, brightness. A high level of skill and intelligence. And, in the world of gems, the quality of reflectivity and sparkle.  My favorite definitions? Radiance, splendor, magnificence.

It is a hot day, due to get much hotter, so I may not have the energy to but scratch the sparkling surface of this word. I'm actually rather shocked that it took me this long to talk about "brilliance", but I guess this reflects how long it has taken to recognize the quality within myself. When I added this to my list back in the 2000's, I was looking outward, thinking more along the lines that the Goddess is brilliant -- bright, beautiful, reflective of all the light in all galaxies, the epitome of all beauty, creativity and clarity.

Were these qualities that I was expected to reflect in life? Basically, I'd say no. (This was probably true of most girls in the 1950's and 60's.) The only exception, arguably, was in the academic world. Because I was gifted intellectually, I was expected to get good grades, at least through college. But due to the expectations of the era and the strange patchwork of my other early influences, family, family friends, teachers -- all would have been horrified at the thought of a little girl from Schenectady heading out into the world and really being absolutely brilliant. Radiant, splendid, sparkling, visible and audible, "out there". Magnificent. And as we bright beings moved out into the world, there were very few traditional institutions that wanted to attract or foster genuine brilliance. Too many of us, no matter what our backgrounds, have had to hide our proverbial lights "under a bushel" just to limp along and survive.

I think it's a hallmark of this time that more and more people worldwide are aligning with their true inner brilliance and unique auras, which is bringing up Earth's own sparkling quality. The bright luminosity of all beings in creation is expanding too. To the right eyes, from space, what is visible isn't city lights, it is brilliance lights.

An Italics Moment

It is so interesting how serendipitously words, people, animals, and concepts show up in my life when I've just written a post, or had a certain conversation, or seen something in the news. The Universe sort of italicizes it by sending along a crossword puzzle clue, or a name in a book, or a passing bumper sticker.

Yesterday's italics moment was seeing a reference to embracing one's heritage. I realize that this is what I've tried to do, at least a little, in these last few posts which have been awkward and hard to write. It's particularly awkward when my heritage (and its, um, dominance in so many places) is arguably the reason why so many people worldwide have had to struggle, themselves, to accept and embrace where they come from. The process of unraveling my end of this ball of yarn will continue, although there is a caveat...

Which is, of course, that as we enter this new paradigm, all the old constructs are in the process of falling away. What was our "heritage" is a concept from history that will be far less meaningful going forward. What will matter is whether you are a being of love, not what country or background you are from. What will matter is whether your intention is to love and be as kind as possible to every single person you meet. What will matter is, when you stumble in that effort, that you look honestly at why it is hard to love in that situation, and see if you can heal your heart. 

Earth is in the process of a serious reconfiguration of Her physical body; at the same time, we humans are reconfiguring how we have defined ourselves. I guess today's bright full moon may be asking us to look squarely at what brought us this far (what has made us who we are) and to bow in gratitude to those factors. Once we do that, we can turn around and walk forward unencumbered by any of the negative baggage that history has heretofore asked us to carry. We will be known and appreciated solely for the quality of our love. Even the most conscious of us may not be ready for what an enormous change this will be!

Paradoxically...

Well, this continues to be a rich time, a liminal time. Traveling around the area the last few days has forced me to feel ever more nuanced impressions of the rough edges between me and my environment. Returning to "home territory" at about 70 was no accident...I see things from my child eyes, my adult eyes, and, arguably, the eyes of my higher self. Every day I am clearer and clearer about what layers of perspective were in place from the beginning, which ones were added like coats of paint over decades, and which ones may be emerging from a much higher perspective as I strip off the old paint. 

A question has amused me -- what if, when my great aunt gave me The Social Register, I had set about on a concerted effort to marry into that class? (Although she didn't quite say so, I suspect that was what she had hoped I would do.) It might have been possible, because I certainly have the ability to operate in that world, including doing polite chit-chat at cocktail parties. I might have lived a very, very privileged life, with a beautiful permanent home (UK or US), a workable marriage (if my husband had had some genuine interests -- other than money -- that overlapped with mine!), and perhaps successful children and beautiful grandchildren. I might even have had a more traditional career of my own, and/or volunteer work bringing me accolades. I might have stopped caring about whether or not I sang the music I love. I might never have focused on women's spirituality, or seen our current global moment through any eyes other than, "How can we keep this apple cart righted for the sake of my own family?" I might have been in a position to donate huge sums of money to my alma maters, and to other arts or social causes. I might have been genuinely respected, at least by a certain group of people. "What if?"

