This is Larry Merculieff. He speaks  on indigenous elder wisdom and modern day personal to global challenges.

I feel this is one of the most important videos of this time. It is over fourteen minutes long, and it is worth watching many, many times. From this talk:

“Most men and women, and even many spiritual leaders, have forgotten why women were considered sacred. Because, like a hologram inside of their bodies is the direct and exact sacred condition as the womb in the center of the universe, that is physically manifested in their womb.”

“Women, now, are being called to restore their own center of power, because even with all of this violence that has been done to women for thousands of years, you still hold this sacredness in your bodies…in the womb.”

“There is a sacred vibrational field inside of the woman that we have forgotten to honor that is the place of all the things born. Nothing new can be birthed without woman.”

“There is a way out of this and it is going to be led by women.”

“Without restoring the sacred feminine, nothing new is going to occur in this world. Nothing. We can’t think ourselves out of these problems.”

::

Please share with me how this video moves you, as a woman, as a man.

And, please share this with others.

Orchid

So Beautiful. So, so beautiful. And yet…

Why don’t we feel this way about our own beautiful, sexual female bodies?

About the same time I took this picture, I came across this article by Eve Ensler, Over it. If you haven’t read it, do. And, after reading that post by Eve, I came across this one, and these words jumped out at me:

“Vagina is the most terrifying word, the most threatening word, in any language of any country I have ever been to. Even when the vagina is worshiped in theory, as the yoni is in India, it is denigrated in practice. It is more reviled and feared than words like plutonium, genocide and starvation. In many countries the word for female genitalia is so derogatory or disgusting, it cannot be spoken in public. In a few places, there is no word in the language for vagina at all.”

A Big Fat Lie

There is a big fat lie of a story in our world, a story that says the feminine is evil, bad, not to be trusted.

We could ask, “Why?”, for the rest of our lives. As Durga points out, dwelling in the negative robs us of our power:

I had secretly followed the “Goddess of Negativity” into her empire. She is a goddess of illusion, seducing us to complain about our life circumstances. She walks into our nights and grows in our dreams of worries and fear. She rules the space. She is a master of pretending to be something different.

She brings up stories and secretly turns optimism into negative magnets. She is a possessed collector of experiences we refuse to consciously digest. Instead we pin them on a fame wall inside a forgotten room of ourselves, and then we leave forever, leaving it alone and unprotected. Negativity knows these rooms and turns our secrets into fearful memories. And because we have left this room to her, she owns our power.

Staying in the place of wondering why keeps us locked in undigested places where we don’t know why we are stuck…

I know I’ve stayed in this place of “Why” for a long, long time. And, remarkably, I don’t move forward when I wait for an answer. The only part that would want to know is the part that does take it personally, because it is the part that believes it is separate from the whole of life and wants to stay separate.

This part doesn’t consciously want to stay separate. And, it’s desire to continue to stay in the illusion of the big fat lie comes from wanting it to change, wanting others out there, most certainly men, to acknowledge it isn’t true. Yet, they can’t tell me what is true. That’s just giving power away, again.

If someone else could tell me how worthy I am, then that same someone else could also take that worthiness away by simply stating something else. I no longer have any willingness to give another person permission to tell me what I am worth.

The only truth is the truth of life, known by way of my experience.

Only I can know what is true, and I can only know that by living what I want to know. By being it, by paying attention, by realizing I am not simply an object but a soul with a female body.

I am unlearning the lies I was fed, by paying attention to my experience, and by feeling the wisdom shared by others to see if it resonates with me. I can no longer take others’ words as truth, and I can feel for resonance with their words, as I did with Eve and Durga’s words.

The Power of Creation

The only truth is the truth of life, known by way of my experience.

Only I can know what is true, and I can only know that by living what I want to know. By being it, by paying attention, by realizing I am not simply an object but a soul with a female body.

Can I settle down into my body and begin to be aware in these cells that are the vagina?

Can I come to know myself without this story of evil and disgust?

How long will I continue to tell this story? It is buried deep within where I don’t have to feel its effects on my body, my heart, my psyche.

In reality, this place within my woman’s body isn’t even really a vagina. It is simply life.

The word itself carries so much.

Can we reclaim the word and not get lost in the word?

Can we be in the body, really BE in the body?

