The babe is born, and in that moment her life hangs in the balance.   She has made it through the sometimes perilous passage from the womb into the world. Now she must take her first breath of life.  Do we who behold her unconsciously hold our breath?  
If she breathes, she joins the breath communion of all life on earth and her life as a individual being begins. If not, then she is still-born, a life ended before it has fully begun.

Approaching the Mystery of Breath we find ourselves awake in the dark hours between three and five o’clock in the morning.  Around us the world is sleeping, wrapped in the unconsciousness of dreams.  The dark ocean laps upon the shore unseen by all but the creatures of the night and those few souls whose business keeps them up beyond where our diurnal bodies willingly go.  

This is the time of greatest psychic quiet, the time when the very old and the ill may simply forget to take another breath and slip out of the world without a sound.  
Above us the sky is full of stars.  Hard to believe that each of those pin-pricks of light sprinkled across the heavens is a ball of fire as big as our sun. Some are whole galaxies. Curving across the sky from east to west the planets move in their great dance against the backdrop of our own galaxy – the Milky Way.

In the quiet of the night, the body of the Earth invites us to lie with our bodies pressed against her body, cradled within her atmosphere.  In the dark our heightened senses may begin to perceive the subtle rhythms of the Earth - breathing through us and around us. The advocates of Deep Ecology remind us of what our indigenous forebears knew well – that through our breath we are connected to all that lives within the body of Gaia, the living Earth.  The air that we filter through our lungs has been recycled over and over through countless generations of beings. From the dawn of life on Earth, the animal and vegetable kingdoms have been inseparably joined in the great whirling dance of shared breath.

Deep relaxed breaths expand our consciousness.  As we follow the invitation of the night to lie on our backs and gaze up at the sky above us, our spirits may take flight. Imagination leaps the bounds of daylight three dimensional reality into dimensions beyond.  Drawn by the timeless wonder of the stars we become astral travellers.

Consciousness spins a golden thread of breath - connecting the worlds within and worlds without, from the unknown dark vastness of outer space to the unknown depths within our minds.    The relativities of time and space blur.  Under the influence of this mystery we are challenged to open our minds to states beyond our physical ken – life before embodiment, the flight of consciousness after physical death.  Here is an open invitation to tap into and channel a wealth of information that seems to come to us from outside the bounds of ordinary space-time, extra-terrestrial possibilities.

The free-floating mind gathers and winds together the fine tendrils of possible reality, weaving gossamer tapestries of imagination, vibrating with potential. Grandmother Spider hums with satisfaction.  Mayhap we catch a hint of some cosmic truth – know fleeting intimations of the Great Beyond.  

May you be blessed with a deep and grace-filled breath!
Ishara

The Earth dreams in the dark embrace of the Goddess. Deep in her sacred womb-cave new life -  new possibility – stirs.  The heart-beat of creation sounds loudly in our ears. We pulse to a rhythm resonant with the birthing and dying of stars and galaxies, the rise and fall of species, peoples, empires… We are seeds, fallen into the fertile growing medium of opportunity.  Heart beats measuring out ripeness as the moon swell and shrinks and swells again.  Slowly the possible takes form.

Winter solstice brings a new appreciation for the generative role of darkness – as we prepare to celebrate the emergence of all that is – the endless process of becoming – which pours forth from the primal darkness of the Great Mother’s womb.  Now is a time for reflecting and giving thanks for the potency that is hidden away within our beings, often well out of sight of our conscious identities, until the time is ripe for its birth (or rebirth) into our lives and our world.  What within you now readies itself to be born?
 (More)

In the Ishtar Mysteries, 'Quickening' is the mystery point half way between Autumn Equinox (conception) and Winter Solstice (birthing).   In the inner and outer cycles of creation/co-creation, this mystery point is about the experience of pregnancy  - from both the point of view of the pregnant mother and that of the forming child. 

