• Category Archives Creative Mythology

  • Wild Mind: A Field Guide to the Human Psyche – Bill Plotkin

    Posted on by AndrewMichaelChallies 1 Comment
    Wild Mind by Bill Plotkin
    Wild Mind

    What does it take to crack the shell of prolonged inactivity when it comes to blogging? The mind has been at work for the last two years reading, changing, looking but somehow the importance of tapping at the keyboard and exposing my soul has been missing. Time has been taken up with other things.

    A couple of months ago an invitation arrived to review Bill Plotkin’s new book Wild Mind: A Field Guide to the Human Psyche. The publishers had seen that I’d made mention of SoulCraft in Sacred Sorrow: Powerlessness 2. It was enough to break the chains of slavery to the routine that had drowned the inspiration to blog.

    That and an innovative approach to publicising the book…… http://bit.ly/wildmindtrailer and an interview at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kqT2AQ3Yvfs with this man who has thirty years experience in the human potential arena focusing on his clients’ relationship to nature. This symbiotic relationship provides a path to the fullest expression of their humanity.

    Field Guides generally assist readers in identifying the flora and fauna; provide maps; and describe points of interest relevant to a particular region. Wild Mind is no different – it allows us to recognize the aspects of the psyche that will direct our passage through life to create a naturally enhancing & sustaining personal and global culture.

    What Plotkin has done is create a map for seekers who wish to experience a life that embodies the fullest expression of our humanity. When he embeds a personal story from someone who has used the map the terrain of his idea becomes more visible.

    The major landmarks of this map use the Medicine Wheel and the directions (North, South, East & West) as a template for an engaging exploration of the facets required to fully express ourselves and to carry that into our communities and nations to bring about transformation that spirals out into global consciousness.

    The Facets are:

    • North: Nurturing Generative Adult – compassionate and competent
    • South: Wild Indigenous One – sensuous, emotive, instinctual, playful
    • East: Innocent/Sage – pure, simple, clear, lighthearted, wise, perceptive
    • West: Muse/Inner Beloved – adventurous, visionary, symbolic, mythic, poetic

    One of the directions will be our preferred way of being in the world. Its polar opposite points towards our weakness. Our weak facets may be the horizon from which our symptoms, our addictions, and our dysfunction arise. Those weaknesses are the sub-personalities formed in early childhood by an immature ego creating a sense of safety for allowing us to co-exist in a world that appears to be maleficent to our under-developed ego. By acknowledging and assimilating the strengths the other directions hold we come into harmony within ourselves allowing us to then radiate this harmony out into the world.

    Plotkin writes:

    “We’re being summoned by the world itself to make many urgent changes to the human project, but most central is a fundamental re-visioning and reshaping of ourselves, a shift in consciousness,” writes Plotkin. “We must reclaim and embody our original wholeness, our indigenous human nature granted to us by nature itself. And the key to reclaiming our original wholeness is not merely to suppress psychological symptoms, recover from addictions and trauma, manage stress, or refurbish dysfunctional relationships, but rather to fully flesh out our multifaceted, wild psyches, committing ourselves to the largest story we’re capable of living, serving something bigger than ourselves.”

    In order to attain this Original Wholeness Plotkin offers some ideas around managing the process. One of these tools is “the four steps of emotional assimilation”

    1. thoroughly experience the raw emotion itself without interpretation, censoring or sanitizing (south)
    2. explore (a compassionate self-examination) what this arising of the emotion tells us about ourselves (expectations, values, needs, desires, attitudes) (west)
    3. expression in a kind hearted and non-violent way (north)
    4. review entire emotional process, see how how fits into our life story, have a good laugh (east)

    Another idea that opens us up to inspired living is that of a three dimensional ego – an ego that has matured to the point that it is “blessed with some degree of conscious communion and integration with the Self, Soul, and Spirit“. When we are anchored in this 3D-Ego we may “experience ourselves not only in service to Soul & Spirit but also as Soul and as Spirit.”