Beingness is love. Simply being in the body, is being the great love that we are in this female body, without the big fat lie.

This female body holds a great power. It is time to once again know this power, love this power and live this power, for it is not power over another, it is the power of creation and life.

::

I’d love to know your feelings and thoughts. Please share them here in the comments.

This post is part two of a three-part series titled, “Begs the Question. You can read part one here.

Orchid

I take pictures of flowers. I can’t help myself. Something in me is completely drawn to a flower in the midst of opening to life, it’s soft petals so vulnerable in a what can be a harsh world.

I have this gorgeous orchid in my home. It was a gift and is now in bloom again. As I walked past it the other day, the sun was shining through its translucent petals. The luminosity drew me to it like a moth to flame. In much the same way, when I get too close to such beauty, something in me dies to this beauty.

I posted another shot of this luminous flower online and received a number of comments.

Absolutely gorgeous.

Stunning.

Oh my goodness. Made my heart jump.

Very vaginal in the best way ever.

It was clear that this orchid looks like a woman’s sexual anatomy – vagina, vulva, clitoris, etc.

It seems as though we respond to this flower as something breathtakingly beautiful.

And this begs the question,

Why don’t we feel this way about our own beautiful, sexual female bodies?

::

This post is part one of a three-part series. I’d love to know how you feel…

Profound words for the Grandmother in each of us…

Surrounded by my shields, am I:

Surrounded by my children, am I:

I am the void.

I am the womb of remembrance.

I am the flowering darkness.

I am the flower, first flesh.

. . . In this darkness, I am

Turning, turning toward a birth:

My own – a newborn grandmother

Am I, suckling light . . .

I am spiraling, I am spinning,

I am singing this Grandmother’s Song.

I am remembering forever, here we

Belong.

~”Song of the Self: The Grandmother”, by  Alma Luz Villanueva

image  by Flickmor, shared under cc2.0

Unspeakable Beauty

The innermost places of the heart are unspeakably beautiful.

I’ve wondered what is like to travel there, to taste the utmost delicacy of life.

This woman’s protective shield has allowed her to not feel the pain that might

deliver her to the threshold of this most honest place.

Until now.

Frangiapani, Hamoa Beach, Hana

As I settle more deeply into my time here in Hana, I feel the softness of this land bringing out the soft, supple places in my body and heart. My soul responds to the beauty and fragrance of this Frangiapani, collected on my walk this morning. There was no clear sunrise, but rather a cloudy and warm drizzly beginning to this day.

I can feel the pull of this place, a pull that tugs at the core of my body, pulling me down into Her. When I arrived and realized I had been called here, that this place had called me, this pull made itself known.

In some ways, it’s like the pull you feel on your whole body as you stand in a wave being drawn back to the ocean. The pull of the tide is mighty.

This pull feels like it’s pulling me down into this place, whatever this ‘place’ is. I don’t know. Yet I know the feeling as it pulls not only on my body, but on my heart as well.

And, sometimes, She’s not gentle at all. As I exited the surf the other day, a wave with a punch lifted me up and tossed me down without warning. I landed on the side of my head. I felt woozy. I felt disoriented and had to sit to collect myself. I remembered a good healthy respect for nature that I had forgotten.

As I walked the beach this morning, one thing was very clear. No matter how much I try to make up a strong strand of meaning in my life, I could clearly see, there is no meaning…at least not one that I might make up. Oh, yes, I will still try to make it up, ’cause that’s what minds do.

Yet in this place of tropical bird calls and sweet frangiapani lying across the ground, I find when I simply be in my body and open my senses to every layer of experience that presents itself, I know no meaning.

In feeling the pull to this place, I know no meaning, but I listen and witness. I am opening. There’s a softness in this opening, a palpable tenderness. I also am aware of my fear of my own power, a power I see all around me, in the waves crashing against the shore and in the volcano on who’s base I am sleeping.

The feminine is mysterious. She’s contradiction. She’s unreasonable. And, so am I.

sun spot with light rays, let it shine

I believe in the erotic and
I believe in it as an enlightening force within our lives as women.
I have become clearer about the distinctions between the erotic
and other apparently similar forces.
We tend to think of the erotic as an easy, tantalizing sexual arousal.
I speak of the erotic as the deepest life force,
a force which moves us toward living in a fundamental way.
And when I say living I mean it as that force which
moves us toward what will accomplish real positive change.
~Audre Lorde

:::

In these days of change, where destruction is so present and many wonder what is next, discovering the enlightening force Lorde speaks of is the rich invitation at hand.

