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Creating Bridges: Spirituality & Philosophy:
Lynn Andrews and The Path of the Heart
Finding Your Power Center
Power Deck Card
of the Month: Perfection
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by Lynn Andrews |
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Dear Friends,
I want to continue our discussion from last month about finding your power center. I had the incredible opportunity of traveling to the Yucatan peninsula to learn from a chaman curandera from Guatemala by the name of Zoila Gutierez. One of the first things she said to me was,
“When you are ready to receive her, knowledge will arrive. She is a wanderer but never so far away you cannot entice her into your existence.”
As Zoila spoke, a beautiful green hummingbird flew between us and explored a fuchsia bush. Zoila continued, nodding toward our guest, “Watch how the hummingbird hovers in front of the flower. Pollen is power to that tiny bird. See, she waits until just the right moment and then joins with it. She takes what she needs and flies away.”
Practically on cue, the hummingbird moved backward from the fuchsia flower and sped off above the coyote fence. “When power comes to you, be still with her. Don’t discuss it and bleed the energy away. Just hold it. Slowly she will begin to dance with you, but only if you are patient and listen for her voice.” (Jaguar Woman)
What do we mean when we say “power?” We use the word so often, and sometimes I wonder if we really stop to think about what we are saying, what we really mean when we speak of power?
When I or the Sisterhood speak of power, we are not speaking of power over someone in terms of manipulation. The women of the Sisterhood are speaking of integrity of spirit, integrity of force which is built within the spiritual warrior over years of practice, definition, and training. Power means that you have the ability and the competence to live your true destiny. Power implies that you are living your truth, not someone else’s. Power means that you are seeing the world through your own eyes, and are not living your life through someone else’s idea of who you should be. (The Power Deck)
What does power mean to you? How do you use power in your life? How does power use you? Always remember, the person or situation that upsets you the most in your life is one of your best teachers. If that person can get inside your head, turn you around and confuse you, you know that you still don’t understand what you are doing. Spend some time reflecting on your true relationship with power, what it is and what it could be for you.
Then, when you dream about making your act of power in the world, you will know what you are really talking about. An act of power is an act that you manifest in the world from your deepest passion. When you perform an act of power, you are manifesting your true destiny in life. You are living your dream.
Becoming centered is one of the most important aspects of your training on your path to power. If you do not live in your center, you live on the perimeter of power, never inside the world of power. By focusing on your inner self and staying centered, you can transcend the daily distractions and not be attached to them. Look at your problems as tests of power, and learn never to leave your center. Count your bad points as well as your good. What is good and what is bad are most often purely relative. If you sense a weakness within yourself, explore it. It may become the source of your greatest strength. Center yourself in your power, and release your need for constant distraction from your center. Then you will have learned to choreograph the mighty energies of the universe. (The Power Deck, Cards of Wisdom)
La Ultima Madre
The earth is female. And on this beautiful goddess planet, there are two very distinct kinds of female energy, each with its opposite face. Altogether these four faces of female energy make up the four hoops of energy that are la Ultima Madre, which translates into English as “the Final Mother.”
If you are to live a life of centeredness and balance, if you are to walk in power, it is important for you to know and understand these four hoops of energy; it is important to know and understand how they work within you, how they work in the world around you.
“You must realize la Ultima Madre,” Zoila said to me, “realize who you are, and become who you are.” In ancient times, Zoila told me, there was a ceremony that was done by the great priestesses “for the benefit of all pregnant women and initiates. It was to teach them of themselves and their future children. After their initiation as la Ultima Madre, they knew who they were for the first time. They knew why they behaved in a certain manner.”
The teaching of la Ultima Madre is magnificent and of such major import that in my Mystery School we spend a great deal of time understanding and working with these Mother Energies. Throughout my book Jaguar Woman, my teachers spoke to me of many aspects of these Energies, often in very specific relationship to my own personal path. It is not possible for me to give you an intimate look into the Mother Energies in these Messages, but it is important for you to become familiar with them so that you can begin to understand how they affect you and the impact they have on your life.
The two kinds of female energy about which I am speaking are called the “ecstatic Rainbow Mother” and the “nurturing Great Mother,” and each of these two Mother energies has her opposite face. On the opposite end of the arrow from Rainbow Mother is Crazy Woman, Rainbow Mother’s dark side. And on the opposite end of the arrow of Great Nurturing Mother is Death Mother, her dark side.
The ecstatic Rainbow Mother is the energy of the poet, the dancer, the weaver and the Seer. Artists are intimate with Rainbow Mother, for she is their muse. And she is completely misunderstood in our society, a world that does not support its artists, its writers and thinkers. She wants to dream and inspire people to health and well-being, and routine wilts her. Rainbow Mother is usually seen as a misfit, a person on the fringes, so if you have always felt that you just don’t quite “fit in,” you might take a look at Rainbow Mother as she was presented to me in Jaguar Woman, and apply what you learn to the mirrors of your own life. Rainbow Mothers often live in chaos because they are always in the dream state. They become frustrated, unfulfilled, perhaps even alcoholic or drug addicted because of the expectations of others, because they are afraid of living life fully as their beautiful Rainbow selves.
