S. Kelley Harrell's Blog: Intentional Insights - Ancient Healing, Modern Shamanism, page 57

What It Is Wednesday — Dauntlessly Dealt (dissociation) Reality

A weekly dose of dauntlessly dealt reality from the What It Is Wednesday Blog Carnival…

The image to the left circulated as a meme on Facebook over the last couple of weeks, and stirred a few synapses for me. It’s too easy in the intuitive arena to assume that empathy is innately good, that it’s innate at all, or that it’s even healthy. As an adult survivor of childhood incest, I can fully attest that it isn’t always beneficial, and Darlene Ouimet’s quote is one reason why.

I am ridiculously intuitive. How, why–no idea. I always have been. Maybe it’s a result of ultra-empathy due to abuse, or maybe I genuinely came out that way. I don’t know, and for the most part, I’ve never cared to dissect it.

Except for the places in which anticipating the moods or needs of others isn’t a solid life tactic.

Whether your approach to The Way Life Works is random, destiny, wyrd, karma, or some original or odd combo of all of the above, there are poignant places in an adult’s life that anticipating the needs of others gets you into a lot of trouble. Like in relationships, work, community–basically any healthy interaction with another human. It becomes a method of damage control that conscripts who you really are, such that your ability to truly be present in dynamics is inauthentic. And if you aren’t showing up sincerely to engage, you can’t expect others to, either. The playing field has already been biased by the projection of what you think is needed. Anything that happens from that point forward is not based on the present. And if it’s not based on the present, it’s a post-traumatic (PTSD) dynamic.

And if it’s PTSD, chances are, you’re dissociating.

Dissociating is when your mind goes blank under duress, or you intentionally shift mental gears to dodge stress. It isn’t inherently a bad thing. When it happens without your control, and in situations that aren’t five alarm, again, PTSD.

When you project (or protect) the states of being of others to protect yourself, it’s a type of dissociation. Doing so becomes so reflexive, so integrated that you don’t even realize you’re doing it. You may think you’re intuitive or super empathic. You don’t realize that you aren’t acting out of your own choice, or that by not doing so, you’re affecting others’ ability to do the same. How I know that is I realized that as an adult, I was still anticipating others’ needs. I was still post-traumatic, just not in the total meltdown category.

I realized I was ‘micro-dissociating,’ as I call it, a few years ago. It would show up when I was engaged in a conversation, yet not realize what was just said. Or I would be poised to speak, when suddenly I’d have no words. I was thinking, thought I was present, and had something to contribute, yet my unconscious urge to be constantly monitoring the situation and respond in the least inflammatory way possible trumped my cognisant process.

If you’ever decided to try something new–instill a new habit, learn a language, pick up a new skill–you know how challenging it is. You have to change who you are at fundamental brain levels, your assumptions about self and life, to let a new pattern seat into your mental processes.

I decided one way that I wanted to improve those processes was through board gaming. It’s fun, educational, challenging, sort of social, and did I say fun? For real, though, playing board games sharpens synapses, encourages critical thinking, and in the most woo way possible, requires you to be present.

I learned very quickly that’s not why other people play board games. In a given scenario of four players, picture me–the one for fun, who may or may not actually be skilled at the given game–two other players who are decent at the game, and one who’s hardcore in it to win. Needless to say, someone like me isn’t fun to game with if you fall into the latter scenario. And if I’m totally honest, it’s not entirely fun to play with someone who counts cards and half-way through the game can tell you the median point spread.

I digress.

Anticipation of needs or moods is a handy skill in playing games, yes? Sure. The problem with it is, when you’re playing board games, you have to be able to read very tangible things. You have to pay attention to the full picture, not just what you think other people need, figuratively or literally. You have to have been paying attention to what you need, and by default, what’s been revealed and hidden in the proceedings, the whole time. If you’re dissociating, you can’t do that.

In contrast, the hardcore player has been counting cards (or money, points, what have you). Not only does this player know what elements are in play, by virtue of knowing what’s out there, they’re making viable assumptions about what’s left, how it must be played to their advantage, and how that will impact the game.

I will never win against someone who can do that (I will also likely never be a fun opponent, either).

