She let go

Allemagne - Franz Hein

"She let go. Without a thought or a word, she let go.

She let go of the fear. She let go of the judgments. She let go of the confluence of opinions swarming around her head. She let go of the committee of indecision within her. She let go of all the ‘right’ reasons. Wholly and completely, without hesitation or worry, she just let go.

She didn’t ask anyone for advice. She didn’t read a book on how to let go. She didn’t search the scriptures. She just let go. She let go of all of the memories that held her back. She let go of all of the anxiety that kept her from moving forward. She let go of the planning and all of the calculations about how to do it just right.

She didn’t promise to let go. She didn’t journal about it. She didn’t write the projected date in her Day-Timer. She made no public announcement and put no ad in the paper. She didn’t check the weather report or read her daily horoscope. She just let go.

She didn’t analyze whether she should let go. She didn’t call her friends to discuss the matter. She didn’t do a five-step Spiritual Mind Treatment. She didn’t call the prayer line. She didn’t utter one word. She just let go.

No one was around when it happened. There was no applause or congratulations. No one thanked her or praised her. No one noticed a thing. Like a leaf falling from a tree, she just let go.

There was no effort. There was no struggle. It wasn’t good and it wasn’t bad. It was what it was, and it is just that.

In the space of letting go, she let it all be. A small smile came over her face. A light breeze blew through her. And the sun and the moon shone forevermore."

Ernest Holmes

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Swan Blessing Story - Releasing the Burden of Past Life Guilt

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How many of our gifts and natural skills are we holding back in this lifetime because of mistakes made in past lives? For Emily it was her natural ability as a leader and wise man that became bound when in leading people away from war she found she did not have the skills to help them all survive in the wild. When she lost the person that she loved most in that lifetime, she blamed herself and created a very strong binding vow upon her spirit in this lifetime - the Vow to Never Lead Again. In moments of trauma, fear and remorse we often make promises and vows to our own spirits that carry heaving binding. When we create theses Sacred Contracts we may believe in them so deeply that we carry their binding energy into our next incarnations. These kinds of vows and promises carry a heavy burden of shame and guilt and a deep sense of unworthiness to live a happy and peaceful life - indeed for some it is hard to feel worthy to be living at all.

It is not my belief that we are here to 'make amends' or be punished for the mistakes of past lifetimes - I do not believe in 'bad karma'. I see each lifetime as an opportunity to be conscious in each moment and to do our best. This does not mean we have to be perfect, we are all learning. It means to recognise when we have made mistakes, to learn from them and to choose differently next time we are in a similar situation. It is important not feel regret and guilt about the past - whether it be from past lifetimes or a more recent event from your current lifetime. Let it go and open your heart to the opportunities to be your Authentic True Self that await in the PRESENT moment. Every morning is a new birth, a new lifetime - full of choice and possibility. By embracing life as a mystery that keeps unfolding, you are letting go of needing to 'know' or to be 'right', letting go of carrying the burden of guilt and shame for events that cannot be changed. We must learn compassion for ourselves and embrace our Life Path as a journey to Wisdom and in doing so we will also be more accepting of the diverse paths of others.

I first heard from Emily when she sent me her Swan Story: Awakening the Black Serpent after journeying in the Swan Blessing Past Life circles that I held at Seven Sisters Festival. And to accompany her story, she sent me the most incredible collage artworks - it was a wonderful way to experience Emily's story on a very visual and deep level. It really touches my heart when I hear of people creating in any capacity after they journey with Swan Medicine - I believe creativity and opening visionary gifts is another 'wing' of the Swan Medicine after clearing past life binds. 

Recently I got to meet Emily in person when she travelled to Sherbrooke Forest to journey again with Swan.  Emily discovered that in the next lifetime she was a Scholar, living like a Hermit away from the world on top of a mountain. When she looked into his face she felt such love for this gentle soul but it was love that he could not feel for himself. 

"I see and hear so many birds on my way to the forest and I immediately feel the wild swan’s wings wrap around me when Julia welcomes me under the chestnut tree. It feels so safe and gentle. My heart sighs.
I easily slip into my mindstream, into the green of the forest where the water is calling to my heart. I let my heart lead me to the water and look deep into the still pool. I see an ancient face, tanned and wrinkled like the face of an old tree. Clear blue eyes crinkled at the edges with kindness. Is it a man or a woman? It doesn’t matter. I feel so much love and wisdom. As a hand reaches through the water to take mine I see it is an old man’s hand. He takes me across the threshold. Everything feels so easy and gentle. I let my heart follow. 

I walk behind him on a faint forest track, meandering through sun and shade, slowly winding up a mountainside. I feel how connected he is to this world, how the plants and animals and the richness of the earth pass through him on a cellular level. He is totally at one with his surroundings. He is the forest and the forest is him. He is filled with this knowing in his being. 

