Shadows on the Moon

When we do not have access to the deep wisdom of our bodies, the earth, our intuition - we end up hiding who we are in the shadow realms.

We try to understand ourselves through bouncing ourselves off the walls of the popular culture. All that is reflected back is the emptiness and loneliness of this place and time. The current popular culture is based on a tradition that goes way back to the emergence of war-like cultures. Cultures that emerged after the matriarchal cultures had been destroyed by the concept of domination based on might. The values that came out of the culture of the conquerors were based on this concept. And it is in the best interest of dominator cultures to keep the masses unaware of their own power. To convince them that they are do not know what they are talking about - to subjugate them and to punish them for attempting to connect to their body wisdom, to their deep intuitive sense of what is right and wrong.

Thousands of years later, we have a culture dominated by greed and consumerism. This is the new approach to domination. It is domination for the purpose of subjugating those who get in the way of the profit motive. One of the ways the dominator culture does this today is to promote consumerism. So once we have been disconnected, or never been connected, to our bodies, the earth, our intuition - once we are a world of people who are discouraged and depressed and confused because we do not know or understand who we really are - we begin to fill up the hole this causes with "stuff." We spend our money, run up credit card debt - work harder to make more money to buy more things. And the dominator culure - no longer "hordes with swords", but now multinational corporations - keeps feeding us the litany of separation so we come to believe that this is the path to happiness. And we abandon the language of the moon - we abandon our deep connection to the earth, our bodies, our deepest selves to chase after more material wealth, prestige, social acceptance from others caught up in this insanity. And everything around us in this popular culture, works overtime to convince us that this is the right path for us to be on.

And this path leads the whole world to the brink of disaster - to the rape of the earth, to a completely unsustainable culture that rains suffering on every part of this world. Including the suffering of those who live the "high life" - because in the end what greater suffering can there be than to be lost in illusion, cut off from the body and the spirit of who you were meant to be.

Intuition and the Moon

Intuition as I am going to be talking about it, is a deeply felt sense of knowing. It lives in the body, which is why it's important to be connected to the earth and to the body's experience - otherwise the intuition is not going to be available for access. It just won't be heard.

It is hard to hear because it does not "compute" so to speak. It's the voice that is most comfortable in the watery realms of our being, in the creative, juicy heart of our existence. It only looks ridiculous when it sits, moonlike, in your office chair next to all those filing cabinets, technological machinery and efficient human beings involved in multitasking.

The intuition is the voice of the moon. It is the chaotic creative voice calling you to listen - to assure that you hear what you are "knowing" in the deepest parts of your being. It's a knowing of the body, not the mind. It's voice is sometimes accompanied by physical phenomena such as buzzing, ticking, pain, warmth, pressure etc. in different parts of the body. It's a deeper more organic way of "knowing" than left brain reasoning. It is your birthright as a human being to have access to this way of knowing, but it is discouraged in our culture because our culture mostly trusts left brain reasoning. The reasoning of the pure light of the sun. Left brain understanding.

To be fully human and to fully understand our place on the earth, we need to have access to all ways of knowing. We need to, within ourselves, honor and encourage the voice of the moon so we can know and understand in a deeper, more connected way. This voice helps us connect our hearts, our minds, our souls, our bodies, with the earth, the moon, the sun, the stars - with all that is. Having access to this voice makes us whole.

It also makes it very difficult for us to do horrible things. Because it connects us with our hearts and souls, it makes it possible for us to feel into what we are doing and know viscerally whether it is right or wrong. It's the voice that leaves us when we participate in violence, in dishonesty, in subterfuge. It's the voice we have to crush under our heel when we walk into that which is wrong.

To hear the voice of the moon takes practice. I would recommend reading the Clarissa Pinkola Estes version of the folktale "Vasalisa" which she recounts in her book Women Who Run with the Wolves. Learn to use an intuitive tool such as tarot or runes. Or just sit and listen to yourself, to your inner workings - learn to hear and trust that inner knowing. This can result in finding lost pieces of yourself. Sometimes listening in this way will wake you up to just how deeply you have not been listening to your inner knowing, and how far your life has drifted off course because of this. Listening to the voice of the moon can be a call to action, to course correction.

Ultimately, listening to the voice of the moon will result in living a life more clearly in tune with the heart and soul of who you are. The world is waiting for you to do just that. The world needs you to learn the language of the moon, and to take your place with the wise ones who will guide us home. Heed the call.

Learning the Language of the Moon - Part 2

So in my last post I talked about learning to understand the body as part of the earth. Why is this so? Why should we be able to do this? Again, because the body is of the earth. Everything your body is made of came from the earth, and it will return to the earth when you die, unless you intervene in some way to make this not so. As humans we often identify with our minds, and then we begin to think we are our minds, and our bodies get left out. We create a delusion in which we are no longer housed in a body, or that body is of very little interest to us unless it is to decorate, subjugate or otherwise fool with it - treating it like an object in which we have little investment, and we have no real concept of how to honor or understand or use it for the benefit of ourselves and humanity.

