Dear everybody. Over the years of my work, I've found that I needed a practice that would help me connect with creation as a whole and the creator in particular. The medicine wheel and the four directions are a common theme across most traditions. It is simple and direct and gets me in touch with the great ALL that surrounds us all. I have used this for nearly thirty years and next to my meditation practice, it's the ceremony I recommend to everyone desiring further development. This is very simple, but such a fundamental step.
First find the direction of north, wherever you are. Then decide on a dedicated space. It can be a small table inside, or a larger circle outside, or four points defining a large area, it's up to you and your location. Dedicate a stone to the north, a container with water to the west, a candle or fire to the south and incense or something to represent air. As you walk around, honoring each spot, or turning your body facing the different directions, say something to honor each of them. Here are some examples. Find your own.
NORTH - earth - the magnetism of the Earth making the compass face TRUE NORTH, giving directions, clarity and purpose, the top of the
arrow, the axis of the globe.
WEST - water - the cleansing factor of creation, the way the earth turns it is always what we leave behind, leaving what is dead in
our lives, what needs to be given up in rain and showers.
SOUTH - fire - the opposite end of the arrow, the fire and energy empowering the arrow on it's way, giving us the energy we
need for our work.
EAST - air - the eternal dawn the way the earth turns, bringing in the new ideas, thoughts, energy, impulses, being what we always
turn towards.
We have now defined four geographical directions. Next define the center of your four corners, and acknowledge the column going out from there to the center of the galaxy and into the center of the earth. And finally, see that you have two directions as well. You receive the input from your surroundings, and you give out your output, all of you, all the knowledge you have just incorporated into your being.
After all of this is established, you have defined your existence in the geographical spot you find yourself in, and creation welcomes you. You have acknowledged that you are connected to the stars and the planet, and understand that you interact with your environment. The nature surrounding you welcomes you. You have also understood the male (the arrow) and the female (the turning movement) principles of the earth and you know that every evolving process has a male and female concept that need to harmonize for the project to proceed. You have balanced your inner male and female sides and enjoy a new harmony with everything.
I've been doing this simple process for a long time. It always brings clarity to the situation, clears away what's no longer needed, gives energy and oomph, and makes me ready to welcome the new. And it grounds me into a universe that's ready to help. This is the most fundamental activity you can do in your journey. First of all, get grounded and acknowledge where you are, then feel gently welcomed in the larger interwoven tapestry of all that is.
May you be blessed with clarity, a clear slate, energy for the ride, and willingness to see things anew.
Wencke.
Tuesday, January 23, 2018
Saturday, April 4, 2015
Easter. Time to share a chapter from my book "Rituals in Sacred Stone".
Dear Readers and friends,
It is Easter and again we are experiencing a powerful eclipse, the lunar counterpart to the solar we had two weeks ago. This also coincides with stories of resurrection of the phoenix, the bennu bird that disappears in flames only to reappear out of the ashes. This moon holds the message of the avatar.
I want to share some relevant chapters from the book I wrote about Jesus and Mary Magdalene, or Yeshua and Mariam as they're called in my story.
From "Rituals in Sacred Stone"
THE CRUCIFIXION
He received his verdict with dignity. The courtyard was cleared and Yeshua was tied to a pole. His shirt was pulled over his head leaving his back exposed. Two sturdy executioners each equipped with a whip presented themselves for duty. Forty nine lashes. That should do. Few people survived more.
Mariam turned her head away, but she could hear every time the whips hit his body. The whips had small cups with sharp edges at their ends that dug into his skin. He would have ninety eight indentations where skin would be missing before they were done.
Lazarus tried to watch the procedure. He was turning pale and felt nauseous before the tenth count. Yeshua didn’t make a sound the whole time.
The executioners looked disappointed when they were finished. But people had been counting with them. They couldn’t put in any extra whiplashes for good measure. They bowed to the centurion who had been standing by, before they returned to wherever they came from. He acknowledged them, they had done their job.
The centurion received a paper with a written order. He opened up the scroll and read. Then he scratched his head and adjusted his helmet. The sun was getting higher in the sky. He hadn’t had a chance for food himself since yesterday because of all this commotion. It seemed to be coming to an end. He was glad.
The prisoner was untied from his pole. He was bleeding from numerous places on his body. Small red trickles were running down his sides. He made no attempt at wiping himself but simply pulled his shirt to cover his body. The soldiers wanted to mock him further. They had made him a wreath of thorns and placed it on his head. The centurion couldn’t deny his soldiers some fun. There certainly wasn’t much to do in this godforsaken place. Why couldn’t he be stationed somewhere exciting, like Caesarea or Alexandria?
Mariam’s sympathy pains were excruciating. Did they know how vulnerable the top of his head was? Did they think they could prevent him from pulling in strength from above, or disconnect him from his inner power? Was this something Antipas had conjured, to make sure Yeshua couldn’t do any of his magic?
The soldiers gathered around the prisoner. The crossbeam was placed across his shoulders. His hands were tied along it so he would hold it straight. There was no need to tie a rope on the prisoner. He had nowhere to go. He was surrounded by soldiers, and the crowd couldn’t open space for him with his wooden wingspan.
It was time to move again. The Romans knew how to march. But this was slow moving and had nothing to do with the rhythmical trot of a good flock of soldiers. This was a funeral procession led by the deceased while still alive.
Mariam felt sick. Really sick. Lazarus bought some bread from a vendor. They had showed up this early morning ready to make a profit. Some goat milk was offered from a bucket. He made sure his sister got some. They stood in the shade of a tree and watched the group in the courtyard get ready.
Mariam gathered her strength. She dutifully ate the bread and drank the milk she was offered. Her gratitude went out to her brother. As she looked up to find his face, she saw that two other familiar faces had joined them. Her mother in law was there with her daughter Mary. Mariam collapsed in their open arms.
Lazarus looked ashen. Mary gave him strict orders to go back to Bethany and take care of Joseph. He did not take this very well and needed help. The two Mary’s would take care of Mariam. Lazarus had had enough of this event. He couldn’t take his brother-in-law being hurt and humiliated any further. He knew what would come next, and he didn’t think he would be of very much help. Mariam seemed to be in good hands with the women. Relieved, he left to do as Mary told him.
The three women watched as Yeshua passed them on his path, surrounded by soldiers, and burdened with the tool that was intended to kill him. He swayed underneath its weight, but kept on walking. They all pulled in their breath and felt their anguish spread from their throats and hearts and close their airways.
The women followed him as close as they could. At the steps by the Temple Mariam saw a familiar face. It was Simon of Cyrene, a man she had seen among the followers before. He was easy to spot with his height and wide body. She grabbed his arm and told him to follow with them close by. Soon they would need his strength.
They passed Veronica who was ready to give Yeshua water and wipe his face. Susanna was there, offering her tears and prayers. Salome and Johanna stood along the path, showing their love for him with their golden glow.
The people of the night had vanished back into the shadows they came from. The people along the path were their own followers. They offered what they could as the procession found its way among them.
Soon Yeshua fell, and the centurion was looking for someone to carry the beam for him. Simon was ready. He took the large piece of wood and handled it like a twig. Yeshua got on his feet slowly. He slurped some mouthfuls from Veronica’s ladle and let her wipe his face. A new sound was heard among the crowd. The yells for his crucifixion had stayed behind in Pilate’s courtyard. The sound heard now was a quiet murmur of encouragement. The people who loved him had arrived. They lined the road for him. They showed him the way, just like he had shown them the way to themselves. The words were condolences for his gruesome ending. The words were gratitude for what he had taught them. The words were love for a man who had healed bodies and souls.
Mariam was moved. She walked silently with the other two women. And where they came, people made room for them.
“There is his mother,” they said.
“I see his sister.”
“That is his wife.”
The people showed them their sorrow. They showed them their tears. Other men and women carried their pain and grief with them. The three women walked straighter, sharing strength with multitudes.
When they arrived at the hill where the poles were erected, Mariam noticed that this was not the usual place for executions. This was on a hill, and could be seen from far away. The hill of the skull. The hollow hill of Golgotha. Mariam felt the cold water run down her spine. Then she corrected herself. There were reasons for this, however morbid.
A warm hand found hers. She turned and saw the lovely eyes of a good friend. Young John had found her in the crowd. He stood with the women representing the disciples of the man who had taught so many so much.
The soldiers lifted the pole out of its holder in the ground. They laid it down on the sand. Simon was told to place the cross beam in the cut out indentation where it fitted so they could tie them together. Yeshua was told to relinquish his shirt and lay down on the cross. The centurion produced three nails and pointed to the hammer waiting in its holder next to where the pole belonged.
Mariam watched her husband stretch out his arms and lie still while the soldier hammered the nail through his wrists. They knew not to hit his main arteries. Then he would die too quickly. She listened to the clangs of the hammer as it hit the nails and watched his face for his response. He didn’t cry out, he didn’t protest, he silently allowed it all to happen.
His feet were placed on top of each other and the third nail was sent through them. A soldier produced a plaque which got hammered to the top of the cross.
Then they lifted it up, and carried it over to where it needed to go into the receptacle in the ground. It was pushed upright and it sank into its hole with a clank.
His body slumped down and was hanging from his wrists. He lifted his head to breathe better, pushing a little up from his feet. The pain was convulsing through his body and he was forced to allow gravity to win.
The three women rushed up to the cross as soon as the soldiers left him alone. They touched his feet, they cried with him. Mariam touched his leg and reached for him. She felt how exhausted he was. The excruciating pain was numbing and at the same time it kept him alert. Using all she knew, she tried to fuse with him, merge with him a little, take on some of the pain he felt. He didn’t let her. He had closed his field. His life force was being concentrated in the center of his body. She knew he was dying.
Remember the sponge, Mariam heard from somewhere. Bashra was talking to her from her herb bag. She had prepared a sponge with some special herbs for this occasion. Now was the time to use it. Thanks.
She turned away from the others and found it quickly in her bag. Looking for one of the soldiers, she found the centurion standing there looking at the inscription on top of the cross. He was again scratching his head and adjusting his helmet trying to give the words meaning.
“Please. Dip this in water and give it to him. He is thirsty.”
“He is dying, madam. It won’t help.”
“Please. Let me comfort him, even for a moment.”
The centurion had instructions to allow the women to administer to the prisoner. He didn’t see any harm in offering a dying man a drop of water. The centurion called one of the soldiers and gave the order. Mariam watched as he dipped the sponge in a water bucket and attached it to a long reed to be able to reach him. Yeshua was hardly conscious, but he noticed the wet thing touching his lips and managed to suck some drops off it.
That will do, Mariam thought to herself.
She finally gave herself time to look at the plaque that had puzzled the centurion. There was an inscription on it in both Greek and Aramaic, and it said Yeshua, the Nazareean, King of Judea. She stiffened as she read it. What was Pilate thinking? Would the insults never end? Or was it an insult? After all, this was what Yeshua claimed. Did Pilate in his lack of understanding, actually proclaim what they had been trying to say all these years? Pilate was a follower of Mithras, the Roman god of warriors. What did he know of priest kings?
Mariam watched the blood streaked, flogged body of her husband give up its last flickers of life. The flame went out. His color turned gray and soon there were no more movements in his body. He looked contorted where he was hanging. The hill was called the Skull, and over the hilltop the sky turned dark.
The soldiers were making their rounds to see that the prisoners were indeed dying. If they felt that the process was going too slow they would break the crucified man’s legs. Then he wouldn’t be able to push his body up to breathe and would suffocate. The soldiers were tired of their games, they wanted to go home.
“Hey, this one is dead already. That went fast.”
“Open his side. See if he bleeds.”
The soldier went over to Yeshua and stuck his lance in his side. Some blood came out.
“He’s bleeding a bit.”
“That’s fine. He’s dead. Let’s go home.”
Mariam was grateful that the soldiers were ignorant of the process of death. And that the position they pointed from made it hard to stick the lance any further in.
Mary had been very quiet and standing over to the side. Now she touched Mariam’s arm.
“Dear, it is late in the day. The Sabbath is approaching. We have to take him down before sundown, or he will hang there for a whole other day. The animals…”
“Yes, Mother.”
As they spoke, Joseph of Aramathea approached the soldiers who were picking up the things they had brought with them for the watch.
“I have spoken to Pilate, and as a relative I have claimed the body of the prisoner.”
“He is all yours. Help yourself. We’re leaving.”
Mariam looked at Joseph and they shared a moment. It was quiet on the hill now. Most people had gone home. Only a few followers had decided to stay to the end. Simon was one of them, and they asked him again for his help. Young John supported it on the other side as they managed to lift the cross from its foundation and maneuver it down to the ground.
He was almost cold by now. Mariam touched his arm and followed it to his hand where the massive nail went through his wrist. How could they get him off of this torturous device? Simon found the hammer the soldiers had used and gave the nail a good whack on its side. It moved enough in the wood that Simon could pull it with his hand. He tried to be careful, but still the hole in the wrist got widened.
“Let’s be quick,” said Mariam to Simon to speed up the process.
Joseph had brought a linen sheet and they transferred him to it so they could carry him between them. Simon took the heaviest load, and young John proved stronger than he looked, and took the other end next to Joseph. The women hurried around them as they left on the path down the hill.
“This way. The tomb is to the left,” Joseph instructed them as they entered the fragrant garden behind the hill. He had said they could use the tomb he had purchased for his own use when his time would come.
The tomb was an open cave in the mountain wall. A large stone could be rolled in front to seal it off. Inside there was a bench to lay the body on. They all came inside and Yeshua was placed on the stone.
He was even colder now. Young Mary was crying and her mother was comforting her. They all needed to say their last goodbyes. After some time, Mariam asked if she could have some time alone with her dead husband. She needed to do her duty as a wife, wash the body and lay it out the traditional way.
“John, would you take young Mary and his mother Mary and walk them back home to Bethany? I will just stay with Uncle Joseph in Jerusalem tonight.”
“As you wish, Mara. Make sure you get some rest as well.”
“I’ll take care of her,” said Joseph.
The women hugged each other goodbye for the night and Mariam watched them leave through the garden. John knew the way and would see them safely home. Simon left with them and was invited to stay with them in Bethany.
As soon as the others had left, Mariam started administering to Yeshua’s wounds. She washed the body the way she was expected to, and did her best to heal the many scrapes his skin had taken. The cut from the soldiers lance wasn’t very deep and was stitched together quickly. The ointment she had applied the previous day had worked well. The whips had not dug into his body as badly as they were built for. With enough white camphor and lavender, besides some pure oils she had and some cactus plants, they would heal very well. He also had eaten the holy bread recently. His whole body was tuned into life, even though he now appeared absolutely dead. The little belladonna and opium he had gotten from the sponge had done its job.
“Here are your herbs, Mariam. How can I help you further?”
“I need water, Uncle. And a brazier.”
“It has already been brought in, daughter.”
“Thank you, Uncle.”
“Nicodemus and I brought aloe vera to heal his skin. Lots of it. Be generous, Miriam. There is a lot of regrowth that needs to happen.”
Mariam looked over her supplies and saw that Joseph had brought aloe vera in abundance. She could reapply it all through out the night. It would prevent infection and encourage new skin to be generated.
They worked together creating a new herbal balm for Yeshua’s body. When it was ready it was applied while the lion goddess Sekhmet was invoked with incantations. Mariam sang a note and uncle Joseph picked up the lower tone. They created harmonies with deep frequency which resonated in the stone surrounding them. When Yeshua had been prepared with the balm, they laid him out straight on the linen. The piece was long enough that it also covered his body on top when folded over from above his head. Before they covered him, Mariam looked at her husband. She admired his strong physique, his height and his fine features. His hands were modestly crossing by his hips. As her eyes viewed where his fingers overlapped she laid her hand over her own abdomen, remembering.
I’ll always be with you, he’d said.
It is Easter and again we are experiencing a powerful eclipse, the lunar counterpart to the solar we had two weeks ago. This also coincides with stories of resurrection of the phoenix, the bennu bird that disappears in flames only to reappear out of the ashes. This moon holds the message of the avatar.
I want to share some relevant chapters from the book I wrote about Jesus and Mary Magdalene, or Yeshua and Mariam as they're called in my story.
From "Rituals in Sacred Stone"
THE CRUCIFIXION
He received his verdict with dignity. The courtyard was cleared and Yeshua was tied to a pole. His shirt was pulled over his head leaving his back exposed. Two sturdy executioners each equipped with a whip presented themselves for duty. Forty nine lashes. That should do. Few people survived more.