The hard part about my recent posts has been publicly acknowledging this "shadow" version of me, the self that I've been sweeping further and further under the rug every time I've lived in a contrasting situation, or traveled on public transportation, or shopped in a big box store. (Leave it to me to have a shadow self who is rich, privileged, and successful!!!) When that little voice within said, "This isn't my true place" or "These aren't my true people", I thought I was hearing the voice of a snobby little mini Dowager Countess of Grantham. The duality within me took on decidedly old paradigm form, a form I am actually as uncomfortable with as the me in thrift store clothes.

So now, it is dawning on me that the rough edges I've felt every day of my life stem from a much, much bigger perspective. Let's face it, I would eventually have felt like a fish out of water in a world of elites! It was never about where I fit on our world's current scale from deep poverty to "the top 1%". Or exactly which square foot of soil I happen to be standing on. It was never about which outward milieu would have felt most like home. Instead, it is about being true to my inner spiritual leadership. It is about who I have been for dozens of lifetimes, a specific facet of the Goddess. And until recently reaching the point of fully embracing that core heart identity, I have been rather stuck.

I know what I need to try to do over the next few weeks. I need to look at every moment, wherever I am, as a potential portal to serving the Goddess. This applies not only to my personal life, but also to the horrifying things in the news. (Some of these things are surely happening so that humanity will dig down into the rich soil of truth under the surface, and embrace new ways of being.) Expansiveness comes not from moving from one side of the "versus" screen to the other, but from embracing more and feeling life energy blooming out into all dimensions and unexpected directions. 

Paradoxically...looking more squarely and honestly at when and how "I don't feel at home" has helped me feel more at home within, and to sense that comfort expanding outward. I am thankful. I just saw my first dragonflies of the season: transformation, breaking down illusions, adaptation, inner magic. Blessings, all.

Thursday Thoughts

Back when I was a teenager attending private school in Albany, I used to take a school bus along part of what starts out as State Street in Schenectady and becomes Central Avenue in Albany. Even 55 years ago, this was for the most part a woebegone stretch of retail establishments, and my young, hypersensitive self found it a profoundly ugly urban/suburban stretch of road. Who knows, perhaps that is part of why I became fixated on getting to the English countryside. 

Yesterday, I took a city bus along the same route, and honestly, the impression that it leaves hasn't changed a bit in over half a century. Actually, it is shocking that some buildings are still there, if somewhat changed for the worse, including 1930's-era Roosevelt School that I attended from first through third grade. Putting aside how worn out/worn down a lot of the structures are, and how not visually beautiful, my obsession yesterday was imagining all the plastic being sold along the route (eventually to be discarded)...in big box stores, small convenience stores and gas stations, pharmacies, fast food restaurants, etc. OMG.

After last week's experience of recognizing some snobbishness on my part -- something that is still causing ripple effects -- I realize that I have changed a bit in six or seven days. Now, I feel a new measure of acceptance. I don't think I actively felt superior to my fellow bus riders or the landscape I was riding through. It was more a case of, I am where I am. All of it "is what it is". There were some hard moments (fights, etc.) but I did not find myself wishing I were elsewhere. I was a little bit better at centering myself and saying, "I am here. There is a reason I am here. Perhaps on some level I am a force for good."

Meanwhile, the kind of cool English summer I remember from writing up my master's thesis in July/August of 1981 is a thing of the past, and earth Herself is rumbling and feverish. Those of us in climes that are currently more temperate and bearable walk the tightrope between gratitude that we are "somewhere else" -- and the sure knowledge that at any moment, we could rumble or burn too. There's a certain calm that comes from simply letting Mother Earth do what she needs to do to regain balance. 

The Chains Holding Us Back

I work hard to edit out unnecessary words and phrases in these blog posts ("just", "a little bit", etc.) but today I'm going to start with one: "Needless to say".

Needless to say, the last two or three days have been pretty intense. I've had so many turning points over the years, that it may take time to gauge whether last week's moment on the city bus was my "road to Damascus" or just another ordinary step on the path. At the very least, I think I will look back and realize that facing perhaps my most embarrassing and shameful quality (snobbery) has released me from a painful, solitary prison. I may be one of the freest people I know, and yes, I am on a boat speeding down the lake, but there have been chains around my ankles holding me back.

