Tag

Feminine

Edie Weinstein welcomes Courtney A. Walsh and Red Basket as they explore the sacred nature of the feminine energies inherent in both men and women.

The magic, the medicine and the mystery of the feminine power exists in all of us. In order to access it, sometimes we need to go out of our minds so we can live from our hearts. Both women have discovered the holy union that occurs when men and women work together.

Courtney A. Walsh is a mental wellness consultant, speaker and author of Lipsticks and Thongs In the Looney Bin, as well as the viral prose called Dear Human that has made its way around the world. www.squeezingthestars.com

Red Basket is a Native American teacher and healer whose name was given to her by a Narragansett elder. She leads women’s circles, drumming circles and sacred rituals both in the United States and Peru.

Edie Weinstein, LSW is a colorfully creative journalist, inspiring transformational speaker, licensed social worker, interfaith minister, BLISS Coach and the author of The Bliss Mistress Guide To Transforming The Ordinary Into the Extraordinary. She calls herself an Opti-Mystic who sees the world through the eyes of possibility. www.opti-mystical.com

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July 28, 2015 0 comment

•-Feature Health & Well-being Spirituality

The Secret Root to “Having It All?” – The Feminine, The Masculine, and Divine Guidance

written by Panache Desai

We’ve all picked up the many books written on how to get ahead in business, nurture our family, and make our loving relationships work in the quest for a perfect life. There are endless how-to tomes detailing the hidden keys to women and men making their way to success and abundance but is there really a secret path to “having it all?” We have many voices attempting to guide us through the intricate maze of everyday life, but once we silence the chatter coming from outside us, what is our inner GPS – our Glorious Perfect Spirit –telling us? Can we calm the external influences and map our own magnificent story?

What happens when the path you’re travelling is actually the road less taken? The idea of “having it all” is a relative term. What is your definition of “all”? Perhaps you’re a woman with an engaging, rewarding career and decide children are not in your future. Or you’re a man with a fantastic family and decide to be a stay-at-home dad so you can raise your kids. Maybe you have the trifecta of partner, family and meaningful work and struggle with the intricate juggling of attempting to manage it all. (See there’s that word again!) Listening to the voices of what society, media, or family deem as acceptable life goals or gender roles does not always fit with the inner vision for your life. Owning and incorporating both your divine masculine and divine feminine into your experience can bring any situation into balance providing an unshakable foundation. And when you are anchored in the personal truth of what aligns with your heart, the life you want to live appears on the horizon.

Regardless of your gender, learning to accept and equalize both our male and female energies opens the vibrational floodgates of expansion and allows life to flow with ease. The cultural concept of “having it all” is really someone else’s version of happiness. Other people’s opinions and judgments are meaningless when we have the courage to stand in our divine truth. When we effectively recognize the potent and meaningful virtues of our divine essences, we can freely exercise those qualities in our daily lives, ceasing the turmoil and confusion and nurturing a fulfilled life not based on what we want others to see but of our soul’s own making.

Trust your internal GPS. It will guide you to exactly where you need to be. You won’t worry about “having it all” because you’ll already have all you need.

November 20, 2013 1 comment

•-Feature Family & Relationships Health & Well-being Spirituality

Apologies to the Sacred Masculine (the apology this warrior-in-transition would like to receive)

written by Jeff Brown

I apologize for those moments when I couldn’t see beyond my projections to your true nature. With so much relational trauma in the rear view mirror, I couldn’t distinguish the heartless from the benevolent warrior. With my lens blurred by unhealed emotions, I was unable to see you in your wholeness. I unknowingly projected my negative expectations without recognizing those moments when you were moving from love. Please forgive me my projections, and know that below my pain was a heart that genuinely longed to merge with yours.

I apologize for pushing you to open your heart when you weren’t ready. I longed to be met in my openness, and I couldn’t bear the disconnect between us. I am nourished by direct communication, and I took your silence personally. I didn’t understand the relationship between your detachment and your warrior conditioning. I do see this now. From the beginning, you have been cast in the role of warrior protector and your emotional armour was fundamental to your task. Without it, you would not have been able to remain vigilant on the battlefield, nor succeed in the competitive marketplace. As our world moves away from survivalism as a way of being, I am hopeful that you will feel safe enough to live from an open heart. Such beautiful light comes through that opening.

