May 7, 2012
The sun is growing in warmth. My eyes scour the roadside – plants speak their presence as I walk the hills to the forest grove.
A small, triangular shape catches my attention. Smooth surface and mottled dark colours stand out amongst the gravel and twigs and sprigs of green. I pick it up – heavy. Perhaps a piece of broken marble counter top? Perfect for a mini-altar for the Mother. I carry it with me.
As my feet continue to move, my mind wanders to this coming weekend of teaching and I watch as scenarios play themselves out across the screen of my mind. Ego arising, fears arising...
Around the next corner, a large Raven feather lays in the grasses. This too I pick up and carry. A few feet from the hidden forest path, a grey tuft of rabbit fur shows itself. All findings are dark in colour – gifts for Mother Datura perhaps? The Dark Mother is calling.
I climb up the rocks of the hidden path, and as I step through the entrance, I can feel – the forest is awake. I have brought dried garden sage to burn as an offering. On arrival at the gateway to the grove, a little snail is eating from a pine-cone. A cricket chirps nearby. I look at the Mother. I had previously gifted feathers to one of the Guardians some weeks back, wedged between her spiraling vines. Now I gift the other Gateway-Guardian the marble altar and grey tuft.
I look to my right – a fallen tangle of the Mother catches my eye. Wild Mother.
Snail, slow and strong, lifts her house, carrying it on her back... "Be slow," she says, "it will be your strength."
As I enter the inner circle, my cell phone rings. A phone call I decide to take, and then wish that I did not. The timing is a perfect reminder that I need to be clear – to make sanctity of the time that I take in the forest. I turn off the phone, embarrassed as I struggle to make peace in my heart after words are exchanged. There is so much happening in my life these days.
I light the sage, and offer smoke and greetings to all the vines. At the Vine-of-Communication – the one that straddles two trees, near the entrance to the Sacred Grove – a little spider has spun her web. I ask Spider for a teaching and offer her smoke as well. Accidentally, I touch her web and she vibrates wildly. There are very clearly two spiders as she vibrates. Then, as her web calms, there is one.
She eats her remaining food and says, "You must learn to communicate between the two – especially in times of chaos or wild inner vibration. Communicate between the light and dark within you, the conscious and unconscious."
I speak to Wild Mother while Raven sits above me. "There will be no easy answer for the quandary of your heart. You must make a clear commitment to your path, as apprentice. Put your practice and dedication at centre. Healthy love will arise from there. Look at how you distract and clog yourself. Decongesting is getting clear in your heart."
I feel how my wounds want to keep the search or openness for "love" at centre. It steals my focus and energy. Imagine being clear, strong in my centre. What kind of love would arise from there?
"These are the deeper medicines," Wild Mother says.
"Read books and learn from embodied teachers for the surface medicines. Come to me for the deeper medicines – to know yourself."
I ask, "What does it mean to be a Mol'farka?"
She replies, "You are the medicine. The helpers you work with (plant spirits, stone beings, animal helpers, nature spirits, elementals) are the medicine. What more do you want?"
I reflect and say, "To facilitate healing; to know the potent medicines to give others; to help bring healing to Gaia; to understand interconnectedness..."
"You will learn the lessons I give you, when I give them. For today, your heart is your work.” And as she speaks, it is as if she reaches out and touches my heart.
The next vine speaks up, and commands that I relinquish my agenda.
"Do not look with your ordinary eyes, do not listen with your ordinary ears, do not feel or see with your ordinary heart. The Raven who is around you now has been assigned as a guardian-watcher for the time you are here. The fly that buzzes loudly and persistently is similar – he is reporting to you what he sees around this place."
Taking a few moments to digest these ideas, I walk to the Broken One near the back of the grove – a dead vine that hangs on a broken tree.
"Let the old die, in its time. Let it become food – see how we are food for the strong mushrooms? Food for new growth? Tonight, make a burning offering for what you are ready to release. It may not be easy – you may also surprise yourself. Let whatever you release become food for your new growth on this path. Offer what you are ready to."
The main Teacher spoke. “Do not worry, child – this is the path! This work is your work as a Mol'farka's apprentice.”
Then, she let me go deeper and feel – we morphed, together, where my hand touched her. I was unable to feel where she began and I ended. "Bending time and space will be your next lesson," she said. A sensation of my body beginning to leave the ground brought fear. I resisted the sensation, and also resisted the fear. My body felt heavy on the ground once again.
I said to her, "My heart feels raw, I feel weary now..."
Guardian spoke, "Take food, take rest, make a burning."
I replied, "I am afraid I will not have the strength to say "no" in the struggles of my heart. I am afraid to give up the opportunities."
"Take it to the burning tonight. And maybe what you are to give up is attachment, not opportunity."