On this Monday morning, am I totally transformed, in a state of bliss, feeling nothing but love? Um, no, not yet. But I have inched closer. I guess you could say that I am in a place of more complete acceptance -- that the world and the people in it are inevitably where they would have to be within the dualistic construct that has been in place for centuries. We haven't been able to help ending up at the top or the bottom, in a race to succeed, or in the constant fear of failure. We have all coped with this in different ways...but in this liminal moment, everything is changing. As we enter the Age of Aquarius, the energies of unity and love are becoming too strong to support stark duality anymore. 

I guess what was hitting me over the weekend is how very old paradigm my chains have been, these manacles keeping me tied to old traumas. I mean, remaining snobbish and condescending may have provided some slim thread of comfort at times, but it doesn't tie me one bit to things I want in my life now! Even if I could be magically transported to England to live in a stately home for the rest of my life -- near a cathedral, and perhaps to become the patron of its girls' choir -- would that be the happy ending of this Liz path? At the end of each day, would I sit in my drawing room, wearing a beautiful linen dress and pearls, sipping my gin and tonic, and say, "Finally, I'm playing the role I was meant to play"?

No! A hundred times no. Not only is it entirely too small of a role going forward, it is not a role that begins to reflect the world and values of the Goddess. As painful as it has been to be chronically outside the worlds I thought I wanted to be part of, clearly it was my unique way to prepare for the higher harmony era we are entering. It was the only way for me to become who I am meant to be now.

It is as if I've looked down at the chains and manacles around my ankles, only to realize that they are not locked shut. All I need to do is reach over, open them up, and step out of them. All the traumas, disappointments, limiting beliefs, even snobberies, can fall away, no longer to impede my freedom of movement. I may wish to continue to hold some qualities close to my chest (musicality, eagerness to learn more about the musical energies of the Universe, passion for the arts and beauty, a certain amount of dignity and strength), but the old historical details can fall away leaving me in a place of more love and acceptance. I feel slightly more at home with myself and the world than I did a few days ago, for which I am profoundly grateful. Life feels a little softer around the edges.

The Recovering Snob

Well, having stuck a pin in a particular balloon yesterday, as the air has been slowly escaping (as it were), I have been inundated by memories of when I've been snobbish, and, perhaps, its origins in my life. This doesn't seem to be a moment for sitting on anything and letting it fester, especially if it might speak to anyone else's condition, as the Quakers say.

I guess it should come as no surprise that most of my snobbishness stems from my twin passions for English church music and England itself. I've told the story of my joining the girls' choir at church, and realizing with a shock that I wouldn't be singing with the men and boys. I wouldn't be singing the repertoire that I had already started to love. Despite the fact that I pivoted as quickly as possible into "I'll be the best girl chorister that I can be" mode, and began piano and organ lessons, the fact is that being so firmly excluded from a world I felt so strongly called to be a part of was traumatic and (as is evident from my writing in this blog) I've never gotten over it. As a teenager, I wore my Royal School of Church Music medallion over my choir robe with a lot of pride, perhaps a little too much. Ditto my pride at being in the choir of Royal Holloway in 1980 -- I soaked up the experience like a sponge, and yet never afterwards had a place to "put" all the expertise in singing choral evensong and that specific genre of music. In recent years, when I have attended services at English cathedrals, I felt actively superior to most of the tourists in the stalls or pews around me. I knew when to stand, when to sit, when to say the confession, and the words of the hymns and canticles by heart, and it probably showed. I mean, it is one thing to adore the music and the environs and the glorious acoustics. It's quite another to feel superior to the people around you. My only consolation is that perhaps being blocked from doing your true work, and being (myself) condescended to at times in that world, has this kind of effect. I had a "ton" of knowledge, skill, and musicality within me, of which only perhaps a few pounds has made its way out over the years. Some of it came out, uh, inappropriately. 

Of course the larger England thing comes to me genetically, although early on I didn't really understand that. But from when I was about eight to fifteen, my family lived what could only be described as an upper crust WASP lifestyle. We had the big house, the oriental carpets, the bits of sterling silver, the summer cabin away from the city. I attended a private school, and slowly, the layers of assumptions that came with that privilege started to pile up. A relative passed on some genealogical material with our almost exclusively English heritage (some of it aristocratic), which I became fascinated with. And the original "Upstairs, Downstairs" started airing on TV in 1971, when I was in tenth grade. (I resonated most with Upstairs...) 

