A Lesson of the Heart
It is a cool morning, and I am sitting outside writing this newsletter. I have a blanket wrapped around my thighs, two sets of socks on, and mittens. And, I am listening to my heart; she called me to write outside this morning. So, listening to bird song, I want to share what is on my heart.
But what my heart longs to share requires a backstory, though...
In late January, I was guided to begin sharing the wisdom of the ancient mysteries. I was called to create courses to help us connect more deeply to these sacred teachings. I was first guided to create a dream course to help us connect to our guides, then a course on Grandmother Moon to help us connect to the cyclical wisdom of our own bodies, and then a course to help us come home to Mother Earth.
When I moved to the forest in Golden in March, I had created the first two courses and was ready to begin receiving guidance from Mother Earth for the next one.
However, my mind took over and convinced me that I needed to face all my fears to fully come home to her and create the course. So, for 22 days, I walked the land in the dark at all hours, trying to face my fears. I laugh at how horrible this seems now. However, it was the most traumatic experience of my life. I have briefly shared about this experience in another post, Innana’s Descent Became My Descent. After this experience, all I could do was lie on the edge of the forest among the teepee poles and cry. I was too scared to go back into the forest. I was lost and confused. I didn’t trust myself or Mother Earth. I didn’t understand how I could heal my relationship with her, let alone help others. However, there was a whisper that asked me to connect with her right there in the teepee in the middle of my tears. I didn’t need to go into the woods and face my deepest and darkest fears, and so I did. I connected with her.
…And this is what my heart longs to share.
There on a cold winter morning in late March, I connected my womb to the womb of Mother Earth as I had hundreds of times before. I became still and quiet and asked her how she would like me to create the course. The only thing she told me was to do it through healing the chakras of my own body. I was confused and wondered how this process was going to help me and others heal our relationship with her. But she didn’t give me any other information. I only had an elementary understanding of the chakras within our bodies. However, I knew that she wasn’t asking me to go and research the chakras and make a course upon my findings. Rather, my body was to be the textbook and Mother Earth my teacher. My logical mind didn’t understand the journey she was taking on, but my body knew deep down to trust her, and so I did.
Ten weeks in, and I cannot even begin to express how healing and transformative this process has been. It has been gentle and loving and nothing short of magical. I am healing, and my relationship with Mother Earth is healing, and I believe she is healing too. Through the teachings of my own body and Mother Earth, I now understand that we store ancestral and past life traumas, negative memories and wounds in our chakras. She is having me heal within to heal without. For if we can’t feel safe and at home in our own bodies, we will never be able to feel safe and at home with her. So, the journey begins with an inward one.
I began by spending weeks at my root chakra, then at my sacral chakra and then to my solar plexus. For the first nine weeks, I was called to begin my days following a routine of grounding in silent meditation and then going to different edges of the forest to connect to Mother Earth. From there, I followed the threads of guidance I was given. As I travelled up the chakras of my own body, I connected deeper to the wisdom of Mother Earth.
I began to form this deep trust and understanding that everything I longed to create was also a longing for Mother Earth and Creation. I began to release what I thought I knew and surrender to her guidance. This meant quieting my mind and dropping deeper into the listening of my body. In doing so, I saw how every conversation had, every social media post made, and every thing created was a thread of healing not only for myself but for Mother Earth too. I felt a power and an aliveness animate me. The power of knowing that I was a part of something so much greater than myself. An aliveness that left me feeling more connected than I ever had before.
And then I arrived at my heart chakra and everything changed…
My heart longed to step away from the sacred work and take a break, and go visit family and friends for the long weekend. Waves of confusion flooded me. I knew that in going away, I would in some ways disconnect. For nine weeks, I had begun attuning myself to the pulse of the land. I could feel the energy field of the trees, be sent on journeys and seek guidance from them and have animals approach me rather than run away. I could feel in my body how a day in town negatively impacted this connection. I knew that three days away would make a difference, for the frequency of the forest and the frequency of friends and family are different. I felt conflicted and nothing short of grief. I truly felt like I was cultivating a relationship with Mother Earth that I had been searching for lifetimes.
And now my heart was calling me to step away…
And, I didn’t understand why.
However, I recalled a mantra of sorts shared by a wise friend.
Never decide out of fear; always make it out of love.
And so I connected with Mother Earth, and then I went.
And, it was joy-filled, sacred and heart-expanding! It was healing in its own way. Although the frequency of the forests, friends and family are different, our heart needs them all. Each of our hearts needs solitude and communion, connection to the land and to people. We need each in different quantities at different times in our lives. It is our task to listen to the longings and needs of our hearts and respond accordingly.
I was right, though. I came back, and things are different. As I go to do my morning routine of grounding and connecting to the land, there is resistance in my body. Fatigue arises. In the past, the predator within my mind would have told me that I am just resisting and need to try harder. However, the wiser protector within my heart is asking me to surrender and listen deeper to her longings and needs. These longings have asked me to bake bread and cookies, read fiction and garden in the afternoon. These needs have asked me to rest. My heart is asking me to surrender again and again to what I think I know and how I think things should be done.
I created timelines to have each chakra done by, to create a safe container to journey in this ethereal realm. However, the ‘deadline’ that I set for the heart chakra is on Friday, and I still don’t know what it longs to be. However, I trust Mother Earth and I trust myself. I am being called to trust deeper into the guidance of my heart. A lesson of the heart is unfolding...
I cannot lie. There is still fear that exists within me. A part of me is afraid that if I don’t do the practices that I was called to before, I will get lost again, that I won’t hear her messages as clearly. A part of me is afraid to fully surrender, wondering if I am misreading the guidance. However, I am on the chakra of the heart, so it is no wonder fears are arising now. Where fear exists, love cannot build a home. So my fears need to be known, so that my heart can love to the fullest.
I don’t fully know the journey that I am being taken on into the chakra of the heart. But my body knows deep down to trust, and so I will.
I share all this because there are times in our lives when we are in the flow of the river and know where we are going, and other times we are pulled onto the shore and don’t know why we are there. In the same way we allow ourselves to flow with the river, we can learn to rest on the shore.
So here I rest and listen. I place my hands on my heart and ask her what she longs for. I ask her what she needs.
I wait… and then I press publish.
With love,
Laurel
(Traductora de la Tierra)