Hello from my heart and welcome to the newsletter of The
~ Lynn Dream Dancer
Feature Article:
~ [re]Connecting With the Dark Goddesses of Your Inner Self
By Lynn Guy
Can you feel the Labyrinth stirring & turning – turning & stirring? Can you feel yourself slowing down & being drawn deep within yourself. Have you begun to feel the shift of awareness in your conscious self & in how you sense the energies around us now? How different have your meditations, visions & dreams been lately? Have you noticed that sometimes the energy feels deeper, ‘heavier’ yet not harmful, at times weighty & almost overpowering?
Do you feel Her arms reaching out to embrace you deep within Her Bosom? You are becoming aware of the Dark Goddess Within & All Around yet don’t know what is happening, only that Change is A’stirring the rhythm of your heart & your dreams. We are being called you & I to join with Her who is our deepest, darkest, richest, inner self.
For two millennia or more we’ve been misled. Told that we should fear Her who is the deepest & most mysterious part of every woman & woman child on the planet. Hers are the energies that rage with passion & fire. She is the part of ourselves that ferociously defends Her ‘cubs’, ruthlessly cuts away that which is poisonous & embraces change which promotes new Being & growth & creates great beauty in the midst of seeming chaos.
All those who explore the Goddess, must sooner or later realize that we Are the Goddess in all Her myriad aspects. When we finally recognise that it’s through delving into Her inner being, & therefore ours, reconciling ALL that we are & so be fully at peace within. Sooner or later as you meander along the inwardly curving passageway leading to the Centre of the Labyrinth you will find yourself in Her vast womb of Creation ~ that rich black velvet of No Space & No Time where ALL is in potential. It is here that you will meet Her. I encourage you to research Her in books & on the net. But I entreat you to discover Her rich & luscious deepness for yourself through working, meditating & reflecting on Her in creative ways, in your heart & through your right brain.
You will discover that even though She reveals Herself in many ways & in many guises She is unmistakably the Dark Goddess of the Southern Cross & She has come for us: you & me & all our sisters & yes, even our brothers, whomever & wherever we are. How do we know Her this wise, ancient, mysterious & occasionally fearsome & ugly One? By Her power & presence we know Her. By what is happening in our outer lives we experience Her presence, Her beckoning finger drawing us in, deeper & closer to Her Heart.
This is my thanks to HER the Dark Goddesses within me.
For some years they have been reaching out to tap me on the shoulder & in my ignorance & yes, my fear, I ignored them. Like so many others, I had bought into the belief system that in order to be spiritual & a peacemaker, one had to only have loving peaceful joyous uplifting & honourable beliefs, thoughts & ways of being. I didn’t fully ‘get’ what the true balance of the Eastern yin/yang symbol meant: to totally & unreservedly accept & embrace ALL that is within me: the good, the bad, the ugly & the beautiful, the feminine & the masculine. I was so scared of that inner self with her fiery outbursts, passionate beliefs, her sexuality & her sensuality, her power & her weaknesses. I was so scared of being rejected, unloved, unworthy of somehow not being acceptable to others. Now I know it’s only me who has to accept me, in loving myself in all my ways I allow others to fully love me too.
Recently I felt the Dark Goddess’s determination to have me ‘get over it’ by pushing me through many lessons which literally cut to the core of my being testing me & all I held dear to my heart. Having openly said over & over that I didn’t want my fears or my ego to hold me back She took me at my word flinging me onto the roller coaster ride of my life! A huge & shattering journey teaching me to trust & honour my own intuition & Her hints first After going through the grieving & the anger, the hurt & the fear, things within & around me began to shift. My creative juices flowed freely. I re-explored all kinds of creative projects til inevitably I found myself with canvas & paintbrushes before me, tubes of paint all around. Goddess music on, I sat still & put pencil to canvas, closed my eyes & allowed ‘Her’ to draw Herself through me onto the canvas.
I felt the tears flow, my heart cracked open once more & we began anew, this ancient powerful fiery Goddess & I, the Dance of the Stars ......... through the Dark Spaces of the Void that are Her Vast Womb until She revealed Herself to me in all Her deep magnificence & wild colourful beauty: Pele!
She of the fiery temper & wild nature. She who creates & recreates Her playground daily. I watched in awe as She flowed through, keeping my conscious self firmly out of the way so She could make Herself in Her image, not mine. When She was done, I stepped back in wonder. I had been fearful of painting portraits. Fearful of not carefully rendering on canvas what I could see in my heart’s eye. Yet here She was, the beautiful Pele & I actually liked the painting!!