The term ‘quickening’ is not much used any more in western culture, as pregnancy tests and ultrasound imagery have largely replaced the first flutter in the belly as confirmation of pregnancy.  My understanding is that in traditional cultures, as in the esoteric strands of western culture, the moment when the first physical movements of the unborn baby are perceptible to the mother (generally between 12-14 weeks of pregnancy) is seen as hugely significant.  According to some sources it signifies nothing less that the soul’s full commitment to this physical embodiment, this journey into expression in flesh.  (When I learned this it changed how I felt about the phenomenon of early miscarriages).  Some esoteric sources believe that at around this point in the pregnancy conscious/powerful souls have the potental to shape/adjust the genetic matrix that was formed at conception.

In my own visualisation of this mystery, the quickening represents the coming together of two spirals of energy.  One (visualised as descending from the Great Above, from the star realms) comprises those specific soul resonances which prompted/resulted in this embodiment.  The other, spiraling up from the Ament (the Great Below, place of the Ancestors under/within the Earth), represents the ancestral heritage.   As these twin forces swirl together, we are reminded of the molecular structure of the DNA – the genetic code or matrix which guides and informs our physical expression as living beings of flesh and blood.

As I write this I am aware of at least three dimensions or ‘layers’ to this mystery. 

On one level, we are invited to tune in to the process of our embodiment as a human being  –  both as the story of our personal beginnings in this life-time, and as an ongoing process that continues to unfold in the ever-present now.  This is an opportunity to contact and bring new conscious awareness to our personal history of coming into incarnation as we take on physical shape within the womb of our birth-mother.  As fetal beings we are literally bathed in our mother’s bio-chemical and emotional field, with very limited capacity to screen anything out.  As we encounter this mystery, new awarenesses related  to this in utero experience may surface – as we become more keenly aware of the impact of our mother’s emotional and physical journey through pregnancy on our forming being, and decisions that we made in response.  I personally believe that the process of bringing these experiences and decisions fully into consciousness is innately transformational and can liberate more of our own energy and potential in our present lives.

On another level, we are invited to become conscious of ourselves as living in a pregnant universe – a universe which is constantly gestating and birthing new forms, new life..  from stars and galaxies, to single-celled organisms, from mountain ranges, to complex life-forms of all kinds.  Some estimates suggest that around the world 250 new human babies are born every minute of every day... That’s a lot of pregnancies and a massive amount of creative energy!  

In these times which many believe are all about a shift in global human consciousness, some speak of a ‘quickening’ in the collective consciousness of humanity.  James Lovelock’s Gaia hypothesis – that the Earth itself has consciousness  - reminds us of more ancient ways of understanding and relating to the Earth as a living being.   How does it change our sense of ourselves to remember/imagine that we are all living within the belly of a pregnant Mother Earth?  

In my (admittedly sketchy) understanding of indigenous Australian spirituality, the Dreamtime is not so much an account of historical events as a process of creation that is unfolding in the ever present now.  The Goddess mysteries invite us to tune in to a similar kind of consciousness.  How does it feel to relate to Goddess as Cosmic Womb of Creation?  And to understand ourselves as existing within the pregnancy of Her consciousness?

Finally, as we celebrate this mystery cycle as a devotional journey of service to the Divine Feminine, we have the opportunity to reflect upon the ways that we ourselves are currently pregnant – pregnant with spirit.  The mystery of quickening brings to life or awakens the potential that has been seeded within us.  A certain kind of faith in the unseen is required as we become a vessel for the sacred mystery which is taking place within our beings. The challenge is to allow this creative/transformational process which began at the conception mystery to continue to unfold in us.  To be receptive and attentive without either wilfully trying to make anything happen, or attempting to shut the process down out of fear.   It is a difficult truth that attempting to push things too soon may just cause the whole process to abort.  It is not possible yet for us to see what the outcome will be. However,  to the extent that we manage (with more or less grace) to hold the space for this subtle yet profound transformation, it will already beginning to make itself felt in our lives – much as the quickening fetus flutters within her mother’s belly.    We begin to get glimpses of our own potential – that we are much more than we thought we were. 

