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Subscribe to this list via RSS Blog posts tagged in healing

Posted by on in SageWoman Blogs

Dianas-Pond-Reflections.jpg

 

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Release the Pain, Keep the Wisdom

         I was receiving acupuncture to address some ongoing health issues.  At one point in the treatment I had a deep visceral experience of a vortex or portal opening up around my belly and the words “Release the pain, keep the wisdom” came into my head.  Those words continued to run the next day as I had a long session with a powerful practitioner of magic who does her healing through deep body work and massage.

 

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Recent Comments - Show all comments
  • Leanne
    Leanne says #
    Maybe it was Anaconda, Montana. Fairmont Hot Springs is close by. Thank you for your essay. Makes me ponder my own ancestral pain
  • Lizann Bassham
    Lizann Bassham says #
    Yes it was Anaconda - thanks for catching that - I just corrected it. They eventually had a ranch outside of Whitehall. Blessing

Posted by on in Studies Blogs
A Headache in Medieval Scotland

The long history of headaches and their relief could doubtless fill many volumes. Although at the forefront of medicine in many ways (at least for the tenth century) Ali ibn Isa al-Kahhal seemed to have run out of practical solutions when he suggested lashing a mole to your head (then again have you tried it?). Hildegard of Bingen might suggest a need for more viriditas or 'greening' in your life, for "green is useful and mellow" as we know.

But sometimes there was only the suffering. Medieval Scots poet William Dunbar captures that pain well in his short poem:

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Posted by on in Studies Blogs
Winter Cold

As the solstice comes upon us here in the Northern Hemisphere our thoughts turn to surviving the cold. While it's considerably milder here in Scotland than it was while I was teaching in New York, cold it is and cups of tea provide welcome warmth. It's hardly surprising that people in the Middle Ages measured their lives in winters survived. In many ways the mid-winter celebrations offer a chance to celebrate that hope and restore it for the lean months ahead.

It's the perfect time to consider the Anglo-Saxon poem The Seafarer, which I think of as a companion to The Wanderer. Both elegiac poems that mourn a lost past, they celebrate the power of the comitatus, the loyal troop of warriors and find poetic resonance in the harsh world of winter.

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Posted by on in SageWoman Blogs

“We are daughters of our mothers
We are mothers of our daughters
We are sisters, we are lovers
We are friends and good grandmothers

We are women like a river
Flowing on and on forever…”

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Posted by on in SageWoman Blogs
The Marketplace Is Sacred

 The following is adapted from my new book A Sacred Marketplace: Sell without Selling Out or Burning Out. Mysticism + Marketing = Sales.

The marketplace is sacred. It is where community gathers. 

I love the world of spirit. I am happy in it. I am also incredibly happy in the marketplace. It is where I get to share from my heart and soul. It is where I get to connect with other humans.

The marketplace is sacred. I am almost in tears as I write this because I am so deeply moved when I work with my students: When we are working together, we are in the real. We are discussing our actual lives, true feelings, soulful dreams, honest needs, terrible doubts, night-sweating terrors, dizzying triumphs, and more.

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Posted by on in Studies Blogs
Cracking Through the Ice

Several days ago, I had a lovely, lovely moment. Sitting in the arch of a big, picture window, I felt the rays of the sun as more than just a heatless hint of things to come. There was, for the first time, a weight to the rays’ touch and I felt the distinctive crack of the cold ice within - that first inkling that the thaw is on its way. Unsurprisingly, the next day brought plummeting temperatures along with re-found gloves and snow brushes for the car. But the tide had turned. Imbolc had reached out its delicate fingers to tickle 2016 for the first time and there is no pulling back from that.

 

As far as weather goes, it hasn’t been a bad winter. We’ve certainly had worse. The snow shovels, for the most part, have bided their time leaning up against the house and the dogs are sorely disappointed that they have not had the opportunity to carve racing tunnels in the snow with their chases. On other fronts, however, this winter has been the worst yet. We have said goodbye to far too many folks – both personally and globally. So many that, in truth, when the news was announced that Glenn Frey had died last week, my husband, a down-to-earth, practical, self-declared atheist, stopped in his tracks, raised his arms to the Heavens and declared “Enough already!”.  The all too frequent heart-stopping announcements were taking their toll. It may not have been too bad outside, but our insides were feeling quite numb.

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