Mariam turned her head away, but she could hear every time the whips hit his body. The whips had small cups with sharp edges at their ends that dug into his skin. He would have ninety eight indentations where skin would be missing before they were done.
Lazarus tried to watch the procedure. He was turning pale and felt nauseous before the tenth count. Yeshua didn’t make a sound the whole time.
The executioners looked disappointed when they were finished. But people had been counting with them. They couldn’t put in any extra whiplashes for good measure. They bowed to the centurion who had been standing by, before they returned to wherever they came from. He acknowledged them, they had done their job.
The centurion received a paper with a written order. He opened up the scroll and read. Then he scratched his head and adjusted his helmet. The sun was getting higher in the sky. He hadn’t had a chance for food himself since yesterday because of all this commotion. It seemed to be coming to an end. He was glad.
The prisoner was untied from his pole. He was bleeding from numerous places on his body. Small red trickles were running down his sides. He made no attempt at wiping himself but simply pulled his shirt to cover his body. The soldiers wanted to mock him further. They had made him a wreath of thorns and placed it on his head. The centurion couldn’t deny his soldiers some fun. There certainly wasn’t much to do in this godforsaken place. Why couldn’t he be stationed somewhere exciting, like Caesarea or Alexandria?
Mariam’s sympathy pains were excruciating. Did they know how vulnerable the top of his head was? Did they think they could prevent him from pulling in strength from above, or disconnect him from his inner power? Was this something Antipas had conjured, to make sure Yeshua couldn’t do any of his magic?
The soldiers gathered around the prisoner. The crossbeam was placed across his shoulders. His hands were tied along it so he would hold it straight. There was no need to tie a rope on the prisoner. He had nowhere to go. He was surrounded by soldiers, and the crowd couldn’t open space for him with his wooden wingspan.
It was time to move again. The Romans knew how to march. But this was slow moving and had nothing to do with the rhythmical trot of a good flock of soldiers. This was a funeral procession led by the deceased while still alive.
Mariam felt sick. Really sick. Lazarus bought some bread from a vendor. They had showed up this early morning ready to make a profit. Some goat milk was offered from a bucket. He made sure his sister got some. They stood in the shade of a tree and watched the group in the courtyard get ready.
Mariam gathered her strength. She dutifully ate the bread and drank the milk she was offered. Her gratitude went out to her brother. As she looked up to find his face, she saw that two other familiar faces had joined them. Her mother in law was there with her daughter Mary. Mariam collapsed in their open arms.
Lazarus looked ashen. Mary gave him strict orders to go back to Bethany and take care of Joseph. He did not take this very well and needed help. The two Mary’s would take care of Mariam. Lazarus had had enough of this event. He couldn’t take his brother-in-law being hurt and humiliated any further. He knew what would come next, and he didn’t think he would be of very much help. Mariam seemed to be in good hands with the women. Relieved, he left to do as Mary told him.
The three women watched as Yeshua passed them on his path, surrounded by soldiers, and burdened with the tool that was intended to kill him. He swayed underneath its weight, but kept on walking. They all pulled in their breath and felt their anguish spread from their throats and hearts and close their airways.
The women followed him as close as they could. At the steps by the Temple Mariam saw a familiar face. It was Simon of Cyrene, a man she had seen among the followers before. He was easy to spot with his height and wide body. She grabbed his arm and told him to follow with them close by. Soon they would need his strength.
They passed Veronica who was ready to give Yeshua water and wipe his face. Susanna was there, offering her tears and prayers. Salome and Johanna stood along the path, showing their love for him with their golden glow.
The people of the night had vanished back into the shadows they came from. The people along the path were their own followers. They offered what they could as the procession found its way among them.
Soon Yeshua fell, and the centurion was looking for someone to carry the beam for him. Simon was ready. He took the large piece of wood and handled it like a twig. Yeshua got on his feet slowly. He slurped some mouthfuls from Veronica’s ladle and let her wipe his face. A new sound was heard among the crowd. The yells for his crucifixion had stayed behind in Pilate’s courtyard. The sound heard now was a quiet murmur of encouragement. The people who loved him had arrived. They lined the road for him. They showed him the way, just like he had shown them the way to themselves. The words were condolences for his gruesome ending. The words were gratitude for what he had taught them. The words were love for a man who had healed bodies and souls.
Mariam was moved. She walked silently with the other two women. And where they came, people made room for them.
“There is his mother,” they said.
“I see his sister.”
“That is his wife.”
The people showed them their sorrow. They showed them their tears. Other men and women carried their pain and grief with them. The three women walked straighter, sharing strength with multitudes.
When they arrived at the hill where the poles were erected, Mariam noticed that this was not the usual place for executions. This was on a hill, and could be seen from far away. The hill of the skull. The hollow hill of Golgotha. Mariam felt the cold water run down her spine. Then she corrected herself. There were reasons for this, however morbid.
A warm hand found hers. She turned and saw the lovely eyes of a good friend. Young John had found her in the crowd. He stood with the women representing the disciples of the man who had taught so many so much.
The soldiers lifted the pole out of its holder in the ground. They laid it down on the sand. Simon was told to place the cross beam in the cut out indentation where it fitted so they could tie them together. Yeshua was told to relinquish his shirt and lay down on the cross. The centurion produced three nails and pointed to the hammer waiting in its holder next to where the pole belonged.
Mariam watched her husband stretch out his arms and lie still while the soldier hammered the nail through his wrists. They knew not to hit his main arteries. Then he would die too quickly. She listened to the clangs of the hammer as it hit the nails and watched his face for his response. He didn’t cry out, he didn’t protest, he silently allowed it all to happen.
His feet were placed on top of each other and the third nail was sent through them. A soldier produced a plaque which got hammered to the top of the cross.
Then they lifted it up, and carried it over to where it needed to go into the receptacle in the ground. It was pushed upright and it sank into its hole with a clank.
His body slumped down and was hanging from his wrists. He lifted his head to breathe better, pushing a little up from his feet. The pain was convulsing through his body and he was forced to allow gravity to win.
The three women rushed up to the cross as soon as the soldiers left him alone. They touched his feet, they cried with him. Mariam touched his leg and reached for him. She felt how exhausted he was. The excruciating pain was numbing and at the same time it kept him alert. Using all she knew, she tried to fuse with him, merge with him a little, take on some of the pain he felt. He didn’t let her. He had closed his field. His life force was being concentrated in the center of his body. She knew he was dying.
Remember the sponge, Mariam heard from somewhere. Bashra was talking to her from her herb bag. She had prepared a sponge with some special herbs for this occasion. Now was the time to use it. Thanks.
She turned away from the others and found it quickly in her bag. Looking for one of the soldiers, she found the centurion standing there looking at the inscription on top of the cross. He was again scratching his head and adjusting his helmet trying to give the words meaning.
“Please. Dip this in water and give it to him. He is thirsty.”
“He is dying, madam. It won’t help.”
“Please. Let me comfort him, even for a moment.”
The centurion had instructions to allow the women to administer to the prisoner. He didn’t see any harm in offering a dying man a drop of water. The centurion called one of the soldiers and gave the order. Mariam watched as he dipped the sponge in a water bucket and attached it to a long reed to be able to reach him. Yeshua was hardly conscious, but he noticed the wet thing touching his lips and managed to suck some drops off it.
That will do, Mariam thought to herself.
She finally gave herself time to look at the plaque that had puzzled the centurion. There was an inscription on it in both Greek and Aramaic, and it said Yeshua, the Nazareean, King of Judea. She stiffened as she read it. What was Pilate thinking? Would the insults never end? Or was it an insult? After all, this was what Yeshua claimed. Did Pilate in his lack of understanding, actually proclaim what they had been trying to say all these years? Pilate was a follower of Mithras, the Roman god of warriors. What did he know of priest kings?
Mariam watched the blood streaked, flogged body of her husband give up its last flickers of life. The flame went out. His color turned gray and soon there were no more movements in his body. He looked contorted where he was hanging. The hill was called the Skull, and over the hilltop the sky turned dark.
The soldiers were making their rounds to see that the prisoners were indeed dying. If they felt that the process was going too slow they would break the crucified man’s legs. Then he wouldn’t be able to push his body up to breathe and would suffocate. The soldiers were tired of their games, they wanted to go home.
“Hey, this one is dead already. That went fast.”
“Open his side. See if he bleeds.”
The soldier went over to Yeshua and stuck his lance in his side. Some blood came out.
“He’s bleeding a bit.”
“That’s fine. He’s dead. Let’s go home.”
Mariam was grateful that the soldiers were ignorant of the process of death. And that the position they pointed from made it hard to stick the lance any further in.
Mary had been very quiet and standing over to the side. Now she touched Mariam’s arm.
“Dear, it is late in the day. The Sabbath is approaching. We have to take him down before sundown, or he will hang there for a whole other day. The animals…”
“Yes, Mother.”
As they spoke, Joseph of Aramathea approached the soldiers who were picking up the things they had brought with them for the watch.
“I have spoken to Pilate, and as a relative I have claimed the body of the prisoner.”
“He is all yours. Help yourself. We’re leaving.”
Mariam looked at Joseph and they shared a moment. It was quiet on the hill now. Most people had gone home. Only a few followers had decided to stay to the end. Simon was one of them, and they asked him again for his help. Young John supported it on the other side as they managed to lift the cross from its foundation and maneuver it down to the ground.
He was almost cold by now. Mariam touched his arm and followed it to his hand where the massive nail went through his wrist. How could they get him off of this torturous device? Simon found the hammer the soldiers had used and gave the nail a good whack on its side. It moved enough in the wood that Simon could pull it with his hand. He tried to be careful, but still the hole in the wrist got widened.
“Let’s be quick,” said Mariam to Simon to speed up the process.
Joseph had brought a linen sheet and they transferred him to it so they could carry him between them. Simon took the heaviest load, and young John proved stronger than he looked, and took the other end next to Joseph. The women hurried around them as they left on the path down the hill.
“This way. The tomb is to the left,” Joseph instructed them as they entered the fragrant garden behind the hill. He had said they could use the tomb he had purchased for his own use when his time would come.
The tomb was an open cave in the mountain wall. A large stone could be rolled in front to seal it off. Inside there was a bench to lay the body on. They all came inside and Yeshua was placed on the stone.
He was even colder now. Young Mary was crying and her mother was comforting her. They all needed to say their last goodbyes. After some time, Mariam asked if she could have some time alone with her dead husband. She needed to do her duty as a wife, wash the body and lay it out the traditional way.
“John, would you take young Mary and his mother Mary and walk them back home to Bethany? I will just stay with Uncle Joseph in Jerusalem tonight.”
“As you wish, Mara. Make sure you get some rest as well.”
“I’ll take care of her,” said Joseph.
The women hugged each other goodbye for the night and Mariam watched them leave through the garden. John knew the way and would see them safely home. Simon left with them and was invited to stay with them in Bethany.
As soon as the others had left, Mariam started administering to Yeshua’s wounds. She washed the body the way she was expected to, and did her best to heal the many scrapes his skin had taken. The cut from the soldiers lance wasn’t very deep and was stitched together quickly. The ointment she had applied the previous day had worked well. The whips had not dug into his body as badly as they were built for. With enough white camphor and lavender, besides some pure oils she had and some cactus plants, they would heal very well. He also had eaten the holy bread recently. His whole body was tuned into life, even though he now appeared absolutely dead. The little belladonna and opium he had gotten from the sponge had done its job.
“Here are your herbs, Mariam. How can I help you further?”
“I need water, Uncle. And a brazier.”
“It has already been brought in, daughter.”
“Thank you, Uncle.”
“Nicodemus and I brought aloe vera to heal his skin. Lots of it. Be generous, Miriam. There is a lot of regrowth that needs to happen.”
Mariam looked over her supplies and saw that Joseph had brought aloe vera in abundance. She could reapply it all through out the night. It would prevent infection and encourage new skin to be generated.
They worked together creating a new herbal balm for Yeshua’s body. When it was ready it was applied while the lion goddess Sekhmet was invoked with incantations. Mariam sang a note and uncle Joseph picked up the lower tone. They created harmonies with deep frequency which resonated in the stone surrounding them. When Yeshua had been prepared with the balm, they laid him out straight on the linen. The piece was long enough that it also covered his body on top when folded over from above his head. Before they covered him, Mariam looked at her husband. She admired his strong physique, his height and his fine features. His hands were modestly crossing by his hips. As her eyes viewed where his fingers overlapped she laid her hand over her own abdomen, remembering.
I’ll always be with you, he’d said.
Thursday, October 30, 2014
LIght, bright suns and warm glows.
I'm back in Chicago, my adopted home town. Love the fall weather, love the festivals of October, love my cool neighbors who has invited for a Halloween party.
MARY MAGDALENE is waiting for further exposure. With the latest jump in consciousness which the earth accomplished last week, she is ready to enter the scene. There has been much talk about the return of Christ Consciousness, which we all support, but included in that level of awareness is her consciousness as well. She represents the warm glow, whereas he represents the bright sunshine. He shows the way by illumination, she assures us that everything will be ok as we travel in the twilight zone of dawn and dusk. (This is where life is more interesting anyway) We need to be familiar with both ways of living and not be afraid of the dark when we have our own inner light to keep our existence enlightened.
Through all my studies, I have finally come to the conclusion that enlightenment is a physical process. Good deeds are good, loving thoughts are wonderful. But at some point you need to know the laws of physics that govern the way. As human beings, we are the only species in the universe that embodies both a concrete part and a spirit part. We are like stones who can think, and trees that can walk and talk. We are so dense, pun intended, and at the same time so ethereal. There is nothing like us. So if the point of creation is to evolve, we are the ones who can evolve the physical world. We are needed if all of physicality is going to be infused with light. They're counting on us. It's hard for angels to move a stone. But we can. And as we touch it we infuse it with our consciousness and when we meet that stone again, we can say hi. Ok, that's cornier than I intended, but I've found that the more evolved you get, the explanations are simpler and silly sayings become very profound. The closer you get to the Gods, the more they want you to laugh. Laughter and lighthearted playfulness becomes an expression of an enlightened being. Love it.
How much light can your body hold? How open are your cells for holding photons of light? Watch the light streaming OUT of your body in the dark. Close your eyes, and see your insides light up. This is the meaning of enlightenment. Physical light, we know it is both vibration and particle, actual photons floating inside your cells, beaming out through you creating halos around your head. If frequencies are what we're working with, than all our emotions are like radio stations we are tuned to. Anger is a pretty rough, low numbered frequency. We can tune to another station. Love is a force in the universe. Not the mushy stuff we call romantic love. Love is a frequency that vibrates as the glue of creation. It is more harmonious than any other vibe and works with anything synchronizing it into a better functioning whatever-it-is.
I am laughing at my own words. Usually I have much more of an organized, laid out, scientific approach to this subject. But today I want to laugh. I want it to sound silly. Right now that works splendidly for me. If it works for you, laugh with me.
MARY MAGDALENE is waiting for further exposure. With the latest jump in consciousness which the earth accomplished last week, she is ready to enter the scene. There has been much talk about the return of Christ Consciousness, which we all support, but included in that level of awareness is her consciousness as well. She represents the warm glow, whereas he represents the bright sunshine. He shows the way by illumination, she assures us that everything will be ok as we travel in the twilight zone of dawn and dusk. (This is where life is more interesting anyway) We need to be familiar with both ways of living and not be afraid of the dark when we have our own inner light to keep our existence enlightened.
Through all my studies, I have finally come to the conclusion that enlightenment is a physical process. Good deeds are good, loving thoughts are wonderful. But at some point you need to know the laws of physics that govern the way. As human beings, we are the only species in the universe that embodies both a concrete part and a spirit part. We are like stones who can think, and trees that can walk and talk. We are so dense, pun intended, and at the same time so ethereal. There is nothing like us. So if the point of creation is to evolve, we are the ones who can evolve the physical world. We are needed if all of physicality is going to be infused with light. They're counting on us. It's hard for angels to move a stone. But we can. And as we touch it we infuse it with our consciousness and when we meet that stone again, we can say hi. Ok, that's cornier than I intended, but I've found that the more evolved you get, the explanations are simpler and silly sayings become very profound. The closer you get to the Gods, the more they want you to laugh. Laughter and lighthearted playfulness becomes an expression of an enlightened being. Love it.
How much light can your body hold? How open are your cells for holding photons of light? Watch the light streaming OUT of your body in the dark. Close your eyes, and see your insides light up. This is the meaning of enlightenment. Physical light, we know it is both vibration and particle, actual photons floating inside your cells, beaming out through you creating halos around your head. If frequencies are what we're working with, than all our emotions are like radio stations we are tuned to. Anger is a pretty rough, low numbered frequency. We can tune to another station. Love is a force in the universe. Not the mushy stuff we call romantic love. Love is a frequency that vibrates as the glue of creation. It is more harmonious than any other vibe and works with anything synchronizing it into a better functioning whatever-it-is.