Ironically, that was the very moment when our family's fortunes were in the process of taking an extreme turn, in part because there had been no "fortune" in the first place! Soon after my high school graduation in 1973, we moved out of the swank house and up to the North Country, where my parents would live year-round in our cabin for the next dozen years or so. I would come home from college or my early jobs to find no food in the fridge, no gas in the car, and my dad asking to "borrow" money. Again, shock seemed to be the catalyst for snobbery. I held onto my supposedly upper crust roots like a life preserver. On and off, washing dishes at my Smith College house's dining room, or being the downstairs nanny in the home of a prominent family, or living at the YWCA in Helena, I would pinch myself and try to remind myself of my real roots, my real persona. I held onto -- as I still do -- a few small silver bowls, spoons, and picture frames. Now, finding certain things beautiful, preferable, or enjoyable is fine. If I could have simply said, these things are important and beautiful to me, it would have been fine. But to the extent that I have at times tried to make myself feel better about my ongoing situation by thinking that I am actually superior to other people, as I do on many occasions such as on the bus the other day, that is decidedly not OK. 

My dad's aunts were the epitome of snobbishness...think Maggie Smith in "Downton Abbey", minus the sense of humor! I was rather scared of them, to be honest. When I was in my thirties, I went to see one of them for the first time since childhood. I rang the doorbell, and my great aunt answered the door, looked me over, and exclaimed in a most imperious voice, "I must say, Elizabeth, you don't look like a Wilson!" (She would laugh if she would see me at 70, the spitting image of my father.) She spent the first half of the weekend making these kinds of cutting remarks, before I finally started standing up to her and showing a little moxie. By the end of the visit, I think she began to like me, and gave me two gifts which were telling -- and useless...a mink stole and a copy of The Social Register. 

Well, I guess that is all I can manage for today. Snobbery seems like a relatively minor thing by comparison with what we are seeing in the world today, but still, it isn't love. It's like the curving upper slope of something that can turn downhill fast, into rejection, outright discrimination, and hatred. And there are snobberies in a lot of areas of life...I am sure I haven't covered all of mine in this "confession", but it is a start. 

Another Big Aha

Well, they are coming thick and fast right now. Today may not be the right day for this, but I must do my best to bear regular witness to my experience of this path...

I was on a city bus yesterday to go to a smaller local city. A man got on, with seemingly everything he owned bagged up in a baby carriage. This kind of thing happens almost every time I take the bus, and sometimes it doesn't faze me. But sometimes it takes me to a very dark place indeed. It's like my own private "event horizon". For ten years or more, I've been circling the edge of a strong eddy, trying desperately to avoid being sucked in and disappearing completely. It's on the bus that I sometimes swirl closest to the void, which was what was happening in real time.

I'm at a place in my spiritual development where I literally cannot stand negative feelings for very long, so I gave myself a good inner talking-to. What was going on here? The very first layer to emerge was old-fashioned, unpleasant snobbery. My upbringing and education should have sent me in a different direction. What was I doing with "these people"? (Goddess, forgive me.) I felt, what?, distaste. Superiority. (Not hatred, I don't think.) Ugh...complex, old, extremely yucky emotions. It was painful to realize that despite this long personal spiritual journey, it wasn't yet natural to feel immediate compassion, solidarity, or love towards this fellow human being.

Suddenly, in a literal "aha", I remembered that in this duality construct, there are only two things, love and fear. And so no matter how this event manifested initially, deep down what I was feeling was fear, pure and simple. Not anger that no one should be forced to live that way, but the narcissistic fear that this man's plight might represent my future. 

Over the course of the bus ride, every possible related issue surfaced. Riding through a suburban/exurban wasteland, and looking out, I realized I was still feeling distaste. Nothing about the endless rollout of car dealerships, fast food places, hair salons, doughnut shops, and dying farms-about-to-be-razed appeared beautiful in my eyes, nor the small green lawns and parked RV's and boats. Middle class America is as psychically hard for me as the world of extreme poverty. And yet at my destination, I encountered any number of very well-off and "successful" people and was reminded that I don't belong with them either. I don't find their world particularly beautiful. I fear them, yet perhaps in a very different way than some of the folks on the bus. 