I apologize for not always seeing your limitations and struggles. There were times when I could not see past my expectations and fantasies. I had grown up with a fairy tale of a great knight that would save me, and I clung to that vision, preferring the perfection projection to the reality of humanness. As a result, I didn’t always see how much stress you carried, how difficult things were, how hard it was to hold it all together. Of course, we perpetuated the projection together- you hid your humanness from view while I chose not to look for it. I look forward to the day when our relationships are not predicated on illusions, but on a deep recognition of each other’s authenticity.

I apologize for giving you mixed messages about how I wanted you to manifest. At times, I wanted you to be soft and tender. At other times, dominant and protective. How confusing this must have been for you, how challenging to go back and forth between such differing feeling states. It has been so confusing for all of us, trying to straddle the line between our needs for both safety and vulnerability. One day, the perversions of polarity will fall away and we will arrive at a sacred balance between all healthy ways of being. Women will feel safe to assert their voice and embody their wholeness, and men will feel equally safe disarming and speaking from their vulnerability. On the rivers of essence, everything flows in the same direction- towards the ocean of wholeness.

I apologize for being passive aggressive towards you. I was not taught to express anger directly, and I was frightened of your aggressiveness. I know that you have had similar challenges with experiencing your sadness and releasing your tears. In the world we are moving towards, I am hopeful that both genders will have seamless access to all emotional states and healthy forms of expression.

I am sorry that I expected you to fill my emptiness, when the only one who can fill it is me. I have often looked for answers in relationship, somehow imagining that another could complete me. After so many centuries of disempowerment, I didn’t realize that I had the tools for my own self-creation. But I am recognizing it now. Where before we met as two fragmented beings, we will soon meet as two whole beings- each of us healthily boundaried, well-integrated and intrinsically complete. Two soulitudes.

I am grateful for all those moments when you held me safe and operated within the heart of compassion. The backlash of recent decades was a necessary response to generations of suffering, but many of your contributions got lost in the shuffle. In my efforts to find my voice and stand my ground, I have not always given credit where it is due. I encourage you to re-claim anything you have lost along the way, and to proudly embody the sacred masculine as you once did. I apologize for those moments when I discouraged your power. I could not distinguish it from its historical misuses.

I am grateful for the many positive contributions you have made to my reality. I realize that you often communicated your love for me and the village with deeds, not words. I thank you for helping to construct the structures that my expansion relies upon. I thank you for labouring long and hard to establish rule of law. I honour the warrior spirit that built the railroads, the cities, the bridges that bring us into contact with one another. I honour those warriors who fought and died on battlefields in an effort to protect us. You have sacrificed so much in order to hold us safe. Praise to those benevolent warriors who came before.

I am grateful for GrandFather, for holding the space for my expansion with patience and wisdom. I am grateful for Father, for defending and sheltering me. I am grateful for Father Sky, for showing me a vision of possibility that transcended my circumstances. I am grateful for the Divine Father, the real Father of us all. I now feel his divine presence, so close. Fiercely compassionate, he was always right here, holding me safe.

There has been so much blame between us, so much hatred and name-calling. To be sure, it is essential that we express our anger and heal our hearts. Nothing should be swept under the rug in that process, everything should be exposed. But it is also important that we have compassion for each other and endeavour to understand the context for our actions. We have all been victims of a sociological landscape that impacted on our identifications and behaviours. Like two different species in the same bed, we were compelled by circumstances to inhabit roles that kept us miles apart. Those roles have caused us great suffering, each gender suffering in its own way. To the extent that one gender was denied wholeness, the other was denied it as well. Women were denied the right to basic protections and pathways of expression, men were denied access to a tender, receptive way of being. No one got off easy, despite appearances.

As we move towards a more enheartened interface, may we create space for new visions of possibility. We must begin the process by healing the genderation gap that exists between us. We must soften the edges perpetuated by our reactivities. We must heal the rifts along the gender continuum that keep us apart. In my most clarified imaginings, I envision a world that fully celebrates the healthy feminine and the healthy masculine. Instead of throwing all gender differences out with the bath water, we make a conscious distinction between benevolent and destructive identifications. We craft a sacred balance of our healthiest aspects. Each of us identifies the unique fusion of feminine and masculine energies that aligns with our essential nature. And we openly learn from one another -men teach healthy manifestation, women teach healthy womanifestation- and we come to humanifestation together. We meet each other in our entirety.