    Towards the end of the book he offers … healthy, mature cultures emerge from and have always emerged from nature from the depths of our individual and collective psyches from the Earth’s imagination acting through us, from the mythic realm of dreams or the Dreamtime, from Soul, from the soul of the world, from Mystery….emerge and evolve naturally and organically through the coordinated activities of mature humans, humans who have learned again what it means to dream the impossible and to romance the world. Mature cultures are self organising. They can only be dreamed into existence.

    Has the South Asian kingdom of Bhutan embraced their Wild Mind and provided a key to our discovering a template for a mature society? Instead of a Gross National Product they have a Gross National Happiness indicator. This is used in their five year planning and is supported by four pillars: Promoting sustainable development, preserving and promoting cultural values, conserving the natural environment, and establishing and maintaining good governance.

    Blessings

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  • Sacred Sorrow: The Sacred Wound Part Four

    Posted on by AndrewMichaelChallies Comment

    A wise old proverb says, “God comes to see us without bell;” that is, as there is no screen or ceiling between our heads and the infinite heavens, so there is no bar or wall in the soul, where man, the effect, ceases, and God, the cause, begins. The walls are taken away. We lie open on one side to the deeps of spiritual nature, to the attributes of God. Justice we see and know, Love, Freedom, Power. These natures no man ever got above, but they tower over us and most in the moment when our interests tempt us to wound them.

    Ralph Waldo Emerson.

    What if our higher selves were – at every moment seeking the most potent expression of our existence? What if it was asking us to create the reality that was in the best interests of not only humans but all the beings that inhabit Planet Earth? I know I have been procrastinating as I consider this post and what meaning there might be behind it. Procrastinating? I’m not so sure now. Every time I come back to work on this I look at it and seem to be blocked. There’s just something about it that won’t allow me to move forward with it. I had hoped to expand on the reference to the enneagram I left at the end of Part Two of these series of posts. I made a start and yet each time I came back to it I’d look at it and it’d look back at me and there’d be nothing going on. Uninspired – I was blocked.

    The enneagram is full of complexity, follows many nuances of character. I doubt whether I would have done it justice within one post and I certainly don’t have the depth of understanding that would enable me to talk intelligently and fluently over another series of posts. The enneagram is one of many great tools to use if you are seeking understanding about yourself and your motivations. I gained some insights into myself through reading and maybe if I’d dedicated myself to it I may have found a path to enlightenment. I don’t know if I have some sort of spiritual attention deficit or whether I’m looking for a simpler path, but I found myself leaving that behind and seeking other ways. I’m not sure I felt it at the time but now it seems life is complex enough without following someone else’s ideas about finding enlightenment. I did the reading, talked about what I found, discovered as I said in the earlier post that I sat at point five on the enneagram, and wasn’t sure I liked being pigeon-holed. I guess being “the Thinker” I find it easy to get lost in ideas and the seeking of wisdom in books, while all the time it waits for me to get out there to physically embrace life and find my own wisdom through experience.

    As I sit here, dealing another hand of Mah-jong, I’m visited by a spider. I seem particularly sensitive to its path across my hand. And I flick it off. Hardly exemplary behaviour seeing as I favour the Buddhist philosophy of doing no harm to any living thing.

    The story of Robert the Bruce and the spider springs to mind. Robert sought the answer to whether he should continue fighting the English. What am I seeking the answer to as I follow this trail through the Sacred Wound and should I continue? Am I clutching at straws? Seems the Spider thinks I am on the right track as he has taken his leave of me.

    It seems this post has been slowly coming into focus over several months, since December, in fact. And paradoxically what has now come into focus is mist. While road tripping to Mount Cook with my daughter I was touched by a synchronicity as I listened to the retelling of a Maori myth and heard a piece of native wisdom. It is said that Mt Cook or Aoraki as it called by the Maori is a place of Spiritual Enlightenment and it is hard not to be awe-struck by the grandeur of the place.