I am laughing at my own words. Usually I have much more of an organized, laid out, scientific approach to this subject. But today I want to laugh. I want it to sound silly. Right now that works splendidly for me. If it works for you, laugh with me.
Monday, May 26, 2014
Secrets in Sacred Stone - Viking, Kelt and Catharr.
It's time. I'm returning to Norway for the summer, for three glorious months filled with family gatherings, fish and white wine, and a pilgrimage to find the footprints of the heroes of my next book. I've started on my next big project, another substantial historical novel. I'm going a thousand years forward in time from the teachings of Yeshua and Mariam, looking for what happened to the body of knowledge they shared with their people.
This brings me to 1015, to the time of the Vikings, the time of the Keltic Church and the time of the Cathars when they were the strongest. And the time when they all were in conflict with the church of Rome.
This has become a lonely footnote in the history books. The Keltic Church was the first early church, established by Yeshua and his family in the first century AD. The church of Rome didn't come into existence until after 325AD, when Constantin declared Christianity to be the official religion of Rome. It became the continuation of the Roman Empire and was declared the Holy Roman Empire under Charlemagne in year 800AD.
The Keltic monks knew that their time was short before the powerful and military strong bishops ordained by Rome would take over their islands far west. It was time to come up with a plan. They knew how to anchor wisdom into stone. They decided to move their knowledge to a place where it would take a long time for the catholic church to find a foothold. They chose a place with ample mountains and stones to anchor their faith. 1000 stave churches, dragon power points, were built in Norway over 200 years. Saints were established and buried in strategic places to form a geometric figure across the land. Bishop Grimkjell knew what he was doing. It had been planned by bishops and monks for several hundred years already.
Chretien Trencavel, a cathar from Carcassonne is sent to Rouen by his grandfather to get him safely out of their territory. He befriends a young Viking warrior who claims he will be king. When Carcassonne is attacked, he willingly goes with his new friend on adventures he could never have dreamed up.
Olav, the brave young Viking, appreciates his new friend, especially one who can handle a sword with grace and strength. They get baptized in Rouen and are ready to sail to England and then his homeland of Norway, where he will find support and claim his birth right as king.
Rane, Olav's foster father and steadfast pillar of strength and wisdom, knows the auspicious signs of Olav's birth. Following a vision, Rane went to the hill where Olav's ancestor was buried sitting upright inside. He took the sword and the belt from the grave and brought them to the mother, who was in hardship giving birth. Placing the items near her, the child is born, and is given the sword and ring as gifts signifying the important birth.
I've planned a pilgrimage with Dan where we'll visit the farm of Chretien, who took the name Ketil Kalv. We will go to Nidaros where Olav was buried, and to Selja where Grimkjell's monks established the first monastery. We will find the center of the pentagram that covers the southern part of the country, making it vibrate with the wisdom taught so long ago by Yeshua and Mariam.
This brings me to 1015, to the time of the Vikings, the time of the Keltic Church and the time of the Cathars when they were the strongest. And the time when they all were in conflict with the church of Rome.
This has become a lonely footnote in the history books. The Keltic Church was the first early church, established by Yeshua and his family in the first century AD. The church of Rome didn't come into existence until after 325AD, when Constantin declared Christianity to be the official religion of Rome. It became the continuation of the Roman Empire and was declared the Holy Roman Empire under Charlemagne in year 800AD.
The Keltic monks knew that their time was short before the powerful and military strong bishops ordained by Rome would take over their islands far west. It was time to come up with a plan. They knew how to anchor wisdom into stone. They decided to move their knowledge to a place where it would take a long time for the catholic church to find a foothold. They chose a place with ample mountains and stones to anchor their faith. 1000 stave churches, dragon power points, were built in Norway over 200 years. Saints were established and buried in strategic places to form a geometric figure across the land. Bishop Grimkjell knew what he was doing. It had been planned by bishops and monks for several hundred years already.
Chretien Trencavel, a cathar from Carcassonne is sent to Rouen by his grandfather to get him safely out of their territory. He befriends a young Viking warrior who claims he will be king. When Carcassonne is attacked, he willingly goes with his new friend on adventures he could never have dreamed up.
Olav, the brave young Viking, appreciates his new friend, especially one who can handle a sword with grace and strength. They get baptized in Rouen and are ready to sail to England and then his homeland of Norway, where he will find support and claim his birth right as king.
Rane, Olav's foster father and steadfast pillar of strength and wisdom, knows the auspicious signs of Olav's birth. Following a vision, Rane went to the hill where Olav's ancestor was buried sitting upright inside. He took the sword and the belt from the grave and brought them to the mother, who was in hardship giving birth. Placing the items near her, the child is born, and is given the sword and ring as gifts signifying the important birth.
I've planned a pilgrimage with Dan where we'll visit the farm of Chretien, who took the name Ketil Kalv. We will go to Nidaros where Olav was buried, and to Selja where Grimkjell's monks established the first monastery. We will find the center of the pentagram that covers the southern part of the country, making it vibrate with the wisdom taught so long ago by Yeshua and Mariam.
Wednesday, April 2, 2014
The historical Mary Magdalene.
It's spring and the world is again bursting forth with new possibilities.
I just did a lecture on Mary Magdalene's Message at Unity in Chicago. It will soon be up on U-Tube. I find that people are interested in her story as an influential person in history, people want to have the circulating stories either debunked or affirmed. Then they want to know what she was teaching her groups of people in France, in the colonies they established in Ireland and England, and what she and Jesus were teaching before they had to escape from Jerusalem in fear of their lives.
Historically speaking:
She was most likely married to Jesus. A rabbi at the time would be expected to be married, there were many duties that could only be performed by the wife, and if Jesus was unmarried he would not have been respected. It would have been mentioned somewhere. Also, the wife was the only one who would be allowed to tend his body after the crucifixion, and Mary Magdalene laid him in the tomb. Did she stay with him through the night? Maybe. 100 lb. of aloe vera were brought to the tomb. Aloe vera is usually used to heal skin wounds, and certainly not to prepare for death. Maybe she prepared his body, not for death, but for further life.
She was a priestess. In the Bible, she is present at all the rituals. She poured the oil over his head anointing him as king. She anointed his feet at the last supper. She stood next to him during the crucifixion. Did she administer the herbs in the sponge that was given to him? The herbs that most likely made him unconscious and made him appear dead? The Romans were willing to take him down after only some hours of the day. Even Pilate was surprised at how short of a time it took. His bones were not broken. He could have survived. He was well taken care of in the capable hands of the most powerful priestess, his wife.
In Provence there are legends about her arriving with an attendant. Was it her daughter, her sister, her servant? Sarah is being honored there as the champion of the gypsies. There are legends in England about the three children; Sarah, Jesus and Joseph. They all were educated like their parents and became the "branches" on the "vine", of the family tree.
Read the book for the real stories.
Coming out with new title: Rituals in Sacred Stone, Mary Magdalene's message of self empowerment.
I'll continue presenting her teachings in the next entry.
I just did a lecture on Mary Magdalene's Message at Unity in Chicago. It will soon be up on U-Tube. I find that people are interested in her story as an influential person in history, people want to have the circulating stories either debunked or affirmed. Then they want to know what she was teaching her groups of people in France, in the colonies they established in Ireland and England, and what she and Jesus were teaching before they had to escape from Jerusalem in fear of their lives.
Historically speaking:
She was most likely married to Jesus. A rabbi at the time would be expected to be married, there were many duties that could only be performed by the wife, and if Jesus was unmarried he would not have been respected. It would have been mentioned somewhere. Also, the wife was the only one who would be allowed to tend his body after the crucifixion, and Mary Magdalene laid him in the tomb. Did she stay with him through the night? Maybe. 100 lb. of aloe vera were brought to the tomb. Aloe vera is usually used to heal skin wounds, and certainly not to prepare for death. Maybe she prepared his body, not for death, but for further life.
She was a priestess. In the Bible, she is present at all the rituals. She poured the oil over his head anointing him as king. She anointed his feet at the last supper. She stood next to him during the crucifixion. Did she administer the herbs in the sponge that was given to him? The herbs that most likely made him unconscious and made him appear dead? The Romans were willing to take him down after only some hours of the day. Even Pilate was surprised at how short of a time it took. His bones were not broken. He could have survived. He was well taken care of in the capable hands of the most powerful priestess, his wife.
In Provence there are legends about her arriving with an attendant. Was it her daughter, her sister, her servant? Sarah is being honored there as the champion of the gypsies. There are legends in England about the three children; Sarah, Jesus and Joseph. They all were educated like their parents and became the "branches" on the "vine", of the family tree.
Read the book for the real stories.
Coming out with new title: Rituals in Sacred Stone, Mary Magdalene's message of self empowerment.
I'll continue presenting her teachings in the next entry.
Tuesday, January 14, 2014
At the beginning of a new year.
Written on the first day of this new year, January 1st 2014.
This new year, this new day, feels like the bubbles of the champagne I drank last night bursting in sparkling units of new life bathed in love and joy. I have never experienced this level of a sense of NEWBORN at the beginning of a new year before.
The astrologers say we're in a rare alignment of many important planets forming a giant cross in the sky. We haven't had anything similar to this since the sixties. This is a generational occurrence giving gravitas to this auspicious moment.
What do I see? I saw myself, no, I see out of the eyes of the wounded king who raises his head to look out of the window at his frozen kingdom. As he looks out, the ice melts and the ships in the harbor of his city can move again. The frozen world bursts to life, commerce starts up and the city bubbles with culture and prosperity.
Then I see the places where I've been doing ceremonies. The circle at Contemplation Point lifts up from the ground and circles in the air spreading good intentions for new life.
The diamond at Rosehill lifts up and shakes new vibration into all the genetic material present there.
The globe in the center of Unity hangs there with all the geography, water and land visible, including the local weather patterns, receiving the well wishes from the congregation.
The city of Chicago is blanketed in fresh white, powdery snow saying HUSH HUSH, calming everything down, calming down an unruly child until he laughs and makes spitballs in excitement and joy.
An auspicious NEW YEAR indeed.
All through 2013 I felt as if I was in a holding pattern. All I started received a wait ..., wait for it ..., hold that thought ... . I haven't even written anything significant this year. I did publish the book though, after months of editing.
What do I see in 2014?
I see new possibilities, new opportunities coming to me. I see recognition, I see success. I see money coming my way. I see travels and meetings with important people.
I see myself bursting out of what I am now and into a whole new form of living.
I see myself writing the next big book and the next little book. And editing the play - and making them all into TV-shows and movies.
I see myself stay in L.A. for a while and then drive north ... to Eugene and visit my grand daughters. I see myself traveling in Norway ... and in Normandy, traveling alone to do research and to experience the book, the people, the places they walked and worked ... Nidaros, Achen, Rouen, Ireland.
The feeling of this new year is of a newborn baby's skin, soft glowing, bursting with potential life, still at peace and in no hurry to get into it all, just savoring the sensation of sunrise. This feeling, this sensation of being in the first day of a brand new year
is like being in meditation
living in a golden glow
hearing the sound of the UNIVERSE
feeling the heart of the COSMOS
beating steadily, lovingly
pulsing new life into creation
the flavor is peach in my mouth
with the color of peachy pink
surrounding me
The day is staring at me with
happy baby eyes, laughing at me
dressed in light yellow
on a soft pink background
There is no need to ask why this day feels so good. It doesn't need to explain itself. I just need to allow it to enfold me, surround me and give me this blissful feeling of that everything is good. All will unfold just the way it optimally will.
All I need to do right now is to enjoy and go with this new consciousness and allow myself to transcend.
This new year, this new day, feels like the bubbles of the champagne I drank last night bursting in sparkling units of new life bathed in love and joy. I have never experienced this level of a sense of NEWBORN at the beginning of a new year before.
The astrologers say we're in a rare alignment of many important planets forming a giant cross in the sky. We haven't had anything similar to this since the sixties. This is a generational occurrence giving gravitas to this auspicious moment.
What do I see? I saw myself, no, I see out of the eyes of the wounded king who raises his head to look out of the window at his frozen kingdom. As he looks out, the ice melts and the ships in the harbor of his city can move again. The frozen world bursts to life, commerce starts up and the city bubbles with culture and prosperity.
Then I see the places where I've been doing ceremonies. The circle at Contemplation Point lifts up from the ground and circles in the air spreading good intentions for new life.
The diamond at Rosehill lifts up and shakes new vibration into all the genetic material present there.
The globe in the center of Unity hangs there with all the geography, water and land visible, including the local weather patterns, receiving the well wishes from the congregation.
The city of Chicago is blanketed in fresh white, powdery snow saying HUSH HUSH, calming everything down, calming down an unruly child until he laughs and makes spitballs in excitement and joy.
An auspicious NEW YEAR indeed.
All through 2013 I felt as if I was in a holding pattern. All I started received a wait ..., wait for it ..., hold that thought ... . I haven't even written anything significant this year. I did publish the book though, after months of editing.
What do I see in 2014?
I see new possibilities, new opportunities coming to me. I see recognition, I see success. I see money coming my way. I see travels and meetings with important people.
I see myself bursting out of what I am now and into a whole new form of living.
I see myself writing the next big book and the next little book. And editing the play - and making them all into TV-shows and movies.
I see myself stay in L.A. for a while and then drive north ... to Eugene and visit my grand daughters. I see myself traveling in Norway ... and in Normandy, traveling alone to do research and to experience the book, the people, the places they walked and worked ... Nidaros, Achen, Rouen, Ireland.
The feeling of this new year is of a newborn baby's skin, soft glowing, bursting with potential life, still at peace and in no hurry to get into it all, just savoring the sensation of sunrise. This feeling, this sensation of being in the first day of a brand new year
is like being in meditation
living in a golden glow
hearing the sound of the UNIVERSE
feeling the heart of the COSMOS
beating steadily, lovingly
pulsing new life into creation
the flavor is peach in my mouth
with the color of peachy pink
surrounding me
The day is staring at me with
happy baby eyes, laughing at me
dressed in light yellow
on a soft pink background
There is no need to ask why this day feels so good. It doesn't need to explain itself. I just need to allow it to enfold me, surround me and give me this blissful feeling of that everything is good. All will unfold just the way it optimally will.
All I need to do right now is to enjoy and go with this new consciousness and allow myself to transcend.
Tuesday, September 17, 2013
I will be on the radio show: "Voices of the Sacred Feminine".
On Wednesday September 18th, I will be interviewed by Karen Tate on her radio show "Voices of the Sacred Feminine". I am honored to be invited to speak on her show about the research I've done to write the historical novel about Mary Magdalene and her life; "Rituals in Sacred Stone".
These are the talking points I plan to discuss with her.
1) Religion today is totally different from religion in the time of Jesus and Mary Magdalene. We consider sitting in a church on Sunday being religious, whereas in their time they lived their religion. It was alive in the legends of the Gods enacted at the festivals honoring the year. It was understood as a relationship of abilities and forces inside every person developing as they evolved in their own lives.
2) Yeshua and Mariam lived at the tipping point of a paradigm shift, just like we do today. She represented the Goddess religions of Egypt and Mesopotamia, where the old mystery schools functioned. He represented the new idea of LOVE being the new focus of religious understanding. Together they faced the old patriarchy of the Jewish traditions and of Rome.
3) Unfortunately, the Roman Empire adopted the Christian movement, adapted it to fit over the existing Mithras religion, and organized it into a Holy Roman Empire, complete with an army, vast landmasses and the same rights as kings. Religion was used to keep the people they conquered at a low developmental level, creating good sheep, to enable them to collect wealth and power. They quite effectively taught shame and guilt instead of enlightenment, and have continued to do so for two thousand years.
4) Mariam was most likely betrothed to Yeshua from birth. They represent two different tribes of the Jewish people. She, from the Benjamin tribe, him from Joseph. The Benjamin tribe had responsibility for the land the Temple stood on, and the physical temple. His tribe was responsible for the functions in the temple. Together they represented the return of the original Jewish people to claim the temple in Jerusalem. The temple had just been rebuilt by Herod the Great, but the rabbis were friendly with the Romans. A change was needed to bring it back to it's old knowledge and glory.
