Thoughts on Grace

My word of the year to explore has been Grace.  I've always had problems with the word. It seems so... ephemeral. Like it means something but what it means has always been really vague to me.  It feels weird and abstract as a noun. As something you have. What is it that you have when you have grace?  

In terms of spirituality, grace is often spoken of as passive, as in being the passive subject receiving blessings not necessarily deserved. The granting action, however is not passive - it's an act of compassion. We are, I believe, called to both give and receive compassion in life. 

In terms of movement, you are said to 'have grace' when you move with elegant precision - when you move economically using neither more nor less strength/power than you need to in order to achieve your chosen goal. Another way I have come to think of this action is moving with accountability.  If action requires only a light touch, only use a light touch.  Sometimes action requires a heavy hand, do not use a light touch when a strong statement is required.  

Grace then is an action of compassionate accountability.  It is not compassionate to withhold accountability, and accountability does not require one to lack compassion.  They work hand in hand, and the balance of compassion and accountability is grace.

As I reflect on many recent events, I turn to Ma'at and ask for Her to hold us each, in all our very human humanity, in compassionate accountability.

CC0: ArtsyBee Pixabay

Catching Up!

So last year I focused on The Sisters of Fierceness Sabbats.  I missed posting on the last one, the Solstice of Rebirth and Renewal. We're off to a fabulous new start with a few new members this year and our Call to Adventure ritual at the beginning of February was an inspiring start to the year! This coming weekend, we're already on to celebrating our Equinox Rites of Discernment (Refusal and Acceptance).

In the meantime, with all that going on, I initiated into the Wildflower Collective at the PDX Sabbat of Prophecy and Initiation! I couldn't be more delighted! Lots ahead of me to work on, and such lovely people to work on it all with!  In the coming year, I hope to track my thoughts more along the lines of what I started out doing.  Last year went fast and while I was having all sorts of thoughts as we fleshed out the Sisters of Fierceness, I didn't always think to track them except in relation to the sabbats as they moved through the year.

March is when we start talking about the importance of Daily Practice. I do my daily practice at night before bed. Because of the time of night that is, it's really almost the first thing I do in a day.  Connecting each day with the sacred, the divine, my community in shared practice, is really grounding.  I can count on one hand the times I've missed my daily practice, and generally it's been because I've been so unwell that I could hardly stand, much less have the brain space to remember words.  Fortunately I'm not in that place too often because that's a miserable place to be!

So not going to try to hit all of the things right now, there's time, there's time, there's time. :)  But before I go -- happy International Women's Month, and o hai, today (since it's past midnight) is International Women's Day!  I'm looking forward to seeing how it's celebrated this year!

Return With The Elixir

It's THAT time of year.  OUR time of year.  At this turning of the cycle, fierceness is required - we look deeply into the things that trouble us, the things we're afraid of, the underworld, and we find...

Healing.  Solutions. Keys to the Mysteries. Regeneration.  We learn how to light the way, for ourselves and others. We grow into our own power.  We learn to hold our heads up and cross into whatever territories we need to go to get shit done like we own it. 

Return with the Elixir.  Inanna and Her Seven Veils.  Persephone. Isis.  We know these stories, the travails and challenges on the road build.  And then, as someone near and dear would say, "Damn, it's the BOSS battle now - I gotta level up!"

And so with that, if you've been following along on our Heroine's Journey, we have reached our "boss battle" - Return With The Elixir.  Our ancestresses and goddesses are prepared.  We have come through the year, we have walked down into our underworld and are in need of the healing salve, finding our truth and our power, and allowing our brilliant hearts to shine and be beacons for ourselves and others in the dark.

Io, Selene!  Io, Persephone! Io, Hekate!  Hail, The Benevolent Dead!  Bless us as we Retrieve The Elixirs, and may the merit from our activities be applied to the benefit and blessing and healing of all!

Leap and Let Go!

Yes, it's time for another Sisters of Fierceness production!  Now with even more help from our awesome Distance Dedicant team! 

Fall is in the air.  What trust the leaves must have to let go of the trees.  What trust the trees must have to let go of the leaves!  Everything cycles around again, change is the only consistency.  Our theme for the Equinox is Leap and Let Go! 

There comes a time in every journey when there is nothing more you can do but keep on going.  It is as far to return to where you came from as it is to get to wherever you're on the road to.  It reminds me of the time I took my sweet landlubber husband out kayaking in the Salish Sea.  Safely (to me) ensconced in one big bay comprised of two smaller bays, we were about half way across one of them when he says, "NOPE!  I'm done! We're too far out! I want to go back now!"  I was able to talk him into going to the far side of the bay & then paddling back to our starting point following much more close to the shoreline.  He wasn't ready to get out of the boat, just ready to get closer to land.   If we'd immediately gone back to the side closer to where we'd taken off, we'd have missed a huge part of the far bay that was well worth exploring and a really nice afternoon paddling around.  It was a moment of trust - he had to let go of the shore behind us (as far away as the other side was close), and refocus on and commit to getting to the far side.  Leap and let go!  