    Mt Cook
    Mt Cook

    The first time I visited Aoraki I was blessed with an uninterrupted view of the mountain. This second time the weather seemed against us. From the vantage of the hotel the mountain was covered in mist. Having observed this phenomenon, the tohunga, their spiritual leaders discovered the wisdom for their chiefs of not always being available for the tribe, of having time away. Wisdom also is not in full view. It must be found in our encounters with life.

    We sought a closer view the following day and were rewarded. So it is with enlightenment itself. It is said by some that we are already enlightened we just have to remember it is so. And yet sometimes the face of the mountain, the face of enlightenment is shrouded in mist. It is easy to get lost during those times, to forget we’re always a spark of the divine and then to create trauma for ourselves and others, tearing open the fabric of the soul. This tear may become the sacred wound in its turn opening you or the other to the possibilities of a benevolent soul consciousness.

    The myth I heard told the story of Aoraki and his three brothers, off-spring of the Sky Father – Rakinui and Maori Earth Mother, Papatuanuku. They had set sail voyaging round Papatuanuku when their canoe ran aground on a reef. They climbed on the top side of the canoe, but the wind rose from the south freezing them, turning them to stone. The canoe became the South Island, “Te waka o Aoraki”. Aoraki being the tallest of the brother’s, became Aoraki the mountain, and his three brothers the peaks surrounding him. The rest of the crew became the Southern Alps, the mountain range for which the South Island is famous.

    As I pondered this the words of Emerson came into focus. From an enlightened perspective there are possibly no greater attributes than those he speaks of in that quote – Justice, Love, Freedom and Power. Just as those mountains tower over us so do those values. They’re something to aspire to. In the routine of our lives it is easy to lose sight of these aspirations. I guess these aspirations are what bring us to study the concepts contained in the enneagram and other systems of spiritual guidance.

    Each of these aspirations lies on a continuum, Justice-Injustice, Love-Fear, Freedom-Slavery, and Power-Impotence.  I feel impotent in the face of what the earthquake has wrought. I had my year mapped out – an exit strategy for my job, a move into something new. All this is on hold for now. This opened up a feeling of slavery to the job I was already in and on-going frustration with the mundane nature of the tasks ahead of me. As I read these words now I’m touched by a sense of injustice. That an earthquake can affect not only the physical, but also the mental and emotional is a testament to the power of nature. And my lot is nothing to what others have endured. It brings me back to gratitude and humility. Is it fear that holds me in place, keeping me safe until I’m ready? Or can I venture something new now, generated from the passion in my soul for transformation.

    Blessings

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  • Sacred Sorrow: The Sacred Wound: Part Three

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    The Hero’s Journey

     At a depth of 5km below the Earth’s surface a quake registering 6.3 on the Richter scale struck the people of Canterbury on February 22. Though 8 times less powerful than the 7.1 which struck on September 4 at a depth of 10 km this quake was far more devastating. With an epicentre less than 10 km from Christchurch and its timing, 12.51pm in a city already weakened by the September event the quake left 166 so far confirmed dead and many still unaccounted for, as well the centre of  Christchurch in ruins.

    earthquake damage

    I had hoped to carry on from the previous post and explore the enneagram further. Thoughts around that subject were beginning to gel and then another quake. Everything else began to pale into insignificance. Was this our Mother Earth lulling us into a false sense of security pending the release of the masterstroke? Had we become complacent?

    At Wainui I was catering for two schools when it struck. The intensity of the shake, while not as long as the 7.1, and the almost immediate loss of power convinced all present that this was a “biggy”. Buildings were evacuated and all protocols adhered to. The worry for teachers and parent helpers was evident and in the wake of the previous quakes the children were well drilled in keeping themselves protected.

    I was lost for the first week not sure what my role was in all this. My process is that I focus on what is in front of me in that moment and allow it to unfold. This meant attending to those closest to me as the days past.

    Eventually I realised that this quake required a separate post and at the outset I seemed lost for words and ideas. How does one do justice to something like this? How does one honour those whose lives were taken?