5) Yeshua and Mariam were well educated. She was a priestess of the old mystery schools, he was trained in the ancient temple traditions, from before the first destruction by Babylonia in about 800 BC. A secret temple existed in the desert north of Heliopolis where they kept the old knowledge. These two were not "priest and priestess" they way we think of today. They were spiritual technicians who knew how to work with unseen forces. They were experts on the laws of physics that governs the spiritual worlds. They used them and they taught them. As for her being accused of being a prostitute; let's expand the story. She comes from a tradition where the sexual act is seen as a fertility rite done in public at the solstices. Seen from a patriarchal society, everything she represents then becomes improper, immoral, disgusting and barbaric. It is very likely people like Peter, a staunch traditionalist, would give her that epitaph without understanding the profound meaning behind her culture.
6) In the Biblical text, Mary Magdalene shows up whenever there is need for a ritual. She washes his feet, she anoints his head, and she follow him through his passion and shows up at Gethsemane Garden as he awakens. Or as in my story; she stayed with him in the tomb administering to him, bringing him back from his journey. She must have been a priestess and his wife. Only a wife was allowed to handle her husbands dead body, and only a priestess could perform the rituals.
7) Much points to that they were giving initiations to their inner circle of disciples. The story of Lazarus is similar to an Egyptian tradition, an initiation called The Journey of Osiris. Administered by trained priests and priestesses, the initiate would be given anointments and herbs and placed in a safe solitary place and then leave the body, appear dead, be gone for three days and then return to their body. Shakespeare described this as Juliet's experience. In the Bible, Lazarus is sent on a similar journey. The passion of Christ seems to follow the same pattern, but including the treatment of the Romans. The question then becomes; did they plan for that outcome? Did they know what the Romans would do to a rebel, and planned their own pageantry around it? It would fit very well in the mythology of their time. There were numerous stories of the sacrificed king, giving his life for the good of his people. These stories were played in front of people at the festivals. Yeshua living it for real made him even more believable.
8) Seen from the Roman's side, the only thing worse than a hero is a dead hero, and this one didn't even die properly, but resurrected himself. This was a total blow to the Roman authority. They were made into fools in front of the unruly people of Jerusalem, who didn't behave at all like other people they had taken over and absorbed. The people of Judea rebelled. In 70AD, shortly after the story of Christ, Jerusalem was destroyed. The famous temple was leveled and people massacred. Another diaspora occurred. The Judaic people were again spread all over the world.
9) Mary Magdalene, Jesus and their families had to escape immediately after the crucifixion. Their lives were in danger. The Romans didn't want any offspring from this famous rebel, and the rabbis weren't too happy with them either since they disturbed the working relationship they had with the Roman authorities. There are legends of Jesus in India and of Mary Magdalene in France. We know of the travel routes of Joseph of Aramathea between Jerusalem and Cornwall, England, passing through the Languedoc area of France. There are also legends in England about the early church, the first altar made by Jesus and his father, the first church built by Joseph of Arimathea and the stories of the hides of land in Glastonbury given as a gift to the family by king Arviragus. They were recognized as royal and treated accordingly.
10) The body of knowledge taught by Mary Magdalene in France was perpetuated by the Cathars and the Merovingian kings. In England, it became the Celtic church, which later had its seat in Ireland, perpetuating the teachings of personal enlightenment. They were famous for keeping the wisdom, writing copies of old scriptures and building monasteries, the universities of their time. As the Celtic church was building in Ireland, and started establishing monasteries and learning centers in Germany and France; the Catholic Church was building their influence from Rome and heading north. You now had two different belief systems building up to a clash of dimensions. The clash came with Charlemagne, who continued conquering northward, while the Celtic church aligned themselves with the Vikings as their armed warriors. This is the focus of my next book; "Secrets in Sacred Stone".
11) We are now at a time when the wisdom of old is being reawakened. The teachings of Mary Magdalene are hidden in forgotten parchments and symbols in stained glass windows. The way to find her is to go within and find where your body resonates with her. Enlightenment is a very physical endeavor. It is a question of establishing more light inside your body. This very refined process is what she taught. It is coming back. In the media of our time, we are finding her everywhere. Thanks to this radioshow, and other similar work all aimed at healing this emptiness, she is returning in our awareness. We are again realizing that we can build our own inner light, and we are starting to figure out how. Lennon said it best; Love is the answer.
I look forward to talking with Karen tomorrow. Please join me at 8pm Central time or hear the interview from the archives later.
Wencke.
These are the talking points I plan to discuss with her.
1) Religion today is totally different from religion in the time of Jesus and Mary Magdalene. We consider sitting in a church on Sunday being religious, whereas in their time they lived their religion. It was alive in the legends of the Gods enacted at the festivals honoring the year. It was understood as a relationship of abilities and forces inside every person developing as they evolved in their own lives.
2) Yeshua and Mariam lived at the tipping point of a paradigm shift, just like we do today. She represented the Goddess religions of Egypt and Mesopotamia, where the old mystery schools functioned. He represented the new idea of LOVE being the new focus of religious understanding. Together they faced the old patriarchy of the Jewish traditions and of Rome.
3) Unfortunately, the Roman Empire adopted the Christian movement, adapted it to fit over the existing Mithras religion, and organized it into a Holy Roman Empire, complete with an army, vast landmasses and the same rights as kings. Religion was used to keep the people they conquered at a low developmental level, creating good sheep, to enable them to collect wealth and power. They quite effectively taught shame and guilt instead of enlightenment, and have continued to do so for two thousand years.
4) Mariam was most likely betrothed to Yeshua from birth. They represent two different tribes of the Jewish people. She, from the Benjamin tribe, him from Joseph. The Benjamin tribe had responsibility for the land the Temple stood on, and the physical temple. His tribe was responsible for the functions in the temple. Together they represented the return of the original Jewish people to claim the temple in Jerusalem. The temple had just been rebuilt by Herod the Great, but the rabbis were friendly with the Romans. A change was needed to bring it back to it's old knowledge and glory.
5) Yeshua and Mariam were well educated. She was a priestess of the old mystery schools, he was trained in the ancient temple traditions, from before the first destruction by Babylonia in about 800 BC. A secret temple existed in the desert north of Heliopolis where they kept the old knowledge. These two were not "priest and priestess" they way we think of today. They were spiritual technicians who knew how to work with unseen forces. They were experts on the laws of physics that governs the spiritual worlds. They used them and they taught them. As for her being accused of being a prostitute; let's expand the story. She comes from a tradition where the sexual act is seen as a fertility rite done in public at the solstices. Seen from a patriarchal society, everything she represents then becomes improper, immoral, disgusting and barbaric. It is very likely people like Peter, a staunch traditionalist, would give her that epitaph without understanding the profound meaning behind her culture.
6) In the Biblical text, Mary Magdalene shows up whenever there is need for a ritual. She washes his feet, she anoints his head, and she follow him through his passion and shows up at Gethsemane Garden as he awakens. Or as in my story; she stayed with him in the tomb administering to him, bringing him back from his journey. She must have been a priestess and his wife. Only a wife was allowed to handle her husbands dead body, and only a priestess could perform the rituals.
7) Much points to that they were giving initiations to their inner circle of disciples. The story of Lazarus is similar to an Egyptian tradition, an initiation called The Journey of Osiris. Administered by trained priests and priestesses, the initiate would be given anointments and herbs and placed in a safe solitary place and then leave the body, appear dead, be gone for three days and then return to their body. Shakespeare described this as Juliet's experience. In the Bible, Lazarus is sent on a similar journey. The passion of Christ seems to follow the same pattern, but including the treatment of the Romans. The question then becomes; did they plan for that outcome? Did they know what the Romans would do to a rebel, and planned their own pageantry around it? It would fit very well in the mythology of their time. There were numerous stories of the sacrificed king, giving his life for the good of his people. These stories were played in front of people at the festivals. Yeshua living it for real made him even more believable.
8) Seen from the Roman's side, the only thing worse than a hero is a dead hero, and this one didn't even die properly, but resurrected himself. This was a total blow to the Roman authority. They were made into fools in front of the unruly people of Jerusalem, who didn't behave at all like other people they had taken over and absorbed. The people of Judea rebelled. In 70AD, shortly after the story of Christ, Jerusalem was destroyed. The famous temple was leveled and people massacred. Another diaspora occurred. The Judaic people were again spread all over the world.
9) Mary Magdalene, Jesus and their families had to escape immediately after the crucifixion. Their lives were in danger. The Romans didn't want any offspring from this famous rebel, and the rabbis weren't too happy with them either since they disturbed the working relationship they had with the Roman authorities. There are legends of Jesus in India and of Mary Magdalene in France. We know of the travel routes of Joseph of Aramathea between Jerusalem and Cornwall, England, passing through the Languedoc area of France. There are also legends in England about the early church, the first altar made by Jesus and his father, the first church built by Joseph of Arimathea and the stories of the hides of land in Glastonbury given as a gift to the family by king Arviragus. They were recognized as royal and treated accordingly.
10) The body of knowledge taught by Mary Magdalene in France was perpetuated by the Cathars and the Merovingian kings. In England, it became the Celtic church, which later had its seat in Ireland, perpetuating the teachings of personal enlightenment. They were famous for keeping the wisdom, writing copies of old scriptures and building monasteries, the universities of their time. As the Celtic church was building in Ireland, and started establishing monasteries and learning centers in Germany and France; the Catholic Church was building their influence from Rome and heading north. You now had two different belief systems building up to a clash of dimensions. The clash came with Charlemagne, who continued conquering northward, while the Celtic church aligned themselves with the Vikings as their armed warriors. This is the focus of my next book; "Secrets in Sacred Stone".
11) We are now at a time when the wisdom of old is being reawakened. The teachings of Mary Magdalene are hidden in forgotten parchments and symbols in stained glass windows. The way to find her is to go within and find where your body resonates with her. Enlightenment is a very physical endeavor. It is a question of establishing more light inside your body. This very refined process is what she taught. It is coming back. In the media of our time, we are finding her everywhere. Thanks to this radioshow, and other similar work all aimed at healing this emptiness, she is returning in our awareness. We are again realizing that we can build our own inner light, and we are starting to figure out how. Lennon said it best; Love is the answer.
I look forward to talking with Karen tomorrow. Please join me at 8pm Central time or hear the interview from the archives later.
Wencke.
Monday, September 16, 2013
I just listened to an interview by Karen Tate on her radio show "Voices of the Sacred Feminine" where she talked with an anthropologist from Italy who guides spiritual tours with Mary Magdalene as their focus. It was interesting to hear her speak from an academic view point and then describe the very emotional responses of her pilgrims.
I've been a pilgrim visiting the site they described. As I traveled alone in France, I went to the cave she described in the mountains near St.Baume. Karen asked about why the pilgrims were perturbed, but there wasn't enough time to go into the details. Well, I remember it well.
I came there on my research journey for "Rituals in Sacred Stone", and visited the cave after I had just been to the cathedral where her skull is displayed and had a profound experience there. My head was full of wonder over what I had seen and I felt her spirit very close, so I wanted to visit the cave as well and be further inspired. I was quickly shocked out of my reveries.
The landscape I arrived at was lovely with rolling hills and meadows, and surrounded with steep mountainsides, not too tall. You can see some buildings hanging onto the mountain and there is a well tended path to walk. As I walked the path, still in wonder of what I'd experienced so far, I was further inspired by old oak trees and a path that many pilgrims had walked before me. I came to some steps leading up into the mountain, nicely cut into the stone and I appreciated the fine craftsmanship. As I turned the last sharp switchback of the steps, I faced a life size crucifixion scene, complete with three crosses with twisted men on them. They were situated above the short stonewall flanking the stairs, right in eye sight from where you have to turn. I had been reflecting on the female side of God, on the life giving, nurturing, creative side, feeling hugged by Mary Magdalene as I walked. The brutality of the realism of the scene was shocking to my system. And why was it there? It certainly wasn't there when she used the cave, and not a memory she would appreciate to be faced with every day.
I had to pass right underneath the display and I felt the eyes of the dying men following my back as I continue to the top. There is a humble little church there and some other buildings. A monk walked between looking like he lived there. He did not greet me and looked annoyed that I was there. I walked through the church to get to the entrance of the cave and tried to be as respectful as I could even though I did not grow up catholic and don't know the motions.
The cave is huge and has many sections to it. You come in at the upper part and there is a staircase to the lower area. I saw several white marble sculptures placed somewhat randomly among the dark rock formations. You can't help but rest your eyes on them, they are so white in the darkness. I remember the typical theme of the reclining penitent, eyes upward, arms up along her head in total submission, bared breast to show that she can't help her flaming sexual desires. This is not the Magdalene I know and had met so profoundly earlier in the day. I walked down the stairs and at the lower level I had a better experience. There was an alabaster jar on display that looked ancient, but bigger and heavier that what I think she could carry around. In the back there was an altar and a stream of water was running down the side of the interior mountain wall.
The whole place looked staged to display the old view of the church, as if they had taken even this, the place she actually used and worshipped at, and turned it into a reminder of the overemphasis on the suffering of Christ and the penitent prostitute she absolutely wasn't. I left the place somewhat disturbed. On the way back to my car I was again renewed by the nature scene and the old oak trees. They sky showed me an unusual break through of light between some dark clouds, and I took that as a good sign.
I've heard that there is a place on top of the mountain you can also walk to, which isn't very far or strenuous. I didn't know about this at the time, so I didn't go, but I've heard of others who have had gatherings there and said that it is a powerful spot. It is devoid of church paraphernalia and connects to the consciousness she established inside the mountain, truly a power point.
I traveled in France to do research for my historical novel about Mary Magdalene. I had many profound experiences on the way. The book is not about my travels, though, it is following her throughout her life. I describe her education in Alexandria and Ephesus, her work next to Jesus in their few years in Jerusalem and her exile in France. In my book they are married and have three children.
In the radio program, Karen Tate mention Lynne Pinkett's work where she suggests that they knew the Isis-Osiris mysteries. In my book I describe the Journey of Osiris as an initiation Mary Magdalene knew how to administrate. Similarly to Shakespeare's Juliet, the initiate is given a potion, appears dead for three days and awakens on the third. This initiation was offered to Lazarus and was used for the crucifixion to achieve it's effect and satisfy the Romans. According to the gospels, Jesus was up there for a very short time. Usually crucified people were left to be eaten by the birds, but he was taken carefully down after no more than three hours and carried to a tomb. Nicodemus and Joseph of Aramathea brought 100 pounds of aloe vera to care for his body. Now we all know that aloe vera is extraordinarily effective in healing injured skin. It is not what you would use to prepare a body for burial. It is an herb supporting life, not used to honor the dead. In my story she stays with him in the tomb. As his wife, she's the only one who is supposed to handle his naked body. As his priestess, she's the only one who knows how to bring him back. As his closest disciple, this is the only place she wants to be.
So did he defy death? Or did he visit the other side and came back, the way the Egyptians knew all about how to accomplish? The apparent order of events would have been the same either way, but carry different interpretations according to how much you were prepared to understand. Those with ears to hear will hear.
I'm sharing all this because I will be on Karen Tate's radio program Wednesday September 18th. We will talk about my book, "Rituals in Sacred Stone", but more importantly we will talk about my research. Seven years of extensive reading and travels to Egypt and France went into this and I finally published the book with Balboa Press. I feel that my work gives a new controversial interpretation of a story we all are looking for more details on. I wrote this combining historical facts, connecting the dots in the story and by submerging my self profoundly in her life. My readers have given me great feedback as they connect with her spirit.
Please join me on Wednesday for "Voices of the Sacred Feminine" or listen to the program later from the archives. I would love to hear what you think.
Wencke.
Thursday, August 1, 2013
Frequencies.
Dear readers and followers,
I've been away from my blog for a while, have needed some time to chill. The sale of the book is going better from my car than from Amazon, but I have several things on the go to improve the situation.
What has she taught me over the summer? I'm always in an open space to come to further understanding. And what has really become crystal clear to me is that we live from our intention. How we think is how we live. And the more you can include everything around you as an expression of you, and love it weather you like it or not, the more you can shift things to the better.
I'm also understanding better the purpose of ritual. To take an object and say that it carries this meaning, and place it in a meaningful context, and then imbue it with intention, builds power. It builds personal power and it gives you an opportunity to affect the physical world.
The physical world is so much more than hard things. Everything vibrates according to it's own frequency and that vibrational field creates the objects we experience. We understand this more now since we can talk about microwaves, electricity and the internet. We have developed our own metaphors to understand this better. And we can now talk about the different parts of our inner life and give it definition. Our intentions, our emotions, our thoughts, our intuition felt deep inside our body, are all aspects of our inner life which we can talk about and relate to. And now we also understand that all these modalities of thought effect everything around us.