Rainbow Mother’s opposite energy is Crazy Woman, the “goddess of death.” But Crazy Woman does not really wish to kill you. She wishes to maim your talents and paralyze your ability; she wishes to strip you of all your sacredness. She pulls your sanity and tests you, trying to lure you away from your center. Men have these energies also, these hoops of power. Where does the madman come from, but from Crazy Woman? Take a very close look at yourself when you are in the midst of chaos and confusion and see what the energy is that is driving you. Then you will know what you need to do to re-right yourself and recover your balance. We all have a dark side; never forget that it is the darkness which defines the light. So if you feel Crazy Woman pulling at your sanity, sit down and write a poem, bring bright colors and beautiful scents into your environment, and light a candle on your altar to Crazy Woman to honor her for what she is trying to teach you about yourself, about honoring your own very special light.
Great Nurturing Mother is known as the “grandmother of the gods.” She is the bearer of fruits and grains, the one who suckles the cornhusk baby, loves routine, gets married, raises her children and is a pillar of society. She is the great powerful mother of this earth, because without her we would not have families, we would not grow corn, we would have absolute chaos. She is the authoritative nurturer who sets her life by schedules and known things. And she is the one who is accepted by our society. On the other hand, Great Nurturing Mother likes to know what you’re doing all of the time, likes to know that you’re going to be home at five-thirty for dinner. So if you place great expectations on the world around you, which Nurturing Mother often does, you might want to hold her up as a mirror during those many times when life seems to disappoint you so much. Great Nurturing Mother may be a pillar of society, but when she reaches midlife and finds that her children are grown and there is no one left to nurture, then her opposite energy, Death Mother, comes close and tries to take her away.
Her opposite face is Death Mother, so called because she can be the instrument of your death. If you choose not to look at Death Mother or Crazy Woman and honor their power, they can easily overpower you. Then you will be consumed by madness, depression or even death.
“As in all things,” Zoila explained to me, “there is great danger. If you falter and don’t honor Crazy Woman, she might get a hold on you and destroy you. When women understand their Ultima Madre, they can build altars and fetishes of these powers. When they feel the influence of Crazy Woman or the Death Mother, in the form of depression or gloom, they can light candles and burn copal and honor her great power, the dark side. You see, her intent only defines your goodness and beauty. By honoring the dark side, you destroy her power over you. Then she can’t take you.”
In Relationships
“Everyone grows differently. No two flowers are the same, but they can grow in the same garden.” (Jose Gutierez, from Jaguar Woman)
When I was given the teachings of la Ultima Madre, I went through some real confusion. I am a rainbow woman. I had been married to a nurturing man, and we had fought incessantly. If we went for a day in the country, I brought ample art supplies for both of us to use and enjoy; he was infuriated that I didn’t bring food. And this scenario repeated itself over and over again in our relationship.
I remember telling Agnes Whistling Elk that I now understood why our marriage had not worked, that a nurturing husband and an ecstatic wife could never make it.
Agnes’s response was, “Sometimes that makes for a very good marriage, if each appreciates the other’s needs.” And she explained to me that certain rainbow men and women live in chaos because they are always in the dream state. If they marry a nurturing type person, the nurturing partner is fulfilled by taking care of the rainbow partner, and it is wonderful for both of them.
I countered by saying that the nurturing person likes to know what you are doing all of the time. And for a rainbow person to be pinned down, “well, I can’t even think that way.” I didn’t see how the nurturing person and the rainbow person could ever communicate, and as a rainbow woman I knew that the rainbow person wants to communicate with the person she loves more than anything in the world.
To that, Agnes said, “If two rainbow people get together, they may forget to eat. They can starve to death, lost in their own chaos. To make a marriage work they have to become practical.”
On the other hand, Agnes said, “If a rainbow person is deeply committed to work, and she finds a nurturing partner to look after her, then it’s superior as long as the nurturing partner does not try to control and nail the rainbow partner’s feet to the ground. Each has to see they are very different in their vision of the world, and then work with that.”
I remember talking with Zoila about her relationship with her husband, Jose. They often spent very long periods of time apart from one another because both were healers with vast stores of knowledge and widespread recognition and both were often needed in different parts of the country. And I was curious how that worked for them.
Zoila said to me, “When people marry, they usually begin to live each other’s lives. At that point the reason for living is buried forever.” She said that both she and Jose need freedom to grow, and so they are apart a great deal of time. For them it works because both are very rainbow. “We live for the most part in unknown worlds. If I lived with the desire to always hold up the clock, I would have to honor the difference between us and let him be. I would have to learn to love him unconditionally. That’s not the easiest thing for nurturing mothers to do. They tie a lot of strings on their love.”