 In pregnancy, a wise woman lovingly attends to her physical and emotional needs, knowing that to do so not only feeds her own being, but also that of her forming baby.  As we partake in this mystery, we too would do well to pay attention to discern our present needs – physical, emotional and spiritual – and be more conscious of what it is that we are feeding our bodies, hearts and minds with.   Similarly, the ‘nesting’ urge of pregnancy is legendary - as we set about creating or adjusting our home to receive a new baby.   As we celebrate the mystery of pregnancy, this is a lovely time to follow the prompts of our ‘nesting’ instinct and give ourselves full permission to make our home, especially our bedroom and/or meditation corner, as comfy and nurturing as we want it to be.

It is all about: Grounding possibility into reality,  A flutter in the belly – the excitement of something new that is sensed but not yet seen Discovering more of our potential – that we are more than we had previously thought we were

 

Questions for reflection:

What does it feel like to be ‘quickened’?

Even though it may not yet be fully present in your life, can you begin to get a sense of what energy it is that is seeking expression in the world through you?

How do things begin?

“May all your choices be ones that intrinsically honour your soul”  (Wendy Rule, 'Deity')

The great wheel of life rolls on. The cosmic cycles of creation turn, returning us to the point of fresh beginnings.

From a place of stepping more fully into the power of her own truth, a woman becomes more beautiful, more attractive. Drawing to her that which holds the powerful fascination of “not self”. Drawing to herself the blossoming potential of relationship with another human being.  Another opportunity to glimpse her own deep potential in the mirror of another’s love, another’s presence. Finding ourselves lost in the presence of the Beloved Other. Finding our lost selves in the presence of the Beloved One.

Curiousity, chemical attraction, imprints buried deep in our subconscious minds from a time before conscious memory, the promptings of our soul urge to grow, to express and share ourselves, to explore belonging and make a valued contribution… who can say what draws us to the edge of the dark cave?  But here we find ourselves, on the eve of the Autumn Equinox, contemplating, on the threshold of another journey.

At Autumn Equinox we are like the woman standing in the mouth of the dark cave. We are like the girl-woman Kore – daughter of the Great Mother herself – reaching out to touch and the flowering promise of the bulb - herself plucked, ripe in this moment, out of time and space and into the transformative realm below the earth, of ancient darkness and the Power of the Deep.    

No hero’s journey this, no sailing in a frail barque at the mercy of the winds across dark oceans to lands unknown there to face down fate and other monsters and bring home a prize of great price.  No.  In our journey it is Ocean herself that calls to us. A vast ocean of darkness teaming with unseen potential, unseen life.  Ocean, her body pulsing in great waves under the ebbing, flowing influence of the dark-bright changeable moon.  Standing on the shoreline we, caught in the enchantment of round, ripely moon. Responding releasing shining blissful touching stroking her undulation, releasing, a stream of moonlight pouring pouring a pathway into… the total transformation of who we know ourselves to be. That begins in a movement deep within. A movement so small we might entirely miss its significance. 

Conception. Accepting the seed. Our hunger taking in and swallowing just one - (surely not even half a handful!) - of the tiny seeds. 

How things begin in darkness. When we say yes. With or without intent. Mindless, heedless, uncomprehending of the consequences. Or curious, tempted, telling ourselves it is such a small thing, won’t matter, couldn’t make a real difference.  Or joyfully, ecstatically, surrendering our small selves to the great waves of love, knowing, and caring not at all that we may be transformed utterly in ways we cannot even begin to predict or understand.  

Tumbling through blissful darkness. Throwing ourselves into the waves on a date with destiny.  Caught up in the cosmic flowering of creation now seeded in our being. Drawn deeper and deeper into ocean, into the dance.  ‘

Into the womb of the ancient and eternal Dark Mother we go!

The following is an account I wrote in February 2006 of an early experience I had with creating a ritual to invoke the Mystery point which corresponds to the threshold of Desire. This mystery point takes place at the midpoint between summer solstice and autumn equinox - generally celebrated on 1st February in the southern hemisphere.

 My dearest Sister,

Time to tell about last night’s ceremony: approaching the threshold of Desire and awakening the Lover within… the eighth point on the Ishtar wheel, and the final ceremony for me before returning to the place where we began – around the autumn equinox last year (before we met, I think). 