Our goddess this time is multiple aspects of Tara.  She who is ready to leap into action to assist us.  Fierce compassion.  As we let go, we all need compassion.  For ourselves, for any companions we meet on our road as well - we are all hitting a brand new curve where who knows what comes next!  Tara will help us.  OM TARA! OM TARA!

Messages From The Universe: Tango (possibly a part 1)

I've wanted to try tango for quite a long time, and this only intensified when one of my closest friends started taking tango... and then quitting her job and ended up teaching tango.  Several years later, she's performing in addition to teaching. At the beginning of the month, she made me an offer I couldn't refuse.  And so, I am now taking tango lessons. And as of my second lesson, the studio has a guest teacher teaching the lead part who is an international tango star.

I don't particularly believe things happen for a reason, but I do like to acknowledge and respect serendipitous messages and lessons from The Universe as they present themselves.  Tango seems to be presenting me with a number of relevant and timely considerations, and I thought it would be good for me to capture them for myself, and in the event that anyone else may benefit, do it here.  With those thoughts as an introduction, let us proceed.

* * *

The first lesson was mostly me saying 'hello, I'm very new!'  Beginner's mind.  Finding, again, that sense of being a stranger in a new community and being accepted and encouraged with, literally, open arms.  In time, I think I might have more to say about this - there are a lot of things codified in tango culture, especially in the invitation and acceptance of a dance that I have yet to learn.  But for now, it was a good reminder that there will always be people willing to not only allow me to be part of a community, but will help me find my way.  Mr. Rogers always said, "look for the helpers" - they are there.

Sure, there are a few leads that I give me the sense that they might rather dance with someone else, but they were new once too. So, eh. We are all terrible in the beginning when we're learning (and we're always learning), and I learn fast.  I have both the benefit and disadvantage of coming in with significant movement experience.  I learn fast, but I have some things to unlearn that others don't (thank you, ballet, for the duck feet, and precisely intentional mechanical steps rather than allowing the movement to flow... but I am a fast learner, so we're getting there!).

* * *

In no particular order except that I must take another step, another  lesson is about connection.  For those of you who don't know, connection, integrity, and order are my top three personal values.  Me writing about this is me making sense of, and establishing order to, my experience, to be meta-analytical for a moment...  Tango is about connecting.

Connection to the floor through the feet - a grounding, if you will - is at the priority level of being a safety issue, it helps you keep a sense of what's around you, if you extend your leg to step, and bump into another foot or a wall or etc, you replace your feet to avoid collision.  In this way, connection is an antenna of what's around you and grounds you.  It is the first connection we must make to stand on our own two feet - find the floor, the ground beneath you.

There is connection through your core, and tied to your intuition.  As a follow for an improvised dance, the cues from the lead can be as subtle as a slight weight change. You can learn the choreography, but to recognize it in the moment of improvisation requires an almost intuitive recognition of the cues. This I recognize as connection to self.  I may have more to say about connection to self when I start figuring out the lead pieces as well - much like you learn a whole new level of information when you teach something, as a dancer, you learn a whole new level when you move between following and leading.  People who can do both are stronger in each role than those who can only perform one role.

There is connection to your partner.  I am finding it very interesting to see how different my movement is from lead to lead.  There are leads for whom I must be exactly right for them to feel like they can move without needing to "correct" me, and then only somewhat tentatively. They can be hard to read, but are often also kind, and I think they offer their corrections in the spirit of trying to help me figure this dance out.  There are leads who are so focused on doing the movement that I'm not sure *we* are connecting at all, but the movement flows out in such a way that it shows that even if we barely speak, the required connection is made through the intent of specific movement.  I am torn between the two - there is kind human connection, but the movement doesn't flow as easily from one, and there is the almost mechanical execution of the second that lacks in human warmth what it makes up for in technical accuracy.  But it also feels less safe to err because error is poorly tolerated in machinery.  AND but because the intent is clear, it is easier not to err.  I may actually prefer the technical and mechanical latter as I get the macro details down, to the leads who are trying to micromanage the tension in my shoulders in practice arms.  But regardless - I learn things from each despite my preference for one or the other.