May we never forget the relational and co-transformative nature of human expansion. Although the ultimate romance is with your own soul, it is our experiences together that give birth to the essential lessons. We are each here to participate in this dance of sacred imagination, stepping on each other’s toes and turning each other toward God one clumsy step after another. We trip, and then we get back up with greater awareness. With this in heart, I am hopeful that we can learn to accept one another in our humanness. We are going to continue to make mistakes, but there is grace in that if we see our errors through to the lessons they contain.

I look forward to the day when we can meet one another in our true nakedness, stripped free of unresolved emotions, pain-induced projections, the distortions of duality. For too long we have been on opposite sides of the river, the bridge between our hearts washed away by a flood of pain. But the time has come to construct a new bridge, one that comes into being with each step we take, one that is fortified with benevolent intentions and authentic self-revealing. As we walk toward one another, our emotional armour falls to the ground, transforming into the light at its source. And when we are ready, we walk right into the Godself at the centre of the bridge, puzzled that we ever imagined ourselves separate.

May you feel the presence of the Divine Mother close at heart, inviting you to rest deeply on the tender shores of your own essence, nestling you in the grateful arms of those you have protected. Those who have received your blessings may not always acknowledge it, but your acts of love have landed within us, growing us stronger and infusing us with love’s light. Rest dear warrior, rest. I hold your heart safe.

May 5, 2013 3 comments

•-Feature

READ: Tantra and the Divine Masculine by Mahasatvaa Ananda Sarita

written by Mahasatvaa Ananda Sarita

The Divine Masculine is a timely subject for 2012, as this is the year when the old world transmutes into a new world, according to the famous Maya predictions. Bring it on! The old world has been dominated primarily by an imbalanced masculine, which shows itself in the number of wars and general raping of planetary resources. This has happened because the masculine has been divorced from the feminine for a few thousand years, and by so doing has gone into a fevered testosterone fueled orgy of competition and destruction. I am by no means saying that men should be like women. Quite the contrary is the case.

Louann Brizendine, M.D. in her book, The Female Brain, says; “female is nature’s default gender setting.” At 8 weeks, the fetus either develops the testes determining factor, thus becoming a testesterone fueled male, or it remains female. In this sense, we can imagine that the female is the tree of life and the masculine is a branch of this tree, receiving it’s primary nourishment from the tree.

Testesterone, a primary male hormone, gives rise to competition, territorialness, muscle mass, strength, deep voice, hairiness and abundant libido. In this sense, it appears that the male has been created in order to offer potency, protection and a living area for the feminine, so she can go through pregnancy, birth and child rearing in peace. He also may have the strength to be a leader and inspiration for his tribe. So long as his power and strength is in service of the feminine qualities of love and compassion, he is onto a great thing. He is living his purpose for his own good and for the good of all beings. The moment he strays away from the feminine, and seeks to live his competitive nature as a solo agent, he brings disaster to this earth.

Living your true nature as a man:

1) Accept your animal, instinctual and sexual nature and live it in it’s totality. Balance and fulfillment will come, if you are able to live these qualities as a meditation, in full witnessing consciousness.

2) Listen to your soul calling rather than following conditioned beliefs given by others. Live your individual truth. Allow yourself to become vast enough to contain both power and vulnerability. This will make you very wise.

3) Allow creativity to be expressed, in service of a higher truth, the truth that resides in the creation principle itself. This means, if inventing something, let it be in tune with nature. As Victor Shauberger said, “learn from nature and copy it.”

4) Recognize the feminine qualities of changeability, love and compassion as being essential to all of life. Above all else, become the protector of love, the advocate of compassion. The more you honor and protect the feminine, the more you will be honored by life itself. You will discover yourself as a pillar of light, a Lingam of consciousness, a blessing for this earth.