Then I was nudged again: 4 days to do a painting of the Magdalen for possible use as a logo. That brought up so many emotions roiling twisting turning & churning within me. Anger like I haven’t experienced for years. Fear that was so overwhelming I could find no where to run & hide & tears of frustration for what I saw as my own ineptitude with a paintbrush. Finally I surrendered to the acceptance that through Her I could & would get through all this. That by surrendering to Her, the Dark Goddess as the Magdalen would paint Herself if only I kept my bossy fear-ridden self out of the way. Easier said than done I ruefully discovered.
On the 4th day, & having gone through 4 ‘skin’ colour changes, & 4 changes in colour for the sacred fluids in the Chalice, She revealed Her near perfect blackness to me. I looked on in shock & wonder. Where had She come from? And yet how else could She be? She is the black Madonna. She is the Void & the Womb. She is the passion & the purity of the divine Feminine principle. She is the Chalice of the Holy Grail. She is the Magdalen in all her wisdom, passion, beauty, mystery, & courage. My Magdalen is the dark side of the Moon, the Goddess who shadows us all. She is the deep mystery cloaked in blackness to the benign ‘white veiledness’ of Mother Mary. She’s the one who was & is a sensual/sexual woman ~ the feminine counterpart energy to Yeshua’s masculine in the ‘holy’ coupling.
Can you feel them dancing around you now, the Dark Goddess of many names: Cerridwen, Lilith, Medusa, Astarte, Isis, Nephyths, Aphrodite, Magdalena, the Cailleach, Sekhmet, Diana, Changing Woman, Bast, Inanna, the Morrigan, Pele, Kali, Hecate, Ishtar - I honour & embrace the whole living rich ripeness of them within us all... deep within me ….
When Day Ya! HO! I am part of the Great Mystery.
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This month’s feature article:
Not a Quiet Mind by Prakash
The real Silence is not just an absence, or if it is, it is a very palpable absence; a very full absence, a perfect absence. Nothing is lacking in it. It is pure Vastness, pure Emptiness, pure Being. It is what has been called God. It is not a quiet mind. A quiet mind helps to be receptive to it, helps to awaken to it. But it is there always, whether there is thinking or not.
Also, it is not an object. It is not something you can observe. You simply are it. You know it by being it. This is the only way to express it. You are that very palpable absence. Not thinking allows you to experience that there is more to you than thoughts, far more to you than physicality. Thinking is just a very small part of the Consciousness that you are. When thinking is not, you look deeper, and Eternity is there. Infinite space is there, and this Space has the feeling of well-being. It is Love.
This well-being is attributed to the fact that you are no more. You feel as though you are not, and because you are not, you most fully are. It is a paradox.
The realization is: when thinking is not, I am not. When you realize this, when you awaken, nothing changes. Even while thinking, both are there, thinking and Silence, Aloneness and the crowd. It sounds contradictory, but it is the reality. It is the ultimate Reality.
True Silence is not dependent on whether thoughts are present or absent. It is omnipresent. It has nothing to do with your effort to bring it about. The effort may make you more attuned, more receptive, it may remove your ignorance, or it may be the block, but the Silence always is. Once you know it for what it is, that it is not an experience, not a quiet mind, but that It/You are beyond the mind, it never departs, it never moves. Everything proves to be changing but That. It is, always. It is there as the substratum, as Presence, as Awareness. It never moves. This has only been your perception, your delusion. What is eternal is unchanging, but you have to discover what that is to know it.
It is like a shadow that follows wherever you go. Only it is not the shadow; the ego is. It is the Reality, The One, and you are That. It is only a shallow observation to say that you become aware of it, or that you realize it. There is no it. You are the Awareness.
Excerpted from Thoughts to Stop Thinking, by Prakash - formerly Kevin Edwards
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For attractive lips, speak words of kindness.
For lovely eyes, seek out the good in people.
For a slim figure, share your food with the hungry.
For beautiful hair, let a child run his fingers through it once a day.
For poise, walk with the knowledge you'll never walk alone ...
People, even more than things, have to be restored, renewed, revived, reclaimed and redeemed and redeemed and redeemed.
Never throw out anybody.
Remember, if you ever need a helping hand, you'll find one at the end of your arm. As you grow older you will discover that you have two hands. One for helping yourself, the other for helping others."
- Sam Levenson
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May Love have Its way with you ~ Sao
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