Part 3 of 4 Monthly Blogs by Anyaa: Conscious Grieving and the Need for Praise

Conscious Grieving

and the Need for Praise

 

It’s Christmas Day 2019 and as the tumultuous year of 2019 draws to a close, I feel melancholic. This morning about 4 am, a dear priestess sister died in a hospice bed in Asheville, after a difficult death process. Thirteen of us priestess sisters from my lineage had been energetically gathering around her and her priestess sister partner for the past week or so, as it became clear she might be in her last days or weeks. We managed to quickly put many support pieces in place so that she and her beloved could experience a conscious blissful deathing process, but her soul had other plans.  Even so, she received visits, many words of love, and outpourings of energy and prayers coming to her from many directions before she left. Now comes the time for grieving that she has left this earth, praise for her many gifts and contributions, and eventually a celebration of her life.

Two weeks ago Lucky died, a dog whom Gary and I inherited in early 2014 after my stepfather’s death. He was with Gary in California. Then 5 days later, my beloved kitty, Cali, who had been blind for the past 9 months, died quickly in front of me. I had just gotten home from a trip and had just walked in the door from a meeting. Although there are blessings and relief in these passings because of the level of energy it takes for us to care for them when they are ill, the sorrow has been all-encompassing lately.

I am also a reader for Tammy Billups not-yet-released book called Animal Soul Contracts: Sacred Agreements for Shared Evolution. I had been reading the chapter on Sacred Transitions that featured my story about a previous beloved dog’s (Lily) passing years ago, and Lucky’s story. The synchronicities of these last few days have been uncanny and obviously engineered to keep my heart wide open. I had just completed grieving Lucky and then Cali, and was tearfully reminiscing about Lily’s death ceremony in Tammy’s book when my sister-friend died.

If you have read my previous two blogs on PTSD and the Death Wish (scroll down here to find them under this blog), you may resonate with me when I say that being in Earth School right now is challenging. I have been asking Spirit to show me where I am next meant to be of service, and suddenly these and other situations presented themselves, all at the same time! If you do not have a disaster, a tragedy, a need or a crisis around you, you are blessed. However, you might be called at any moment to step up, and step into, a situation that needs just who you are. That is a blessing too. We are here to serve in whatever way is ours to do. That service serves our soul’s evolution and gives us purpose.

So let’s talk about grief. Are you able to grieve when you lose someone or something dear to you? What do you feel? Do you go numb? Do you freeze up? Do you distract yourself? Do you self-medicate with food, drugs, alcohol, and busy-ness? If that’s your usual habit, try breathing and going deeper. Find your sadness, even if it is painful. Open to tears, and not just a few. Go even deeper. Breathe. Feel and stay with it till you can cry, keen, wail, and call out your pain. Play music that makes you sad.  Find someone to hold you, and if you do not have someone, hire a healer to help you get there.

Attend a grief ritual in your area. They are happening everywhere these days, as we wake up to the gift that death is. You can go here for a beautiful 27-minute video called “The Gifts of Grief” by my sister-friend Melody LeBaron. Schedule a Shamanic Breathwork™ session (see the series based on these blogs that starts in late January here in my community) It may take a while and you may have to go back to your grief many times. You will know when you are complete, for the moment.  I find that my initial grieving is intense and deep. Then it comes up when it is triggered by other grief, for the world, for a friend’s animal passing, for a friend’s grief or a story or song that evokes sadness. I don’t apologize or feel shame or guilt, I just let it flow until it is done. Our grieving is as unique as we are. As you will see, the ability to grieve is essential for many reasons.

Joe and I have been reading the work of Martin Prechtel and in particular his recent book The Smell of Dust on Rain: Grief and Praise. Martin is one of the first teachers to speak about the need for grief and praise, as food that the dying and the dead need to be able to make their way across the veil. Other teachers and students of Martin’s have followed this guidance. Many cultures tell stories about the dying, talk to them about their lives, sing their praises, speak gratitude for the gifts they have brought, and celebrate them with more stories and praise after they have gone. They cry out loud and have professional wailers and keeners to do this for them and with them.