NEXT WEEK: Tantra and the Divine Feminine (article 13)

Sarita is a world renowned Tantra master and mystic offering courses and retreats across the globe. Having received a direct transmission from Osho, she is true to the spiritual essence of Tantra and leads us on the path to self realisation. At the same time she takes care to help us transcend the psychological blockages that we carry as a result of our cultural background and past experiences. She is also a master healer, author and consultant. website: http://www.tantra-essence.com

Read more from VividLife.me bloggers:

The Meaning and History of Tantra by Sarita

Part of my mission in teaching Tantra is to clear up misconceptions about it. When I moved to Europe in 1999, having spent 26 years in India, I was amazed to find out that most people seemed to believe that Tantra was all about sex and promiscuity with a few feathers and some incense thrown in for good measure. The general public still carry such concepts, and some even think that Tantra is a code word for a massage with a ‘happy ending.’ I offer here a little reality check…

Tantra ~ Harmony in Relationship by Sarita

Many people have discovered the sublime peace, which arises through regular meditation practice. And yet, meditators are often confused as to why their intimate relationships are still subject to turmoil and confusion. It seems logical that if the individual discovers deep meditation, life as a whole should be transformed…

January 10, 2012 1 comment

•-Feature Family & Relationships Spirituality

READ: APOLOGIES TO THE DIVINE FEMININE (from a warrior in transition) by Jeff Brown

written by Jeff Brown

I apologize for my inability to distinguish the benevolent warrior from the heartless warrior, a reflection of my own confusion dealing with the battlefields of yore. When I opened my heart too wide, I was vulnerable to attack from warring factions. I was conditioned to believe that I had to stay rigid, focused, prepared for any eventuality, in the desire to protect myself and others from attack. But I went too far, and closed too tight, and eradicated the bridge between our hearts. I am seeing this now and I am sorry.

I apologize for my perpetual absence, a reflection of my own inner absence, my inability to connect from a heart jammed tight by unresolved emotions that I did not have the tools to work through. I still lack many of these tools, but I am open to their emergence.

I apologize for my inability to distinguish relationship from war. Like a warrior in enemy territory, I would sneak in and out of your life in the night, plundering and selfishly taking what I needed, then crawling back to the other side of the abyss with the spoils. I gave little back for fear that I would become vulnerable to attack. I had war on the brain and I could not see the river of love waiting on the other side of the battlefield. I now recognize that love is the antidote for the armoured warrior, but I could not drink the antidote in my driven state.

I apologize for not seeing you, my eyes blinded by congealed rage and unshed tears. If it is any consolation, and I imagine it is not, I could not see myself either. I saw only that which served my hyper-vigilance, my warrior focus. My mirror was a battlefield.

I apologize for my ungrounded materialism, my power driven tyrannies, my obsession with accumulation. Somehow I imagined that accumulation would protect me and those close to me, but I failed to recognize that it just perpetuated the madness. I also apologize for my egoic abuses, a reflection of my own misguided ego, pumped up to deal with an inherently competitive world. I couldn’t distinguish the healthy, confident ego from the cocky, unhealthy ego. I went much too far in the wrong direction.

I apologize for a sexuality that was objectifying and disconnected from the heart. I know you longed for real intimacy, a merging of our souls along the heart-genital highway. But there were too many defences around my heart, and no bridge could form between our souls. There were moments when your loving ways freed me from my body masks, but I had no template to stand in that heart-fire. I am sorry for this, for I know that the path you longed for was the path to God.

I apologize for my horrifying acts of violence, a reflection of my own congealed rage, my own inability to distinguish real enemies from friends. There are no words that can undo what I have done in those moments of madness. I know this, I do. I would hide my face in shame, but that won’t make things better. I need to own my misdeeds, and then find a way to believe in my capacity to move from a more loving place. I call out to other male warriors to be accountable for the actions of our gender, not in a way that is self-hating, but in a way that is courageously self-honest and genuinely compassionate. The heartfelt warrior acknowledges the error of his ways, and has the courage to do all he can to make amends over time.

I apologize for my inability to develop a conscious relationship. You were right there with your beautiful heart on your sleeve but I was too attached to my individualism and afraid of this unknown terrain. I know the forests, the marketplace and the ways of the outer world so well, but my inner geography is foreign to me. You called me to a place I was ill-prepared to go, although I sensed, below the surface of my bravado, that you called me home.

I am grateful for your willingness to believe that who I was in those rare moments of vulnerability was the real me. You were right- the real me lives inside of my heart- but a few moments now and then was the most I could handle. I saw you as dangerous, for in your presence I began to taste a surrendered way of being. Nonetheless, your faith in my goodness kept me going through many a battle, and restored my faith in life when I most needed it. You were the light at the end of a barbaric tunnel, and I am blessed.