I did have difficulty creating enough clear space in my life in the days leading up to the ceremony… But woke early on Thursday morning with a memory of reading a passage in a book on tantra that I was browsing in a bookshop one day last year, about a visit the author made to a Tantra temple in India where she described a yoni fountain, with the water pouring in an endless stream out of the wall… So that day and the next I rushed around buying bits and putting together a small fountain of my own – no time to craft the image out of my sleep, but instead a small version of the large overflowing urns they had in my local water features  shop….   The pot I bought was charcoal grey on the outside, and I tried painting the inside purple, but the acrylic paint just bubbled off as soon as I put water in… However, the overall effect was good.

The ceremony itself turned out to be very simple. 

Before we began, I chalked a simple labyrinth on the floor, with the entrance/exit in the northwest, in front of the evening’s altar  (representing the Gate of Desire) with the overflowing water pot, a candle, and one or two other bits and pieces.

It was a very warm night, so we began by purifying/cleansing ourselves with cold lavender-water cloths  (I froze them by accident, but they soon melted again).  The cold refreshing feeling on face, neck and arms was really lovely. 

Then we moved into the sacred space and the women sat on chairs around the circle, whilst I invoked the energies/presence of the Guardians, energetically opened the Gate of Desire, and awoke the Ishtar currents at each of the altars in the usual way.  We then moved into the waterlily/open heart meditation – standing and holding hands together in the centre of the space.

Sitting down again, for some quiet meditation, (whilst Ishara desperately sought guidance on what needed to be happening now?!)… Hand on heart, connecting with own heart beat, hearing/echoing its speaking “Ish-Tar  Ish-Tar” etc…  for some moments…   Gathering up my drum I began a simple heart beat 

 …and (attempting to keep the rhythm going) voiced the words that began to flow into my head (a bit like being an interpreter  – hearing and then voicing).  Wish I knew exactly what those words were. Some kind of attunement to this mystery of desire’s threshold.  Calling on the Goddess, calling her forth into this space… asking to encounter – and be shown – something – anything really – to take each of us more deeply into this mystery… There was something in there about oneness, becoming one.. I remember there was something about our desires leading us to where we need to be, even when it seems to us that we are wandering in a confused muddle, wandering around in circles.. Something about surrendering, which is about melting into the Goddess, which is not about putting ourselves beneath or less than, which is not about submitting or sacrificing ourselves. The drum did something interesting like changing rhythm, building to a crescendo and then slowing again.  Towards the end I remember voicing something about desire coming in continuing waves – whether we be waiting for the wave to come, riding high on the crest of the wave, or feeling like we are crashing down / the wave breaking over us, still always and ever connected to and a part of the wave, a part of the great ocean of desire….   

With which the drum & words abruptly ceased.  I stood up, went across to the red altar in the north (our focus from the previous mystery) and, gathering up the tray of frangipani flowers, offered them around the circle to all my sisters. 

We then spent a few moments connecting with our flowers, and then there were more words coming… about the flower being a product of whatever growth of self/selfhood/sense of power and autonomy we have accomplished in this past bit of time..  Reflecting on this, contemplating our flower.  About every flower being the product of a seed which sprouted and grew into a plant, more or less easily, through whatever challenges it encountered… a plant which put forth flowers/a flower.  And that this growth, this maturation which is the flower, is in some way an invitation, some kind of invitation to the world…

A space, in which each woman as she felt ready, approached the Altar of the Gate of Desire, prayerfully, with her flower in hand.  Very luckily I had exactly the right cd on hand, with a gentle song sung by women’s voices with a refrain that goes “So give yourself to love, if love is what you’re after, open up your heart to tears and all the laughter…” which I left on repeat for the duration…  Some of the women chose to offer their flowers first, before walking the labyrinth, some carried their flower with them and offered it up as they came back out.  The chalk lines on the floor didn’t exactly stand out, and some women did an interesting little dance with finding the way back out from the centre, but the energy was lovely, and it worked just right with the seven of us who were there. 