Our western culture has been afraid of loss and death, and we are in need of a have a reeducation so that we can approach the inevitable in a healthier way.  It’s as if we abandon our dead because we do not know how to honor them, or face our own grief. It is typical for divorces to happen after a child dies, for friends to disappear when someone is dying or is very ill, and when we lose an animal beloved, for us to try to forget and move on. After all, didn’t we learn to never talk to a dying person about dying, and didn’t we also learn when an animal dies that it was just an animal?

The better approach would be to value those that have died in every way you can out loud, and let them and everyone know what their contribution was to this world. In my priestess sister Toby Evan‘s 2019 book Dead, But Not Gone: Are You Part of the Soul-Bridge to Guide Them Home she recounts stories of many souls and large groups of souls who have been earthbound because they died suddenly, were not prepared, were confused, had no belief in any life after death, were too attached to people who could not let them go, stayed with a leader who did not leave, or were just not honored. As a healer and empath who has been visited by earthbound souls her entire life, she shows us how to honor those who have passed so they can have another chance to meet with their Higher Self and go to their spiritual destination. I had no idea that there were so many that needed this kind of assistance. At present Toby is using her prairie labyrinth and working with many around the world to create Soul-Bridge Crossings for the four primary races, which will likely lighten up the earth in powerful ways to come.

Part of the grief and praise that is called for now is for the peoples of the world who have been persecuted, dominated, stolen from, enslaved, and worse. These are our ancestors. We come from these people, and everyone has experienced the cruelty of the dominators and controllers of the world in some way. Remembering is an important step that can lead to forgiveness, self-forgiveness, and maybe even restitution. Wouldn’t it be liberating to see the USA make amends to Native Americans, to African-Americans and other cultures that simply came here for refuge, and instead found cruelty? What a joyous day that will be when we can actually openly celebrate all the gifts these people have added to our own cultures in a good way.

Melody LeBaron says that grief that is buried alive never dies. It ends up in the lungs (in many healing systems the lungs are directly connected to the emotion of grief), and can cause lung issues, heart issues, depression, anxiety, and emotional coldness and cruelty, either toward self or others. Un-processed grief may be an underlying cause of the loss of heart in the world right now. Think of all the wars this planet and its creatures have endured and humans have participated in through the ages. Imagine the millions of ungrieved soldiers that have died alone in battle, and the many “civilians” murdered in acts of war.

Grief that is not allowed to be fully witnessed and expressed has the potential to turn on us, and diminish our life force. It does not matter if that grief is covered over by PTSD, anger, self-medication or addiction. It can be unearthed and healed with healthy grieving and healthy praise.  Another teacher that has been helpful to me in my own grieving is Frances Weller. In his book The Wild Edge of Sorrow: Rituals of Renewal and the Sacred Work of Grief he quotes William Blake who says “the deeper the sorrow the greater the joy”. Francis says when we send our grief into exile we simultaneously condemn our lives to an absence of joy. Melody also says that whatever we grieve well and integrate within us, becomes part of the medicine we carry for others, who will inevitably need our wisdom at a future time for their grief.

If you’ve not yet done so, do yourself a favor and begin to work with your grief. If you are already grieving someone, honor your process, affirm yourself, and take your time. Name what you have not yet grieved. Let yourself bravely look at those pictures, or read those letters, or pick up one of the books I have mentioned about death, dying and grieving or watch Stephen Jenkinson’s film Griefwalker or his book Die Wise: A Manifesto for Sanity and Soul Perhaps there is a book a friend has highly recommended. Do ceremony to honor your beloveds on special days, and if you have a beloved or an animal companion die, honor her with a poem, a memorial, and/or a special memorial altar or wall.

I leave you with a poem my partner Joe wrote for Cali, and a picture of my memorial wall. Enjoy, and if the tears come for goddess sake, please enjoy the liquid nourishment they give your heart!