We reach the mountaintop. It is rocky and windy and wild. An eagle glides above us, just out of sight but a part of our interaction all the same. He is showing me the view…a ruined city far below. Just rubble and tumbled down towers and charred remains of what was once great. He is heavy hearted. It was his home. He has lost so much and been alone for so long. 

He shows me his happy childhood in the city...playing on the floor in a sunlit tower, learning to read and write with a loving tutor, growing into a wise scholar and advisor to the king. This king is his friend and like a brother. But he is a ruthless and brutal leader. He brings chaos, destruction, war and famine to his city. My wise and gentle scholar, he cannot change this man, he has failed, his advice has led to this ruin. 

He shows me how he fled the burning city, leading a small group of people to safety across the mountain. But he did not know the forest then. It was a long difficult journey and they were weak and starving. He didn’t know how or what to feed them. He was a city man and had never killed an animal in his life. Many of the people died on this journey because of his lack of knowledge.

We look into the face of a woman as she dies. He loves her, she is his one love that he never fully acknowledged or had time to appreciate. She whispers her love, her patience and forgiveness as she dies. She tells him her child is his daughter, please take care of her. When she passes, he is so desolate and alone. He takes the remaining people to the safety of a village and wanders away into the mountain forest. He will live as a hermit forever. He is responsible for so much death and destruction. He vows to never lead his people to harm. He will never be a leader again. This binding weighs as a heavy stone in his/my heart. 

I see his home in the forest, a simple wooden hut, cosy and full of books and dripping candles to light his long nights alone. He is writing, writing, filling so many pages. He is recording histories, forest wisdom, his deep knowing. He will share this so that no one need die or suffer for lack of knowledge. His daughter visits him here in the forest. She loves him so much and understands his heavy heart. She has the same energy as my mother in this life…such a wise, big hearted woman (who I can share so much time with now, healing the loss in his life). 

I am back beside the deep still pool. I let go of the stones in my heart. A sister of the well hands me a clear crystal to crush these stones. They smash into dust and blow away with the breeze. She guides me into the pool, it is warm, thick. It is no longer water but blood. I curl up in the heart-womb that the pool has become and the other sisters join the first, so that nine of them surround me. They peel back the veils that are wrapped so tightly around me, they peel back my skin. They remove all the bindings and heaviness that surrounds my heart and then slowly drift away so I am alone in the warm pool. I AM FREE. I feel my open heart beating. It says “I am a true and shining guide”. 

I see my past-self smiling at me from the forest. His wife and daughter have come for him. He is light hearted and FREE. Then I feel myself pulled upward with the wind. I feel the lightness and strength of my huge wings spread wide…I am the eagle, soaring and drifting above the mountaintop, visioning the world."  EMILY 2013

Thank you Emily for sharing your Swan Stories and art so generously it was an honour to guard the threshold as you reclaimed your Wild Wisdom again. 

And Emily has just informed me that she will now be teaching this beautiful art process and if you would like to learn how to make your own Collage for the Soul, Emily is holding an Introductory Workshop on Sunday 23rd June at the Mindful Wellness Centre. You can find out all of the details through Emily at emilymorter@ymail.com or phone: 0402 672 482. 
Collage created by Emily Morter after her Past Life Swan Blessing

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Wildish Nature

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"Fairy tales, myths, and stories provide understandings which sharpen our sight so we can pick out and pick up the path left by the wildish nature. The instruction found in stories reassures us that the path has not run out, but still leads women deeper, and more deeply still, into their own knowing. The tracks which we are following are those of the Wild Woman archetype, the innate instinctual self....
"To adjoin the instinctual nature does not mean to come undone, change everything from right to left, from black to white, to move from east to west, to act crazy or out of control. It does not mean to lose one's primary socializations, or to become less human. It means quite the opposite. The wildish nature has vast integrity to it. It means to establish territory, to find one's pack, to be in one's body with certainty and pride regardless of the body's gifts and limitations, to speak and act in one's behalf, to be aware, alert, to draw on the powers of intuition and sensing, to come into one's cycles, to find out what one belongs to, to rise with dignity, to retain as much consciousness as we can."
"It's not by accident that the pristine wilderness of our planet disappears as the understanding of our own inner wild nature fades," Estés adds. "It is not so difficult to comprehend why old forests and old women are viewed as not very important resources. It is not such a mystery. It is not so coincidental that wolves and coyotes, bears and wildish women have similar reputations. They all share related instinctual archetypes, and as such, both are erroneously reputed to be ingracious, wholly and innately dangerous, and ravenous."