    Looking through some of the faces in the paper of those feared dead I found a face that looked familiar. I recognised him as a regular in a bar that I also drank at a few years ago. I don’t remember engaging him at all though we may have sat in the same group on the odd occasion. It turned out he died entering a building to bring injured people out. There is sadness for me in not having connected with him in some way.

    <iframe src=”//www.slideshare.net/slideshow/embed_code/key/UqFiVYjOuIdA8″ width=”425″ height=”355″ frameborder=”0″ marginwidth=”0″ marginheight=”0″ scrolling=”no” style=”border:1px solid #CCC; border-width:1px; margin-bottom:5px; max-width: 100%;” allowfullscreen> </iframe> <div style=”margin-bottom:5px”> <strong> <a href=”//www.slideshare.net/AndrewMichaelChallies/heros-journey1″ title=”Hero’s Journey” target=”_blank”>Hero’s Journey</a> </strong> from <strong><a href=”//www.slideshare.net/AndrewMichaelChallies” target=”_blank”>Andrew Challies</a></strong> </div>

    The word Hero fits many of the people who were caught in town when the quake struck and just did what needed to be done in the circumstances. As I pondered it further, listening to news reports, listening to politicians, hearing the stories, it seemed a perfect example of the Hero’s Journey unfolding in a short space of time.

    I had touched on the Hero’s Journey previously in my post Working with Qualities of Soul: Cyclical. I follow the work of  Carol Pearson who developed a system of 12 archetypes that assist the path of evolution for our souls. My initial discovery inspired an on-going passion for the work.

    The journey evolves through 3 stages – the preparation, the journey, and the return. Within those 3 stages there are 4 archetypes encountered as we assimilate the rememberings required to move to the next stage. The archetypes of preparation are the innocent, the orphan, the warrior, the caregiver. In the journey stage we have the seeker, lover, destroyer, and the creator. Finally on our return we are governed by the ruler, the magician, the sage and the fool.

    The devastation wrought by an earthquake as experienced in Christchurch can immediately precipitate people, both individually and collectively, into encountering the archetypes of the preparation. An abrupt transition from innocent to orphan as the quake wreaks havoc upon the populace. From an apparently innocuous sort of day we become victims once more to thrashing of the earth. This sense of victim is one of the attributes of the orphan archetype.

    earthquake damage

    People began instantly and instinctively to look after those who had been obviously injured, or going into wreckage searching for those trapped. These are prime examples of the archetypes of the care-giver and warrior. I speak as one who watched from afar seeing the images on a television screen.

    My reality was different being 80km away from the centre of Christchurch. As a chef the archetype that was strongest for me was, I imagine, the caregiver. There was a sense of frustration as I waited for the groups present to decide if they were going or staying so that the warrior element in me could respond to the call to action and begin cooking. When the power returned I watched the TV with fascination as the story unfolded. There was an aspect within me that would have liked to have been amongst the destruction having my mettle tested and at the same blessed because I was away from the worst of it, not having to face the pain obvious to those who had first-hand experience of death and damage.

    Within the exploration there is the challenge of not attempting to make the events fit nicely into an ordered unfolding of the Hero’s Journey process. With any kind of process there is fluidity around the steps. As the drama unfolds a particular stage may arise out of sequence. As the dust settles the services – Fire, St John’s, and Civil Defence – attempt to impose some sort of order on the scene. That sense of order can be identified with the ruler archetype.

    After those initial hours of people working instinctively a more structured approach begins to take shape. Within that structure there can be instances of archetypes showing their faces as events unfold. Each of the archetypes may play its part over the course of a day. Each day holds the potential of seeing ourselves as innocent or victim, caregiver or warrior, as seeker or destroyer, lover or creator, as an opportunity to take responsibility like the ruler, find our personal power like the magician, the wisdom of the sage and the joy and freedom of the fool.

    The Christchurch quakes have become threshold events enabling us to look more closely at these archetypes. The features of the preparation are seen in the immediate responses to the devastating effects as the virtuous aspects of the archetypes – optimism, realism, courage and compassion – play out. That said, there are also the negative aspects, wrought by fear – abandonment, victimisation, weakness, selfishness.

