Healing – Page 2 – Feminism and Religion

The Grandeur of Fragility by Carolyn Lee Boyd

Lake Ruban. Jacques-Cartier National Park. Quebec, Canada. By LBM1948 – Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=72309690

Water is mighty. Water was the birthplace of all life on our planet. Water regulates the world’s climate cycles and makes it possible for the matrix of life to exist. Twenty-thousand years ago, ice moved across the Earth creating the planet’s landscape of mountains, lakes, rivers, lakes and oceans that bring us awe in their majestic beauty.

Water is also fragile. Water evaporates and disappears from our sight during the laziest summer day. Frozen water, ice, can shatter into shards at the slightest tap. With just a few degrees of extra warmth even great glaciers disintegrate and slide into the ocean. Water is elemental to much of our species and planet’s fragility, whether there is too much of it in a flood, or not enough in a drought. In just a couple of centuries, humans have endangered water all over the globe through pollution and other actions.

Devi* Has a Sense of Humour by Terry Folks

(*Devi is the feminine principle in Hinduism, the goddess counterpart to Deva, the male aspect.)

I live alone.

I put a small stool on the bathroom floor beside a kitchen chair next to the vanity counter top. My plan was to step on the stool then up on to the chair, then up on to the counter so I could stand and put a hook in the ceiling.

When I finished, I carefully turned around to make my way back down from counter to the chair. As I was stepping down, I felt unstable so I instinctively reached for the towel bar on the wall. The towel bar gave way and I fell directly left side down on to the high back of the chair, bringing the chair down to the floor with me beside the empty stool.

Do You Hear Seal-Woman Calling?

It was beautiful to read Carol P. Christ recent ‘from the archives’ post “Mermaid, Goddess Of The Sea,” especially because I’m in the middle of organising my first live Story-Dance workshop since several years, to move through one of my favourite stories of the Selkie-Seal Woman!

Stories of seal-women drift across the sea from the windswept coasts of Scotland to the icy shores of the Arctic. In the Scottish and Irish Highlands, Seal-women are known as selkies—shapeshifters who live as seals in the ocean, and who, when they shed their skins, walk as women on land. These selkie women dance beneath the moonlight, their laughter echoing across the waves as they rejoin their sisters in joyful reunion with the earth.

Yoga for Witches: Should You Try This at Home?

In this post, I review Yoga for Witches by Sarah Robinson, a practical book that weaves together two ancient practices with surprising similarities, yoga from the East, and witchcraft as practiced in Northwestern Europe.

I start with what I loved, and how Robinson describes the similarities and differences between those two traditions. That weaves into some personal and deeper reflections on the theoretical background and yoga sequences. At the end you’ll find a specific recommendation so you’ll know if this is the book for you!

Overnight at a Neolithic Dolmen: A Womb Healing Ceremony by Eline Kieft

In preparation for my hysterectomy, I decided to spend a night in a dolmen at Samhain last year, to seek guidance and healing. I chose Dolmen de Bajouilière in Saint-Rémy-la-Varenne, in Northern France, a site I had discovered by chance the previous year on my local explorations.

This well-preserved structure, with its spacious square divided into two rooms, felt inviting and safe for an overnight ritual. Though I am accustomed to spending nights in neolithic monuments, mostly in the UK, I felt some hesitation, partly due to my intermediate French and unfamiliarity with the local spirits.

Nevertheless, I recognized this resistance as part of the ego’s fear of the unknown, and I gave myself permission to retreat if needed. If I would feel too vulnerable, it wouldn’t serve my body and spirit ahead of the surgery. Please join me on my overnight Samhain Ceremony full of deep imagery and transformation as I shed my womb three times…

Death & Rebirth : Domestic Violence and Victimhood by Chaz J.

*Trigger warning

**When I refer to Black women, I am referring specifically to descendants of African peoples that were forced to experience the dehumanization of chattel slavery in the United States.

I am no different than most Black children. Physical, mental, emotional, and physical harm is a historic reality deeply rooted in the Black American experience. This experience is mirrored in collective parenting and relating to children. In this context, many parents believe preparing children for the harsh realities of the world and the United States, while living in Black bodies, necessitates acclimating them to mistreatment and aggression. This parenting approach, (a consequence of centuries of colonization, slavery, and the ongoing impact of white supremacy), prioritizes survival. This survival mechanism has indeed ensured that we live and therefore I deeply respect the survival mechanisms deployed to survive. I offer no harsh critiques, only lessons learned and a desire for us to do better collectively now that we know better.

A Healing Shrine by Joyce Zonana

From October 5, 2023. Joyce posted the blogpost which she titled: Nineteen months and Counting: Experiencing the Web of Life

On February 28, 2022, I unknowingly drove into a deep snowbank, shortly after finding myself in a strangely unfamiliar landscape. Suspecting a TIA, my primary care physician urged me to go to an emergency room for a possible CAT scan. There, a lesion in my right parietal lobe was quickly discovered.

Walking the Chartres Labyrinth

The Chartres Cathedral, located southwest of Paris, is rich in symbolism and history. Featuring stunning stain-glass windows, a famous labyrinth, and a shrine to “Our Lady of the Pillar”, it offers a profound meditation experience. Exploring the labyrinth’s symbolism and personal reflections amidst everyday distractions, the author shares a transformative journey.

Let me take you on a pilgrimage to Chartres Cathedral, share about the ancient symbolism of the labyrinth, and ponder on how to interpret signs and symbols we receive along the way…

3 Taoist Secrets for Embodying your Life

Taoism is an ancient Chinese philosophy and spiritual tradition that offers a unique perspective on life, existence, and human experience. Where many religious practices aim to transcend and sometimes even punish the body, Taoism cultivates a deep connection with our physical self in ongoing relationship with nature around us.

This resonates with my own experience, in which I see the body as starting point and place of return for everything we do in life. Leaving the body in order to meet spirit or the divine has never made any sense to me.

In this article I’ll highlight a few elements of Taoism as an embodied philosophy, specifically zooming in on principles and practices that promote holistic wellbeing and inner peace.

Desperately Seeking Persephone by Janet Rudolph, Book Review by Carolyn Lee Boyd, Part Two

In Part One of this review (posted yesterday), we learned how Janet descended into the Underworld, like Inanna and Persephone, after child abuse and rape, and how she began a decades-long journey back to our own world, healed and empowered. To learn more about her return from the Underworld and how she became the shaman and author she is today, I invite you to join the journey in Part Two as we continue to explore “Signposts” that marked her ascent.

Signpost #3. Be aware, be free, be focused, be here, be loved, be strong, be healed.

Janet’s teachers at the Mystery School had brought together shamanic traditions from throughout then world. Among them was Huna, or Hawaiian Adventure Shamanism as practiced by Serge Kahili King. A summary of Huna is shown in a mantra: Be aware, be free, be focused, be here, be loved, be strong, be healed (114) and “focus on the gifts that come to us through adversity” (116).