To Cali      

by Joe Landwehr

I hear tell that you lived a life of brave adventure,

and that in your day, you were a feisty force to be reckoned with.

I knew you only as a buddha cat, descending more deeply into silent wisdom and grace

as blindness swallowed you.

Even then, you sought the occasional adventure,

and found your own way around

with patient probing of the edge.

But mostly you were a supreme teacher of presence,

responding to touch and sound

but mostly riding the ethereal airwaves

in that uncanny way that only master cats can do.

We, your slow and wayward students,

will miss you sadly.

I hope wherever you are now,

it rains kitty treats

and there are plenty of new adventures to be had

worthy of your sweet and sassy heart.

May you remember our love, and may it guide your way through the darkness

into the light.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Tracking the Soul Workshop 2019

by Joe Landwehr

I am deeply grateful for this experience. I know that much of the change is permanent, that my life is irrevocably altered – past, present, and future. – CT, 2018 workshop participant

For the past five years, I have taught an annual workshop based upon my second book entitled Tracking the Soul With an Astrology of Consciousness.  The book integrates astrology and the chakra system of yogic philosophy and explores the way that the astrological birthchart can be a map, not just to personality or to the skillful navigation of life circumstances, but also to personal growth.

From the soul’s perspective, each of us is born into this life with unfinished business.  Often, we experience this unfinished business as a wounding in childhood, which then gives rise to various issues, which generally cause problems throughout our lives, until we face them with a clear intention to address them, and ultimately to heal the underlying wounds at their core.  When we do, this important decision becomes the moment we consciously step onto the path of our soul’s journey toward Wholeness, or from an ultimately spiritual perspective, the return journey back to our Source in Spirit.

For me, the moment of wounding came at age 3, when I was playing king of the mountain with the neighborhood kids on a pile of ashes in my grandfather’s backyard.  I momentarily made it to the top of the mountain, only to have the other kids gang up on me, stuff ashes into my mouth and nose, and nearly kill me.  If it hadn’t been for my grandfather’s rescue, I would not be writing these words now.

Instead, I was rushed to the hospital where I spent several months recuperating from pneumonia.  This event set in motion several core issues, which in retrospect have served as the pivot point for a lifetime of growth: not just the obvious lung issues, which have waxed and waned; but also an inability to trust others; a fear of winning; and an explosive anger seeking some constructive outlet, to name just a few.  Throughout a lifetime in which these issues have periodically come to the fore and caused problems and difficulties, I have learned a great deal.  I won’t say I am completely healed, but I am most definitely a better, more conscious, more empowered person for having had to wrestle with them.  This, in fact, is the essence of my soul’s journey back toward Wholeness, as I now understand it, looking back.

In my 20s, as part of my soul’s quest for the healing of my lungs, I started studying kundalini yoga, where breathwork is central. I eventually moved into an ashram in Connecticut, then moved across the country to join the newly formed Kundalini Research Institute in California.  At the Institute, my job was to tape and transcribe Yogi Bhajan’s lectures, teach kundalini yoga, and after a while, help train teachers of kundalini yoga.  Around the same time, I discovered astrology and started doing charts for everyone who came through the teacher’s training program. 

While living in the ashram, it soon became apparent to me that raising kundalini also raised buried psychological issues, and ultimately brought core wounds to the surface.  Because there didn’t seem to be sufficient support for this aspect of the spiritual practice, I felt the necessity for additional training in psychology.  So I enrolled in graduate school and got my Master Degree in Marriage, Family and Child Counseling.

Through these formative years, I started weaving together the three threads that constitute the heart and soul of my work – astrology, yogic philosophy – particularly regarding the chakras, and western psychology – particularly the psychology of Carl Jung, and various humanistic and transpersonal schools of thought.  There is no better methodology in my opinion than astrology for mapping core issues and determining the timing for the triggering – and attendant opportunity for healing – of these issues.  A background in psychology adds depth of understanding to any astrological practice and is absolutely necessary for any astrologer working with core issues.  Meanwhile, a yogic perspective and understanding of the chakras provide a spiritual context in which working with core issues can be understood as a matter of consciousness.  Knowing how core issues are mapped to the chakra system in turn also gives the perspective necessary to devise strategies for more consciously addressing and transmuting these core issues, and ultimately to healing the core wounds that reverberate beneath the surface.