Can we, as women, remember and re-member this force within our bodies and within our lives?

Our sexuality is as natural as breath.

It moves within because it is the deepest life force. To come into alignment with it is to align with life.

Sexuality is not simply having sex. It is awakening to our nature, returning to the wholeness of the feminine, and remembering that at the center of our female bodies lies the void of creation.

We embody the creatrix, the void out of which all arises. To turn our attention inward, to the innermost recesses of the heart and the birthing capacity of the feminine, opens us to re-member this force.

Can we feel life moving within? Can we begin to trust what we see, especially when it is not visible to the eye?

I see things.

I know things.

Ways are shown.

Yet, I learned at a young age to cut them off before they really blossomed in my consciousness; my intellect learned to come in quickly and try to rationalize and explain these unexplainable things.

As a woman, I walk in ways not understood by the intellect. These ways, these feelings and knowings that are irrational to the intellect, but exquisite morsels to the soul, are calling to me to listen. There is no time to dawdle. They call me to play in the stream of deep healing and honoring.

Trees speak.

The sun shines.

Life pulses.

:::

And, you?

What do you hear?

Image: Sun Spot with Light Rays, Let it Shine Some rights reserved by Torley

If you could picture your intuition as a person, what would he or she look like? If you sat down together for dinner, what is the first thing he or she would tell you? ***

First Buds, by John-Morgan

What would she look like?

She is bold.

She is bright and beautiful.

She is alive with light and vibrancy.

She pulses with life force, the same force that pushes seed to flower, that causes the gray gnarled bark to erupt with soft petals of blossom, that speaks fire when the circumstances require it.

She stands completely in her nature, without apology.

What does she say?

” You are a sexual creature.

Your creativity and sexuality are inextricably intertwined.

This sexual vibrant creative energy has nothing to do with men. Nothing.

It is completely about the body and the divine.

The more you disconnect from the projection of this sexual, creative power onto men, the more you will know the experience of your life force solely unto yourself.

Knowing this solely unto yourself frees you to be you in all your radiance.

Then, and only then, can you be in

right relationship

with men, with women, with all of life.

Creatively.

Sexually.

Lovingly.”

Then she says,

“I’m not your intuition. I am you.”

…

*** question posed by Susan Piver as part of the Trust30 writing challenge.

First Buds by John-Morgan licensed under CC2.0

The task for women is to consciously live their unique connection with the earth. The earth needs to stay connected with consciousness. Matter is so dense, and consciousness vibrates at a much finer frequency, and matter needs consciousness. You can look at it as women providing a way for the earth to be conscious. ~ Angela Fischer, shared by Hilary Hart in The Unknown She

Softly Imbued with Life

Last year, the United Nations designated April 22 International Mother Earth Day. I didn’t know they had inserted the word Mother…nice.

I’ve spent a fair number of hours in these past weeks taking walks in the park across the street, a park filled with redwoods, creeks, a lake, all sorts of furry, scaly and winged creatures, and even a merry-go-round.

On my walks, I’ve been noticing how the earth is so alive, so available, so nourishing. As I walk, I feel the same aliveness is me, in the body, and I notice how deeply connected I am to her. I notice that as I am acutely aware of my own consciousness in the body, my awareness of her deepens. and vice versa.

Something Different for Earth Day

What is this deep connection women have with the earth?

Friends left some beautiful comments on my last post, Earth’s Embrace:

Colette: This is the most important thing we can do for Gaia today…simply engage with her.

Marjory: The Earth comes even more alive when we truly see and feel Her.

She comes alive, and we come more alive. There is a deep relatedness between women and the earth.

I’m feeling something different for earth day could truly bring us all more vibrantly alive.

Coming to know the earth in this manner, woman to earth to woman, can help us all to awaken.

Rainer Marie Rilke wrote:

“Women, in whom life lingers and dwells more immediately, more fruitfully, and more confidently, must surely have become riper and more human in their depths than light, easygoing man, who is not pulled down beneath the surface of life by the weight of any bodily fruit and who, arrogant and hasty, undervalues what he thinks he loves.”

earthy mystique

Immediate.