In the same way that empathy isn’t necessarily a great skill to fall back on all the time, neither are coping devices that really only work in isolated situations. They will not serve you in situations in which it’s dire to have tactile input.

No board gaming isn’t dire. But life is. And if I finally can learn that skill in an arena that’s safe, it will serve me well beyond the mere roll of dice.

—

If You Want to Be Real on your blog, visit the inaugural page —http://www.soulintentarts.com/what-it-is-wednesday/  and follow the instructions there to share your reality with the world! Read other blogs in the carnival, below:

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The Weekly Rune

For the week of 5 February 2017

Solo joy.

Algiz is the half-month stave through 13 February. Mannaz reversed is the intuitive stave, and Wunjo indicates the planet’s message to us. Read right to left is Algiz, then Mannaz reversed, followed by Wunjo.

The half-month rune is set by the runic calendar, and governs for a tad over two weeks. The intuitive stave (meaning, I draw it blind) indicates the life force most available to us, which brings the focus of the half-month rune into sharper focus for the present week. It suggests how we can handle these energies. The planetary stave (also a blind draw) indicates the state and needs of the planet.

Below is a summary of The Weekly Rune. If you’d like to receive the full runecast, subscribe  for as little as $5 a month. The full runecast provides more details on how the current runes impact human life force over the next week, and how to best manage the curves and twists therein. With a subscription, you also receive it on Sunday instead of Monday!

Over the last week, Algiz shown us what protection is needed to be who we are in the world. It looks much like a splayed hand, from which we can easily infer “talk to the…,” though in its cultural context is perhaps a bit more complex than that.

It isn’t protective in an us vs them way, but in a we are them sort of way. In the art of war, we don’t learn how to cope with enemies by focusing only on where we are different from them, but also on where we are the same. That balance of exchange and surrender is very on pointe with the Old Norse culture, which was known for hostage-taking. Throughout the eddas are accounts of intermingling of the Æsir with the Vanir, the Æsir with the Jötnar.

Mannaz reversed implies not to expect company in that endeavor. Upright it indicates that new awareness is needed on a matter, new social interaction, new mindfulness. Reversed, expect to go it alone. Whatever insight can come will either be self-derived, or just not come at this time. The challenge in this configuration is not to let it get too mental.

Wunjo leaves things on a ridiculously positive note. It’s one of the two runes that everyone wants too come up in their casts. This stave represents the sweet spot of all cylinders hitting as they should, all systems aligned. However, what it really is and its challenge are one and the same: joy. How often do we allow ourselves to feel joy? To express it? To share it? The ability to recognize, feel, and be joy are very distinct things, and many of us struggle with one or all parts.

So, even though there’s some work to be done creating the space of ourselves as Algiz, and Mannaz reversed points to do that largely alone, Wunjo brings the opportunity to feel really great in that process.

See it for what it is, and be it.

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Originally published on Soul Intent Arts.

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The Weekly Rune

For the week of 29 January 2017

The big reveal.

Algiz is the half-month stave through 13 February. Sowilo (Sowilu) is the intuitive stave, and Kenaz reversed indicates the Nature’s message to us. Read right to left is Algiz, then Sowilo, followed by Kenaz reversed.

The half-month rune is set by the runic calendar, and governs for a tad over two weeks. The intuitive stave (meaning, I draw it blind) indicates the life force most available to us, which brings the focus of the half-month rune into sharper focus for the present week. It suggests how we can handle these energies. The planetary stave (also a blind draw) indicates the state and needs of the planet.

Below is a summary of The Weekly Rune. If you’d like to receive the full runecast, subscribe  for as little as $5 a month. The full runecast provides more details on how the current runes impact human life force over the next week, and how to best manage the curves and twists therein. With a subscription, you also receive it on Sunday instead of Monday!

We’ve moved through the progression of Eihwaz and Perthro, which means we’ve grown from  realizing the culmination of [our] actions to realizing the exact point that we have to step back and just let things fall where they will. It’s been challenging, though not grueling.  The natural progression to Algiz brings the proper fortification needed to hold that space.