I could not have articulated this understanding back in my 20s, but one full Saturn cycle (about 30 years) later, I wrote the book – Tracking the Soul – on which this workshop is based, and started to put together the system that I now use to work with people in this way.  The process has been refined over the course of the last 12 years or so since the book was written, and through the course of five workshops conducted over the past 6 years.

Since 2016, I have been working with another gifted astrologer – Julie Yeaman – who also owns and operates a retreat center called Spirit Matters in Almonte, Ontario, Canada – roughly halfway between Toronto and Montreal.  This will be our third workshop together.  Each one is a little different, custom designed to address the common themes that individual participants bring to the workshop.  This keeps it interesting and fresh for everyone, and several participants have benefitted from returning for a second helping.

I used to teach the astrology behind my system as part of the workshop but gradually began to feel that this added layer of information was getting in the way of participants having an actual experience of shifting core issues and healing core wounds. So in 2014, I removed astrology from the program.  It still provides the invisible scaffolding for the workshop, but the workshop itself is a carefully crafted opportunity for participants to become more conscious of their patterns, and if ready, shift them to a higher, more conscious, more creative, more empowered level of expression.

Prior to the workshop, Julie and I use our knowledge of astrology to work one-on-one with each participant in a series of 6 private 1-hour sessions – to identify patterns ready to be shifted, to track the stories of those patterns, and to begin to imagine what life might look and feel like at a higher turn of the evolutionary spiral.

At the workshop itself, the group energy field, charged with a shared intention to learn and grow creates a sacred space in which genuine soul growth becomes possible.  After a day to share our stories, we work (and play) together through a series of exercises and experiences built around common themes to embody our insights so they can affect deep and lasting transformation.

At our last workshop, for example, we explored the roles our mothers have played in passing on lessons from the patriarchy about what it means to be a woman (or a man) and the ways in which these messages have limited use.  With women composing the majority of participants at this particular workshop, in general, these messages revolved around becoming smaller and more invisible than we really are; suppressing our emotions – particular fiery emotions like anger and outrage; and orienting ourselves around service and caretaking, instead of self-actualization.

In our preparation for the workshop, Julie and I then designed exercises to address these themes.  We had a “show and tell” about our mothers – sharing their favorite music, our favorite photographs, and stories about them, and the comfort food they prepared for us.  We had a values “auction” bidding against each other with Monopoly money for the values we claim to hold dear.  We raged at all the injustices in our lives and around the world and sought to transmute this raw energy with movement, art exercises, and Heart Math meditations.  We practiced speaking hard truths to others in our lives, whom we felt needed to hear us.  Lastly, we had a costume dance party that allowed each of us to step into an expanded identify and be seen and appreciated.

In short, we had fun – while exploring the possibility of living a larger life.  In these troubled times, it is important for each of us to step up, do the healing we need to do, access and cultivate our creative resources, and dedicate ourselves to making a difference in the world.  Our mutual desire to do this important work is what made it possible for everyone and an actual opportunity to make a quantum leap for some.

This year will be entirely different, depending on who shows up.

About the workshop, past participants have said:

“The concept is brilliant: working on your core issues in a beautiful and powerful setting. Eating vegetarian food. Bringing in exercise and meditation to complement it.  It was the first time that I really sat down and thought of my life in that way and it was helpful.” 

“The workshop was really, really something for me.  It was wonderful, scary, fun, sacred, mind-jarring, a time of growth and peace and a whole lot more.”

“Thank you so much for the incredibly deep work that you guided us through and birthed us through during those few days. I feel different inside and more surefooted on the outside.”