    There seems to be a cycle involved here, where a fearful focus may precipitate us into the next fearful experience of an archetype. Awareness of the process may assist us to arrest the downward spiral and refocus with a more positive attitude.

    The initiation sets up the continuing journey and the qualities we’re hoping will be embedded in our psyches – a sense of autonomy, of humility, acceptance, passion, commitment, and the sense of an individual calling. The archetypal passage of the journey tends to cycle through seeking, destroying, loving and creating and in fact one of the insights from “Awakening the Heroes Within” suggests that from a lifetime perspective the path of the hero may end in the journey phase. I somehow felt sad that perhaps people weren’t getting the most out of their lives, that it was interrupted before the opportunity to live it fully presented itself. And I also understood how one could be quite satisfied by the loving and creating aspects of the journey

    The journey isn’t about the acquisition of things or knowledge although these may arrive as part of the process – physical representations of the inner passage. The gifts of this unfolding are those that nurture the psyche – the virtues being shaped within our characters and personalities.

    It seems the further we travel the path of the Hero the gifts become less tangible. I know for myself I began to question the almost constant seeking – the “looking” for answers. I was doing course after course acquiring knowledge and somehow feeling I did not yet know enough to do what it was I was meant to be doing.

    I think that was when I began to move into the return. I took the Ruler’s responsibility for what I already knew and allowed it to colour my personality, to expand my character. Essentially all we can be responsible for is how we respond in any given situation.  Whether we follow our heart or our fear is a choice and that can be changed in the blink of an eye. As soon as we accept that responsibility the other aspects of the return seem to come into alignment quite quickly – the personal power of the Magician, the wisdom of the Sage, and the joy and freedom of the Fool.

    Knowledge of the Journey doesn’t take away the challenges. It allows you see the landmarks ahead safe in the knowledge that when this one is reached another one is beckoning. Feel the freedom of the fool and know the optimism of the Innocent is just around the corner motioning you onward to the start of another journey.

    During the last week as the post has been slowly coming together I was informed of another tragedy – and old Air Force friend had been killed while assisting people in a car accident in Queensland. I remember the laughs we shared and not only am I reminded that joy matters on the Hero’s Journey but that Death is the ultimate return and going out with the Heart of a Hero is a true blessing. I’m also reminded to notice the areas of my life which are undergoing change, to acknowledge those things which are passing away,  let them go gracefully and then embrace the new – that which is becoming.  Thank you, Alan. Your inspiration will live long.

    Blessings

     

     

     

     

     

     

     


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  • Sacred Sorrow: The Sacred Wound Part One

    Posted on by AndrewMichaelChallies Comment

    Apologies to all who felt I’d left them hanging at the end of the last post. I’m told they wanted to know how I was wreaking inhumanity upon myself. I reread it and thought perhaps it wasn’t enough to know that a person feels this way. Or do we have a fascination for the methods of a person’s undoing? It seems so when we glance at the covers of any women’s magazine or tabloid newspaper. In the wake of the undoing what do they do to rebuild their lives? Noting that the Sacred Wound was the next installment in this series of posts I felt that the hanging was a perfect segue into it.

    The Sacred Wound for me is a tear in the fabric of the soul caused by a traumatic event. This could occur at any time during our lives and open us to what may seem initially to be a Pandora’s box of experience and yet also contain that which remained in her box – hope. Hope of an increased soul consciousness, of heartfelt connection to all divine sparks that exist in this universe.

    The best discussion I’ve found on the net in regard to the Sacred Wound is at Lightworkers.Org. It gives a comprehensive outline to a subject that is really an abstract concept. Anyhow….

    Spring is in full swing, new beginnings, new life sprouting. A time to trim the threads lank and frayed by the depths of winter, cutting away that which has served its purpose and splicing what is still strong back into our lives.