I am grateful that you stuck with me through thick and thin, and I also understand those times you had to give up and let go. I now recognize that there is meaningful difference between a love-ship and a relationship. Love alone is not enough. Without a shared willingness to become conscious, there can only be frustration. I was so often impossible, clinging to my unconsciousness like a soldier clings to his weapons. I recognize the courage it took for you to keep your heart open in the presence of my resistance. You had every right to seek an authentic relationship, as your spirit was ignited in its presence. Your beautiful heart had every right to be met in its openness and willingness. I am grateful for the time you gave me, a moments respite from the hiding places I mistakenly called home.

I am grateful for Grandmother, for no one saw my tenderness more clearly. I am grateful for Mother, for choosing to bring me into being and for nourishing my body until I could find my feet. I am grateful for Mother Earth, for grounding my expansion and enlivening my spirit. I am grateful for the Divine Mother, the real Mother of us all. I now feel her divine presence, so close. Fiercely compassionate, she was always right here, breathing life into me, holding me safe. I sit in her lap as she breathes me.

I look forward to the day when the only thing that ignites relationship is two souls calling out to one another, two soul-hearts beating in the same direction, a whisper of longing that bridges one essence to another. I want to want you not because it gratifies my ego, not because you are outwardly beautiful, but because your very presence invites my Godself out of hiding. I want to touch you with my heart on my sleeve, to know chemistry between us that is not gender identified, but that is essence sourced, loves liquid lava flowing from the heart to the genitals to the great beyond. In this love-struck world, relationship will always be experienced as spiritual practice, a devotional expression of our God-self.

I had always believed that sensitivity is impossible to hold to in a harsh world. Yet in this moment, I feel sensitive, but without the fragility. I am still wearing armor but there is a shift in the direction of my intensity. I can linger in the heart-space a little longer than I once could, I am softening in places. After so many lifetimes with weapon in hand, a tenderling warrior is being birthed in the core of my being. He is confused, but he intuitively knows that this is the way home.

Please don’t give up on me or my fellow warriors. Forgive us our misdeeds, or, at the least, be open to the possibility that we will change as the trail expands to meet our shifting intentionality. The day will come when our warrior spirit loses its harsh edge, and comes into alignment with benevolent action. Some of us are already there, and many more of us will follow. The road to transformation is dependent on a bridge between genders, a benevolent bridge that celebrates our differences with respect and kindness. That work must begin with healing the rifts along the gender continuum, working hard to heal the collective heart until one day we can stand on a bridge across forever, hands held together, hearts open and alight, embracing the sacred masculine and divine feminine living at the heart of us all. I will meet you there.

May you feel the love of the Divine Mother crashing down on your heartfelt shores, graciously lifting you up above the madness of the world, nestling you in the grateful arms of those you have nurtured. Those of us who have received your blessings may not always acknowledge it, but your acts of love have landed within us, growing us stronger and infusing us with love’s light. Thank you.

~A former criminal lawyer and psychotherapist, Jeff Brown is the author of “Soulshaping: A Journey of Self-Creation,” recently published by North Atlantic Books. Endorsed by authors Elizabeth Lesser and Ram Dass, “Soulshaping” is Brown’s autobiography — an inner travelogue of his journey from archetypal male warrior to a more surrendered path. You can connect with his work at www.soulshaping.com

Read more from VividLife.me bloggers:

There is no reason not to follow your heart by Em Claire

The question I apply to any “have to” or “should” throughout a day is: Why am I “doing” this? and then, What is it I think I’ll achieve by “doing” this? Is this “doing” some natural, inner impulse, or is it yet one more attempt to in some way seek society’s approval?

What does it mean to be free of definitions? by Gangaji

At this time in our present history, we have the ability to be conscious of the stories we have been taught and how they define us, as well as the stories we unquestionably have believed about who another is. We can be willing to be unguarded with ourselves, and we can take responsibility for the result. We can marvel when we discover that the stories of previously demonized others (enemies) are as beautiful and multi-layered as our own. We mature when we realize that some of the stories cherished as the foundation..

December 19, 2011 1 comment