There is also connection to the spirit of tango, and the heart of the dance itself. I have been told tango is a dance of the present, and the present is connected to the past.  The lead, in particular is moving into the present from their past.  The follower must lean into and know the past that the lead is moving from in order to intuitively experience the present.  That said, the dance is not about the past.  It is about being fully present in the NOW.  To fully experience the now, you must know the past, no one comes to the present as a tabula rasa, and it doesn't need to be an acceptance or rejection or understanding of the past, just the knowledge of the past.  Whether that past is having known your partner for years, or whether that past is the split second of past that informs you of the intention of movement in any direction - it is past and eventually will inform the pattern of movement that leads us into the future, but the Now is the moment in which you exist.

* * *

There is a lesson about improvisation, intuition, and the Now.  I've spoken a bit about these three already, but there is a specific lesson around planning, prioritizing, and practicing.  I am a person who likes to be prepared. I like to have a sense of what needs to happen as well as what is going to happen.  I have observed the things we do to practice without partners in class and brought them home and done them in my living room.  We practice particular forms in class.  And then when they say, ok, now practice what you learned today, I have a new small vocabulary of movement to work from.  Tango is entirely improvised in the milonga, and in many performances as well.  While I'm building a vocabulary now, and I suspect my partners are thinking it might just be best to walk me backwards in circles until I can 'walk' (which is a Thing in and of itself in tango), when it comes to Now and 'dancing from/into the past', all of the planning, preparation, anticipation, and practice must integrate seamlessly into what happens in *this* moment.   Whether it is all jettisoned as you launch into the improvisation, whether it all builds upon itself in order to release you to the liberation and total freedom of intuition, the Now consists of taking the step that is asked of you by the tango.

Likewise, in daily life, you can plan, prepare, anticipate, and practice right up to the meeting, the event, the encounter, and then, in the Now, you must take the step that is asked of you by the Now.  Not to say that you can't make missteps in the Now, because you certainly can, and not to say that all that planning, preparing, anticipation, and practice won't help you to be able to better shift in the moment to where Now takes you because it certainly may.  But there will also be times when Now will tell you that the only correct step is one that you could not have planned, prepared, anticipated, or practiced for.

* * * 

The final lesson that has struck me to date is "attitude".  "There is a saying!  Dance me! I learned to dance with old women at the milonga ["and old men!" chimes in the woman teaching the follow parts].  I would ask them to dance and they would say dance me, or I will leave you in the middle of the dance floor.  [Leads], when you ask a [follow] to dance, ask because you want to dance with them.  [Follows], when you accept, you must be 100% in.  You commit to the dance.  And you accept with attitude and ownership."  There was more to that particular instruction, but the gist was - there is no giggling coyness on the part of either party. It is direct.  

In tango, the follow has the option to say no, with no repercussion including getting questioned or insulted on the decision. Lead, no means no, and that's that - move on, find a different partner, do not ask why, do not plead, do not insult, just move on. You will never know why the follow said no and it's not necessary for you to know either.  And follow, if you say yes, you commit.  Your actions must also be direct, take the lead's hand and find your dance position with confidence.  Dance me.  You want to dance?  Bring it. Prove it. Show me.  Dance me.  

There are studies that show people do not respond to competence, they respond to confidence.  If you seem tentative, exploratory, or anything less than committed, they read that as a lack of confidence and make assumptions about competence tied to that.  The origins of the verb "to con" was originally confidence.  A con man was a 'confidence man' - someone who, through being able to gain people's confidence, would then swindle them.  I think this ties back to what I said above too, about how a physical connection can be established through the mechanistic confidence of intent and how in order to navigate the "macro" skills of knowing where and when to step it becomes more clear when the lead moves with confidence even if they have not established all levels of "perfect" connection.  And issuing an invite, responding to the invite, then leading, and following, all require confidence, attitude, for the full expression of the dance.

Dance me.

* * *

So, those are some initial thoughts, three classes in. It is hard to believe that Tuesday will mark four classes.  Someone my first class suggested that I mark the date of my first class in my calendar, or in my diary (for the record, it was 8/2/16), or somewhere because then I could look back and say, "that is the very day it all started."  Perhaps I will say that.  Perhaps I will recognize the past that led me to that particular expression of Now as I dance from the past in the present.  I suppose it's within the realm of possibility that this is a momentary flash in the pan, the Universe offering me lessons that once learned, I'll move on from.  But for now, I recognize and acknowledge these serendipitous opportunities to learn, and thank the Universe and the Eternal Now for presenting them in such a lovely format.

Challenge and Opportunity

Our next Sisters of Fierceness sabbat celebrates Challenge and Opportunity.