    All this talk of threads and hanging has me considering rope more deeply. Ostensibly the twisting of hemp firstly into strings and then three strands are twisted together to form rope. Metaphorically I see the whole rope symbolising our physical existence and the three strands representing the emotional, intellectual, and spiritual attributes we all carry with us. Life is a constant twisting of the strands together allowing ourselves to be fully connected. It reminds me of the helical nature of DNA. Rope is used to bind, to secure, to attach. And it tangles.

    My obsession with MASH at present has not left me and I find I’m seeing threads in the stories that have left me feeling that those episodes were somehow unfinished.

    I‘ve been guilty of leaving things hanging. I have attached threads to those I have been in relationship with and have not had the sense to consciously detach myself from them. I have become entangled in these threads and by allowing this I have metaphorically hung myself in my relationships. The threads I’ve left hanging in the external have been the unravelling of my inner world.

    In New Zealand we have the Plunket Society who provide support services for children under 5 years old. Families had a Plunket Nurse who would monitor the development of the child. Their progress would be written in up in a Plunket book including graphs of their growth. A few years ago my mother gave this book to me and browsing through it I noticed that from the age of 6 months my graph went into a decline. Until then the graph described a straight line upwards, after, it began to fall off. I asked her about this. She said that at the time they’d left me with my grandparents while they attended a wedding in another part of the country. I imagine this to be my sacred wound. A sense of abandonment perhaps. I have no recollection, no memory of it except this record of a decline. And yet I have a strong sense this played out in my relationships. That when I felt a sense of abandonment or neglect, a severing of a bond, then I would go into a decline and seek that bond in someone else. I see now that it became the end of my marriage and other relationships into which I entered.

    I remember during my marriage developing an emotional though unrequited attachment with a co-worker. But not consciously detaching from that previous entanglement I came to point in a subsequent relationship where the thought of meeting her again and the hope of reciprocated feelings led me to exit that relationship. It remained unrequited and a period of grief followed.

    Grief for what? Grief because this was my Sacred Wound insisting I look more closely at it? Grief because I had betrayed the essence of love? Grief because love requires me to love myself first before surrendering to relationship for a fuller expression? Or all of these things?

    I return to MASH and one episode sticks in my mind…. In it they explore a soldier afflicted by hysterical paralysis. Nothing is physically wrong with the patient but he is unable to move his lower body. He has feet of clay. In face of an enemy attack he is absolutely frozen with fear. The method of treatment is doing nothing for the patient until he breaks through and begins to take responsibility for himself and goes back to the fighting. The fear is that if sent home instead of returning to the front guilt will overwhelm him and affect the rest of his life. A line at the end of Black Hawk Down fills this out further – one of the soldiers says to another that war is not about politics or ideologies, its about the guy next to you. This was the wound experienced by the soldier in the MASH episode, doing nothing to look after the guys next to him, the guilt of this causing his hysterical paralysis.

    Having not experienced war first hand this is all supposition from me and yet I get the feeling that war is a collective sacred wound.

    I’m aware that this is somehow unfinished but there is a second part to come….

    Resources:

    http://www.shiftinaction.com/node/3025

    http://lightworkers.org/channeling/86314/sacred-wound-gateway-higher-consciousness

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  • Sacred Sorrow: Powerlessness 2

    Posted on by AndrewMichaelChallies 1 Comment

    Surrender

    “Individuation, as a process can be seen at important stages of life and at times of crisis when fate upsets the purpose and expectation of the ego-consciousness.”

    E A Bennett – What Jung Really Said

    It seems an age since I sat here with a sense of dedication and commitment to my blog, and a need to open my mind further to the possibility that somehow others maybe inspired by what I put in here. It has been twelve weeks at least since my fingers tapped out a new creation for the blog . It almost sounds like I’m in a confessional telling my sins to a priest. Go easy on me.

    Since April 2 I have had an insane work schedule, a holiday, a season change in both climate and work, the passing away of a goal, and in orbit around me others have experienced the death of a loved one, hospitalisation, and an overseas move. They all involve surrender, letting go, or what may seem to be our fate.

