This past week I traveled back to New York City, where I had lived in
my 20s, for the first time since I left. While I was there, I visited
the Museum of Natural History, where I had first experienced a
worldview that included women as sacred. Back in the 80s, Diane
Wolkstein had brought her performance of the Inanna story from ancient
Sumer there. I didn’t know it then, but that may be the closest I will
ever come to experiencing an ancient religious rite involving a female deity.
Thousands of years ago, the celebrations and ceremonies frequently
included re-enactments of stories about goddesses like Inanna.
When I unpacked after I returned home, I took my jewelry out of a
little silk bag and put back into it a mirror that had been sent to me
by my friend Marione. I had written a story in which one of the
characters shows another her reflection in a mirror as part of a ritual
and Marione sent me that gift in response. After I wrote the story, I
found out that this is indeed one of those spiritual acts that have
been done by priestesses for millennia all over world. Once again, a
modern woman had enriched my life by acting as a priestess.
What if we were all to take it upon ourselves as a sacred duty to act
as priestesses for each other? We live in a world in which women do
not see themselves as worthy and are treated as soulless objects by
others, leaving us subject to violence, abuse, and exploitation with
horrendous results for women and all of society. To me, as I study the
functions that priestesses held in ancient times and witness what seems
to be lacking in our world, a priestess is anyone who reflects back to
others her own sacredness and who heals. When we forget that we are
sacred and others are also, we open the door to violence, abuse, and exploitation.
When we heal, we make ourselves and others whole and bring ourselves
and others back into the web of all being.
Everyone has her own way of being a priestess, but here are the ways
that I have thought of to bring this essential function to our everyday
lives:
Make every job that of being a priestess. One common thread among the
women I know who I would consider priestessly is that they view their
jobs whether as a checker at Walmart, a teacher, a nurse, an
administrator, or a stay-at-home mom as a means to show others that
they are sacred. They do whatever they do in a way that responds to
each person they encounter as unique, important, and worthy. With
their family and friends, they encourage dreams, listen to ideas and opinions, mend broken self-respect.
They provide opportunities for others to find the sacred in themselves
by letting them take chances, by allowing the other person to take care
of the priestess as well as the other way around, by listening with
genuine interest as people talk about their lives and burdens.
Our lives are the stuff of the sacred. What happens to us everyday is
just as valuable, more really, for wisdom and life lessons, as any ancient story.
Be a priestess by telling your stories, expressing your thoughts,
giving others the benefit of what you have been through. Your life,
both the good and the bad, is a gift to you from the universe, and
priestesses share what they have been given.
Create beauty and celebrate the joy in life. Music, dance, poetry,
magnificent architecture and paintings have always been part of our
spiritual experience whether in temples or churches or in rituals.
Something about beauty makes us into spiritual beings. So often our
creative work is put on the back burner for what we may think of as
more important things, like making a salary or fulfilling social
obligations. As a priestess, I will try to make creative endeavors a
priority, maybe even blogging more often.
Finally, priestesses of old would often dress, speak, and behave like
the goddesses who they celebrated. To be a priestess, we must reflect
whatever reflects the best within us, whatever that may be. For many
women, the most important aspect of this is expressing compassion for
all those who come across their path. They hear the cries of the
world, as do so many goddesses and other female divine beings. Maybe
for me it is storytelling or making visions of the future. Maybe today
it will be one thing and tomorrow another.
Being a priestess everyday most likely won’t change much about what you
do, but maybe it will change the way you perceive yourself and your role in it.
Maybe it will help you get through a tedious day at work, or
re-evaluate what you see as important, or remind you in a new way that
you are sacred and worthy of being treated as well as the highest
spiritual leader. The Delphic oracle, the priestesses who dreamed
healing visions at the , the women who over thousands of years
have led their communities as spiritual leaders, they are all women
just like we are, and, no matter who we are, we can be like them, too, everyday.