“I would say that it was life-altering.  I feel that strongly and I don’t say that lightly, perhaps because I’ve done some personal growth work before.  I was ready to heal and I’m extremely grateful for this past weekend.”

 

In Honor of “One Billion Rising”…pass it on, post it, be it!

https://www.facebook.com/apollopoetry/videos/10159968585645182/

http://https://www.facebook.com/apollopoetry/videos/10159968585645182/

If there is one thing I know….
It’s that WOMEN will lead the next revolution.

Men. It is time to be humble allies to the rise of the strong feminine. That healing will serve all of us, and it is necessary now more than ever. By working together.

“My Revolution Lives in my Body”
Written by Eve Ensler, Performed by Rosario Dawson

The Gift of Living Your Integration by Anyaa T McAndrew

written for www.myconsciouslifejournal.com

Most of us are pretty familiar with the idea of living our lives holistically. We know that it is essential to pay attention to every level of being including body, emotions, mind and spirit. If we know how we are operating from each of those places we can also sense where we have imbalances. Finding the places that are under-developed help us tune into strategies for strengthening those places, and calming down the parts that are over-developed. Typically, humans are over-developed mentally and under-developed physically, emotionally and spiritually. We tend to walk around with a lot of mental static, as if our head is saying, “I’m in charge, I’m in charge, I’m in charge, while we over-ride our physical needs, For example, when was the last time you got up from your desk to empty your bladder, get a snack or move your limbs? Emotionally, we tend to repress, deny and project our emotions so that either our bodies or our relationships take the brunt.  Spiritually, we forget our connection with our Source, forget that we are here for a bigger purpose, and get caught up in 3-dimensional reality to the exclusion of spiritual reflection and inspiration.

As a budding transpersonal therapist in the 90’s, we called it transpersonal living; we recognized that we were more than our personalities and subpersonalities. When we were able to see the bigger picture of a transcendent reality, all the pieces fell together. When we identify and work with the inside “committee”, the many subpersonalities that make up our psyche, we have a much better idea of who we really are and what each part of us wants. An extreme of this inner state would be dissociative disorder, which used to be called multiple personality disorder. But the truth is that each of us is a multiple, in the sense that we have an inner feminine, masculine, matriarch, patriarch, critic, several inner children, including toddlers, rebellious and compliant versions of teenagers, and those who have been wounded at various stages of our lives. This is just a smattering of our inner selves. The better we know who is inside through dreams, journaling, inner work, and personal reflection, the better we know ourselves. I find it helpful to know who the primary committee of 6-9 of us is that runs the show, their qualities, needs, wounds and strengths. This gives the hostess or host of this inner menagerie (us) a pretty good lay of the land and answers to lots of reasons why we do what they do, and believe what we believe.

In the late 90’s into early the early 2000’s, I brought in the shamanic perspective on wholeness; approaching life as a series of initiations for the soul, including all the dark nights, the soul-loss from past traumas, and the deaths and re-births that inevitably happen with a lifetime. I had already discovered that altered states of consciousness, like breathwork, trance-dance, hypnosis, and focused regression were powerful ways to integrate all parts of the self. Shamanic consciousness teaches us that we live in different realms and dimensions at different times, but that all of these are essential to our wholeness. The whole point is to get to a more expanded perspective on life, which may come from an animal ally, an angel, or a departed ancestor. From these expanded states of consciousness, to which we can return again and again after we inevitably fall off our path, we can find the meaning and purpose for living a life of grace, ease and balance.

Now there is a calling for us to go further, because to co-create the kind of world we all want to live in, we must be whole, healed and integrated. The times we live in are more complex than ever. The old spiritual dictate “know thyself” is of highest priority in these transformational times.

We are all multiple personalities and subpersonalities. Our inner world is made up of many voices, desires, wants and needs that must be tended to or else. It’s  amazing how unique and at odds with each other they can be! When they are not “all together” around our intentions, decisions and actions, we suffer. The suffering can include inner sabotage that results in having to go back and learn lessons over and over again, or it can be as extreme as anxiety, addictions, dysfunctional relationships, depression and illness.