It was overwhelming to realize that, if I love so few aspects of this variegated manmade scene, then I must fear it. What is that all about? After all this enlightenment work, I am still torn with duality -- loving a small sliver of beautiful, mystical, and natural experiences and people, and profoundly uncomfortable with all the rest. How can I consider myself even remotely spiritual?

So it was a freaky day and, as it turned out, a violent one. For over an hour, there was a torrential rainstorm with extremely strong winds. Running around on errands, feeling quite dazed, I couldn't help but get soaking wet, despite sheltering for a while at the library. I was grateful to know that at least I would have a place to really dry off later in the day.

Shortly after getting on the return bus, it stopped at a corner, and who got on but the same man from the morning?! Still with his overflowing carriage. His situation hadn't changed in four or five hours. Had mine? The pendulum hadn't swung from fear to love that quickly. I didn't yet feel warmth or compassion. But I found myself in a softer place of "appreciation" -- he has found a way to just barely survive a system whose currency is money, not love. Ditto the people who build tacky one-story coffee shops, and potential customers for swank apartment buildings starting to be put up. We are all trying to survive. 

I haven't lost my personal fear of slipping over the event horizon. But by the end of the day, I was able to see the whole thing from a larger perspective. We are entering a new age where money will no longer dictate our station in life, where we will all love one another. We will outgrow the duality hell of judging each other's success or failure -- much less (on this Juneteenth) anything else about who we are. We will understand that we are all, literally, one. (Today, I feel quite ashamed of the snobbery that has beset me on and off over the years, but I think yesterday's "aha" served as a pin in the balloon, a bucket of water on the wicked witch.) Aha.

Quite a Day

From what I understand, this is quite a day, astrologically, for the energies of the divine feminine. To honor this, I am basically doing things that come naturally to me -- writing, laundry, clean-up chores, cooking...yesterday I transplanted some plants into bigger pots, and they literally doubled in size overnight! I get the feeling of being squeezed out when you don't have enough room...I couldn't stand to look at their constrained state one more minute. It's a joyous feeling to see them so immediately leaving "surviving" mode and heading into "thriving" mode.

In an interesting addendum to my last post, where I mentioned feeling so much love for animals, birds and trees (but not yet to insects!), yesterday I swear I saw at least five insects that I have never seen before in my life, or at least have no memory of seeing before. I mean, it is almost as if they sought me out, wandered into my orbit, either on foot or through the air. It was a little hard to say, "hi sweetheart" to them, but in the end, not impossible...at the very least, I was more aware of their essential beingness than I generally have been with bugs of any kind. It will be interesting to see how this all unfolds.

I've started a magic list for today, just to note anything absolutely wonderful or magical that I experience. I started with, "I am still alive", and added, "my plants doubled in size." I figure if nothing else happens, that about covers it all!

More Love

On this new moon week, and after days of definite wobbling (emotionally and energetically), I am committed to focusing on love, joy, and magic. By magic, I don't necessarily mean wave-a-wand magic (as fun as that might be!), but more, seeing and appreciating the extraordinary in nature and in life. There was a sunset about three nights ago that was about a twelve on a scale of 1-to-10...absolutely as if from another world. Magic.

I've touched on this once or twice before, but something became very clear to me this past weekend. I have started to think of birds and animals as my beloveds. When one crosses my path (on land or in the air) I often cannot help speaking aloud to it, calling it my "sweetheart". Some of them stick around for a few seconds afterwards, and some skitter or fly off as fast as can be. I knew I was capable of slightly more-than-ordinary depth of communication with people's pets and horses, but feeling almost the same about multiple wild chipmunks, squirrels, robins, wrens and raptors is a leap into what these days people seem to be calling "another timeline". And I'm feeling almost the same about trees. So far, not quite there with flowers, vegetables, weeds, grass, or insects such as mosquitos (the latter would be quite extraordinary, right?!) But for solitary old me, it is a new experience to feel waves of love going outward and, at least in some cases, being received and reciprocated. I can almost hear the word "sweetheart" coming back in my direction, on the wind.

