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The Age of Restoration
Claire Dubois speaks of the Age of Restoration beginning now. As we turn our creative envisioning from focusing on everything that is falling apart to how we wish to see the world, we began to create the world we want.
A few days ago I wrote that we are literally building a new world as the old paradigm is falling apart around us. Claire says we do this by accessing our feelings– by deconstructing the dams we’ve built around painful emotions and then acting from a clearer inner place.
Last night a friend came over for a time of drumming. We spoke about issues that we wished to send healing energy to, called in angels, ancestors and other helping spirits and acknowledged the gateways of the six directions. Spontaneously, the issue that seemed to call us both was the children and families held in detention centers.
Usually the room fills with ancestors, animal spirits and angels and it was the same with one exception. The room filled with children last night. As we prayed with our drums and open hearts a dam broke within both of us as we wept for children and families held in for-profit detention centers. Then we shared visions of children being loved and held by grandmother and grandfather spirits, loved by gentle animals.
As we continued to drum we sang, “Jesus loves the little children….all the children of the world…red and yellow, black and white, they are precious in his sight….Jesus loves the little children of the world.” Tears continued to flow and we continued to build a vision of love and compassion for all those suffering in separation from loved ones and risking everything to escape war, famine, violence, persecution.
The energy of love and compassion filled the room as we envisioned children being cared for, reunited with families….on and on we build a vision of restoring families, of politicians stepping up to take right action, of light illuminating the for-profit detention center goals….light, light, light, light, light.
What if each of us longing for a better world took the time to actually envision it rather than keep envisioning a world that is falling apart. We know the old paradigm is falling apart. Now let us plant the seeds of the world we wish to create.
There is an incredible amount of light flooding the planet these days. That’s why the old paradigm is crumbling—the old ways are falling. Let us remember that the light is here for us to heal as well…and to open and to grow beyond our wildest dreams. It is a catalyst not only for the breaking down but for the re-building. What is it you wish to create, to become? What kind of world do you want?
The Tower Crumbles
The other night in meditation, a very strong vision came and I watched with discomfort as the Tower I stood on with my white horse started to crumble. But it wasn’t crumbling from any outer force. It was falling apart because the horse and I were striking it. The white horse reared up and used both front feet to begin the destruction and I slid off her back and grabbed a sledge hammer and aided her. Then I saw my child self and teenage self arrive and begin to work with us. There came a point when the energy was so intense the three parts of myself were hitting each other and the guide intervened and reminded us not to turn on each other. Then as the Tower fell, the horse took the three of us to safety on her back. The ground turned to boiling lava so the horse flew us to safety…a green pasture beside a clear stream. The edge collapsed and we went into the water where we were washed clean.
It wasn’t the most peaceful meditation. It was more of a journey into the reality of what is happening not just in my life but with all of us. The old paradigm is crumbling and the process is scary and filled with danger. We even turn on others we care about in the process of dismantling the old way of living.
Today I was opening boxes I packed nearly a year ago when I had a near-sale of my home and the buyers were pushing me to get out quickly. When they ghosted, I never bothered to unpack. So I decided to open all the boxes and get rid of more stuff…if I haven’t used it why keep it?
I came to a box of books on the Ocean, whales and dolphins…some of my most precious books. When I started looking at them I stopped and hugged the box to me and wept deeply for my cetacean brothers and sisters and our beautiful seas and all life that hangs in a very precarious place. I allowed myself to feel the grief and be with feelings of great sadness.
What a strange time to be alive. We are watching the old paradigm be challenged every day and it rears up and shows its abusive self…but we are collectively taking it down….piece by piece.
It’s a time of intense emotions and fears and great anger at what is being done to innocent children and wildlife and wild places. Ultimately compassion and kindness and a deep, fierce love and devotion is what is needed. The kind of love that stands up and says…NO MORE! We are experiencing the old paradigm die within ourselves and in the world around us.
This is a time when we need to forge bonds of love and compassion and reach out to those experiencing difficulties….and who isn’t these days? It’s not a time to isolate ourselves even though we might need time alone to access stillness and inner silence. A phone call, a visit, an email or text….are you okay, friend?
The new is found within the old so as we witness and feel the old falling away, let us be mindful of the seeds of new awaiting nurturing so they can take root and grow and thrive. Water those new seeds, give attention to what you wish to create.
Stay hydrated, rest, take time to be still and quiet, eat well, talk to friends who understand, talk to a life/spiritual coach, be outdoors, get a massage, take a salt bath. Take loving care for you are birthing a new world from within yourself.