Algiz looks much like a splayed hand, which ties well into its meaning of “protection.” Indeed, it is about boundaries and knowing the home territory so well that we become it. Historically, this rune translates to elk, or an elk-sedge (razor-sharp grass). Significant about these is both presents a territorial stance. Defensive? Perhaps, though most certainly protective.

Sowilo fosters that ability wonderfully. It translates to “sun,” though harkens to a time that the sun wasn’t just a star, but an entity. In fact, it reflected a perception that Nature was divine. In fact, it was divinity, itself. So when we look at the sun, we have the opportunity to remember what is Divine in our lives, in ourselves. Regarding Sowilo, I love the saying, “The divinity behind the sun shines on us so that we may shine on others.” Bringing this element to Algiz doesn’t have to disrupt its protectiveness. In fact, it can bring compassion and wider awareness to otherwise pigeonholed rough edges.

Kenaz reversed suggests that at some point there has been a tiny spark of light in an otherwise pitch black surrounding that didn’t seem feasible or possible. Self-doubt shadowed that flicker until it’s dire that it be known. The good thing is this rune shows up when the crisis has somewhat passed, and we’re sitting in the remaining ashes. What we’re left with are choices to be made in how to dispose of the ashes, and an openness in how to go forward.

And of course, we can’t force habit.

This week there’s a lot to learn about what it means to stand firm and understanding what’s stood upon in that process. Chances are what’s revealed this week is the ability to do that well.

Subscribe to the full runecast.

Learn more about the Reclaiming the Runes Intensive and preview course.

Originally published on Soul Intent Arts.

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The Weekly Rune

For the week of 22 January 2017

In which diving deep becomes easier.

Perthro is the half-month stave through 28 January. Ehwaz is the intuitive stave, and Gebo indicates the planet’s needs. Read right to left is Perthro, then Ehwaz, followed by Gebo.

The half-month rune is set by the runic calendar, and governs for a tad over two weeks. The intuitive stave (meaning, I draw it blind) indicates the life force most available to us, which brings the focus of the half-month rune into sharper focus for the present week. It suggests how we can handle these energies. The planetary stave (also a blind draw) indicates the state and needs of the planet.

Below is a summary of The Weekly Rune. If you’d like to receive the full runecast, subscribe  for as little as $5 a month. The full runecast provides more details on how the current runes impact human life force over the next week, and how to best manage the curves and twists therein. With a subscription, you also receive it on Sunday instead of Monday!

Last week I wrote at length about Perthro as the stave of “chance,” and how it’s somewhat the culmination of our actions, our ancestors’ actions, and many other forces of Nature we know, and those we know nothing of. The point is, when Perthro comes up we can bet it’s a done deal. We’ve set up the dominoes per our wyrd, and how they fall is örlög in motion. The next part of it is to get out of the way and let the work carry itself, which doesn’t mean collapse in a heap of exhaustion or move on to the next focus. It means that the job now is to sustain the momentum without projecting into it.

That’s the hardest part.

Ehwaz gives great pointers around how to handle that. The rune of the shamanic journey, it encourages us to call in the spirit of what we’re creating–all of it. The inspiration, the process, where it’s going, etc., and engage it. Ask what it needs. State what’s needed. Keep the dialogue going. Don’t just show up; breathe life into it, every day.

Gebo hints that trusting that process brings partnership in some way. What’s telling is this is the message from the planet to us. If we walk that process, devote ourselves to it completely yet hold it loosely enough for it to make its own way, that’s the highest work we can do. It’s perhaps also the hardest, though what other option is there?

Subscribe to the full runecast.

Learn more about the Reclaiming the Runes Intensive and preview course.

Originally published on Soul Intent Arts.

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Podcast – Are We Changing the Spirit World?

Join me tomorrow at2pm EST, on Why Shamanism Now with Christina Pratt to discuss how we impact the spirit world.

The fixed and constant idea of the invisible world ordered in upper, middle, and lower worlds is a fundamental assumption of neoshamanism. However, if the relationship between humans and helping spirits is truly a working relationship, then it is possible that humans are changing the spirits even as the spirits are help us to change ourselves? Join us this week and contemporary shamanic practitioners and teachers, Kelley Harrell and Christina Pratt explore the signs that humans are changing the dynamics of not only the physical world, but also the invisible world of energy and spirit. Are there spirit world parallels between our affects on the physical world, climate change and polluting our elemental resources, and the spirit world? And most importantly, if there are, what shall we do about it?