I know the phrase "we create our own reality" is a household concept. But do we really know the physical properties of why this is true? Do we understand that all is frequency and our thoughts carry a tremendous power that changes the frequencies of everything else? It is time for this to be crystal clear and that we own every intentional frequency we send out and make sure it is coated in love. That was their message. It's time that we live it.
I've been away from my blog for a while, have needed some time to chill. The sale of the book is going better from my car than from Amazon, but I have several things on the go to improve the situation.
What has she taught me over the summer? I'm always in an open space to come to further understanding. And what has really become crystal clear to me is that we live from our intention. How we think is how we live. And the more you can include everything around you as an expression of you, and love it weather you like it or not, the more you can shift things to the better.
I'm also understanding better the purpose of ritual. To take an object and say that it carries this meaning, and place it in a meaningful context, and then imbue it with intention, builds power. It builds personal power and it gives you an opportunity to affect the physical world.
The physical world is so much more than hard things. Everything vibrates according to it's own frequency and that vibrational field creates the objects we experience. We understand this more now since we can talk about microwaves, electricity and the internet. We have developed our own metaphors to understand this better. And we can now talk about the different parts of our inner life and give it definition. Our intentions, our emotions, our thoughts, our intuition felt deep inside our body, are all aspects of our inner life which we can talk about and relate to. And now we also understand that all these modalities of thought effect everything around us.
I know the phrase "we create our own reality" is a household concept. But do we really know the physical properties of why this is true? Do we understand that all is frequency and our thoughts carry a tremendous power that changes the frequencies of everything else? It is time for this to be crystal clear and that we own every intentional frequency we send out and make sure it is coated in love. That was their message. It's time that we live it.
Sunday, April 14, 2013
The new book about Mary Magdalene.
"Rituals in Sacred Stone"
"Wencke Braathen harvests the historical and the mythical knowledge of Mary Magdalene, and renders a story that allows us to embrace both the human and divine. Rituals in Sacred Stone retells the story of Mary Magdalene and Jesus in the context of a sacred culture where joining of woman and man completes and balances the energies of the universe, and where light exists beyond death. Reading this book is a healing journey for those weary of the androgen religions"
...Carrie Ingrisano
Friday, March 8, 2013
The book is launched!
It's here!
The long awaited historical novel I've been working on for seven years. It is available on Amazon, and a click away on the image of the front cover.
For a couple of days I've felt like a mother holding her newborn, panting after a long delivery. I've been holding the book in my hand, admiring it's weight and size and allowing the front cover to to stare at me.
Balboa Press did a great job designing the front and the interior. I was envisioning a much more elaborate picture, but they suggested a more austere, simple photo where the viewer is emerging from a cave. That seems fitting for the story about this fascinating woman who have been not only covered in historic dust, but actively suppressed for close to two thousand years. Let us find our way together with her out of the cave, out of the darkness of the interiors of the earth. The story about her, the story about the suppressed feminine, need to find it's way into the sunshine, and it needs our feet to walk on.
My book takes place in Alexandria, in Jerusalem and in Southern France in their time frame. She did hide her true identity to be safe, even then, but that was by choice. According to my research, the mystery schools were in their last chapters, and the priestesses knew that their knowledge would have to be hidden to be preserved. The desert sand flew over and covered the temples, but the very stones of their buildings remember and still vibrate with their frequency.
I can't claim truth, but I can claim an interpretation based on good research, good intuition for connecting the dots of history, and personal experience from walking the sand and touching the stones where she traveled.
As I dived into this story, it did not follow the scriptures. It did not want to include every mention of her in the gospels. Instead, it wanted me to write about the intense political arena they lived in. It wanted every ritual she performed described. It focused on the profound effect she had on the development of consciousness on the earth, as she worked with the Gods behind the scenes of what was apparent. I had to feel what she experienced so I could go into the interior process of how she moved energy. It wasn't always comfortable. I was at a loss for antique sounding words for energy work, and figured that they would have had proper phrases in Aramaic and forgive my translation into modern English.
Describing how the process of enlightenment works inside your body had it's effect on me. I had to become familiar with all the ways this is described in mythology, in symbology, in stories that are found in all cultures. Giving justice to this natural process made me humble. I had to find and understand this magnificent possibility inherent in human flesh. It is our invitation as we incarnate in these incredible bodily structures that are capable of so much more than we realize.
We've learned. We've advanced, and we've forgotten. It is time to walk out of the cave. It's time to brush some dust off the desert stones and listen.
Today, March 8th, there is a celebration at the Tor in Glastonbury. It celebrates the Magdalene Stareeds now being dispersed over the earth. Read more about it here.
http://www.cosmicconsciousnessonline.com/
It seems like there is an awakening taking place across the globe. This is an awakening to partnership, to finding the balance between everything that appear as opposites. This is the balance we want to find inside every human being, the harmony inside when all of parts of you sing the same song.
Next entry will be about the process I discovered. I promise.
The long awaited historical novel I've been working on for seven years. It is available on Amazon, and a click away on the image of the front cover.
For a couple of days I've felt like a mother holding her newborn, panting after a long delivery. I've been holding the book in my hand, admiring it's weight and size and allowing the front cover to to stare at me.
Balboa Press did a great job designing the front and the interior. I was envisioning a much more elaborate picture, but they suggested a more austere, simple photo where the viewer is emerging from a cave. That seems fitting for the story about this fascinating woman who have been not only covered in historic dust, but actively suppressed for close to two thousand years. Let us find our way together with her out of the cave, out of the darkness of the interiors of the earth. The story about her, the story about the suppressed feminine, need to find it's way into the sunshine, and it needs our feet to walk on.
My book takes place in Alexandria, in Jerusalem and in Southern France in their time frame. She did hide her true identity to be safe, even then, but that was by choice. According to my research, the mystery schools were in their last chapters, and the priestesses knew that their knowledge would have to be hidden to be preserved. The desert sand flew over and covered the temples, but the very stones of their buildings remember and still vibrate with their frequency.
I can't claim truth, but I can claim an interpretation based on good research, good intuition for connecting the dots of history, and personal experience from walking the sand and touching the stones where she traveled.
As I dived into this story, it did not follow the scriptures. It did not want to include every mention of her in the gospels. Instead, it wanted me to write about the intense political arena they lived in. It wanted every ritual she performed described. It focused on the profound effect she had on the development of consciousness on the earth, as she worked with the Gods behind the scenes of what was apparent. I had to feel what she experienced so I could go into the interior process of how she moved energy. It wasn't always comfortable. I was at a loss for antique sounding words for energy work, and figured that they would have had proper phrases in Aramaic and forgive my translation into modern English.
Describing how the process of enlightenment works inside your body had it's effect on me. I had to become familiar with all the ways this is described in mythology, in symbology, in stories that are found in all cultures. Giving justice to this natural process made me humble. I had to find and understand this magnificent possibility inherent in human flesh. It is our invitation as we incarnate in these incredible bodily structures that are capable of so much more than we realize.
We've learned. We've advanced, and we've forgotten. It is time to walk out of the cave. It's time to brush some dust off the desert stones and listen.
Today, March 8th, there is a celebration at the Tor in Glastonbury. It celebrates the Magdalene Stareeds now being dispersed over the earth. Read more about it here.
http://www.cosmicconsciousnessonline.com/
It seems like there is an awakening taking place across the globe. This is an awakening to partnership, to finding the balance between everything that appear as opposites. This is the balance we want to find inside every human being, the harmony inside when all of parts of you sing the same song.
Next entry will be about the process I discovered. I promise.
Tuesday, February 19, 2013
"RITUALS IN SACRED STONE", to be published by the end of March.
It's been a some time since I wrote an entry. I've been busy with the publishing process of the book. (And Christmas and my birthday.)
It is now ready for the first printing, and I'm feeling like a squirrel running up and down trees. I'm of course excited about this development, but I'm also scared to death. The research and the writing of this work has all been a very private process. Now it's all becoming public. I'm birthing a baby. I'm on the outward journey after an inward one, where I've retreated to my little room and dived into my story, walking with my characters and feeling their emotions through this dramatic story. It's been a heartwrenching experience. Mary Magdalene's life was filled with danger and heavy decisions. She was burdened with her heritage and her knowlegde. They led her to make crucial choices at difficult crossing points leading her to secretly carry a lot of information she would rather not be privelieged to have.
I've always felt that the story of the head of John the Baptist was missing some crucial elements. Young Salome wouldn't have the desire for a man's execution. There is more to the story. In one version, she consults her mother, before she presents her wish. I looked up her mother, and found that her name was Herodias, the widow of Herod Philip, who upon her husbands death was forced to marry his brother, Herod Antipas. Now the plot thickens. I also found that John the Baptist had protested against the behavior of Antipas, who had divorced his previous wife to marry Herodias, and was trying to get into the council at the Temple of Jerusalem. According to the Jews, divorce was not allowed, and only Rabbis could be on the council. What was Antipas trying to do, being a Roman with no Jewish connections? Now we have a political hornets nest which the good Baptizer put his religious nose right into.
As I researched Herodias, I found that she was educated at Ephesus, famous for it's oracle, and that she had a following of admirers. Now we have a much more interesting set up for the story.
The more I looked into the mystery schools in function at their time, I found that they all respected each other and students traveled between the different temples to learn the different traditions. The druids had their universities, the Egyptian temples had their temple schools, and the exchange of information was welcomed.
There was a different focus for the religious centers. They weren't focused on worshiping the Gods. They were working with the Gods, in the focus of the temple in questions. They were all presenting different paths to relate to the unseen forces functioning between us, whether you used them for healing, to communicate with God or to take the journey of Osiris. All the different ways were valid and seen as different paths to God.
And today we are fighting over which way to worship God, to the point of disagreeing on which hymn to sing.
It is very likely that Mary Magdalene was a highly educated priestess of rank in several temples. There were things happening around Christ which shows that they worked across many traditions and used elements from the Egyptian Journey of Osiris, the healing thechnique from the Therapautae group, the wisdom of the Nazareeans and the Essenes, and older wisdom of the Torah.
I found that the temple of Serabit on top of Sinai knew how to make monoatomic gold and how to work with it. It could be ingested to produce enlightenment from within, or it could be used as an advanced architectural technology to build pyramids.
I was now introduced a world very different than our own, and very very different than the passive church going of our time which passes as relationships to God. To these people, God was a concept that lived inside you. It was a force you learned to work with. The world behind the veils was somewhere you could learn to visit and come back from.
Did Herodias know how to create an oracle? Was the head of John the Baptist presented at the birthday party of Antipas not the product of a brutal and gory exectution, but a product of a planned operation creating an oracular head which could be woken up by an educated priestess from Ephesus? And why did Herodias want it? Or did she want it back? What happened to it afterwards? And why do we have two places, one in Spain and one in Turkey, that claim to have the head of John the Baptist on display?
On my pilgrimage through France finding the footsteps of Mary Magdalene in the Languedoc and Provence, I visited a church in a mountain town between Aix-en-Provence and Marseille. This cathedral was dedicated to the Holy Balm, and I wondered what significance this herbal product could have. In their crypt they had a head on display. They claimed it was the skull of Mary Magdalene.
I was full of questions as I descended the stairs. Did someone desecrate her grave? Did they dig her up at some point and give a bone to various different churches that qualified? I actually didn't run across any other relic of her body in my travels. So why was this head saved, prepared and put on display? It was a skull with some skin still on it and some hair on one side. Was it prepared as an oracle by an expert priestess from Ephesus?
The book is coming out by the end of March. See what I found out over eight years of research and pilgrimage, both in interesting landscapes and in my own inner worlds. "Rituals in Sacred Stone" became a controversial interpretation of one of the most mysterious and compelling women in history; wife, priestess and queen, Mary Magdalene.
It's been a some time since I wrote an entry. I've been busy with the publishing process of the book. (And Christmas and my birthday.)
It is now ready for the first printing, and I'm feeling like a squirrel running up and down trees. I'm of course excited about this development, but I'm also scared to death. The research and the writing of this work has all been a very private process. Now it's all becoming public. I'm birthing a baby. I'm on the outward journey after an inward one, where I've retreated to my little room and dived into my story, walking with my characters and feeling their emotions through this dramatic story. It's been a heartwrenching experience. Mary Magdalene's life was filled with danger and heavy decisions. She was burdened with her heritage and her knowlegde. They led her to make crucial choices at difficult crossing points leading her to secretly carry a lot of information she would rather not be privelieged to have.
I've always felt that the story of the head of John the Baptist was missing some crucial elements. Young Salome wouldn't have the desire for a man's execution. There is more to the story. In one version, she consults her mother, before she presents her wish. I looked up her mother, and found that her name was Herodias, the widow of Herod Philip, who upon her husbands death was forced to marry his brother, Herod Antipas. Now the plot thickens. I also found that John the Baptist had protested against the behavior of Antipas, who had divorced his previous wife to marry Herodias, and was trying to get into the council at the Temple of Jerusalem. According to the Jews, divorce was not allowed, and only Rabbis could be on the council. What was Antipas trying to do, being a Roman with no Jewish connections? Now we have a political hornets nest which the good Baptizer put his religious nose right into.
As I researched Herodias, I found that she was educated at Ephesus, famous for it's oracle, and that she had a following of admirers. Now we have a much more interesting set up for the story.
The more I looked into the mystery schools in function at their time, I found that they all respected each other and students traveled between the different temples to learn the different traditions. The druids had their universities, the Egyptian temples had their temple schools, and the exchange of information was welcomed.
There was a different focus for the religious centers. They weren't focused on worshiping the Gods. They were working with the Gods, in the focus of the temple in questions. They were all presenting different paths to relate to the unseen forces functioning between us, whether you used them for healing, to communicate with God or to take the journey of Osiris. All the different ways were valid and seen as different paths to God.
And today we are fighting over which way to worship God, to the point of disagreeing on which hymn to sing.
It is very likely that Mary Magdalene was a highly educated priestess of rank in several temples. There were things happening around Christ which shows that they worked across many traditions and used elements from the Egyptian Journey of Osiris, the healing thechnique from the Therapautae group, the wisdom of the Nazareeans and the Essenes, and older wisdom of the Torah.
I found that the temple of Serabit on top of Sinai knew how to make monoatomic gold and how to work with it. It could be ingested to produce enlightenment from within, or it could be used as an advanced architectural technology to build pyramids.
I was now introduced a world very different than our own, and very very different than the passive church going of our time which passes as relationships to God. To these people, God was a concept that lived inside you. It was a force you learned to work with. The world behind the veils was somewhere you could learn to visit and come back from.
Did Herodias know how to create an oracle? Was the head of John the Baptist presented at the birthday party of Antipas not the product of a brutal and gory exectution, but a product of a planned operation creating an oracular head which could be woken up by an educated priestess from Ephesus? And why did Herodias want it? Or did she want it back? What happened to it afterwards? And why do we have two places, one in Spain and one in Turkey, that claim to have the head of John the Baptist on display?
On my pilgrimage through France finding the footsteps of Mary Magdalene in the Languedoc and Provence, I visited a church in a mountain town between Aix-en-Provence and Marseille. This cathedral was dedicated to the Holy Balm, and I wondered what significance this herbal product could have. In their crypt they had a head on display. They claimed it was the skull of Mary Magdalene.
I was full of questions as I descended the stairs. Did someone desecrate her grave? Did they dig her up at some point and give a bone to various different churches that qualified? I actually didn't run across any other relic of her body in my travels. So why was this head saved, prepared and put on display? It was a skull with some skin still on it and some hair on one side. Was it prepared as an oracle by an expert priestess from Ephesus?
The book is coming out by the end of March. See what I found out over eight years of research and pilgrimage, both in interesting landscapes and in my own inner worlds. "Rituals in Sacred Stone" became a controversial interpretation of one of the most mysterious and compelling women in history; wife, priestess and queen, Mary Magdalene.
Thursday, November 8, 2012
"RITUALS IN SACRED STONE"
This is the title of my book which is in process with Balboa Press. It will be out December/January, I am of course hoping for a Christmas launch.
Balboa is promising that it will be available on Amazon, offered to "Barnes and Noble" and numerous other bookstores. We will create a press release and I hope to make some waves with this.
Mary Magdalene's immense historical importance has been suppressed and ignored for more than a thousand years. It is time to separate the Biblical Jesus, the historical Jesus and the persona surrounded by dogmas by the Catholic church. They really are three very different entities and people have very different relationships with them.