I suggest that people start recreating their relationship with their body by connecting it to the earth. The body is a tool for connecting with creation, and starting with the earth seems like an easy way to begin. It's there, under your feet somewhere, all the time. I don't know how this will look to you, or how you will accomplish this. One suggestion is to find a place to lie on the earth, and to feel it through the body. To lie on the earth, and to breathe deeply, to relax, to let go of the busyness of the mind and to feel what it feels like to be thus connected to the earth. It is important that you understand that this means to move out of your mind and into your body to experience the sensations of the body.

Our bodies have been with us since the beginning of our lives, and most of us have experienced many things with our bodies. Most of us hold emotional and physical pain in our bodies from past experiences. When we begin to become more aware of our bodies, we begin to be able to feel our pain, the places in our bodies where we hold this pain, and how uncomfortable it is - how it often blocks our intent and our energy. Healing means finding ways to release this pain so we can be fully present in our bodies - so we can use our bodies to connect to and experience creation in the magical ways we were born to.

There are many ways to release pain. There are many, many pathways, healing modalities, healers. The important thing is to find the healing that works for you, and immerse yourself in it. Sometimes people are very fearful about releasing this pain, as it can cause you to remember and relive very frightening experiences. I find this especially true of survivors of domestic violence and soldiers who have experienced war - with soldiers it is both the fear of nearly being killed, and the fear that one will never be the same for having taken the lives of others. But there is no way around taking on the experience of releasing your pain if you want to live life in this magical way - in the joy of partnership with creation.

When the body, mind and spirit have been healed and are in partnership with creation, life becomes easier because it is then based on hearing, feeling, understanding and trusting the life force of creation to guide you. This life and the act of trusting it is profound.

And it all comes back to the earth, the body. Trusting what we know deeply and intuitively because we are living in this moment, present to ourselves, to the wisdom of our bodies, and open wide to the presence, love and guidance of the life force that has brought us here and given us this precious life.

In my next post, I will be talking about intuition and the moon.

Learning the Language of the Moon

Here's how you learn the language of the moon.

You start by contemplating the fact that you are of the earth. We like to say in our culture how we have "separated ourselves from the earth." This is not possible. We are the earth. Your body is a natural object, it is made up of the earth. As long as you are in your body, you are the earth. Your body is the earth. You can deny this, refuse to feel it, or otherwise live in the world of illusion about this. And the sooner you accept this, and honor your body as part of the earth, the sooner you will learn to speak the language of the moon.

So first comes the earth - connecting to the earth, all the while understanding that we are part of it, and there is no disconnect there. We all find our ways to connect with the earth, be it gardening, hiking and camping in the wilderness, doing meditation or contemplation in nature, sitting quietly in the woods. I have been doing this since I was a small child. Recently I learned something new that has made my connection with the earth all that much more powerful.

Now, when I go outside I ask permission of the natural beings around me - permission to enter their space and interact with them. I used to take for granted that they wanted to interact with me, but I have learned that it is much more respectful for me to ask them if that's okay. For example, I like to walk in a natural area near my home. I go there and stand on one side of the small creek, and I wait. I honestly describe my own feelings of the moment. I tell the nature beings of the area that I am afraid, or angry, or lonely. I ask them for healing. I tell them that I also offer them any healing that they might need from me, and I ask them to freely take what they need from me while I am there. Then I wait until I hear an answer. Sometimes it is the sudden sound of a bird, or a gust of wind through the trees, or my eyes light on a bush with red berries. Whatever it is, I recognize the moment and understand that I have been granted permission to come enter. I have found that since I have been doing this, my relationships with the natural world have deepened and become more powerful.

This is the first lesson in learning the language of the moon. Connect with the earth, connect with your own body which is of the earth. The next lesson has to do with understanding your body as a conduit of energetic information about your self and your environment.

The Moon Goes Dark

The moon goes dark
and with leaden feet
I trod the path to Kuan Yin
where I will pray for the suffering
of the people of Haiti.
But before I pray, I will walk through the woods
and I will hate suffering
and I will bargain with suffering
and I will let suffering see
how my heart breaks with it all,
hoping this will convince suffering
to stop.
It doesn't.
So I go to Kuan Yin
and I ask her to
tend to the suffering,
and I tell her I am grateful
that this is her job, not mine
and that I am human, not a Goddess.
The suffering will be lifted from my shoulders
and I will walk home in the gray rain
and wait for the returning moon,
for the return of spring.

Language of the Moon

The moon has its own language
and so does the ocean.
They are sisters and they choose
priestesses, oracles
through whom they send their
luminous, tidal chants.

I am their sister, priestess, oracle.

I listen in that deep way
I have learned from my ancestors.
I interpret, I serve, I speak the language of Earth.

This happens so as to keep the magic
from leaking any further out of this life,
this place we call home.

This happens in order to raise the frequency,
to restore the magic to our hearts,
to heal the souls of humanity
with the cool lunar touch of the sisters of the moon,
the smooth healing stroke of mama ocean.