Rushing Water Singing
A Mary Oliver poem recently reminded me of my inner child’s love of rushing water. I was going to write about it and then let it slide until I saw the same poem again, posted on a social media post. My cue to explore this reminder cannot be ignored.
“What can I say that I have not said before? So I’ll say it again. The leaf has a song in it.” She then reminds us through her poem to take our busy hearts to the forest. “The song you heard singing in the leaf when you were a child is singing still.”
What made my heart sing as a child? I always wanted to go to the mountains for family vacation and never wanted to leave. The sound of clear, running water over mossy rocks was music to me as was the entire range of mountains and valleys. It was as if the spiritual world came alive to me in the sacred Appalachian Mountains.
So after a couple years in the second Saturn return, I find myself anxiously and longingly anticipating the return to those mountains to live. Saturn returns are generally ages 27-31, 56-60 and 84-90. The first is when a person leaves youth behind, the second is coming into maturity and the third is the final one when a person enters ‘wise’ old age.
Saturn return….just the thought of it can make some cringe. Western astrologers think of these times as major thresholds before moving into the next phase of life. It can mark major upheavals and major life-changes. But some of the greatest leaps and transformations come from the most challenging times.
Saturn Returns….letting go of anything that no longer serves us, pressure to step up to challenges. Our passage determines the next stage of life. During the middle ‘return’ it’s like a check-up to see how we’ve progressed since we became adults. Common questions we might ask ourselves include: Am I loving myself and others unconditionally? Am I facing my fears? And I taking care of myself? Am I allowing my passion to shine? Have I chosen friends that love and support me? Am I true to my soul’s calling?
What I’m finding during this rather intense ‘return’ is a greater call to listen to my heart and be true to the path that calls me…the deeper spiritual path. I am more conscious of clearing the energetic gunk that comes through technology so I’ve recently stopped streaming television, the last bit of TV I allowed into my home. I’m also aware of the negative energy in politics and social media and am limiting my time with both. Fears are intense during this time so I’m working very hard to listen but to not allow them to control me. Mostly I am evaluating my work…although I just typed ‘worth’ which I thought was a mistake….obviously the truth came through my fingers. So yes, I’m evaluating my self-worth, too.
What gifts did I bring with me to this life and what others have I developed since incarnating. Mostly I want to let go of things that no longer serve me. I am going through every box I packed almost a year ago and am evaluating the contents as a way to let go of more ‘stuff’ both physically and symbolically. What no longer serves me I happily release.
Selling my home has been a long process, but then so is the path of transformation. A younger friend of mine recently posted on social media that he was beginning to excavate his fears and things that kept him small. That’s probably a result of that stern task-master Saturn on his first ‘return.’ I’ve spent decades unearthing the yuck of societal conditioning and feel I have just cleared the foundations so I can begin to rebuild.
As the Borg said in Star Trek, “Resistance is futile.” The more we fight it, the harder we make it for ourselves. So here, Universe. Take this and this….and this, too. Oh, no…I didn’t want to keep that. Please, by all means, take that too…I say with a bit of sarcasm.
I want to simplify my life by selling my home, downsizing and living in a small home surrounded by woods in the mountains. I have my eyes on just such a place…now if my home will sell I can finally move forward.
But the timing isn’t up to me–a stern reminder that it is through letting go that movement happens. No grasping…only releasing.
A David Wilcox song comes to mind… “This is where I played as a baby, this is where I ran as a child. This is where my dad took the last breath he had and smiled….I guess I’m wondering where this place is trying to take me, overnight, if I never did resist. What strange breezes make a sailor want to come to this. With lines untied, slipping though my fist.”
Nearly two years ago I shared with a retreat group in Ireland that I was at a Threshold. Never in my wildest dreams would I believe I would still here at the Threshold, awaiting passage. But now I understand it a little more clearly. It’s exactly what’s supposed to be happening. So here I drift with lines slipping through my hands…releasing the fists that want to hold on….and asking the Universe to help me move gracefully to the next place in this life. That magical mountain home as well as my spiritual home within the heart of the planet.
The clear, rushing waters still sing to my heart. They are calling me home.
Let It Go
While cycling yesterday I put my iPod on shuffle of all songs on it. I do that sometimes as a way to let the Universe choose my inspiration for the ride. David Wilcox’s song, Let It Go, really touched me…
“I watched it sinking down…the treasure I’d almost found is gone…I had been holding on so long I had to let it go….I wagered my heart and soul, all of that weight in gold and dreams….the woman I thought I should be, I had to let it go….High above the broken opening I see the light of love is spoken, welcoming me…Now that I remember how this love can be, full of my surrender emptying….Into the deep blue sky when it’s my time to fly away I can release this weight, now I can let it go, now I can let it go….all of this love I’ve saved, I get to let it go.”