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The Weekly Rune

For the week of 15 January 2017

In which push doesn’t have to come to shove.

Perthro is the half-month stave through 28 January. Isa is the intuitive stave, and Thurisaz reversed indicates the planet’s needs. Read right to left is Perthro, then Isa, followed by Thurisaz reversed.

The half-month rune is set by the runic calendar, and governs for a tad over two weeks. The intuitive stave (meaning, I draw it blind) indicates the life force most available to us, which brings the focus of the half-month rune into sharper focus for the present week. It suggests how we can handle these energies. The planetary stave (also a blind draw) indicates the state and needs of the planet.

Below is a summary of The Weekly Rune. If you’d like to receive the full runecast, subscribe  for as little as $5 a month. The full runecast provides more details on how the current runes impact human life force over the next week, and how to best manage the curves and twists therein. With a subscription, you also receive it on Sunday instead of Monday!

Perthro is often misunderstood as “luck,” though it is perhaps better described as “chance.” To assume it is only luck implies that all possiblity is up to the wind–anything can happen. However, with this stave, that’s not the whole story.

 

There are a few good analogies for Perthro, though I like my domino one best. Ideally, by the time we work the process leading to half-month rune of Perthro, we’ve set the dominoes up. We know what condition the dominoes are in, we know how many we used, we know what basic pattern they should form and what characteristics they should express as we tip them to fall.

The nature of Perthro, though, is we have no idea how they will really fall. So with this stave comes with a certain amount of confidence that we have covered the elements under our control, and have only to let the örlög of the situation play out.

So, where’s this week headed?

Isa isn’t going to let us progress further until were very clear on our process with Perthro. Isa carries a ‘ring not pass’ dynamic, in which we won’t move beyond the current vantage point until we’ve gotten what we can from it. Such is the wisdom offered to humanity at this time. Don’t rush through the manifestation process that’s unfolding. Let it guide, yet stay attentive to points along the way that need attention.

Thurisaz reversed comes to reinforce that hesitation. Thurisaz upright is concerned with unconscious urges that motivate change. Where Hagalaz is external upheaval that initiates change, Thurisaz is internal. It’s no less explosive, however. If anything, it’s often messier and tied into intimate life change.

Stay aware of streaks of self-righteousness and the instinct to lash out, this week. Indeed, as the voice of Nature, there is a place in natural prrogression for such action to occur. Maybe something useful comes of it. Maybe we can catch ourselves before we retaliate. There’s no projection of outcome with this stave, just a caution to be aware of our own power and wielding it in a way that supports our truth without devastating that of others.

Subscribe to the full runecast.

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Originally published on Soul Intent Arts.

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The Weekly Rune

For the week of 8 January 2017

In which rituals are set, though we are not.

Eihwaz is the half-month stave through 13 January, at which point Perthro moves forward. Algiz reversed is the intuitive stave, and Berkano indicates the planet’s needs. Read right to left is Eihwaz above, Perthro below, then Algiz reversed, followed by Berkano.

The half-month rune is set by the runic calendar, and governs for a tad over two weeks. The intuitive stave (meaning, I draw it blind) indicates the life force most available to us, which brings the focus of the half-month rune into sharper focus for the present week. It suggests how we can handle these energies. The planetary stave (also a blind draw) indicates the state and needs of the planet.

Below is a summary of The Weekly Rune. If you’d like to receive the full runecast, subscribe  for as little as $5 a month. The full runecast provides more details on how the current runes impact human life force over the next week, and how to best manage the curves and twists therein. With a subscription, you also receive it on Sunday instead of Monday!

The rune for the season, is one that bothers a lot of people. It’s often equated to death or a point that what we’re carrying just can’t be shouldered any longer. On the surface that sounds like a terribly dark time. In reality, it’s the point that Nature has come to relieve us of our crap. We haven’t for whatever reason unburdened ourselves, so Nature will do it for us. This stave can’t be reversed, which means this dynamic can’t be avoided.