There are only a handful of TV shows that I'm watching at the moment, one of which is "Astrid" on PBS. I am not entirely sure why the main character touches me so much, but she does. (My particular sensitivity is very different, but I resonate with her.) And I'll leave to others debates about its presentation of neurodivergence...but in a recent episode, there was an act of love that almost literally blew me away. A young man, knowing that Astrid loves the music of Bach but cannot tolerate attending crowded concert halls, arranges for the two of them to listen (alone) to a top violinist rehearse. Astrid has never heard music played live, and it is monumental for her. Putting aside the context of a budding romance, what was almost inconceivable to me was imagining someone, anyone, loving someone so much that they would find such a perfect, pierce-you-to-the-core, life-changing gift. It is astonishing that a person could see their beloved so clearly, and leap over so many hurdles, to make the perfect gift happen. Yes, it caused a big wobble, a big moment of feeling sorry for myself that I haven't experienced such love, a brief trip into the Void. But once I righted myself, I realized, this is my new bar. Finding the place inside where I can imagine not only being given a gift of this personal importance and magnitude, but also imagining giving such a gift in return -- not something I need or want, but what they need or want. 

Around the time of the new moon last night, we had a doozy of a thunderstorm, and today has dawned blissfully cool and almost fall-like. After a week of intense heat, it is -- yup -- almost magical...

Olio

Well, it is that kind of day. Very hot and humid. Due to get well into the 90's. I don't know what to write about, except I feel a responsibility to be a balancing energy. In the end, though, I think there may be enough calming, loving energy in enough hearts to provide that balance. It seems fairly old paradigm to feel the necessity to actually write.

So last evening, I saw two woodchucks chasing a bunny rabbit. I spoke about rabbits and fear the other week, and I suspect that this poor rabbit was super scared. The trio disappeared into the underbrush and I didn't hear any sounds that might have indicated that the chase was successful, but I may never know. It was a reminder, if one that was needed, that Nature is far from a peaceful place. And as extreme movements of the landscape become more common -- earthquakes, floods, fires, volcanos, tsunamis --  many of us may feel like the scurrying rabbit at times. Earth herself is undergoing such radical transformation, and is throwing off so many of Her own old restrictions, that we must expect the unexpected. However, violence in Nature may stem from the necessity for change, or fear or a survival instinct, but unlike human violence, it is never about hatred.

I've tried not to let all that hatred get to me, but it begins to seep in, doesn't it? I don't believe in trying to protect oneself -- it's just a case of trying to hold a strong, positive energy. This last week, I've been quite "wobbly". I think it is in part because of having come closer and closer to fully embracing my full wealth of gifts -- looking out at the world becomes increasingly surreal and painful. It is a literal wobble, an up-down wave between energy levels that I finally feel, after a lifetime of trying not to. In the past, I was more apt to try to match my energy to the world's, as unsuccessful as that effort was. Now I don't try!

Unlike last year, I have recently seen very few eagles or hawks, and I feel a bit bereft about it. From what I've read, it isn't an actual decline in population, just some seasonal ups and downs, but I long to see them. Perhaps today, I will experience that gift! Hang in there folks. Have a good weekend!

Goddess Words 63: Gifts

Back in February of last year, I presented one of my other Goddess words, "Gifting". I made the decision this morning not to go back and read that post, so there could well be a little overlap with that essay, or others such as my previous Goddess Word, "Money". But I thought it was best to come to this with as much of an open mind as possible on this very hot June morning.

Gifts. As usual, an enormous word, both a noun and a verb.  I assume that when I added it to the list, what I had in mind was the gifts of the Goddess to us, to all of life. Because all of life is a gift. The fact of being alive is a gift. The fact that we breathe is a gift. The fact that we have access to Mother Earth's natural resources is a gift. The ability of Earth to sustain life is a gift. And although it may not always feel this way, each and every event in our life is a gift, a learning gift, an abundance gift, an opportunity for growth. 

From that standpoint if from no other, I've always found our economic system to be strange. To do anything in life from any other place than "gifting" seems strange to me. I've never understood the exchange of money, but of course that is evident in my. life! I suspect that by some point in the future, gifting will be the norm, but of course it isn't yet.

