Sacred Thread Update: December New Moon 2020

December 14, 2020/Elizabeth Rainey/

Hello Fellow Body-Mind-Hearts –

It is so DARK right now. It is the new moon part of the moon cycle (when the moon seems to hide from us), it is the final week before the Winter Solstice in the northern hemisphere (when it seems that night has overstepped it’s bounds) and it is the ninth month of living through a global pandemic (when the heartbreak seems endless). It is heavy right now… heavy with exhaustion, grief, and frustration among other things. It is so easy to want to wish it all away, to not deal with the uncomfortable, painful and seemingly bleak present…the darkness and heaviness of life. But…

“There can be no transforming of darkness into light and of apathy into movement without emotion.”
~ Carl Jung

So if we are to transform the darkness then we must FEEL it. Emotion means that which needs to be moved out, expressed, felt, danced, gesticulated, touched, shaked, rolled, etc. When we have an emotion it is a calling to move our body, voice our breath and generally express our truth. This opens us up for light, for joy, for the return of the sun in its many forms. And the light needs its movement as well but that often seems so much easier and enjoyable.

We need to squeeze our sponge regularly in order to be able to meet all that is coming our way. If a sponge is not squeezed out then at some point it reaches saturation and can no longer take in any more moisture. We are the same. If we don’t regularly give ourselves time to move, growl, shake, rock, etc. then we reach a saturation point where we can’t take in anymore of life…the dark or the light. We either shut down or go into overdrive, both of which disallow the ability to be fully present for life. To really see the light that is also present with the dark.

This process of feeling and knowing our own shadows gives us the capacity to be with the shadows of others…and it does seem as if this time is a shadowy time!

“Knowing your own darkness is the best method for dealing with the darknesses of other people.”
~ Carl Jung

There is so much darkness being elicited in the world that it can be easy to add to it with our own judgements, righteousness and unmoved emotion. We can also add to the heaviness with our unwillingness to explore our own shadows and claim we see nothing but light and that ‘it’s all good’. But this focus on light is a way of not squeezing the sponge, of staying full of imaginary rainbows and butterflies and not being fully present for the moment. Which is the one that counts.

“Filling the conscious mind with ideal conceptions is a characteristic of Western theosophy, but not the confrontation with the Shadow and the world of darkness. One does not become enlightened by imagining figures of light, but by making the darkness conscious. The latter procedure, however, is disagreeable and therefore not popular.” ~ Carl Jung

So I invite you to squeeze your sponge as often as you can. To give your emotions some motion and expressing. To honor the truth of the darkness, which in turn allows for more light. To be with your full and messy humanness which in turn can allow us to deal with the sometimes confusing humanness of others.

Blessings to you this Solstice…
May we find time daily to ride the ocean of emotion in order to be fully present with the moment
May we honor the darkness within and outside us as an invitation to hold the light
May we offer kindness and compassion to others who are dealing with their own light/dark conversation.
May we be offer presence as our gift to others this season and all year

Practice Prompts:

Take some time, perhaps just 5 minutes daily, to shake, shimmy, roll, growl, tone, stretch, move your body…whether you know the story line of what is needing to be expressed or not, doesn’t matter…motion is the lotion:-)
Take some time in the next week to sit in the darkness (eyes open but not looking)… with as little light pollution from devises and switches as you can manage. Simply sit and allow yourself to be absorbed into the darkness. And allow the darkness to hold you. Notice what happens. You might even do this several nights in a row and see how it speaks to you over time.
Practice seeing the pain and suffering of others from the awareness of your own pain and suffering. Explore opening to the messiness of being human for all of us.
Schedule an online Resiliency Session with me. Sliding scale available upon request. Come learn some simple and profound ways to move the stress, trauma and pain through your body and discover ways to feel the light and joy that resides there as well.

Upcoming Live Streaming Practice Opportunities:

Inspirational Wisdom:

Gravity’s Law

“How surely gravity’s law,
strong as an ocean current,
takes hold of the smallest thing
and pulls it toward the heart of the world.

Each thing—
each stone, blossom, child—
is held in place.
Only we, in our arrogance,
push out beyond what we each belong to
for some empty freedom.

If we surrendered
to earth’s intelligence
we could rise up rooted, like trees.

Instead we entangle ourselves
in knots of our own making
and struggle, lonely and confused.

So like children, we begin again
to learn from the things,
because they are in God’s heart;
they have never left him.

This is what the things can teach us:
to fall,
patiently to trust our heaviness.
Even a bird has to do that
before he can fly.”

~ Rainer Maria Rilke

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