Many are familiar with the Biblical Jesus and the stories in the New Testament. They are somewhat repeated four times, and are short with relatively little additional information about his life. The saviour presented by the Catholic Church is floating in a sea of concepts connected to symbols that have attached themselves to peoples DNA through the centuries of systematic insistence on their importance. Most of them are constructs to install a true fear of stepping outside the accepted realm of the church. It has been extraordinarily effective in creating good sheep instead of free thinking people encouraged to continue their own inquiry.
The historical Jesus is starting to take shape as he is uncovered from historical dust and intentional coverups. Many great authors have done some remarkable research and written great academic books that give a vivid picture of his time and culture. We are fleshing out the story, making Jesus a person who lived a life on Earth and changed history.
As we are finding the man who's teachings shaped Western civilization we are insisting on discovering more of his human side. Afterall, he lived a life as a human among other human beings, in a culture that was bustling with political strife, bombarded with influences from all the different nations within the Roman empire and with his own struggles to define his role in a religious world in turmoil. What makes me stand in awe at this process we are tumbling our way through, as we separate what is belief and what is more likely historically true, we are somehow managing to allow his humanity and his divinity to coexist. Yes, he was human in his life among us, but he was also extremely conscious of his divine side and in close connection with God, angels and the unseen forces that guide our lives.
And as we are defining Jesus as both human and divine, we are finding our own divinity. We are also both human and divine. This is becoming a more conscious thought among us and expanding our view of ourselves. And like Jesus said; we can achieve the same state of consciousness as him. We might still have to recognize our shortcomings and in all humility take an inventory of ourselves, and then set out to do some serious inner work. But by finding His human side, we are finding our own divine spark.
The greeting of Namaste is such a beautiful way of recognizing our fellow citizens of this planet. The true meaning of the greeting is; "The spark of God within me recognizes the spark of God within you." If we all could greet eachother with this in mind, there would be PEACE on earth.
This is the title of my book which is in process with Balboa Press. It will be out December/January, I am of course hoping for a Christmas launch.
Balboa is promising that it will be available on Amazon, offered to "Barnes and Noble" and numerous other bookstores. We will create a press release and I hope to make some waves with this.
Mary Magdalene's immense historical importance has been suppressed and ignored for more than a thousand years. It is time to separate the Biblical Jesus, the historical Jesus and the persona surrounded by dogmas by the Catholic church. They really are three very different entities and people have very different relationships with them.
Many are familiar with the Biblical Jesus and the stories in the New Testament. They are somewhat repeated four times, and are short with relatively little additional information about his life. The saviour presented by the Catholic Church is floating in a sea of concepts connected to symbols that have attached themselves to peoples DNA through the centuries of systematic insistence on their importance. Most of them are constructs to install a true fear of stepping outside the accepted realm of the church. It has been extraordinarily effective in creating good sheep instead of free thinking people encouraged to continue their own inquiry.
The historical Jesus is starting to take shape as he is uncovered from historical dust and intentional coverups. Many great authors have done some remarkable research and written great academic books that give a vivid picture of his time and culture. We are fleshing out the story, making Jesus a person who lived a life on Earth and changed history.
As we are finding the man who's teachings shaped Western civilization we are insisting on discovering more of his human side. Afterall, he lived a life as a human among other human beings, in a culture that was bustling with political strife, bombarded with influences from all the different nations within the Roman empire and with his own struggles to define his role in a religious world in turmoil. What makes me stand in awe at this process we are tumbling our way through, as we separate what is belief and what is more likely historically true, we are somehow managing to allow his humanity and his divinity to coexist. Yes, he was human in his life among us, but he was also extremely conscious of his divine side and in close connection with God, angels and the unseen forces that guide our lives.
And as we are defining Jesus as both human and divine, we are finding our own divinity. We are also both human and divine. This is becoming a more conscious thought among us and expanding our view of ourselves. And like Jesus said; we can achieve the same state of consciousness as him. We might still have to recognize our shortcomings and in all humility take an inventory of ourselves, and then set out to do some serious inner work. But by finding His human side, we are finding our own divine spark.
The greeting of Namaste is such a beautiful way of recognizing our fellow citizens of this planet. The true meaning of the greeting is; "The spark of God within me recognizes the spark of God within you." If we all could greet eachother with this in mind, there would be PEACE on earth.
Sunday, October 7, 2012
New historical novel; "Rituals in Sacred Stone".
I've taken a big step forward. I'm going to publish her book. This is a manuscript I've had as a work in progress for seven years. I've wanted to give birth to this baby, but haven't been able to, haven't had the urge, haven't wanted to part with her, haven't felt she or I was ready.
Well, all that has changed. The time is right. This story needs to be out among people.
I'm working with Balboa Press, part of Hay House, to publish my historical novel "Rituals in Sacres Stone". Hopefully it will be out by Christmas. This is the story of the life of Mary Magdalene interpreted after I submerged myself in the world of Egypt, Judea and Gallia 2000 years ago. I started by studying church history from I was very young, looking for scriptures outside of the Bible. It took many decades before more useful information became available. Over the last twenty years or so, a lot of great research has been published. Notable authors like Henry Lincoln, Laurence Gardner, Graham Hancock, William Henry, Philip Gardiner, Elaine Pagels and Karen King have done academic research that caught the public attention and couldn't be ignored. There is now a body of material about Jesus as an historical figure that is accepted next to the Jesus presented by the church.
I've read everything I could get my hands on that had even the remotes connection to Mary Magdalene and her time. I've studied the most obscure hypothesis and the most grounded statements about the Roman Empire. Along with that, I've measured what I've learned with my own physical experiences. I learned to meditate at the age of nineteen which changed my life and stayed with me as a daily focus. Coming from a country with a small population and a lot of forests and fjords, my connection with nature was developed at an early age. Having given birth to four children made me very aware of the functions of my own female body. Studying human self discovery brought me to the conclusion that enlightenment is a very physical job. Studying alchemy taught me how.
With this packaged background, I went to France to follow her footsteps. I walked the footpaths along some mountains, I found castles, cathedrals and grottos that claimed a connection with Mary Magdalene. In Provence I had a profound experience in a crypt which displayed her skull.
Only then could I write her story.
My late friend Richard claimed that this was channeled material when he edited the book. I'm honored to be chosen to reveal her story the way it was presented to me.
This is a controversial interpretation. There are severed heads featured as important characters. John the Baptists fate gets a new angle. There is a background story to the head the Temple Knights are referring to. Jesus and Mary Magdalene were married and had a deep understanding of the physical union between husband and wife. There were rituals performed that anchored their profound knowledge and high frequency in the sacred stones of the temple of Jerusalem. There are stones in France still vibrating her song.
"Rituals in Sacred Stones" is a big book about a big story featuring a powerful woman history has done it's best to bury under the stone floors of old cathedrals. But old stones don't forget. They are whispering that there is so much more to know, as historical facts, as intuitive visions and in the very juices of your own body.
Our DNA vibrates all of human history. The water we drink has circled through other bodies, other lifetimes, other cities in other countries in another era of human civilization. Every one of us vibrate the story of everybody else. There is so much knowledge to be found inside the cells that keep us alive every day. The same sun observes our evolution all the way back to green soup that carried all possibilities.
Well, all that has changed. The time is right. This story needs to be out among people.
I'm working with Balboa Press, part of Hay House, to publish my historical novel "Rituals in Sacres Stone". Hopefully it will be out by Christmas. This is the story of the life of Mary Magdalene interpreted after I submerged myself in the world of Egypt, Judea and Gallia 2000 years ago. I started by studying church history from I was very young, looking for scriptures outside of the Bible. It took many decades before more useful information became available. Over the last twenty years or so, a lot of great research has been published. Notable authors like Henry Lincoln, Laurence Gardner, Graham Hancock, William Henry, Philip Gardiner, Elaine Pagels and Karen King have done academic research that caught the public attention and couldn't be ignored. There is now a body of material about Jesus as an historical figure that is accepted next to the Jesus presented by the church.
I've read everything I could get my hands on that had even the remotes connection to Mary Magdalene and her time. I've studied the most obscure hypothesis and the most grounded statements about the Roman Empire. Along with that, I've measured what I've learned with my own physical experiences. I learned to meditate at the age of nineteen which changed my life and stayed with me as a daily focus. Coming from a country with a small population and a lot of forests and fjords, my connection with nature was developed at an early age. Having given birth to four children made me very aware of the functions of my own female body. Studying human self discovery brought me to the conclusion that enlightenment is a very physical job. Studying alchemy taught me how.
With this packaged background, I went to France to follow her footsteps. I walked the footpaths along some mountains, I found castles, cathedrals and grottos that claimed a connection with Mary Magdalene. In Provence I had a profound experience in a crypt which displayed her skull.
Only then could I write her story.
My late friend Richard claimed that this was channeled material when he edited the book. I'm honored to be chosen to reveal her story the way it was presented to me.
This is a controversial interpretation. There are severed heads featured as important characters. John the Baptists fate gets a new angle. There is a background story to the head the Temple Knights are referring to. Jesus and Mary Magdalene were married and had a deep understanding of the physical union between husband and wife. There were rituals performed that anchored their profound knowledge and high frequency in the sacred stones of the temple of Jerusalem. There are stones in France still vibrating her song.
"Rituals in Sacred Stones" is a big book about a big story featuring a powerful woman history has done it's best to bury under the stone floors of old cathedrals. But old stones don't forget. They are whispering that there is so much more to know, as historical facts, as intuitive visions and in the very juices of your own body.
Our DNA vibrates all of human history. The water we drink has circled through other bodies, other lifetimes, other cities in other countries in another era of human civilization. Every one of us vibrate the story of everybody else. There is so much knowledge to be found inside the cells that keep us alive every day. The same sun observes our evolution all the way back to green soup that carried all possibilities.
Wednesday, March 14, 2012
Viking lore.
I have been studying the viking culture for years, after all I was born in Norway and grew up with all the magnificent things they left behind. The celtic snake pattern is recognized as a common thread between the centers of the viking world. Many of the central figures of Norse Mythology is showing up in popular culture in our time. In fact, so many have appeared to me recently, it is time to take notice.
I am finding that the powers that be, the unseen world that surrounds us, are superbusy getting the human population and the earth itself ready for the big event of 2012. As far as I understand, we are talking about a frequency change, not the end of the world, but maybe the end of the world as we know it. We are heading for an alignment with the Galactic center, our sun and a bunch of planets. This will result in a strong field of a new frequency eminating through our known galaxy. It will be like getting used to a new sound which reverberates through your body. I feel like we're going to experience something like the radical change in the music scene in the 50's, when the parents truly couldn't stand the sound of Rock'n'Roll nor the movements of Elvis. Nevertheless, the young got it, and the world has never been the same since.
Well, we're all like the parents who didn't get it and had no framework to understand it from. So we're being helped, ever so gently, by our unseen winged friends.
Back to the Vikings. Do any remember the story about the bridge BiFrost? In Norwegian, often called Bivrost. It was guarded by Heimdall. If you saw the movie "THOR", you might remember the rainbow golden bridge guarded by a powerful golden armed warrior. According to Viking lore, Norse mythology, the bridge was dismantled and the gods were separated from the humans at some point. In "Thor" it is caused by him misbehaving, and the direct connection between gods and humans is broken.
I have it from good authority that the Bifrost bridge has been reestablished. It started in the very north of Norway, where Norway and Finland meet, in Finnmark the land of the laplanders, the country of the Sami. The Sami population has many similarities to the Native Americans here. And apparently, it is the indigenous people that has kept these connections intact and the bridge is now open in most areas of the world. There is again direct access between humans and the Gods.
To make this work, we have needed some sounds to be emitted to prepare us for the big soundwave at the end of the year. The creatures responsible for the sounds are the dragons. Now find all you know about Chinese New Year dragons, Puff the magic one, MidtgarsOrmen, Oroborus, snake power in the earth, leylines, Merlin's red and white dragons guarding the hill, the green dragon slain by St.George, etc etc. These beautiful powerbeasts have been part of our global culture for quite some time. Wheather you think they ever existed is beyond this discussion. They have existed as an archetype for millennia. Also, if you go for the existence of powerlines in the earth, Feng Shui, or have felt the power in your body at old sites, there is no doubt that dragons as a magnetic field exist.
It is important at this point that we acknowledge this. It is important that we are willing to communicate with these beings. Whether you feel attracted to dragons in the earth, dragons in mountains, dragons flying in the air, pet dragons, or have the ability to stand in one spot and call the powers of the earth up and send it through your body to connect with the Galactic Center, is up to you. It is all real, it's all good, and it all helps.
I have started to understand the power of imagination and intention. Anything you can imagine and put intention behind achieves it's own form of reality. And we create these intentional etheral life forms together with our unseen helpers. So why not help them and ourselves along a little bit. Befriend a dragon. Create a power rock. Infuse it with your intentions for the changes we are all going through.
Magic occurs when you take a piece of reality, a rock works well, send into it a thought with a strong intention, and then do something physical with it; bless it, breath on it, pour your favorite wine over it, and then place it in a special spot. It works the same way a computerchip can hold information, encoded in the matter itself.
Is this witchcraft? (I probably would have had a lively fire around my body by now, if this was 100 years ago.) Then watch your language, observe what you say throughout the day, and find how many times you send out an intention with words, a spell if you will, whether you intended it or not. Take responsibility for your own thoughts. This is like cleaning up the airwaves. Yes, I know we are surrounded with waves of all sorts, but at least we can make sure that the ones created by humans are clean. Besides, a machine cannot put intention behind their vibration. Only humans can do that, and so far we have intended a whole lot of not-so-well-thought-out thoughts.
Was this what Jesus and Mary Magdalene taught their students? Love thy neighbor and watch out what spells you cast?
The Rainbow bridge is open. How does your color combination look? All the angels can see you now. All the angels can feel your sounds. Is the patchwork of you pleasing to look at? A few more I love and I like, even if it is honestly icecream, would brighten it up a bit. How is the symphony of you? How does it sound to yourself? How well do you vibe with everybody around you?
So did the vikings have something to teach us? Are we reliving some part of history of our distant past? It seems like all the indigenous cultures have a message for us. It is all spoken through their own mythology. What does the Condor and the Eagle mean to you? Why is it important that they unite? Look at all the dragon lore that is surrounding us today compared to some few years ago. Do they have something to tell us? How to tame your Dragon was a beautiful film. Do you remember the wise old tree in Avatar? It is time to plug in your ponytail in Yggdrasil, the world tree.
There is a lot plug into. The angel world, the dragons of the earth and sea, the wise old tree at the center of the material world. It is time to learn about the many unseen worlds that surround us. They are trying their best to teach us as they descend down Bifrost, the Rainbow bridge, with welcoming hands to meet us.
I am finding that the powers that be, the unseen world that surrounds us, are superbusy getting the human population and the earth itself ready for the big event of 2012. As far as I understand, we are talking about a frequency change, not the end of the world, but maybe the end of the world as we know it. We are heading for an alignment with the Galactic center, our sun and a bunch of planets. This will result in a strong field of a new frequency eminating through our known galaxy. It will be like getting used to a new sound which reverberates through your body. I feel like we're going to experience something like the radical change in the music scene in the 50's, when the parents truly couldn't stand the sound of Rock'n'Roll nor the movements of Elvis. Nevertheless, the young got it, and the world has never been the same since.
Well, we're all like the parents who didn't get it and had no framework to understand it from. So we're being helped, ever so gently, by our unseen winged friends.
Back to the Vikings. Do any remember the story about the bridge BiFrost? In Norwegian, often called Bivrost. It was guarded by Heimdall. If you saw the movie "THOR", you might remember the rainbow golden bridge guarded by a powerful golden armed warrior. According to Viking lore, Norse mythology, the bridge was dismantled and the gods were separated from the humans at some point. In "Thor" it is caused by him misbehaving, and the direct connection between gods and humans is broken.
I have it from good authority that the Bifrost bridge has been reestablished. It started in the very north of Norway, where Norway and Finland meet, in Finnmark the land of the laplanders, the country of the Sami. The Sami population has many similarities to the Native Americans here. And apparently, it is the indigenous people that has kept these connections intact and the bridge is now open in most areas of the world. There is again direct access between humans and the Gods.
To make this work, we have needed some sounds to be emitted to prepare us for the big soundwave at the end of the year. The creatures responsible for the sounds are the dragons. Now find all you know about Chinese New Year dragons, Puff the magic one, MidtgarsOrmen, Oroborus, snake power in the earth, leylines, Merlin's red and white dragons guarding the hill, the green dragon slain by St.George, etc etc. These beautiful powerbeasts have been part of our global culture for quite some time. Wheather you think they ever existed is beyond this discussion. They have existed as an archetype for millennia. Also, if you go for the existence of powerlines in the earth, Feng Shui, or have felt the power in your body at old sites, there is no doubt that dragons as a magnetic field exist.