There are lots of tools to help us identify our inner selves. One of my favorite methods is Voice Dialogue, the work of Hal and Sidra Stone. Another is Alchemical Hypnotherapy, the work of David Quigley. Gestalt Therapy, Psychosynthesis, Family Systems Therapy and any kind parts therapy, or work with our inner selves can be a place to start. WAny of these methods will help us understand what all or our “selves” need from us to do their job in our lives, and assist us in coming to conscious, integrated decisions with everyone on board. We can then work with them towards cooperation, collaboration and unity.

There’s a great peace that comes when everyone has been heard. It’s easier to open to the inner guides and Higher Selves who have another agenda to promote, that of the soul. May you be inspired to return to an favorite old way of “self” discovery, or find a new way that serves all of you, even better. May you accept all of your “selves”, with the inner compassion that leads to living with grace, ease and balance.

I am grateful for all the ways we have available to look at ourselves, accept all of ourselves, and live life with integration. May you be reminded or inspired to return to a favorite old way or find a new way that serves you in this moment of your life journey!

 

Because Life IS Ceremony: Bridging Spirit and Physical Reality by Anyaa T. McAndrew

written for www.myconsciouslifejournal.com

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Ceremony gives us the opportunity to celebrate our life passages so that they are fully grounded and integrated within us. Life is ceremony if it creates a bridge between the spirit or soul and our physical reality. When we use our minds creatively to construct the perfect ceremony, with all the appropriate preparation, prayers, symbolic objects, place, and people, all aspects of us come together in a unified field of consciousness that feels fullling and gives just the right expression to our intention. Then our consciousness is uplifted, and we are different. The ceremony has done what it was intended to do.

Marriage ceremonies are perhaps the best example of the kind of ceremony we humans really enjoy. We publicly proclaim our commitment to another, accompanied by lavish beauty and spiritual or religious rituals. It does not matter how many times we have been married in the past, we will embrace the opportunity to do it again in front of new friends.

Anyone can create a ceremony. Some of us enjoy orchestrating them, others like to participate, and still others prefer to witness, an essential role because witnesses hold an energetic container that frames a ceremony and gives it substance. Ceremonies
can be as small as one person or as many as space can accommodate. Is the ceremony for yourself, and if so, do you want witnesses, or is the ceremony for a larger group or even the planet? Tune into what and who is right for you.

The first step for a creator of ceremony is to know your Intention. Why are you doing ceremony? When you can name your intention out loud, the reason for coming together, you have begun the process. The second step is Invocation. This is where you call on beneficial powers and forces greater than yourself to assist. Often evoked are nature and the elements, animal totems, the directions, spiritual dimensions, and Spirit. They are waiting to be asked and love participating with human life. Always ask for the highest and best energies, and the highest and best for all beings involved in the ceremony, so that rogue energies don’t come in uninvited! The next step is to perform the body of the ceremony. This can be accompanied by music, song, instruments, readings, dancing, acting out roles, special prayers, using sacred objects, and working with fire, incense, herbs, oils, and water.

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Ceremonies are as varied as our imagination. It is essential to keep the energy and vitality of a ceremony uplifted, so that our own spirits and the spirits we invoked stay with us. When the body of the ceremony is nished, a closing that acknowledges and offers gratitude to every person, spirit, and element that participated brings in the feeling that all is complete and good. And last, the nal celebration may include a feast, party, dancing, and merriment to round out the experience and bring in sensual pleasure.

Ceremonies can honor life passages like puberty, adulthood, motherhood, elderhood, signi cant birthdays, marriage, divorce, birth and death. There are also more spiritual types like sweat lodge, re-walk, an initiation, a priest/ess emergence, ordination, sacred union (within ourselves), even a relationship completion or forgiveness ceremony. If you have not included a ceremony in your life recently, seek one out or create your own. The spirits will thank you, and the spiritual part of you will feel fed and honored.