 

 

Cover the bases this week of clearing, healing, and in the space opened up, where the effort need to be focused to do the best work.

Algiz reversed suggests that we may be a bit exposed during this clearing time. Upright it expresses protection. Reversed it seems a good time to make sure the home front is being tended, such that our relationship with Nature/home spirits is in good health. They are ultimately our strongest protection, and this is a good time to renew any commitments, there.

Berkano brings balm to this whole process. She comes at the end of a long labor and offers us rest–real rest–not the spinning-in-the-head-planning-the-next-move kind. This is what the planet wants of us at this time. Nature doesn’t criticize itself. It doesn’t plot. It rests when it needs to, then it takes action again.

For now, realize hard work come to fruition, and sit with it. Celebrate it. Come to know the work as its own being, and release it on the world, as we also present a new self at the end of this transition time.

Subscribe to the full runecast.

Learn more about the Reclaiming the Runes Intensive and preview course.

Originally published on Soul Intent Arts.

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Life Betwixt – Depression in the Shaman’s Life

Throughout the Betwixt Series I’ve emphasized that shamanism isn’t called ‘fire in the head’ for no reason.

It’s inextricable from mental illness because we culturally can’t honor hearing voices and engaging trance states without also projecting judgement onto sanity and credibility. Schizophrenia and bipolar conditions are most often associated with shamanism, though I  posit that depression touches every shaman in some way, at some point on their path. I cycle with it, still.

Cultural bias aside, shamanism is a challenging path, one that undertaken lightly quickly grounds into stark initiation. So intense are they once begun that incomplete initiations become PTSD. I frequently tell my students that yes, the spirits call you, but you decide to answer, and part of that decision is learning to navigate life betwixt. It isn’t innate. Learning mindfulness, coping skills, and self-care are requirements. While engaging the unseen may be intuitive, knowing what to do with what’s found there isn’t. Having experiences that set you apart from the pack may be profound, though not being able to talk to anyone about them is isolating. That judgement is real. Being a natural in mastering ecstatic techniques may be a blessing, though lacking coping skills to deal with the onslaught of empathy generated by them incites deep crisis.

These are facts that I’ve witnessed, repeatedly, both on my own path and in being present for others working theirs.

Such are the sensitive points that many seekers turn away from shamanism, completely. Regardless of how giddy the heart or powerful the totem, the reality of the challenges of shamanism set in for all who tread there, eventually.

For those that stay and complete the initiation, these are the moments that undermine their sanity, terrorize their dreams, and subvert their deepest truths.  Fun yet?

From there, the path progresses from personal exploration and healing to one of universal integration and healing. It becomes bigger than the self, as does the potential for trigger. It isn’t possible to over dramatize how it feels to witness the spiritual source of horror and hatred, then somehow manage to still forge self and stability–getting the bills paid, lunch made, and clean clothes on the family. In the face of such, why stay? Why stick it out?

Therein lies the real rub. We’ve conditioned ourselves to think that the shadow aspects of shamanism are paranormal bumps in the night, suffering spirits in the New Age closet, and confrontation of personal and collective wounds. We’ve assimilated the notion that it’s our job to heal everything,  yet not talk about the wounds that emerge from the work, itself. These ghosts are the very same depression of our waking moments, yes? What we fear, what we fail, what we fake.

The work takes a toll. However, those haunts aren’t what creep into the hearts of shamans and hold them stricken. They aren’t what sit so heavily on our shoulders, and sustain the fire in our heads. Shadow isn’t what does shamans in. In fact, you can’t be long on the path without realizing that Shadow isn’t even Shadow. We think it’s prescribed darkness. We think it’s the boogeyman crafted by our unique psyche, waiting to do us in. It’s none of those.

Shadow is what we don’t know about ourselves and the world around us, and what most of us don’t know isn’t what’s dark, but what’s sweet, beautiful, breakable.

Shadow is sublime beauty and balance. It’s the empowered feminine and benevolent masculine. It’s experiencing deeper interconnection than any human can imagine, yet is part of. It’s Nature as engaged fae and Other, and worlds within worlds. It’s perfect compassion, unrelenting unconditional love, life Before, life After, life Beyond. It’s unraveling the riddle of the Unknown, and realizing you’re part of its Unknowable.