When all were done, we stood again, joining hands  in the centre of the space, while I jumped forward to another track on the cd “We are opening up in sweet surrender to the luminous love-light of the One”… again just right.  And when we had been singing and swaying and opening up a little, I retrieved the dish of freshly cut mango and peace pieces from the altar – and moved around the inside of the circle feeding everyone, whilst they continued holding hands and singing and generally getting into the energy of the moment.  Then we passed the dish around the circle, each woman feeding the woman next to her, and then back the other way.. and then making eye contact with the woman opposite, and crossing the circle to feed her, and part way through I realised that we were tracing a seven pointed star, which was just so perfect I could hardly believe it… and there was still plenty of sticky juicy fruit in the dish, so then we passed it around and fed ourselves!! …. By this time we were all pretty juicy and sticky and happy… and as I said to the woman next to me as we reached out to join hands again – “May I join my stickiness to yours?”     Then taking up the chalice of liqueur mead, I called Ishtar again (“Now that you have us exactly as you like us!...”), to bless this chalice with her juicy bliss essence, that it might awaken the Lover in each of us… And then partake of Her goodness - dipping my fingers in and sucking them, and passing the chalice to the woman sunwise from me to partake by her own preferred method…

A closing prayer circle – for voicing/affirming/asking whatever was there in each of us to voice/affirm/ask… I felt such gratitude to have been given such a space, and such a beautiful circle of women to share it with. 

I can’t quite describe to you the energy that we shared together  - but it was light, and happy, and words like open and juicy tend to spring to mind… and everyone was smiling.  

I am sure when I do this ceremony again it will come out differently, because the way that it unfolds is so dependant on where I am at, and who is with me, and on the inspiration that flows on the night… 

And I definitely felt challenged in the anticipation - to be able to embrace and embody and voice these resonant qualities of the Divine Feminine which are so juicy and abundant and explicitly erotic… so I can see why I needed to come to it last. And expect that its expression in the mysteries will continue to deepen and change as my capacity to hold it deepens and evolves…   As you can imagine, it stirred up the memory of that inward mystery I experienced  at Mariam Baker’s retreat last year – and my own yearning/fear to return to that expanded state of being.

I hope these simple words and your own deep connection to the Star Goddess will have awakened some of the resonances of this mystery in your own being, because it was so simple and so delightful.\ 

So there we are, becoming Lover-ly, awakening and embracing our capacity for desire, our capacity to become juicy and melt into the Beloved… as the wheel turns again towards the great mystery of conception, in which we shall once again be transformed from within by Love, so that something new can in due course be birthed into the world.

Altars are a spiritual technology for focusing and deepening our personal relationship with the Divine.

Many of people have a special place in our homes - a shelf, benchtop or small table - where we keep some of our special things. These are usually things which are especially lovely or which have become invested with a symbolic or sentimental significance because of they way they came into our lives or what they have come to stand for.

By naming and creating our special shelf as an altar we are taking this impulse one step further. By calling it an altar we are investing it with sacred significance. We are, in effect, declaring it to be a dwelling place for the Sacred, however we understand that.

Human beings have been making and tending household altars for many thousands of years.

On our trip to Bali last year Miriam and I were struck by the way that the making and offering of baskets of flower petals - on altars, on the doorsteps of houses, on the footpaths in front of shops and market stalls - was an integral part of every day life for the local Hindu population. Similarly, when I recently went to visit my parents while they were up in Perth for a week, I remarked at how the lady of the house they were staying in had filled her house with many and varied beautiful icons of the Virgin Mary, connecting to what is very much a living tradition of Marian worship and creating a beautiful feminine presence throughout her home.

Altars with Intention

Creating and tending an altar or shrine is like sending out a personal invitation to the Sacred. When we deliberately establish and tend a personal altar or household shrine in our home or garden, we can add power and energy to our project by consicously focussing upon our intention. By consciously creating a physical form that appeals to and arouses the senses - by the use of colours and textures, scents and symbols - we focus our invitation towards their corresponding sacred qualities or aspects of the Divine. If the objects upon our altar invite us to engage - to ring the bell, to light the candle, to dip our fingers into the water, to place offerings of fruit or money or chocolate in the bowl or upon the plate - then each of these actions reinforces the intention or invitation which the altar embodies and increases the energy that it holds.

