Preparation is Initiation

March 17, 2012

The Mother-Teacher appeared in dream-form last night.  The dream took place on a part of the property where I live.  In the dream, a man with wild animal eyes had joined me, along with one of my students.  We were eating parts of the Mother-Teacher, and other food as well – a caterpillar and something that looked like a mouldy marinated pepper.

In the morning, I went to the place I had dreamt about and found several vines of the Mother. One vine in particular stood out to me. I touched her bark – cool – the presence of life-bloods.  The Mother reiterated my need to clean my diet and self, and prepare.  There was an unclear, unspoken caution about toxins that I ingest in some way.

I walk to the forest again, seeking the Mother-Teacher. It is a ten minute walk, mostly up hills along the winding roadway from the property.  I enter the forest and walk directly to her.  Without formality, I immediately ask what to eat and do to prepare.  She is quiet. 

I pause, wait.  And then I ask how to ingest her.  With crisp clarity, she replies, "You are not ready for ingestion of my Teachings.  There are other ways to connect and take-in my energy, and regardless, you still need to prepare yourself by clearing your energy.

This initiation and preparation period is indeed part of my medicine as Teacher.  You need to prepare more than your body.  You need to clear your energy, clean up the lines and boundaries -- make yourself clear," she says.

I ask her more questions about her relationship to the trees.  With exasperation, she says, “Child, you need to open more fully, deeply, in your heart, in order to really know and hear me.

“You will not know my way of communicating with the trees because you are too dense to listen.  You are not being one of us. Child, you must feel. Come, feel me…”

I touch her rough and spiraling bark, and wrap my fingers around her thick vine.  My body begins to sway.  Perhaps it is just me?  Perhaps I am just tired?  I put my forehead on the tree to steady myself. The sensation intensifies. 

I feel her movements.  It is not a trick of the wind.  She moves.  She pulsates and sways.  I feel her heart and I feel her communicate through her movements.  I do not understand what the movements actually mean, but I definitely feel. I remove myself and reposition at the next vine, which is firmly anchored and embedded in a tree and its bark.  She, too, sways and pulses.

My body feels alive! Each vine I touch sways and pulses.

This… This must be the flow of her life-blood.  This must be her way of communicating to the trees, to the earth, and to me.

Excited – too excited to stand still – I turn and begin to walk away.  As I leave, she calls to me, "You have not yet done your burning offering... Honour me - do your Fire tonight."

Walking home, I watch the play of wind in the trees. As if the Mother is still communicating to me through the swaying pulsation, I feel the world shift.  No longer do I perceive wind pushing branches to make them move, but rather wind generated by the trees and branches.  Trees speak through movement; wind is the result and the carrier of their story.

My mind expands to become a current of the wind. And within this current, stories from afar are woven with stories that are near.  The winds shift with each added movement, breath, flutter, feeling…  The literal breath of Gaia.

My heart begins to awaken.  I feel such gratitude.