I don't do the following often enough in my personal journal -- but I'll do it right here as an example of embracing the gifts coming our way in life. Today, I am thankful for many gifts, and I'll list a few of them here. There's been a recent development that may give me more living stability going forward, so I'm very thankful for this. The other day, I was feeling extremely lonely, which is unusual for me. But I just could not think of one person exactly on my wavelength to connect with. I went outside, and realized that the trees surrounding me felt friendly! I could almost feel their blessings and gifts (including shade) coming my way. I am thankful for online access to many wise and beautiful people who are exploring this new age we are entering. I am thankful for the cornucopia of flowers and vegetables blooming right now, and how healthily some of us are in a position to eat on a day-to-day basis. 

Despite what I said above, I am thankful for many beautiful friends, and the people who have entered my life at just the right moment (sometimes to leave again soon after!) I am thankful for a long life of adventures and travel, singing and art. I am thankful for this blog and the regular opportunity to write. I am thankful for the gifts and talents that have enriched my life. I am thankful for animals, the chipmunks on the driveway and the hummingbird at the flowerpot. 

All of these are gifts, the kinds of gifts that may come to us almost every minute of every day. The Goddess doesn't ask us to place money in the hat. She doesn't want to know if we are worthy -- every being is worthy simply by virtue of being alive. And similarly, we can choose to gift others in a host of situations without expecting payment in return, without expecting the recipient to be "worthy". In other words, we can choose to act like the Goddess -- if we wish.

There are many things happening out there which superficially don't seem like "gifts". But they are gifts, teaching moments, learning prompts. If nothing else, we are being reminded of what we don't want, and sometimes that is a gift!

I know many people who are uncomfortable either giving or receiving gifts...at the moment, perhaps seeing our entire life from a gifting perspective might be hard for some of us. Maybe today, focusing on one gift will be enough. The blue sky above me is a gift. It is a beautiful color. Thank you, Goddess.

A different perspective

Today, I know I am circling around some of the ground I've been on recently, but from a different perspective. I remember, literally half-a-lifetime ago (35 years) sitting on a mattress on the floor of my new apartment in Duluth. I could see Lake Superior out the window, and was trying to make sense of an enormous change in my life. I had left New York City, and decided that I couldn't return to England since the men-and-boys' choir tradition still appeared to be in full force. (Unbeknownst to me, at about that very moment, Salisbury Cathedral was in the process of creating the first girls' cathedral choir in England! It is remotely possible that had I known about this and headed to Salisbury to become involved in this venture, everything might have turned out differently. My University of London MMus might have provided an entree...I'll never know!) 

Through a long, circuitous car journey, I had chosen Duluth for an experience of becoming more American, more directly spiritual, and perhaps more grounded. I had already been journaling in a conversational way, perhaps one might say "channelling", drawing on inner wisdom in trying to make decisions. But that particular morning, I must have accessed a huge well of pain and frustration about having significant gifts in a variety of areas -- particularly writing, art and music. I remember bursting into tears and sobbing almost uncontrollably, railing at God about why he hadn't just given me only one of these gifts. I mean, if I had just been one thing, I could easily have focused and not been drawn away by other talents. (My life had already been like a three-way tennis match, art-music-writing-music-art-music-writing...etc.) I had left the one iota of security I had ever experienced, in the corporate world, and here I was out in the wilderness, hoping to use these gifts in some meaningful way, and yet knowing in my heart of hearts that I didn't have the singleness of purpose in any one of these areas to create a career or substantial income. To put it mildly, I was scared to death. And in the subsequent half-a-lifetime, the tennis match has continued. Even now, having focused more exclusively on writing this blog and largely having given up any lingering hopes of fashioning a life devoted to cathedral music or painting, those two talent areas remain live wires, I guess you could say. No matter how often I visualize them flying off into the wake of my boat (!) I find they are still in my heart. They are still at my core.

This past weekend, thanks to some material I listened to online, it finally, finally hit me. These gifts are not (and never were) separate entities. They have been ways of accessing the beauty, harmony, love, and wisdom of the Goddess...separate "paths", perhaps, but one destination that arguably I "reached" early in life and was trying to express. The "gift" isn't being a writer or painter or singer or organist, it is having the capacity to access a high level of spiritual beauty. The gift is having the capacity to easily align with the Aquarian values that are now emerging in our world. (Since I am an Aquarian, I guess it makes sense, right?) Truly, I don't think that I fully understood this until this very moment. 

I don't know quite what to do with this different perspective except to let it settle in and take hold. It helps me understand why this lifetime has been what it has been, but what that will mean for my life moving forward in any practical sense, I don't know. I'll just have to let the insights keep surfacing.