It is possible to create altars with a wide range of intentions. We can create altars for healing, as an expression of devotion, to manifest desired outcomes. By being intentional with our altars - by careful choice about what we place upon them, and how and where we place them in relation to each other - by giving our full concentration to what we do when we stand or sit in front of them - we send out a particular energetic vibration - and the natural response of the Universe comes back to us as waves of energy.

Energising your personal or household altar

If your personal or household altar or shrine is currently feeling a bit flat, you could try

• giving it a good physical clean,
• energetically cleansing it with smoke or salty water,
• saying a prayer or invocation and blessing it with your hands,
• spending some time in engaging with it in meditation or contemplation.

 

For those who can't make it to our solstice gathering,  I would like to offer you a simple ritual in honour of Ishtar Enthroned that can be performed at your home altar.

You will need paper and pen, a red candle, some oil for anointing, a burning pot, some red beads (however many you intuitively feel to have on hand), and some thread to string them on. 

Dress your altar in red. 
Create sacred space and in your own words call upon Ishtar Enthroned,  the Goddess of the firey sun and the inner fires hidden in our blood, to be present to you. 

State your intention to reclaim and integrate more of your innate power and authority as a woman and a priestess, so that you may become a clearer channel for the power of the Goddess flowing through you in your daily life and relationships.

Spend a few minutes reflecting upon the fears / barriers that keep you small in the various dimensions of your personal, professional and spiritual lives.  Jot these down – keys words will do.   Once you have run out of steam, review what you have written and discern if there are any ways in which your fears are legitimate attempts on the part of your unconscious to protect you from any realistic dangers.  Set any which require deeper consideration to one side.

Next spend a few minutes focussing on the positive vision that you wish to create for yourself in your life.  If there were no fear, what would you do?  Imagine it as sharply and clearly as you can. How would it look, feel, taste, sound? 

Now holding this vision in your mind, take some of the oil and anoint your candle.  You may wish to hold the base of the candle to your heart centre, solar plexus or belly, as you stroke the oil along the length of the candle, imagining that you are empowering the candle with the energy of your vision.

Placing the candle in a candlestick on your altar, light it with a prayer of gratitude to the Goddess for the manifestation of your vision within a timeframe that feels comfortable to you.

The next step is to release all of the fears / barriers to your vision by burning them. Be sensible with your fire safety measures. Alternatively you may wish to just place them in the pot one at a time while visualising that the energy of each one goes into the flame of your altar candle and is consumed.  (Later on you may want to take the bits of paper to a safe outdoor location to burn).  

If there are any fears you have set to one side, consider how these might be framed as positive intentions and added to your vision for yourself.  Write down your new affirmations to keep on your altar, then burn the original statement of your fear.

Finally, taking the bowl or container of red beads in your hands, consider the places, situations and people in your past from whom you wish to reclaim your own power.  Taking one bead at a time in your fingers, affirm that you are claiming back this aspect of your personal creative power, and then add it to your string.

When you have finished threading the beads onto your string, tie it in such a way that the beads cannot slip off.  You may wish to make it into a necklace or bracelet that you can wear. Or better still, you may want to incorporate it into a woven red belt that you can wear around your hips, helping you to sit firmly in your own centre of gravity and wear your innate authority as a woman.

When you are done, close with a final prayer to Ishtar Enthroned and then extinguish your candle.  
Open your sacred space in your usual way.

 According to astro-physicists the star-sun that centres our solar system is utterly immense – it makes up 99% of the mass of our entire solar system.  You could fit 1.3 million Earths inside the Sun with room to spare.  Similarly, the Goddess in her red power as exalted Queen of Heaven is a force to be reckoned with.

 The arrival of the summer solstice calls us to step into our full power and authority as women.  There is no room here for any notion of womanhood as dependent on our menfolk for our political or economic survival or sexual satisfaction.  Rather, this is an invitation to stand on our own feet, to stand up for ourselves, to take a stand about issues we care about in our communities.  We are asked to know what we want, and be willing to do what it takes to make it so.