The sun is growing in warmth. My eyes scour the roadside – plants speak their presence as I walk the hills to the forest grove.
A small, triangular shape catches my attention. Smooth surface and mottled dark colours stand out amongst the gravel and twigs and sprigs of green. I pick it up – heavy. Perhaps a piece of broken marble counter top? Perfect for a mini-altar for the Mother. I carry it with me.
As my feet continue to move, my mind wanders to this coming weekend of teaching and I watch as scenarios play themselves out across the screen of my mind. Ego arising, fears arising...
Around the next corner, a large Raven feather lays in the grasses. This too I pick up and carry. A few feet from the hidden forest path, a grey tuft of rabbit fur shows itself. All findings are dark in colour – gifts for Mother Datura perhaps? The Dark Mother is calling.
I climb up the rocks of the hidden path, and as I step through the entrance, I can feel – the forest is awake. I have brought dried garden sage to burn as an offering. On arrival at the gateway to the grove, a little snail is eating from a pine-cone. A cricket chirps nearby. I look at the Mother. I had previously gifted feathers to one of the Guardians some weeks back, wedged between her spiraling vines. Now I gift the other Gateway-Guardian the marble altar and grey tuft.
I look to my right – a fallen tangle of the Mother catches my eye. Wild Mother.
Snail, slow and strong, lifts her house, carrying it on her back... "Be slow," she says, "it will be your strength."
As I enter the inner circle, my cell phone rings. A phone call I decide to take, and then wish that I did not. The timing is a perfect reminder that I need to be clear – to make sanctity of the time that I take in the forest. I turn off the phone, embarrassed as I struggle to make peace in my heart after words are exchanged. There is so much happening in my life these days.
I light the sage, and offer smoke and greetings to all the vines. At the Vine-of-Communication – the one that straddles two trees, near the entrance to the Sacred Grove – a little spider has spun her web. I ask Spider for a teaching and offer her smoke as well. Accidentally, I touch her web and she vibrates wildly. There are very clearly two spiders as she vibrates. Then, as her web calms, there is one.
She eats her remaining food and says, "You must learn to communicate between the two – especially in times of chaos or wild inner vibration. Communicate between the light and dark within you, the conscious and unconscious."
I speak to Wild Mother while Raven sits above me. "There will be no easy answer for the quandary of your heart. You must make a clear commitment to your path, as apprentice. Put your practice and dedication at centre. Healthy love will arise from there. Look at how you distract and clog yourself. Decongesting is getting clear in your heart."
I feel how my wounds want to keep the search or openness for "love" at centre. It steals my focus and energy. Imagine being clear, strong in my centre. What kind of love would arise from there?
"These are the deeper medicines," Wild Mother says.
"Read books and learn from embodied teachers for the surface medicines. Come to me for the deeper medicines – to know yourself."
I ask, "What does it mean to be a Mol'farka?"
She replies, "You are the medicine. The helpers you work with (plant spirits, stone beings, animal helpers, nature spirits, elementals) are the medicine. What more do you want?"
I reflect and say, "To facilitate healing; to know the potent medicines to give others; to help bring healing to Gaia; to understand interconnectedness..."
"You will learn the lessons I give you, when I give them. For today, your heart is your work.” And as she speaks, it is as if she reaches out and touches my heart.
The next vine speaks up, and commands that I relinquish my agenda.
"Do not look with your ordinary eyes, do not listen with your ordinary ears, do not feel or see with your ordinary heart. The Raven who is around you now has been assigned as a guardian-watcher for the time you are here. The fly that buzzes loudly and persistently is similar – he is reporting to you what he sees around this place."
Taking a few moments to digest these ideas, I walk to the Broken One near the back of the grove – a dead vine that hangs on a broken tree.
"Let the old die, in its time. Let it become food – see how we are food for the strong mushrooms? Food for new growth? Tonight, make a burning offering for what you are ready to release. It may not be easy – you may also surprise yourself. Let whatever you release become food for your new growth on this path. Offer what you are ready to."
The main Teacher spoke. “Do not worry, child – this is the path! This work is your work as a Mol'farka's apprentice.”
Then, she let me go deeper and feel – we morphed, together, where my hand touched her. I was unable to feel where she began and I ended. "Bending time and space will be your next lesson," she said. A sensation of my body beginning to leave the ground brought fear. I resisted the sensation, and also resisted the fear. My body felt heavy on the ground once again.
I said to her, "My heart feels raw, I feel weary now..."
Guardian spoke, "Take food, take rest, make a burning."
I replied, "I am afraid I will not have the strength to say "no" in the struggles of my heart. I am afraid to give up the opportunities."
"Take it to the burning tonight. And maybe what you are to give up is attachment, not opportunity."
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