You can’t participate in these things and come back to everyday life the same, let alone satisfied. That’s why we keep doing it. That’s why it affects us so deeply. The soul of war and wounding hurts, though its wounds pale beside memories of just how charmed and beguiling Other life is. I’ve never had complications bringing a client back from a dismemberment or depossession, though there have been several occasions that I had to coax clients back into their bodies after meeting long lost allies, exploring light worlds that feel like a first-ever homecoming.

When we venture out with intention, we encounter states of perfection that waking life can’t sustain. It’s not built to sustain them, yet some part of us is them. We seek them out, over and over. Yes, the lure for shamanism can become escapist, creating another recipe for crisis.

How do we stay tender to the magick of All Things, yet remain functional, progressive in the drudgery of formed being? That is the age-old question. It isn’t whether shamanism is real, or who gets to be recognized as one, or if it’s another word for crazy. Because no matter how attuned to the beauty and wonder of physicality, no matter how in love, how devoted to being here, it’s not the light experience ever awaiting us Out There. It just isn’t.

Living betwixt is the conundrum that shamans face from day one, to the last. The hardest part of the role of shaman isn’t being between worlds, but living between states of being. Ecstasy, itself, is altered. Actively, directly, willfully engaging it is leaving self open to states of being beyond our control. We can’t know how they will affect us until we’re already changed. We learn the walk, the talk, the work, yet keeping our hearts open and well is the true job. And on the best of days, with the most powerful healing, returning from the sweetest of soul travels, that work can look a lot like depression.

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What It Is Wednesday — Dauntlessly Dealt (annual theme) Reality

A weekly dose of dauntlessly dealt reality from the What It Is Wednesday Blog Carnival…

For years, in lieu of New Year’s Resolutions, my magickal mystic lunch group has chosen themes for ourselves. I can trace exactly what my themes have been and my progress on them, back to 2010. Things like “recognize patterns,” “find a better feeling,” “appeal to the High Self,” “make room for creativity,” etc.

These weren’t just themes, more like oaths. When things go awry, come back to the theme. When nothing blesses, sing it like a mantra. After a while the themes became progressive, as in movement with one dovetailed neatly into what theme could come next year.

I’ve easily spent the last month trying to come up with my theme for 2017. I read back over my journal of previous themes, tallied where I am on each of them, gave pats on the back, cringed with incompetency, and came up with a big fat nothing.

Over the last year I’ve retained two attorneys (apparently it’s the new adulting), dropped back on my shamanic practice, published one book, not contracted on any of my current manuscripts/proposals, experienced a significant decline in health, which finally was diagnosed after fifteen years of pain, exhaustion, and WTF, had two deaths in my family, didn’t take a class in anything, cried more than I can remember in adulthood, been stressed out of my mind, set glorious plans in motion, been hard-pressed to complete.a.single.thing, and my spirit allies have largely been MIA in the wake of intense planetary changes. I’ve realized in 2016 that I am against some intensely debilitating restrictions physically, and it’s taken a tremendous toll on my psyche, mobility, and drive. And if I had to isolate one of the above things that’s really doing my head in, it’s the lack of engagement from my spirit guides.

There’s no guidance to have right now. No bullet list, no meaning. What’s uplifting about that is most every shamanist I talk with frequently notes the same trend. There is a much bigger dynamic in play that isn’t at all personal, and our guides are busy tending it. The isolation left in that lack comes down to really good coping skills, a solid Tribe, and that thing about bootstraps.

In truth, the crud of 2016 has left me realizing how good I had it, before. I’ve said many times, mine has been an enchanted life, even through terrible childhood times, and sad but healing adulthood. I have always been in the company of muses, internal and beyond. I have never in my life been as lonely as I am now, spiritually speaking.

It reminds me of realizing I didn’t know how to study, in college. I always got good grade with little to no effort. I enjoyed learning, I was well-read, fairly privileged where the public school system is concerned, and even though I wasn’t a cookie cutter learner, I could get by on some innate ability to perform well in school.