 “Unless we include a job as part of every citizen's right to autonomy and personal fulfillment, women will continue to be vulnerable to someone else's idea of what need is.”  Gloria Steinem

Just imagine how different your passage to womanhood would have been if, on graduating from school / turning eighteen you had been explicitly welcomed into the circle of woman-power by the older women in your community. If this was not your personal experience, imagine how it might have been if you had been explicitly supported, as you made your transition to womanhood, to make a personal vision quest, to discover the contribution you most wished to make in the world through the development of your innate gifts and talents (– recognising that a woman might have more than one vocation in the course of her long life).  And imagining that this was greeted with enthusiasm and empowered with gifts of insight as well as tangible practical support to continue to educate yourself in your first chosen field of endeavour.  What would it be like to have had your vocations recognised and celebrated, to have been given the ‘tools of your trade’ to help you on your way to true independence as a self-supporting, productive member of your community?

 In the Dances of Universal Peaces which I lead there is a dance chant inspired by the writings of Mechthild von Magdeburg which goes  ‘God has given me the power to change my ways.. heal the broken, loose the bound…’     This sense of taking up the power to make a change in our own lives, as part of our desire and commitment for a positive vision of hope for our world, can come through very strongly as we tune into the mystery of Ishtar Enthroned.  In our summer solstice ritual of 2006 I had an awesome experience of the power that women’s voices chanting in harmony can generate.  Focussed by the energy of the sacred temple space, threads of inspiration that had been playing in my mind wove themselves together into a power chant “For our lives, for ourselves, moving on, moving on.. For the sake of the Earth, moving on, moving on.. To the heart of the Goddess, to the heart of our power, for we are the people, and now.. now is the hour!”   As those around me took up the chant and harmonised, it grew in strength and beauty, becoming an affirmation of ourselves, of each woman in the room, of the power that we hold in our lives to make a difference, of our will, our desire and our capacity to make possible the changes that will preserve our precious planet. 

 Ishtar Enthroned, seated in majesty on her throne on the red altar of the north, calls us to claim our innate power and authority as women. The authority of our own bodily experience. The authority that comes from knowing what we think, what we feel, what we want.   Nor Hall, in her book The Moon and The Virgin describes the word ‘virgin’as meaning ‘belonging to no man’, ‘one in herself’. It ‘does not mean to be chaste, but rather to be true to nature and instinct’.  In a similar way, Ishtar Enthroned calls us into a deeper experience of our own autonomy.   

 Nor Hall says of the feminine principle:  “In women she is asking for reverence, that we see our selves ‘with a dry eye’ – capable of the turn from tenderness to the mad devouring of our own creations. … To know our natures, to be ‘self-housed’ or self-contained, giving over to the love of children and of women friends and men when our instinct demands it. She asks us to carry our dark sides with us as surely as the moon does – to see that we carry death on our backs and the green brightness of morning out in front” (Nor Hall, the Moon and the Virgin , p 16)

 Autonomy = self-direction, self-reliance, self-sufficiency, personal independence.   This is not an endpoint, to be won and held against all comers, but a station on the great wheel of our creative lives as women that we cycle through again and again.   The more we are able to claim and embody our autonomy as women, the richer our experience of relationship, with our lovers, with our children, and as interconnected members of our wider circles of community.  Similarly, the insights that we glimpse in the mirrors of relationship must be brought home, integrated, made our own, if they are to serve our full empowerment as women and priestesses and enable us to realise our full potential as ambassadors of the Goddess in the contemporary world.

 What does it take to be able to fully claim and hold our own radiant red creative power?   Ironically, a willingness to face and even befriend the dark is a large part of it. 

 Claiming the fullness of ourselves, our power, generally involves a process of recovery.  We must be willing to take the dark road into the shadows of our personal and collective unconscious, to discover where we have given our power away or had it taken from us - and claim it back.  We must be prepared to listen to the voice of Lilith, where she dwells in her cave by the Red Sea, refusing to lie passively back and accept her lot as woman.  At times, like Lilith, may have to wander exiled in the wilderness on our road to the full recovery of our deep instincts and capacity for self-trust.