    Surrender is the other side of powerlessness. When we go beyond the anxiety of having fate cast an ugly hand, or the feeling that life has betrayed us somehow, we enter the realm of surrender, the place where trust envelops us and allows us to acknowledge that while difficult our current experience is actually moving us forward.

    In Greek Mythology Lachesis, Clotho, and Atropus are the Fates, the Moerae, the three sisters who decide the fates of humans, singing of the experiences we had, that we are having, and the things we will have. Lachesis apportions the lots of fate, Clotho spins the thread of fate and lastly Atropus cuts the thread of fate as we move from life through death, the ultimate surrender, and onwards. And the Fates are attributes of our own souls. We know what has gone before, what is ultimately in our future, and we have an inner knowing of where life is carrying us.

    In honouring a relationship with our soul we may be led into experiences that appear to invade our psyches and push us in directions we hadn’t considered. Surrender is giving up the ways of being that don’t serve us anymore and being open to the possibilities it holds for us, receiving the new experiences life offers us around each new corner.

    I acknowledged the passing away of a goal when I noticed coming up against barriers to its fulfilment. The act of surrendering to the release of something I was holding onto allowed a new idea to take its place. This new thought seemed more difficult to bring to fruition and yet it held more promise than the previous one. It fits well with one of my favourite quotes from Neale Donald Walsch – “Live the grandest version of the greatest vision you ever held about Who You Are.” By offering ourselves to this possibility there maybe sadness as we leave behind those ideas we hold about ourselves that have outlived their usefulness.

    Soul Craft coverBill Plotkin in his book SoulCraft tells the story of Lauren, a woman wandering alone in a sandstone canyon during one of his soulcraft intensives. After she’d been walking for an hour unbidden sensations both emotional and physical left her afraid and struggling. She was in an area surrounded by ancient cliff dwellings and could feel a great sadness emanating from them. This induced a profound experience of grieving, and she left the canyon under the shadow of what Bill terms a soul encounter or initiation. From this she gained the belief she was destined to grieve and assist others in connecting with their own deep sorrow. She received a secret name from the canyon and prepared a naming ceremony in the following three months. After this she went on to drag her feet for a few months until an “accident”, a fall from a horse, forced her into accepting this path that had been chosen by her soul.

    Through committment to the tug of soul she now facilitates grieving processes through word of mouth.

    Surrender means acceptance of what the present moment holds, of what fate has allotted us right now whatever that may be. In saying that we hold the power to apply meaning and emotion to this current experience. We have choice. We are the architects of our own fate. All we need to do is take up our paddle and move out into the current of our life, honouring both the times when we have a gentle course and also when we enter the rapids and life throws us around, shaking us up and making us more acutely aware and focused on our path. There is power in powerlessness if we allow ourselves to be directed by our hearts and souls, allowing a life that engages the mysteries of existence.

    Resources:

    Soulcraft: Crossing into the Mysteries of Nature and Psyche Bill Plotkin. New World Library 2003

    Animas Valley Institute

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  • Sacred Sorrow: Powerlessness 1

    Posted on by AndrewMichaelChallies Comment

    “Did you come here for forgiveness,

    Did you come to raise the dead,

    Did you come here to play Jesus

    to the lepers in your head?”

    “One”

    U2

    This morning before I got up I entered into a shamanic meditation, a guided meditation to my medicine place. A place of spiritual solace gifted by the Creator, however you perceive him to be. A place to receive guidance, to connect with teachers and guides

    Over the past months I have neglected this source being too focused on the tasks in front of me as a Catering Manager. Whenever I have entered the space it has only been experienced superficially – no real depth to the communications within. And again this morning this was so. No depth of experience. While two of my guides were present I felt largely ignored by them, something that I have patently been doing to them.

