I am using the time between now and the New Year to explore who I am, in order to introduce myself to the world, claim my space and truly begin, it all started with a Soul Art Journey. These are days 4-6:
Days 4 & 5:
As I’m in the process of having set an intention of getting to know myself in order to Introduce myself and I’m cataloguing the process, I’ve been aware of everything else going on in my life, and I’ve been spending time with what comes to the surface.
With that said, the last two days, I’ve been sick. I haven’t done anything.
I spent a good amount of my time while being sick just feeling what sickness feels like in my body. (It’s funny how when you place your attention specifically in a feeling, other things alleviate and the fascination with what you’re really feeling shifts)
And I’m acutely aware that since my parents died in 2021, I have become terrified of being sick.
I was never afraid of illness. I never stayed away from people who were sick, I’ve never played the quarantine game. My parents taught me that. I understand on a cellular level that we have millions of viruses living within us and among us because we are part of this planet. I understand that there are natural remedies that can provide relief, immune boosting properties and healing on all levels. I understand that illness is a way for us to become stronger. But since 2021, when my parents both got Covid, ended up in the hospital and died with Covid on their death certificates, I have earned some backwards badge of terror that I’d like to forfeit now.
And it’s not fear of illness, its actually a fear that one day I might have to use the system as a way to manage an illness.
I am more than aware, especially after reading the medical records of my parents, that Covid did not kill them, it was the mass of unwarranted medical treatments without consent and neglect that left them to die alone in a hospital without anyone by their side. It was so much more than Covid. In fact it does their deaths more than an injustice to call it Covid, there’s so many layers to unpack than just the top, which would be thousands of dollars the hospital received for naming Covid on their death certificates.
No, my terror lies in being in a situation where I might have to trust a system that has failed so many people that I’ve loved. That I might have to put my faith in a system that steals your voice and your choices from you in the name of authority and a greater good.
And it’s a real fear that started in 2021. In fact, I imagine a lot of people feel this way since 2020, at least those who were witness to what actually happened.
Now, every time something travels through our house, I prepare myself for all of the emotions.
So, having been sick for two days and feeling better … I’m moving through it, and measuring how deep this fear has actually rooted in me. I’ve watched my reactions to a sniffle or a sore throat, I’ve watched the way I buckle down, my pulse quickens and my mind begins to place value on everything, I’ve had to focus on keeping calm, breathing, closing my eyes if it gets too bad, even going to sleep early or taking a bath. I find myself constantly asking how everyone is doing, afraid to check in on them in the morning when I wake up but forcing myself to do it and talking myself down from an extreme imagination. I’ve spent a lot of hours meditating and healing in the last two days. I’ve been taking tablespoons of fermented garlic honey and vitamin C and I’m doing good … in fact, I recommend the combination.
I was never this person.
I’m moving through it.
I’m learning through it
I have no art today, but I’ve been working on a lot.
This was Today (Day 6):
I started my exploration today with pulling a few cards from the Archetype deck. At first I pulled The Ring, The King and Thanatos (in that order)
The Ring symbolizing the circular nature of the universe and the constant communication between all things. I took it as a reminder, when I explore today to be open to all the ways my body is communicating with everything around me.
The King is about the reminder to be benevolent and not controlling. So I took this to remember to be benevolent with my own exploration today, raging kindness in my own process.
Thanatos is the Personification of death, the death of the ego, the reminder that as we meet both birth and death on the shores of our living experiences, we also bring back compassion and depth of understanding deepening everyone we meet along the way.
I went downstairs to look further into Thanatos as a Greek God, partly because death has been at the forefront of my mind, not only from hearing of a friend’s death yesterday but also because a large part of the work I’ve been doing on myself was birthed in the crisis of losing my parents (though before my parents died I was already writing a book on grief, it’s been a cycle for sometime) I was taken by the idea that we, as living souls on this earth, travel to the time and space of death/birth and return many times, and that if we open ourselves up to the true experience of what birth and death are, we can evolve each and every time into softer, gentler, more loving human beings. I thought for a bit about how I experienced both in the same exact moment in 2008 when I had a stillbirth. It’s a rabbit hole worth traveling if you’re interested.
I decided to go deeper into my exploration of Thanatos by doing an hour long Yoga Nidra for the Winter Solstice. The Winter Solstice is a time when we pull inward and get to know our own hearts. We witness death in nature around us, but it’s only part of the natural cycle.
When I got to my Yoga Nidra nest, one archetype card was sitting on my mat (I thought I had put them all away) It was the card for The Heart.
The Heart is about reclaiming your own heart, dancing with it, moving past the shrubbery of the outside world and settling into the center of the self.
I was intrigued.
I did my Yoga Nidra which spent a lot of time focused on the heart.
When I was done I went to my art table and I painted my own Heart Space.
It came out so different than I ever anticipated. I figured it would be a cave or an ocean. But it’s so much more. And I love it.
I spent some time speaking with the bird in my Heart Space and this is the wisdom I received:
I am wonder. I am unfiltered. I am here. I am present.
It’s time to color your world once again.
You will thrive where you think you’ll fail.
Don’t forget to rest and witness all you’ve accomplished.
In the rest there’s alchemy.
I’m not looking out on anything, there’s nowhere to go, I’m presenting you with what’s already here.
Look in my eyes and you’ll see the answer.
So, I looked closely in the eyes of the bird and it’s an equal sign!
I just love it!
This work is so powerful.
I’m taking the time from now until Christmas to openly explore whatever presents itself to me each day. Between the week of Christmas and New Year’s Day I’ll be honing in on everything I’ve created up to that point to formally introduce myself on January 1st 2024 <3