 "We are all filled with longing for the wild. There are few culturally sanctioned antidotes for this yearning. We were taught to feel shame for such a desire. We grew our hair long and used it to hide our feelings. But the shadow of the Wild Woman still lurks behind us during our days and in our nights. No matter where we are, the shadow that trots behind us is definitely four-footed."


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the heart has dreams of it's own

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Your heart has dreams of it's own. Do you have a place of such deep dreaming that it is something the rational mind cannot understand? I spent many years living in my ancestral home of Scotland and even though I journeyed to the sacred isle of Iona I did not visit her sister island of Staffa. And yet I dream about her constantly, I travel to her in visions to sit inside the basalt temple of Fingal's Cave, the Cathedral Cave. Last night I spoke to a dear sister about this dreaming cave and how I feel I will finally journey to her next year. How I long to swim in the freezing turquoise waters, to sing into the stone arch... it is a place my heart remembers, it is a home of Swan Blessing.

I would love to know more of these Dreaming places...where are yours? Let's share them here and here. Below are some of the songs of Julianna Barwick including her latest release 'Forever' - this is the music I hear with Swan Medicine, I imagine this to be the sound that fills the Cathedral Cave. it is the sound of the Place of Dreaming calling me Home.

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Changing Woman Project by Patricia Ariel

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Patricia Ariel is an artist close to our hearts. She is a dear sister to us and is the creator of the Swan and Her Lady illustration you see in our emblem for Swan Blessing. For me, Patricia is someone who can draw and paint visions that speak straight to my heart, images that are in my dreams but hard to describe. Over the years I have loved seeing her create the mysterious visions that I have been feeling - almost simultaneously - and this is why so much of her art graces the room we hold Swan Blessing in - I believe art helps us to open immediately to the mystery and to the dreaming within.

Patricia inspires me so much, she recently conceived the Changing Woman project to raise awareness about women's issues and rights through the expression of art. Here she is talking about the project and her dreams for it - I love to hear her beautiful voice and I hope she inspires you to become a part of this wonderful project. 
You will see so many stunning artworks on the Changing Woman site and here are a just a few to wet your appetite. Go Patricia!

Reveal by Patricia Ariel

Enchanting the Dreamer - 13 Eclipse Medicine Dolls

How did I survive the Season of Eclipse? By making 13 Medicine Women dolls. I had no idea when I began that there would be 13 and so it was a lovely surprise to put them all together yesterday and see that they were indeed a wee tribe. I love to work with art and crafting during deep points of lunar activity. And it is no small work that we do in these moments. The dolls your see above and below were amongst the first creations and I realised they were threshold sisters. The doll in the black box became a mourning doll for my best friend who just lost his father and the doll in the white box made right at the point of eclipse became a Blood Moon Guardian for my dear 13 year old faerie god-daughter as she awaits to step through the threshold into womanhood. Both of these dolls were very alike in energy, both deep and silent in their voice, serious work to do looking after their new owners. I was so happy to be able to assist both of these beautiful friends in this way - in times of threshold crossing and transformation, we rarely find words that do justice to the Mystery.
I feel Medicine Dolls help us to connect to the magical child, the Otherwordly Dreamer that exists within us all. We are at a time when the veils to the Mystery are becoming ever thinner and many of us are feeling the call to connect deeply to our dreaming selves and intuition again. If you feel you have lost the Dreamer or do not have one, you are feeling a common ailment in the western world. I call this feeling Hiraeth from the Welsh for Homesick Spirit. Making art, writing songs, dancing with our own Spirit again - are just some of the ways to call the Dreamer home. We must make time for our dreaming self, how else can know the difference between thought and intuition? I hope you can find time to create for your Dreamer as we head into the Dark Moon. 
In our Winter Solstice Swan Blessing workshop will be focussing on clearing binding Vows, Oaths and Sacred Contracts made in Past Lives that are still binding the Dreamer and trust in our natural intuition. These binds can be created from lifetimes were we embraced strict religious beliefs, temple vows and also lifetimes where we may have trusted our intuition only to see something go terribly wrong - we are often carrying fear and regret from these lifetimes that do not serve our spirits in the present.  At Winter Solstice we will journey back into our past lives to understand the oaths we have made and why we made them and with great love release our spirits from these heavy binds. We will then be guided by Doll Enchantress, Nicole Ahava to begin creating our own Spirit Doll in the likeness of our Dreamer. I am so pleased to be offering this deep SoulCraft in my beloved Sherbrooke Forest, the wild green home to the magical Lyrebird - Medicine Totem of Lineage, Storytelling and Memory. 
You will find all the details for the Winter Solstice Swan Blessing here. And you can see the full range of the 13 Eclipse Medicine Dolls on our Facebook page.