And then she explained to me again the importance of understanding the translation of Mother Earth’s energy and also about the female energy and how it reveals itself in a person. “When we understand the great mothers in us, we can live in harmony and help fulfill each other’s destinies.”
We all have relationships in our lives, and we all have intimate relationships. Many of us marry, often more than once; others live together as if we are married. Many of us have children. And so much of our time and energy is spent trying to untangle our tangled relationships, trying to wade through our anger and our fears when our relationships are less than perfect, recovering from a broken heart if the relationship fails.
The next time you find yourself enmeshed in relationship problems, relationships of any sort whether they be between lovers, between partners, between parent and child, relationships in the workplace, step back a few paces and try to ascertain what the mother energies are that are at work here. If you can understand your true nature, you will be so much better able to voice your needs and concerns in the world, to make yourself understood. And if you can understand the nature of your partner in the relationship, can you just imagine the gifts of understanding and guidance that you are capable of bringing into the relationship! You can do it. Everything you need is here. The things you need are always there; you need to be smart enough to find them.
If you can place yourself between these mother energies and mediate their attractions, you will have great influence in your world. But always remember to honor the dark side, the Crazy Woman or Death Mother energies, for the lessons they bring to you. To balance your dark side with your beauty brings you to power.
And if you are being true to yourself and living with integrity of purpose, and the relationship fails anyway, know always that Great Spirit loves you. Grief deepens us. It allows us to explore the perimeters of our soul. Grief is the only gateway to certain levels of consciousness, even though it is a hard taskmaster. The seeds of wisdom and enlightenment are planted within the wounds of grief. What is lost can only come back to us again in higher ways. Essential life and love can never leave you, because you are that.
In Love and Spirit,
Lynn Andrews
POWER DECK CARD FOR MAY 2005
17. PERFECTION – WEST
Dream your passion. Fly away. Go through the hoop of your innermost fears and desires. Meet them and conquer them. What pain from childhood have you not dealt with? Move into the wound of your most secret fears, and find the seeds of wisdom that are planted there. Face what upsets you the most; it is a great teacher. Give away whatever is holding you back – insecurities, ego, fear of failure or of not being loved, fear of being alone – and be reborn into a new state of perfection.
Definition of the Card
The painting is entitled Joyful Rebirth. An eagle feather tied to a branch is the eternal giveaway of humans, four-legged creatures, and winged ones on the planet earth. To find perfection, we must give away what is holding us to this earthly plane. We must give away our addictions, the blocks that keep us from perfection. To reach perfection, we must move into the universes that live within our own souls.
Introspection is a teaching of the west. We must find the universal consciousness, symbolized by the sphere in the sky, that resides within our own unconscious. Shamans call this process moving into the wound of our deepest fears and finding the seeds of wisdom that are planted there. Grow from this knowledge into a state of perfection.
From The Power Deck: The Cards of Wisdom by Lynn V. Andrews
We are registering now for my 2005 Joshua Tree Gathering, “Wild Dreaming and Other Shaman Delights,” May 12-15, 2005. Please go to www.lynnandrews.com and follow the links to receive more information about this magical event and to learn how to register
Everyone has what he or she needs to develop higher awareness. Each of us has asked for the experiences, the family, and the talents that will teach us about ourselves. Miracles happen when we take responsibility for our choices in life. Through this simple ‘Act of Power’ we can reclaim our exuberance and our enthusiasm. A shaman knows that we also choose the dream in which we live. Look at the dream you are living and decide if it is the one you really and truly want. If it isn’t, then change it. Call forth the dream that sparkles on the horizon. It is not a mirage… it is your birthright!
Each year we experience wonders great and small at our Joshua Tree Gathering. Magic, masters and angels join us, as you can plainly see. Come and explore the beauty and power of understanding Shaman Delights and acquire a humor, an enthusiasm, and a vibrant sense of self. Find your brilliant dream… and bring it to life! Lynn Andrews
Continue to Lynn Andrew's Prayer
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Lynn Andrews,
Shaman, Author & Lecturer
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Internationally acclaimed author, preeminent teacher and 21st century shaman, Lynn Andrews has written 18 books and created The Power Deck, audio meditations, and videos.
Lynn Andrews offers a variety of opportunities to work with her at her annual events and through online courses She also offers a degree program and a 4-year mystery school. CE credit is available for nurses and therapists. Lynn is available for private phone sessions.
For information about Lynn Andrews' Mystery School, events including Joshua Tree and Hawaii, Online Courses, or to schedule a phone call with Lynn please call 1-800-554-7414 (US), or 1-213-683-3804 (international), or visit Lynn's website at www.lynnandrews.com/.
www.lynnandrews.com
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