I never studied. I never had to.

Then college happened and for the first time in my life I got bad grades. Of course everything that I’d held back emotionally about my childhood came out at the same time, so that was part of it. But strictly cognitively, intellectually, I was finally being challenged, and I didn’t know how to rise to it. There were no resources, no fall back skills, no faking it til I made it. There was either I knew it or I didn’t, in which case I had to figure out how to learn it. In some cases I failed outright, but every step was a PTSD nightmare of learning how to learn.

Life feels that way now, in this spiritual dearth, and I don’t want to do it piecemeal again. I am on my own, spiritually speaking, and I have to decide that I’m enough to do the things I want in my life, with this body, this family, this Tribe, open to calling, every step. There’s no muse motivation, no cheerleading fae, no ass-kicking spirit ally. There’s only me, and if that’s not enough to keep me, I don’t know what is. And for now, that’s still a question, not a diva-delivered power statement.

With that in mind, my theme this year is quite simple: breathe.

Keep the body going, let what comes move through on the breath, leaving me well-placed and clear for What Comes Next.

How simple.

How complex.

How the mighty have fallen.

I wish you the best this New Year. May 2017 bring you the realization that you are enough. You are not alone. You are beautiful, and I see you. We all see you. Thank you for what you do here.

—

If You Want to Be Real on your blog, visit the inaugural page —http://www.soulintentarts.com/what-it-is-wednesday/  and follow the instructions there to share your reality with the world! Read other blogs in the carnival, below:

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The Weekly Rune

For the week of 1 January 2017

In which we end then begin.

Eihwaz is the half-month stave through 13 January. Dagaz is the intuitive stave, and Mannaz reversed indicates the planet’s needs. Read right to left is Eihwaz, then Dagaz, followed by Mannaz reversed.

The half-month rune is set by the runic calendar, and governs for a tad over two weeks. The intuitive stave (meaning, I draw it blind) indicates the life force most available to us, which brings the focus of the half-month rune into sharper focus for the present week. It suggests how we can handle these energies. The planetary stave (also a blind draw) indicates the state and needs of the planet.

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The rune for the season, is one of endings and beginnings. Specifically, Eihwaz forces the corner we have no choice but to go around. The journey is as comfortable as we make it.

It’s appropriate for this state of needed uncertainty to come after Solstice. Jera asked us to evaluate harvest and make plans, when things were festive and still giddy from the tranciness of Isa. Eihwaz slams us back to grounded reality, requiring us to change our foundation to accommodate those plans.

And it does slam.

Several of the runes can be considered change runes, though what makes Eihwaz stand out from them is that it comes with baggage, and is usually the kind that we carry dutifully, though complain about carrying. It expresses the point at which we realize change is necessary, though not necessarily welcomed. Indeed, when Eihwaz appears in a cast, the time to strip out the dead of our lives has arrived.

Eihwaz represents the hell we know, and the itch for change despite tense comfort.

Linked to the evergreen yew, its association with poison and configuration as an axis between worlds brings multiple levels of meaning to Eihwaz. It is the part of the path that lies between extremes. It is the point that we know we must leave the familiar and venture into the unknown.

Dagaz as the rune of best-spent energy encourages us to find meaning in this change. If we approach the required change as perfunctory, one we’re obligated to participate in, we’re likely to miss or resent the emotional process required to heal what’s led up to this need for change, and we’ll lack the bond to the change, itself, which can make settling in more agreeable.

Greet this change as a being unto itself. Talk with it. Ask it what it really needs. Tell it what is needed. In this way, intimacy is created, and all forces can work together to a helpful end.

Mannaz reversed sets the stage for this change to be fully self-driven. Brightstave, Mannaz is all about engaging new social groups so that new consciousness can be stirred. Merkstave, though, the processes needed for that interaction can’t happen, or are misleading. What the planet tells us through this rune is no calvary is rushing in to save us, or even set us up and dust off in the hubub.

And really, we don’t need the calvary. As all things in Nature do, we have what we need to make this change and see it into being. We just only produce change under the needed circumstances.

Push comes to shove, we’ll meet on the other side of this.

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Originally published on Soul Intent Arts.

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