It is important at this point that we acknowledge this. It is important that we are willing to communicate with these beings. Whether you feel attracted to dragons in the earth, dragons in mountains, dragons flying in the air, pet dragons, or have the ability to stand in one spot and call the powers of the earth up and send it through your body to connect with the Galactic Center, is up to you. It is all real, it's all good, and it all helps.
I have started to understand the power of imagination and intention. Anything you can imagine and put intention behind achieves it's own form of reality. And we create these intentional etheral life forms together with our unseen helpers. So why not help them and ourselves along a little bit. Befriend a dragon. Create a power rock. Infuse it with your intentions for the changes we are all going through.
Magic occurs when you take a piece of reality, a rock works well, send into it a thought with a strong intention, and then do something physical with it; bless it, breath on it, pour your favorite wine over it, and then place it in a special spot. It works the same way a computerchip can hold information, encoded in the matter itself.
Is this witchcraft? (I probably would have had a lively fire around my body by now, if this was 100 years ago.) Then watch your language, observe what you say throughout the day, and find how many times you send out an intention with words, a spell if you will, whether you intended it or not. Take responsibility for your own thoughts. This is like cleaning up the airwaves. Yes, I know we are surrounded with waves of all sorts, but at least we can make sure that the ones created by humans are clean. Besides, a machine cannot put intention behind their vibration. Only humans can do that, and so far we have intended a whole lot of not-so-well-thought-out thoughts.
Was this what Jesus and Mary Magdalene taught their students? Love thy neighbor and watch out what spells you cast?
The Rainbow bridge is open. How does your color combination look? All the angels can see you now. All the angels can feel your sounds. Is the patchwork of you pleasing to look at? A few more I love and I like, even if it is honestly icecream, would brighten it up a bit. How is the symphony of you? How does it sound to yourself? How well do you vibe with everybody around you?
So did the vikings have something to teach us? Are we reliving some part of history of our distant past? It seems like all the indigenous cultures have a message for us. It is all spoken through their own mythology. What does the Condor and the Eagle mean to you? Why is it important that they unite? Look at all the dragon lore that is surrounding us today compared to some few years ago. Do they have something to tell us? How to tame your Dragon was a beautiful film. Do you remember the wise old tree in Avatar? It is time to plug in your ponytail in Yggdrasil, the world tree.
There is a lot plug into. The angel world, the dragons of the earth and sea, the wise old tree at the center of the material world. It is time to learn about the many unseen worlds that surround us. They are trying their best to teach us as they descend down Bifrost, the Rainbow bridge, with welcoming hands to meet us.
Friday, September 23, 2011
Love is a force to be reckoned with.
The message of Jesus and Mary Magdalene was love. Jesus introduced the new age of the Pisces with a new logo; Love is a force in the universe. It put the previous belief system on its head. Social justice was being replaced with compassion, a radical view in his time.
It is still a radical view. We're still practicing the importance of social justice, even to the point of invading another sovereign country or suing for minor offences. Jesus taught forgiveness and inclusivity, but it seems like the people who announce their religious fervor the strongest are the least forgiving or inclusive. I'll let that be a case for their own conscience to consider.
The church has over time taught us that being meak and humble was a sign of love, only to use it to create good sheep for their flocks who were easier to control. Physical love was called sin to create an over reaching guilt over a natural need for closeness. This was a very effective way of taking the teachings of Christ, turning them upside down and establish the hegemony of the church.
Having studied the Cathars, the Gnostics and the early church, I've found that the true teachings of Christ and his main disciple who continued teaching after he left us, Mary Magdalene, taught love from a different perspective. They taught purity of body, mind and spirit, so that the love you sent out would be more powerful. They taught that physical love between husband and wife in the bridal chamber led to union with God. (Now, love is love, and husband and wife refers to male and female forces, which are present in any combination of lovers). They found that love sent out as a loving field would diffuse a conflict, would provide protection, would create a field of inclusion in a community.
We can talk about romantic love, forgiving love that turns the other cheek, paralyzing humility taught as love, parental love, love between friends, etc. All these topics deserve their own chapter. What Jesus talked about was different.
Together they taught the idea of Love as a forcefield in the Universe. Love is a forcefield we can tap into and send through ourselves and direct towards a situation. It does require humility, a loss of ego, and pure intentions, but once you get the mechanics, it's a force with great power.
Love becomes less personalized. You don't have to love the person or the situation, justifying why you love them, or even like them. You generate a field of love, because anything in creation is made of Gods love, and you need to infuse the situation with more of it. If you have a conflicted situation, it is because love has been removed from it, so to calm it down, you reintroduce it.
This is an active use of the force of love. It is not like romantic love or parental love, which acts upon you, or love in response to kindness. This is a way of establishing yourself in the field of love, knowing how it works and then utilizing it as forcefield in your surroundings.
I'd like to give you an example. I was standing at a trainstation in Chicago at 2am. There was a group of young men waiting for a train as well, and I positioned myself some distance from them. I am generally not afraid of people, but I have great respect for the effect of group mentality, so I looked in a different direction and found a more stable footing in my boots. One of the men came towards me and said something. He was so dark he almost disappeared in the night sky. His face told me he hadn't met much kindness in his life. I thought that this could turn into a not so good situation. What could I do? I smiled my most polite and welcoming smile as I turned towards him, still very much on the alert. He was perplexed and said, "Aren't you afraid of me?" This was my chance. I assembled all the love I could attract from my surroundings and showered him with it, as I said slowly and in my most reassuring and gentle voice, "No, I'm not afraid of you." I stood there, smiling and holding the lovefield, as I watched the other young men observe the situation. The young man in front of me was bewildered for a moment. Then he drank in the lovefield like a thirsty camel who had been in the desert for too long.
The train arrived. He sat down next to me and leaned his head on my shoulder. During the ride I managed to switch sides with him, so I sat on the aisle side. I waited until my stop, and left quickly to catch my corresponding train. On the next train, another passenger who had seen the entire passage of events said to me, "It was a brave thing you did there." I noticed that a couple of other men on board seemed to have observed what was going on as well. They were ready to intervene to prevent anything from happening, to protect the young man from doing something stupid and to protect me from a situation I possibly could not handle. I felt that I had stepped into a protection field I had no idea existed. All because I decided to respond with love instead of fear. And to my surprise, I discovered how powerful, inclusive and protective it was.
This entry is an introduction to a wide topic. In the following blog entries we will discuss how to infuse yourself in the existing field of love of creation, the laws of physics that govern this work and how to use human intent and imagination to wield the force.
It is still a radical view. We're still practicing the importance of social justice, even to the point of invading another sovereign country or suing for minor offences. Jesus taught forgiveness and inclusivity, but it seems like the people who announce their religious fervor the strongest are the least forgiving or inclusive. I'll let that be a case for their own conscience to consider.
The church has over time taught us that being meak and humble was a sign of love, only to use it to create good sheep for their flocks who were easier to control. Physical love was called sin to create an over reaching guilt over a natural need for closeness. This was a very effective way of taking the teachings of Christ, turning them upside down and establish the hegemony of the church.
Having studied the Cathars, the Gnostics and the early church, I've found that the true teachings of Christ and his main disciple who continued teaching after he left us, Mary Magdalene, taught love from a different perspective. They taught purity of body, mind and spirit, so that the love you sent out would be more powerful. They taught that physical love between husband and wife in the bridal chamber led to union with God. (Now, love is love, and husband and wife refers to male and female forces, which are present in any combination of lovers). They found that love sent out as a loving field would diffuse a conflict, would provide protection, would create a field of inclusion in a community.
We can talk about romantic love, forgiving love that turns the other cheek, paralyzing humility taught as love, parental love, love between friends, etc. All these topics deserve their own chapter. What Jesus talked about was different.
Together they taught the idea of Love as a forcefield in the Universe. Love is a forcefield we can tap into and send through ourselves and direct towards a situation. It does require humility, a loss of ego, and pure intentions, but once you get the mechanics, it's a force with great power.
Love becomes less personalized. You don't have to love the person or the situation, justifying why you love them, or even like them. You generate a field of love, because anything in creation is made of Gods love, and you need to infuse the situation with more of it. If you have a conflicted situation, it is because love has been removed from it, so to calm it down, you reintroduce it.
This is an active use of the force of love. It is not like romantic love or parental love, which acts upon you, or love in response to kindness. This is a way of establishing yourself in the field of love, knowing how it works and then utilizing it as forcefield in your surroundings.
I'd like to give you an example. I was standing at a trainstation in Chicago at 2am. There was a group of young men waiting for a train as well, and I positioned myself some distance from them. I am generally not afraid of people, but I have great respect for the effect of group mentality, so I looked in a different direction and found a more stable footing in my boots. One of the men came towards me and said something. He was so dark he almost disappeared in the night sky. His face told me he hadn't met much kindness in his life. I thought that this could turn into a not so good situation. What could I do? I smiled my most polite and welcoming smile as I turned towards him, still very much on the alert. He was perplexed and said, "Aren't you afraid of me?" This was my chance. I assembled all the love I could attract from my surroundings and showered him with it, as I said slowly and in my most reassuring and gentle voice, "No, I'm not afraid of you." I stood there, smiling and holding the lovefield, as I watched the other young men observe the situation. The young man in front of me was bewildered for a moment. Then he drank in the lovefield like a thirsty camel who had been in the desert for too long.
The train arrived. He sat down next to me and leaned his head on my shoulder. During the ride I managed to switch sides with him, so I sat on the aisle side. I waited until my stop, and left quickly to catch my corresponding train. On the next train, another passenger who had seen the entire passage of events said to me, "It was a brave thing you did there." I noticed that a couple of other men on board seemed to have observed what was going on as well. They were ready to intervene to prevent anything from happening, to protect the young man from doing something stupid and to protect me from a situation I possibly could not handle. I felt that I had stepped into a protection field I had no idea existed. All because I decided to respond with love instead of fear. And to my surprise, I discovered how powerful, inclusive and protective it was.
This entry is an introduction to a wide topic. In the following blog entries we will discuss how to infuse yourself in the existing field of love of creation, the laws of physics that govern this work and how to use human intent and imagination to wield the force.
Monday, September 19, 2011
New focus.
I'm back from the Alchemy conference in L.A. with new inspiration. I realize that I'm not ignorant in these matters. I've lived a long time, I've experienced a lot and all this time I've tried to create my own framework of reference to understand my own process.
I've listened to a lot of good people with a lot to teach. Kathleen McGowan, the author, was there, showing me her parallell path to my own, with a lot more success to show for herself, which I can admire, or be envious of, according to which route I want to take. Dennis Hauck is always inspiring with his long and extencive personal dive in all subjects of Alchemy, from the mathematical theories, to the lab, to our spiritual progress. William Henry showed us how to build our own light body. Sonia Barrett gave us her crystal clear insight in the mechanics of evolution without any New Age Lite statements. She is profoundly honest and says unless you're willing to go into new places that are uncomfortable and difficult and willing to put your world view upside down, you're really just at your own favorite spa talking bumpersticker statements. Which I feel a lot of people are, including myself from time to time. Granted, there are things we need to heal, and for some that means finally finding some comfort after a harsh life. For some that means finding the last statements that are "in" and restate them in the right context.
To analyze my own belief system and challenge my own limitations, that's a challenge that requires some real thinking. I'm finding where I've been lazy, complacent, and seeking comfort because anything else have scared me. It's time to stop being scared.
Well, to pick up Gales challenge, what do I know? Why do I feel this pressure that it's time? Time for what? I feel like the white rabbit with the big watch in his hand who knows perfectly well that he's late, late for an important date. Oh, where's my favorite spa, I need an oilmassage. No? I am scheduled for a trip down the rabbit hole into unknown territory.
I watched Kathleen McGowan describe her traveling in France in the same places I've been, drawing the same conclusions. I watched her give a brilliant presentation of her work, of her dedication to Mary Magdalene and promoting her message. I listened to her describe her life, traveling, writing, giving lectures, and I almost cried. This is the life I wanted to live, the message I wanted to give. Where did I leave it off? Where did I lose track of my own mission? What happened along the way where I got distracted, got lazy, didn't go further, didn't attract the attention that I needed?
There aren't any answers to this. She deserves everything she has accomplished. She has worked hard, is an excellent writer and has excited her audience with new material that brings the message forward. Kudos to good work.
My work is different.
I have decided to start a mystery school. My friend Richard, who died in May, told me that I'm not a novelist, I'm a teacher. A young man at the Burning Man Festival I attended in 2008 told me the same thing. I've been trying to ignore the message I got. I guess it's time.
I want to teach what I know, what I've learned over a good long lifetime, from my studies, from my experience, from my children, from my granddaughters. But most of all from my guides. I've been in close contact with them for a long time. And they have gently told me the same thing.
In 1994 I was given a challenge. I was told that my work was to balance the relationship between the male and female forces of the planet. Everything I've done since then has been in preparation for taking on this work. Everything I've done has been doing this work.
I've studied it, I've experienced it at work, I've been in deep profound connection with it, I've learned what powers I'm dealing with and whatever I've done, Mary Magdalene has been close by watching over the process.
Now it's time to start teaching others.
The school will be called Mary Magdalene's Message. This blog will be the forum to start the school. I will available over a new email which I have established for this specific purpose. You will only recieve an email from me if you write to me on this email address first and request to be included on the mailing list. It will not be shared.
marymagdalenesmessage@gmail.com
The previous entries on this blog will stay here. They show some of my own progress along the way, some of the signposts where realizations have occured.
The first lesson will be:
"Love is a force to be reckoned with".
It will appear here in this forum by Friday.
Welcome to a new journey.
I've listened to a lot of good people with a lot to teach. Kathleen McGowan, the author, was there, showing me her parallell path to my own, with a lot more success to show for herself, which I can admire, or be envious of, according to which route I want to take. Dennis Hauck is always inspiring with his long and extencive personal dive in all subjects of Alchemy, from the mathematical theories, to the lab, to our spiritual progress. William Henry showed us how to build our own light body. Sonia Barrett gave us her crystal clear insight in the mechanics of evolution without any New Age Lite statements. She is profoundly honest and says unless you're willing to go into new places that are uncomfortable and difficult and willing to put your world view upside down, you're really just at your own favorite spa talking bumpersticker statements. Which I feel a lot of people are, including myself from time to time. Granted, there are things we need to heal, and for some that means finally finding some comfort after a harsh life. For some that means finding the last statements that are "in" and restate them in the right context.
To analyze my own belief system and challenge my own limitations, that's a challenge that requires some real thinking. I'm finding where I've been lazy, complacent, and seeking comfort because anything else have scared me. It's time to stop being scared.
Well, to pick up Gales challenge, what do I know? Why do I feel this pressure that it's time? Time for what? I feel like the white rabbit with the big watch in his hand who knows perfectly well that he's late, late for an important date. Oh, where's my favorite spa, I need an oilmassage. No? I am scheduled for a trip down the rabbit hole into unknown territory.
I watched Kathleen McGowan describe her traveling in France in the same places I've been, drawing the same conclusions. I watched her give a brilliant presentation of her work, of her dedication to Mary Magdalene and promoting her message. I listened to her describe her life, traveling, writing, giving lectures, and I almost cried. This is the life I wanted to live, the message I wanted to give. Where did I leave it off? Where did I lose track of my own mission? What happened along the way where I got distracted, got lazy, didn't go further, didn't attract the attention that I needed?
There aren't any answers to this. She deserves everything she has accomplished. She has worked hard, is an excellent writer and has excited her audience with new material that brings the message forward. Kudos to good work.
My work is different.
I have decided to start a mystery school. My friend Richard, who died in May, told me that I'm not a novelist, I'm a teacher. A young man at the Burning Man Festival I attended in 2008 told me the same thing. I've been trying to ignore the message I got. I guess it's time.
I want to teach what I know, what I've learned over a good long lifetime, from my studies, from my experience, from my children, from my granddaughters. But most of all from my guides. I've been in close contact with them for a long time. And they have gently told me the same thing.
In 1994 I was given a challenge. I was told that my work was to balance the relationship between the male and female forces of the planet. Everything I've done since then has been in preparation for taking on this work. Everything I've done has been doing this work.
I've studied it, I've experienced it at work, I've been in deep profound connection with it, I've learned what powers I'm dealing with and whatever I've done, Mary Magdalene has been close by watching over the process.