We're in the midst of the doldrums of summer.  Everyone is hot and irritable. The air and energy seems stagnant and it's like moving through a morass of mud to get anything done.  Then again, the sky is blue, the air is warm, everyone starts heading outside to enjoy their summer breaks (or inside to enjoy the beautiful, beautiful air conditioning in some parts of the country!).

So much of how we experience life is determined by how we choose to frame it.  It's a truism that everyone seems to have a variation on, that challenge and opportunity are two sides of the same coin.  Where there's a challenge, there's an opportunity, and vice versa.

Our Goddess for this challenge is Kali - fierceness embodied!  When the world turns upside down, Kali is present deconstructing and then helping us reconstruct, showing us the friction where things are no longer working, helping us through the fires of transformation.  Safety is comfortable. If we are going to make change in our world, we need to be uncomfortable and get up and change those uncomfortable things. Kali shakes up our safe spaces and helps us create brave spaces where true transformation can take place.


What is your challenge? What is your opportunity? Where are your safe spaces? And where are your brave spaces?

Liminality, Schrodinger’s Cat, and Dis/Integration

Originally posted at http://www.lepismatidae.net/blog/archives/1218. 

There is a lot I don’t write online anymore, for a lot of reasons.

One of the things I’ve been struggling with is that I’m very good at compartmentalizing. Who needs to see which Venn diagram of the pieces that comprise me. Who is allowed into one safe space, but not another. Having a rubric of ‘what do I gain from sharing this with this part of the diagram, where and who is likely to find a way to use this against me? And what is my plan of defense if I need one?’ And there is virtually no public safe space. What happens when it becomes too much to manage all those pieces of the Venn diagram. What if the pieces that used to provide structure are merging and blending? What if, as those compartment walls become exhausted, I/we were allowed to integrate them into our being instead of watching everything fall to pieces in disintegration?

When I tell a community that I am an invisible part of that they matter to me, even though some of the people that I am directing that message at and meaning, truly, from the tenderest parts of my heart are not allowed to see that part of my Venn diagram, and even though I suspect that due to other parts of my Venn diagram, I don’t actually matter to them… It’s sometimes a heavy weight to carry. The price for ‘appropriate’ compartmentalization.

And when through experience I know that it’s dangerous and terrifying to stand up, stand out, and that even when I do, the validity of my voice, my opinion is questioned and judged or outright ignored or not heard. And when despite the danger and terror of standing up and trying to stand out, I do try to stand up and stand out, I am still invisible until I am heard and shouted down or ignored until I no longer have a voice, or the will to keep speaking.  Whether that’s on a timeline where the algorithms bury me, or a business room where I can never find the right way to ‘show value’ (or maybe it’s that I’m in my 40s and no longer a young, fresh, face — there’s a reason that age discrimination laws exist, or maybe I just suck at ‘showing value’), there is an echoing loneliness.  And as an introvert, sometimes I find more company with the wind, and the rain, in the dirt, the whirring of a spinning wheel, the pieces of me you’ve never seen (to steal a line from someone else).

Where is the possibility for wholeness? Where is integration? Some days even keeping Venn diagram pieces of me showing up is exhausting. Bringing the whole puzzle to the table seems… illusory and dangerous.  I am so proud of my people with the loud and strong voices, the right words that come at the right time, in the right order, in the right framing, in their wholeness.  And for the rest of us, in the in-between places, it has to be ok to be in liminal spaces.  My heart aches, I am tired.

Am I too much for ‘living out loud’?  I don’t perceive myself as whole, and picking my pieces apart threatens the integrity of my being.  And being told I am too much for sharing what I do share — even now that I don’t share at the levels I used to share — tells me, my whole self is “valued,” but please keep it contained and quiet and you don’t need to talk about that and what kind of ‘value’ is that?  But pieces keep escaping from their compartments awkwardly, demanding to be said when they shouldn’t be said because there is so much not to say that sometimes they break their constraints.  And then sometimes, they wilt in the deafening silence having been said.

Doris Lessing wrote a book called The Golden Notebook about the fragmentation of self & society, and one woman’s attempts to overcome it eventually by trying to combine four different journals into one ‘golden notebook.’ These days, it might be called the ‘bullet journal.’  I have this space, I have another blog (or two), I have a notebook with therapy notes, a bullet journal, a general reflection journal, five DayOne journals, calendars… and others. What does the ‘whole self’ even mean when even in the best of times, I can only expect even those close to me to see a facet of myself?

There is no graceful way for me to end this. I am experiencing the breakdown of my compartments as integration of my whole self, and the fear remains of others picking over the pieces of those evolving compartments and leaving me doubtful, silenced, hurt and all of me present, but still in pieces.