For Myself and My Foremothers
The first time I felt god/source energy was at my mother’s death bed. My mother died of cervical cancer at age 43, when I was 16 years old. As we, myself and the spiritual healer, stood over my mom in prayer, holding hands, I felt it. A powerful surge of electricity, or energy, ran up my arm as we prayed. It caused me to run away screaming in shock. Having no experience, I couldn’t explain why I freaked out.
I come from a lineage of women with reproductive organ issues – cervical cancer, as well as spousal abandonment or abuse. My maternal grandfather drank a lot and abused my grandmother and mother. My paternal grandfather left when my dad was six years old. Thankfully my dad was a good dad. I have been, unknowingly, working out these maternal karmic patterns for generations back. I have had my issues with my female organs, cervical dysplasia, endometriosis, and it had gotten worse. Infections. Irregular cycles. Ovarian pain. And to top it off, divorce.
A friend of mine was a medical intuitive, and I decided to contact him. He is someone who can look at you and tell you exactly what’s wrong with you – physical, emotional, diet, etc., but he didn’t have time for me. He said he was too busy and couldn’t help me. All he could tell me is that I was holding anger there and I needed to release it. So I got even more mad that he couldn’t help me and said, “Forget it, I can do this myself. I am an energy healer and I can heal myself.”
I began to write down all of my anger that I felt I was holding in female organs – when I had let men take advantage of me and my sexual power in the past, my health problems because of it, the cheating, the lying, the lack of babies in my life, that lack of creating a perfect family like I had always dreamed (like mom and dad used to be). And now I was going through divorce and was in the pit of despair.
Then I began to do some energy healing on myself on my second chakra. This chakra represents feeling, emotion, pleasure, sensuality, intimacy, and personal connection. I decided that I would not get out of bed until I figured what I was doing wrong to attract this dis-ease in my life in the forms of health issues, cheating and divorce. I would not take one step further into my life, as I knew I would keep repeating the same mistakes. I didn’t get out of bed the whole day – no food, no water, just intense crying. The crying lasted so long and was so hard and deep I thought I was going to die. But I didn’t care because dying would have been better than repeating the same mistakes and living in this kind of pain my whole life. Eventually, I cried myself into a lucid, trance state. I was numb.
Through this process, I suddenly realized that I had attracted it all. I was totally responsible for all of the bad things that happened to me. Why? Because I gave away my power. I felt that in order to be strong, I needed a man in my life to take care of me or define my power, security, or happiness. I cried so hard when I realized that I had given away my power to men to define how great I was, to define me – that the external world defined me. I felt like I was literally dying. I was paralyzed, and in shock. The grief in that moment, was more than I had felt than when my mom died. There was no greater shame that I had ever experienced my whole life. I had only known shame in front of others, but I was the only one there this time. There was no-one to be ashamed in front of, except for myself. I felt destroyed by truth. I couldn’t even look myself in the mirror I was so horrified and embarrassed.
Pleading for mercy, I begged god and the angels to heal this. Just as I did this, my mom appeared to my left and then grandma to my right. Their lives flashed before my eyes like a movie. I saw all of the times that they had given their power away to men for their own happiness or sense of security.
Suddenly, I felt a million doorways opening, with a loud “Bbbblllliiiinnnggggg” sound — connecting me with every one of my maternal grandmothers. I heard joyous bells chiming, and clanging loudly in my ears. I felt them all holding hands with me, mom and grandma, all the way back to my first grandmother, in excitement of the clearing. They cheered and applauded loudly, as they celebrated the maternal karmic wheel of dysfunction that had been stopped.
Then came a big release of tears and healing of all the pain they went through and the pain I was going through now — being alone and finding my personal power without a man. The cancer of the cervix my mom and grandma had, and that I had been prone to acquire, was all because we allowed ourselves to be shut down. I cried and cried for all the pain of all the ancestors and women from generations back that had passed on this karma to be healed. I continued releasing until I dozed off again into a trance-like state.
The Fire and the Phoenix
As I floated off into this sense of ease, I had a vision of me standing in my living room. My awareness was drawn to the bush outside the window. I saw a red bird-like creature with an extremely long red tail sitting on the branch. I squinted and said, “What is that? That’s a … a… phoenix!” As soon as I said that, my awareness snapped me back into my body. I felt every cell in my body being pulled and electrocuted, as if my skin were a black elastic and was being ripped off of my body. I screamed and cried “Nooooooooooooooooooooo!!!!!!!! Nooooooooooo!!!! Nooooooooo!!” the pain was horribly intense and burning. The vibration of my cells was so hard and loud that I felt my head would explode if I didn’t open my mouth and scream more to let it out. It felt as if my soul was being removed from my body, and I was really leaving this life for good. The terror overtook me as I fought this force that was pulling something out of my body. Just then the “ black elastic skin” snapped and broke free. A whole dark layer of my being had been ripped out of me and transmuted by the phoenix.
When it snapped free, I jerked awake back into my body. Everything around me seemed completely new, as if I had just been born. My hands, the texture of my bedspread were all completely new and amazing to me. My eyes were brand new. Sitting there in amazement, I imagined this must be how a newborn baby feels when she sees everything for the first time. I thought, “I have never seen my hand before.” Even the texture of my bedspread was suddenly the most beautiful thing I had ever seen. Everything was bright, new and a miracle.
Quickly, I got up, ran outside, jumped on my bike and headed for the river. Abandoning my bike without care, I began to climb and walk up a waterfall, turning over every rock, stick and leaf along the way, amazed at what I saw. Eventually, I found my self sitting on a rock, admiring and petting the neon-green, fuzzy moss, its shape and patterns. Inside I thought, “How have I never noticed how beautiful this is before? How incredibly beautiful this whole world is?” I cried in disbelief and awe of every amazing thing around me. Rolling off the rock, onto the ground, I began to shape my body like the shape of the rock. My body began to bend and contort into the shapes of tree branches. Moving with the wind I imitated birds and the flow of the river.
And out of the ashes, I found my essence of self love. I realized that all of the men in my life were a symbol of power for me. Since I first got picked by the cutest boy over all of the more popular girls in school, it was a symbol of status and power for me. Yet in that moment on the river, I got the lesson. Whatever I was looking for, whatever support I needed, I could find in nature. It is always there, everywhere I go. If I needed stillness I could sit on a rock. If I need to feel rooted, I could imitate or meditate on a tree and learn from it. If I needed an embrace, I could lay on the ground and let the warm grass surround me. My happiness was not found in any one thing out side of me — person, degree, status — it was found in everything. I discovered an endless system of support, love and wisdom, buried in the dirt beneath my feet.
Thus my children’s book, Playing with Gaia, was born. It since has won two gold medals from the Moonbeam Children’s Book Awards and the Mom’s Choice Awards.
“Know that you always have a friend in Gaia. Treat her well. Play with her every day.”