Fruitful

Riper.

Pulled down beneath the surface.

In our depths.

In our bodies.

Open and receptive to life.

Surrendered to life entering.

Creating and birthing new life.

As of the earth,

so as of women.

::

The old Irish saying, “May the road rise up to meet you” is a wonderful experience when you can really feel the earth meeting your foot.

When I consciously walk on the earth (in the happiest moments, I am barefoot), it’s as if the earth is meeting each footstep, meeting the foot, coming into relationship with each step. The earth is not just a lump of dirt…it is alive. It meets us, especially if we meet her, giving her our love with each step. I’m not sure the Irish meant that, but then perhaps they did.

One practice I give my coaching clients is that of ‘Lotioning’. I want to share it here, because it is such a lovely way to awaken the cells of the body with awareness and love.

Lotioning Practice

1. Find a nice lotion, one you really love the fragrance and feel of.
2. For a generous amount of time, at least 10 minutes, give yourself complete time and space to silently apply lotion to each part of your body, in this particular way. You can begin with any part of the body, but for example we’ll begin with the thigh.
3. Apply the lotion with your hand to your thigh, with awareness in your hand as it touches the thigh. Be aware that you are the lotioner, applying lotion to the leg.
4. Switch, and allow your awareness to be in your thigh, so you are the one being lotioned, aware there is a hand applying lotion to you. Feel the experience of being lotioned.
5. Switch back and forth, from lotioner to lotionee. Feel each sensation of applying lotion, and each sensation of being lotioned.
6. Repeat with your entire body, area by area.
7. As you lotion, notice if there are areas of the body where it is more difficult to be aware. Be kind to yourself as you enter these areas. Lotion lightly, yet continue to invite awareness into the cells there. If emotions arise, feel them, and let them move through you.

Take this awareness outside

1. You can take this same awareness outside to the earth.
2. Find a soft place to walk barefoot.
3. As you walk, become aware of your feet, each foot as you step on it. Feel the ground underneath each foot.
4. As you become more aware of the earth beneath your foot, be curious about any awareness you experience in the earth beneath your foot. Allow yourself to be surprised.

::

While to many, these practices may not seem as important or practical as what we’ve been taught to do on Earth Day, and everyday, anything that brings women into closer communion with the earth may be some of the most important ways we pay reverence and respect to this beautiful home that provides for us day in and day out.

I’ve discovered a direct correlation between how awake I am in my own body and how aware I am of the earth’s aliveness. The more aware I am of how little respect and love I’ve had for this body, the more aware I am of how unconscious I have been of the earth and all she provides.

May the earth rise up to meet you and may you come to know her as vibrantly alive and awake, and may we all come to know, in the cells of all matter, how sacred life is.

]]> http://www.unabashedlyfemale.com/2011/04/21/something-different-for-earth-day/feed/ 7 http://www.unabashedlyfemale.com/2011/04/20/earths-embrace/ http://www.unabashedlyfemale.com/2011/04/20/earths-embrace/#comments Wed, 20 Apr 2011 15:44:53 +0000 Julie http://www.unabashedlyfemale.com/?p=3571

Yesterday, as I do most days, I walked in the woods across the street from our house. But before I set out, I took a moment to capture some of the sights in our own yard. This one picture speaks to me in so many ways.

The heaviness of fruit is, many times, how I feel. My hips, my thighs, my belly all weighted down, pulling me close to the Earth’s embrace.

Just as these gorgeous fruity globes display, I, too, am imperfect. Blemishes here, spots there, a not-quite-symmetric fleshy shape enrobes me.

And while I can feel heavy and weighted, if I am willing to be vulnerable, I notice I am bathed in a light that is tender and fragrant. If I open to  the nourishment available to me in any moment, I can feel it enter my skin and bring sustenance to the cells that crave its touch.

All around me I am reminded of how the Earth provides. And, all around me I am reminded of how I take from her, almost always without any conscious gratitude of what she offers up without hesitation.

The Earth is alive. I hear her in the breeze. I feel her in the redwood trees outside my house. I taste her in every meal I eat. I know her as I know my own body – sometimes acutely aware, sometimes completely unconscious.

I hope to come to know her body through mine, to give back to her in some way for all she continually offers up to me, to my children and their children, and to all the world’s children.