This seems so appropriate for the place in which I find myself. Letting go of the woman that I thought I should be. Who was she?
That question is so wrapped in expectations…of family, culture, institutions…my interpretation of what was expected and what I expected of myself.
The past 18 months have been a deep journey into all of these expectations and as I begin to move from this long threshold moment in this life, I gain perspective of what has been happening.
Today I listened to an interview with a guy who does some truly inspired work and he said he had gone through two major awakenings in his life. One led to his first spiritual opening where he moved more into alignment with his path and was very happy doing the work but eventually he began to feel called to deeper work and wasn’t sure what was happening. He related that his intuition, his guidance that he had grown to trust, disappeared and he felt as if he was stumbling in the dark. It went on for a few years until finally he came through that long period with guidance that was specific about the next phase of his work. He had no idea how it would work out but he listened and the result is simply amazing.
This resonated so deeply with me as I have been very happy in the work I’ve done over the past decade or so. Photographing underwater wildlife, writing about the connection with Nature and sharing with others has been amazing but my guidance is taking me to different work. And no matter how much I question and wrestle with the direction, in the end I completely trust it.
For many, many years–even when I lived in the mountains years ago– I have heard guidance to go outside each day and connect with Nature. I didn’t know what that meant…not really. I meditate and do yoga and even when I cycle I’m tuning into Nature. What exactly was this guidance telling me?
Over the past few months, as I have started to come out of the threshold and begin the first tentative steps to the other side of this transitional period, the meaning has become clearer. There’s a different level of opening that occurs when we take our wholeness into Nature and sit simply with the intention to connect.
For example, if I (personality self) connect with my soul self (higher self) and allow that soul self to expand into its proper ‘size’ I notice an inseparable connection and flow with Nature….complete Oneness. Nature and this expression of life known as Simone exists in the state of Oneness with all life….trees, insects, bats, dogs, cats, grass, stars, you, the homeless woman, the wounded child, the cow in the pasture.
That experience helps me deal with the insanity happening all around the planet. Nature is teaching me how to be balanced while it seems everything in the world is falling apart. And this is key to being present with this mess and not going crazy. It seems the answer lies in realizing Oneness.
I believe the solution to the problems of the planet begins within each of us. And it seems that recognizing Oneness and experiencing it is the first step. Perhaps our only task is to stand in conscious awareness of Oneness with Nature and all life. What if we all did that? There would be no war, no hate, no pollution or destruction of our planet, no fighting…imagine.
I’m not suggesting that we stop everything we are doing to help make a difference and just meditate (well, not really) but I am suggesting we take a few steps back and clean up our own emotional, spiritual, mental and physical selves and find our own experience of Oneness so that the actions we take come from an egoless intention. Sometimes the rhetoric of the ‘good folks’ is as scary as that of those committing the atrocities.
My work is unfolding from this shift in focus, this beautiful place of connection. The animals I have worked with through my photography and travels are encouraging me, from inner guidance, to take the work deeper and share what I’ve learned from them with others. The first stage of this is through a course of study called Deepening with Nature. It’s a thirteen lesson self-study course in which animals guide participants through 28 days each lesson with exercises and meditations to deepen the relationship with Nature and thus the self. Each lesson is guided by a wisdom keeper animal spirit. It begins with a Humpback Whale. Lesson two is a Wolf…three is a Dolphin and four a Bear….and so on.
The other way the work is unfolding is to consult with individuals wishing to gain insight on their current life path. I do this through intuitive consultations via phone or in person. This is unfolding quite beautifully. The synergy that occurs expands the process of healing and wholeness.
I’ve had to let go of the direction I thought life would unfold and allow it to organically blossom into a deeper expression of my heart’s profound love of this planet. Years ago I made the commitment to be a bridge between humans and nature and envisioned it would be through me connecting with Nature and then sharing photographs, videos and writing and that would be it. Now I see the depth of the work I am called to and it’s quite humbling. I’m being asked to go much deeper in helping people connect to Nature, not just from a superficial level but to the real core of it all.
All the energy invested in the previous direction, all the love for what I was doing, I can release and allow it to guide me deeper…and help guide others deeper into relationship with Nature, with themselves.
When we open our hands and hearts and let go, we can once again receive.