For many of us, our true fear is not in fact that we are powerless, but rather that we indeed are, in the famous words of Marianne Williamson, ‘powerful beyond measure’. We fear that were we to claim our full power we might exercise it in immoderate ways, becoming just like the ones who have wounded or oppressed us in the past, a reflection of the collective wounds of our culture and the way it twists and distorts our goddess-given power to co-create our lives and our world.  Again, the only real way forward is to be willing to embrace the healing journey, to have the courage to simply be present to the fear and shame that inevitably erupts out of our cellular memories as we go to get bigger and start to step forward into our greater fulfilment.  We may well find ourselves called to follow the descent of Inanna-Ishtar into the dark realm which is below presided over by the Queen of the Dead in order to become truly safe for ourselves and others, returning with a new wholeness and a new degree of living authority to the throne of power in our own lives.

That being said, the energy of the summer solstice mystery is most centrally one which calls us to celebrate our own brightness, to rejoice in the bigness of our souls and allow them direct and passionate expression in the world.  And so my sisters, let us come together this solstice in sacred women spaces - to worship her, to dance and sing, in praise of the immense goodness of life and the indomitable power of womanhood.

“Day breaks: the first rays of the rising Sun, stretching her arms.

Day breaks, as the Sun rises to her feet.

Sun rising, scattering the darkness, lighting the land. 

With disc shining, bringing daylight, as birds whistle and call. 

People are moving about, talking, feeling the warmth. 

Burning through the Gorge, she rises, walking westward, wearing her waistband of human hair. 

She shines on the blossoming coolabah tree, with sprawling roots, shady branches spreading.” 

Sacred song from the Dulngulg cycle of Australia’s Mudbara tribe cited by Patricia Monaghan in ‘O Mother Sun!’

 “The Sun never takes back its rays, its spending has no end. And so should we learn to love.  It is the Sun’s agape, the love spoken of by the avatars.”
Alice Howell, Jungian Symbolism in Astrology

Inspirational Images of Budding

While preparing materials for a 'Budding Ceremony' for a group of 111-13 year old girls and their mums, I came across these beautiful images of budding gum blossoms on Flickr.com

I love the feeling of the blossoms gradually coming out from under the cover of their protective 'fairy hats', which so beautifully describes the early stages of the passage to womanhood.

I also love the sense of connected community - each blossom gradually emerging in her own ripe moment, yet all of them interconnected.

I hope you will also find inspiration in looking at these lovely photos.

(If you click on the photo the link will take you to the photographer's page on flickr.com where you can see the photographer's name and description for each image, and leave a comment if you wish).

Meanwhile, stay tuned for more info on budding ceremonies coming soon!

 

My priestess path began in my late teens, as a fascination with questions about what it means to be a woman, a curiosity about spiritual healing, and a growing resonance with earth-centred, pagan spirituality. I remember reading Starhawk's Dreaming the Dark during my second year as an undergraduate student in the Faculty of Arts at the University of WA, and thinking, as I experienced bells ringing for me on every page, "I must be a pagan!"

My sense of vocation came to head late in 1992 (in the wake of a failing marriage and an errupting urgent need to become someone's mother). Although I was still unclear about what being a priestess might look like, it became very apparent to me that I needed to be willing to embrace this mystery and begin the work. So, in the early morning of the summer solstice (December), in the witness of an assembled group of spiritual friends, I ritually committed myself to life as a contemporary priestess in the service of the Great Mother Goddess and her son and lover, the Wild God or Green Man.

Ever since that day I have been actively engaged with the challenge of finding ways to live out my vocation within my local community. (More)

Do you ever feel very small? Do you sometimes feel stretched by the bigness of what life’s asking of you?  The demands of holding an adult space, of recognising and managing your own needs as well as the needs of others who depend on you can sometimes seem beyond us. If you know you do your best to take care of yourself in the face of these feelings, but sometimes feel inadequate to the task, you are surely not alone. The practical and emotional support of a friend or lover can sometimes ameliorate the sense of overwhelm, but there are times when we know we need another resource.  You know what I mean?

Then’s the time to come sit yourself down in the abundant lap of the Star Goddess, and let your small self be gathered up and held in loving arms. Feel yourself tucked close against the beating heart of the universe.  Allow the Mother’s milky blessings to flow over and through you, nurturing your newborn dreams.      (More)