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Part One: The Problem with Trying to Change

Healing my spirit, increasing inner power, becoming my biggest self—these can be terribly challenging. 

I suspect everyone becomes discouraged about inner growth, now and then, feeling like it’s just too much to take on. It is not unusual to think that life’s hard enough as is without also trying to grow spiritually and emotionally. 

Personal transformation can be daunting. Faced with all the effort that might be required, a person might end up just watching Netflix instead.

We Are Goddess Tiamat

A dragon coils around the Earth.

A dragon coils around us.

The dragon is Tiamat,

Great Mother Creator of All.

We are each the Great Mother.

Each of us, individually, is the Creator of All.

Take a moment: 

Feel your power—you are the dragon Tiamat,

Great Mother Creator of All.

I used to think my huge anxiety, angst, and nervousness meant something was deeply wrong with me. Then one day the Goddess told me the intensity of those feelings stems from my wild, free spirit. I would’ve thought that was contradictory, but when She showed me the whole picture, it made sense.

Emotionally and spiritually, I’m in fairly decent shape. Am reasonably serene, given the pandemic and my statistically being at greater risk of dying in it. But anxiety visits. Sometimes, it overwhelms me. Right now, my stomach’s in a knot, but at least I’m not sobbing today.

It really helps when I remember that my abundance of intense feelings is appropriate and part of my passionate nature, and that passion is a gift I was given by the Goddess, and that I enjoy right down to my toes. Feeling passionate about life’s ups and downs of is part of my vitality—my life force expressing itself. I want to honor that.

Notes: 

1) The tree of life represents all of reality. Reality extends past the mundane plane. 

2) Only speaking for myself, I am a theist who experiences all of reality—the Tree of Life—as my Goddess: I feel Her in my surroundings, reap the fruits of Her loving care, and experience magic as the Goddess and Her love made manifest.

Oh, Tree of Life,

You Who Are Tree Mother, Great Mother,

Great Mother Creator of All beings,

please bring me power, joy, and wholeness.

When I was in training to become a priestess, the priestess guiding me told me that although the world had once required us priestesses to seclude ourselves in temples, to focus solely on our devotion to the Goddess and adding that light to the world, that we had evolved into a space and time where we were called to be among the masses. No longer were we to be sequestered away from the world. This transition brought both blessings - freedom to explore many experiences in the world while maintaining one's commitment to being a priestess, and challenges - more energy and drama to sift through as we endeavoured to sustain and raise our priestess consciousness. 

 I pray: 

I will not live drawn and quartered by the hate and fear around me. I will not respond to hate and fear with hate and fear, thereby ripping my body apart myself, but will remain whole, loving, confident, present, and happy.

When in action, I will not be disjointed. I will be integrated.

When my arm reaches out—to give, to heal someone, to bless, to receive—God the Father’s hand supports my arm so its mere and insufficient human strength is upheld by His endless power.

"And they painted on cardboard, because it was new, cheap, and affordable. But they didn't know it wasn't archival, so very little of that work remains intact."  -The words of one of my art history professors, talking about a group of abstract expressionists or similar genre of artists from the 40's-50's. 

It sounded like some sort of moral failing - that these artists had abandoned expensive, time-tested techniques of canvas or wood panels to try something they could afford and was plentiful.  

Having been in art school for a good chunk of my life, as well as a professional high-end picture framer, I have come to see how much museum-culture of the last 300 hundred years has had an effect on the modern art-making process.  That we must work with archival materials, watch out for UV light and dampness, preserve, preserve, preserve.  Think about the future of your work.

The other week while finishing up my book tour, we stopped at Mt. Rushmore, as well as watched the 15-minute film about the making of it. I believe it was in part of a speech from FDR where he talked about the world 10,000 years from now, and what future generations of Americans may think when they see the monument, worn by the weather and time.  In that moment I was thinking two things: if there are even human beings on this planet then - and the condition of the giant sphinx in Egypt.