Now it's time to start teaching others.
The school will be called Mary Magdalene's Message. This blog will be the forum to start the school. I will available over a new email which I have established for this specific purpose. You will only recieve an email from me if you write to me on this email address first and request to be included on the mailing list. It will not be shared.
marymagdalenesmessage@gmail.com
The previous entries on this blog will stay here. They show some of my own progress along the way, some of the signposts where realizations have occured.
The first lesson will be:
"Love is a force to be reckoned with".
It will appear here in this forum by Friday.
Welcome to a new journey.
Monday, June 20, 2011
I attended a webinar Sunday which gave me an enormous energy down load.
At first I didn't even sense the energy field we were working with and Simeon's information was filling out things I was familiar with. This field was extremely subtle, but when I invited it into my body, it filled me with a gentle, loving, healing smoke.
I am still trying to understand the mechanics of how this works.
It seems like the "gods" need to anchor their vibration into physical matter. They can only do this with humans, since we are the connection point between spirit and matter. And they can only go through us if we volunteer for the process.
The energy field that they need to anchor is hard for them to explain in terms that we would understand. They try their best, but if they told us how powerful and important this actually is, we would be afraid and run and hide. So they treat us like scared lion cubs, who have all the potential power of a full grown lion, but who have no idea of who they are.
So I am present through all the initiatory time where I feel as if I'm being calibrated to recieve the full load of what comes later. What we talk about is good, but the most important thing is that we are present and open to being informed.
When we open for meditation, and I freely invite the "gods" to use my vehicle, I feel their field flow through me from my head to the bottom of my spine. They connect with the spark of God I carry inside and let the new vibration spread through my electronic system, my meridians, my chacras and my tissues, bones and muscles. I feel their love for me connect with my love for creation and expand to vibrate in each cell of my body. Light is permeating through my whole system.
After the meditation, download, is over, I need to rest. This time I slept for two hours. I wake up, still seeing light behind my eyelids and shadows of light in the room.
Today I still feel drunk on spirit. I use the techniques I have for grounding energies, and wonder if I really want to. This state of consciousness is very pleasant, as long as you don't have anything you need to do that day. Daily life takes on as much importance as moving stones from here to there and back again. What is important is to keep this state of consciousness long enough for it to affect my environment, my neighborhood, my city. I tell myself this as I connect with Gaia at the center of the earth with a light beam and feel her create a cone shaped field aimed back at me. Light through stone. Spirit through matter. Golden lightfilled bodies vibrating love.
At first I didn't even sense the energy field we were working with and Simeon's information was filling out things I was familiar with. This field was extremely subtle, but when I invited it into my body, it filled me with a gentle, loving, healing smoke.
I am still trying to understand the mechanics of how this works.
It seems like the "gods" need to anchor their vibration into physical matter. They can only do this with humans, since we are the connection point between spirit and matter. And they can only go through us if we volunteer for the process.
The energy field that they need to anchor is hard for them to explain in terms that we would understand. They try their best, but if they told us how powerful and important this actually is, we would be afraid and run and hide. So they treat us like scared lion cubs, who have all the potential power of a full grown lion, but who have no idea of who they are.
So I am present through all the initiatory time where I feel as if I'm being calibrated to recieve the full load of what comes later. What we talk about is good, but the most important thing is that we are present and open to being informed.
When we open for meditation, and I freely invite the "gods" to use my vehicle, I feel their field flow through me from my head to the bottom of my spine. They connect with the spark of God I carry inside and let the new vibration spread through my electronic system, my meridians, my chacras and my tissues, bones and muscles. I feel their love for me connect with my love for creation and expand to vibrate in each cell of my body. Light is permeating through my whole system.
After the meditation, download, is over, I need to rest. This time I slept for two hours. I wake up, still seeing light behind my eyelids and shadows of light in the room.
Today I still feel drunk on spirit. I use the techniques I have for grounding energies, and wonder if I really want to. This state of consciousness is very pleasant, as long as you don't have anything you need to do that day. Daily life takes on as much importance as moving stones from here to there and back again. What is important is to keep this state of consciousness long enough for it to affect my environment, my neighborhood, my city. I tell myself this as I connect with Gaia at the center of the earth with a light beam and feel her create a cone shaped field aimed back at me. Light through stone. Spirit through matter. Golden lightfilled bodies vibrating love.
Monday, April 4, 2011
I just got back from a trip to the South West with Dan. We started in Las Vegas, a place where amazing architecture and environments are all man made, on our trip to the canyons that are 5 million years old showing us the artwork of God and Nature over time.
We went to Zion, Bryce and Escalante national parks, all located along the same stretch of highway in southern Utah, but oh so different. In Zion we stayed at the lodge inside the park, hiked up lovely paths along rivers and waterfalls feeling our boots on the work of the CCC of the depression in the thirties. What an idea for rescuing the economy: putting people to work for the national parks building access for everybody to these landmarks.
Looking at the lines in the stones, showing the works of earthquakes and vulcanoes millions of years ago and the steady grinding of rivers over thousands of years, makes the fundamentalists claim that the world is 5,200 years old blow away in the wind. The mountains tell their own story. Their agelines compete with the ones of the trees telling us that whatever we do, however many short sighted ideas we come up with resulting in tremendous destruction, earth will just shake us off and continue. We might make ourselves extinct, but this planet will go on continuing her artwork.
We went to Zion, Bryce and Escalante national parks, all located along the same stretch of highway in southern Utah, but oh so different. In Zion we stayed at the lodge inside the park, hiked up lovely paths along rivers and waterfalls feeling our boots on the work of the CCC of the depression in the thirties. What an idea for rescuing the economy: putting people to work for the national parks building access for everybody to these landmarks.
Looking at the lines in the stones, showing the works of earthquakes and vulcanoes millions of years ago and the steady grinding of rivers over thousands of years, makes the fundamentalists claim that the world is 5,200 years old blow away in the wind. The mountains tell their own story. Their agelines compete with the ones of the trees telling us that whatever we do, however many short sighted ideas we come up with resulting in tremendous destruction, earth will just shake us off and continue. We might make ourselves extinct, but this planet will go on continuing her artwork.
Wednesday, November 17, 2010
I have been away from my post for a while. Yes, I got married, yes, my family from Norway and all my children where gathered in Chicago for a couple of intense weeks. I also had my five year old grand daughter with me for two weeks, oh the stuff you learn from children, and I delivered her safe and sound back to her mother in California. It's been hectic.
I think as a response to some insanely busy months, I've gone into a retrograde together with the planet Venus. My egg shaped aura, usually extending about 3 ft. beyond my body, has felt stretched and expanded. I've walked inside a large Christmas decoration complete with mesmerizing lights and the dreamy twinkling eyes of a newborn.
At the same time, I've been given a time with a focus on death and dying. This spring I had to put my 87 year old aunt in a nursing home in Indiana. Her house and belongings were sold at an auction, and I felt as if we were pulling apart her finished life, even as she was quite alive in her new home. She cannot comprehend what has happened, and I've been advised not to tell her. My honest goodie-two-shoes girl wants to tell her the truth, and my new role as her guardian tells me that it would be cruel to try to explain it to her while she's starting to be happy in her new situation. The financial guardian advised me to arrange for a prepaid funeral for my aunt. I went to the funeral home where her son had been buried. We planned all the details, and all was well until the funeral director handed me the newspaper clip describing my cousins suicide. I went to the grave site, an unkempt, unassuming, flat stone under a tree, and cried. Finding a silk arrangement at a nearby Michael's, I left the flowers at the names of the mother and son, where his date of birth and death is engraved next to her lonely birth date, and went to visit my aunt at the nursing home, not being able to share anything I had done that day.
At the same time, my brother in law died, and we dealt with three days of funeral arrangements, this time with people who were well informed about his declining health and his own blessings to his family. Quite a beautiful exit. I felt his presence at the funeral and saw his loving goodbye to his wife.
This month my aunt in California died on her 91st birthday. She had organized her cremation, her funeral and her good friend as executive director of her estate. All I could do was bring flowers and give a little speech at the memorial service. This woman wanted to be in control to the very last. She was a surgical nurse in a MASH unit in Korea with the title of Captain. My aunt knew how to give orders, even after her death.
I could bless my older family members in their later years, and bless their passing. But when my good friend was diagnosed with ALS, Lou Gehrig's disease, I lost it. Over the last year I have watched him slowly deteriorate. I drove him to appointments, I supported him as he practiced walking, I took him to the concerts he still did every month as long as he could play his guitar. Losing the use of his legs, I could handle, if he could still use his hands. When the disease made it impossible for him to play, I totally lost it. The voice I had heard sing for 16 years was becoming a raspy ghostlike shadow of itself. I started helping him with his computer work. He taught me how to work with the Garage Band program, navigate among his poems and organize his hundreds of songs on I-tunes, all by verbal direction. I answered his emails, writing his poetic answers to his friends in Paris, in Belgium, on Hawaii and all over Chicago land. When he wanted to dictate a poem, I had to hide my tears as he starts: "How happy and harrowing life is, concluded the last mosquito of October."
I watch his three year old daughter run about trying to look happy in front of her father. She understands that the best gift she can give is to be a delightful child in the midst of all this suffering. But when she cries as she goes to bed at night, her sounds belong to a younger child, and she gives went to her own frustration and grief. All I can do is hug his wife, help him with his medication and help her get him out of the wheel chair and into his bed. It's a two person operation to stand him up, turn him around and lower him slowly down hoping not to hurt his arms.
One of his songs is called One Life. One phrase is "me into trees". He means to say that all of creation is interconnected, but I'm wondering if his body is turning into wood. His knees don't bend properly anymore. His fingers don't move. In the morning, I have to fight with his legs to get them to bend after a night of lying straight.
I'm writing this to illustrate the world I'm in right now. The universe is trying to teach me something about life and death. And marriage and relationships and children. What else is new? Isn't that the lessons of life in a nutshell? Maybe, but I seem to have been given a crash course over the last six months.
At the same time, as I'm exposed to all these real life situations; the approach to death, the choice to pass over, and the honoring of a long life with an exciting story, I'm experiencing my own life as if I live with a foot on the earth and one levitating in open air. I just need to close my eyes, and I am one with my being and everything else fades away. I open my eyes a moment later and face the fact that I'm cooking a meal, doing laundry or admiring a sunset. I pause and look intently at the trees, at the waves of Lake Michigan and pick up a stone and squeeze it between my fingers, just to pinch reality and feel what is really real.
And is it? Why aren't the colored light I see behind my eyelids given equal validity? Why can't I speak of the colors, the sounds, the music, the words, the feelings I have, all this which I experience with my inner senses, which take me on these trips to beautiful places of peace, tranquility and comfort? What is it? I'm not conjuring it with my ever so lively imagination, if so, I would never be surprised at what I see, and the experience would be limited to what I can imagine. What I see and experience is always beyond what I could have made up. The words I hear, the answers I get when I pose a question to the ethers, is always surprising.
So I bury the dead. I make sure my aunt with dementia is well taken care of. I help my friend through his illness, and cry as his abilities are diminishing while I try to give his genius mind an outlet through my hands. And I continue on my own travels between the worlds, with one foot firmly planted on planet Earth while I explore what I can only see when I close my eyes.
Yes, we are mystics without monasteries. Where is the abbey where I could have asked an abbess like Theresa of Avila what it all means? Where is the monastery where the daily routine of prayers and meals and tasks would structure my days for me and ground my focus to earthly deeds, all the while allowing my mind to ask my questions and my heart to find God?
I think as a response to some insanely busy months, I've gone into a retrograde together with the planet Venus. My egg shaped aura, usually extending about 3 ft. beyond my body, has felt stretched and expanded. I've walked inside a large Christmas decoration complete with mesmerizing lights and the dreamy twinkling eyes of a newborn.
At the same time, I've been given a time with a focus on death and dying. This spring I had to put my 87 year old aunt in a nursing home in Indiana. Her house and belongings were sold at an auction, and I felt as if we were pulling apart her finished life, even as she was quite alive in her new home. She cannot comprehend what has happened, and I've been advised not to tell her. My honest goodie-two-shoes girl wants to tell her the truth, and my new role as her guardian tells me that it would be cruel to try to explain it to her while she's starting to be happy in her new situation. The financial guardian advised me to arrange for a prepaid funeral for my aunt. I went to the funeral home where her son had been buried. We planned all the details, and all was well until the funeral director handed me the newspaper clip describing my cousins suicide. I went to the grave site, an unkempt, unassuming, flat stone under a tree, and cried. Finding a silk arrangement at a nearby Michael's, I left the flowers at the names of the mother and son, where his date of birth and death is engraved next to her lonely birth date, and went to visit my aunt at the nursing home, not being able to share anything I had done that day.
At the same time, my brother in law died, and we dealt with three days of funeral arrangements, this time with people who were well informed about his declining health and his own blessings to his family. Quite a beautiful exit. I felt his presence at the funeral and saw his loving goodbye to his wife.
This month my aunt in California died on her 91st birthday. She had organized her cremation, her funeral and her good friend as executive director of her estate. All I could do was bring flowers and give a little speech at the memorial service. This woman wanted to be in control to the very last. She was a surgical nurse in a MASH unit in Korea with the title of Captain. My aunt knew how to give orders, even after her death.
I could bless my older family members in their later years, and bless their passing. But when my good friend was diagnosed with ALS, Lou Gehrig's disease, I lost it. Over the last year I have watched him slowly deteriorate. I drove him to appointments, I supported him as he practiced walking, I took him to the concerts he still did every month as long as he could play his guitar. Losing the use of his legs, I could handle, if he could still use his hands. When the disease made it impossible for him to play, I totally lost it. The voice I had heard sing for 16 years was becoming a raspy ghostlike shadow of itself. I started helping him with his computer work. He taught me how to work with the Garage Band program, navigate among his poems and organize his hundreds of songs on I-tunes, all by verbal direction. I answered his emails, writing his poetic answers to his friends in Paris, in Belgium, on Hawaii and all over Chicago land. When he wanted to dictate a poem, I had to hide my tears as he starts: "How happy and harrowing life is, concluded the last mosquito of October."
I watch his three year old daughter run about trying to look happy in front of her father. She understands that the best gift she can give is to be a delightful child in the midst of all this suffering. But when she cries as she goes to bed at night, her sounds belong to a younger child, and she gives went to her own frustration and grief. All I can do is hug his wife, help him with his medication and help her get him out of the wheel chair and into his bed. It's a two person operation to stand him up, turn him around and lower him slowly down hoping not to hurt his arms.
One of his songs is called One Life. One phrase is "me into trees". He means to say that all of creation is interconnected, but I'm wondering if his body is turning into wood. His knees don't bend properly anymore. His fingers don't move. In the morning, I have to fight with his legs to get them to bend after a night of lying straight.
I'm writing this to illustrate the world I'm in right now. The universe is trying to teach me something about life and death. And marriage and relationships and children. What else is new? Isn't that the lessons of life in a nutshell? Maybe, but I seem to have been given a crash course over the last six months.
At the same time, as I'm exposed to all these real life situations; the approach to death, the choice to pass over, and the honoring of a long life with an exciting story, I'm experiencing my own life as if I live with a foot on the earth and one levitating in open air. I just need to close my eyes, and I am one with my being and everything else fades away. I open my eyes a moment later and face the fact that I'm cooking a meal, doing laundry or admiring a sunset. I pause and look intently at the trees, at the waves of Lake Michigan and pick up a stone and squeeze it between my fingers, just to pinch reality and feel what is really real.
And is it? Why aren't the colored light I see behind my eyelids given equal validity? Why can't I speak of the colors, the sounds, the music, the words, the feelings I have, all this which I experience with my inner senses, which take me on these trips to beautiful places of peace, tranquility and comfort? What is it? I'm not conjuring it with my ever so lively imagination, if so, I would never be surprised at what I see, and the experience would be limited to what I can imagine. What I see and experience is always beyond what I could have made up. The words I hear, the answers I get when I pose a question to the ethers, is always surprising.
So I bury the dead. I make sure my aunt with dementia is well taken care of. I help my friend through his illness, and cry as his abilities are diminishing while I try to give his genius mind an outlet through my hands. And I continue on my own travels between the worlds, with one foot firmly planted on planet Earth while I explore what I can only see when I close my eyes.
Yes, we are mystics without monasteries. Where is the abbey where I could have asked an abbess like Theresa of Avila what it all means? Where is the monastery where the daily routine of prayers and meals and tasks would structure my days for me and ground my focus to earthly deeds, all the while allowing my mind to ask my questions and my heart to find God?
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