    One of the stimuli for this exploration of Sacred Sorrow was a dream a few weeks ago. In it I had found a piece of land I felt I wanted to buy on a corner in my old neighbourhood. It was an empty section with mounds here and there and hedges in the middle and the surrounds. I went away to source the finance. When I came back there was a bohemian couple living on it. I felt aggrieved that I’d missed out on this property. Not only that but the man came up to me and reached into my pocket and removed a shiny glass ornament, dripping wet, from my pocket with a red and blue symbol embedded in its centre. At the same time a piece of pounamo (jade, greenstone) with crocheted wings flew out of another pocket and alighted on the nearby hedge. I was noticing a sense of deep sadness within me as this unfolded. Underlying the sense these items were being taken away from me was another feeling of them being still present.

    There’s a sense of powerlessness in some of the imagery. I know I’ve not been doing myself any favours in other areas of my life. Allowing my addictions a greater hold – TV, computer games, cigarettes, email, coffee. I feel powerlessness as I consider them and the ways I can break the habits.

    As I ponder the last thought I see that by transferring that sense of powerlessness on to the objects themselves there are ways to divert myself from the sense of addiction. Seeing the objects as powerless diminishes their hold on me and my sense of personal power grows stronger.

    Addictions are certainly manifestations of the “lepers in my head”. The verse in “One” those words come from also include references to forgiveness and raising the dead. By playing Jesus to the lepers in our heads we’re able bring to life that which may lie dead or sleeping within our psyches. Unable to forgive my own faults how can I expect to forgive the faults of others.

    How often in the silence of my mind do the lepers take up residence and I hear myself saying I should do this, I should do that, I should have done this, I should have done that!? It occurs typically when feeling a need to confront my addictive ways. I have heard it described as “the tyranny of shoulds” or “shoulding all over myself”. There is a sense of doing things on a whim when should is mentioned. Powerlessness kicks in when I add have to the mix. I missed an opportunity. Poor me and into a downward spiral!

    And yet “ONE” holds a positive message as well. As I consider it from a point of powerlessness I see the lyrics pointing towards an impotence in relationship not only with another but also with the world itself. Perhaps the “raising of the dead” can be acknowledged as we work with those parts of ourselves that we have left for dead in the aftermath of shoulds. Can I forgive myself for not standing up and being definitive in the path of a storm of shoulds? Can I hear myself saying I AM or I WILL when a “should” is like looking on the face of the Medusa, poisonous serpents flailing about her head, threatening to turn me to stone.

    One love, One blood

    One life, you got to do what you should

    One life with each other

    Sisters, Brothers

    One life, but we’re not the same

    We got to carry each other, carry each other

    Can I find the power within to help myself in turn offering the same to others struggling.

    Resources:

    Going Home to Your Medicine Place Guided Meditation. Academy of Shamanic Studies

    ( http://www.shamanic.ac.nz/index.html )
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  • A Raft Across the River

    Posted on by AndrewMichaelChallies Comment
    Ten Thousand Miles Without a Cloud
    Ten Thousand Miles Without a Cloud

    Ten Thousand Miles Without a Cloud is written by Chinese author Sun Shuyun who grew up during the cultural revolution. It begins by telling of her childhood in a family lucky enough to be aligned with the communist policies of the day. By virtue of this background Sun Shuyun was able to enter Beijing University to study English. This in turn lead her to being accepted for Oxford University in 1986. Her grandmother though, who was subject to some ridicule by the family, continued to follow the dictates of Buddhism and in particular the figure of a buddhist monk Xuanzang 599-664AD.

    Buddhism in the time of Xuanzang had gone into decline and he began a journey along the Silk Road to India and back that took him 18 years to complete. Sun Shuyun follows his journey using modern forms of transport and finds that this Buddhist master is still revered at many points along the journey.

    The wisdom that Xuanzang gained on the journey touched and revivified not only those he connected with on his return but also some of the people he met along the way and ultimately the way Buddhist philosophy was more deeply embraced in China. In the same way Sun Shuyun was touched by wisdom as her journey unfolded and she examined her life in the light of not only Xuanzang’s teachings but also through the benefit of hindsight.

    There’s a wealth of Buddhist wisdom within the covers. I found it quite serendipitous that she one of the stories she tells of the Buddha, came from a man, Andrew, she met at the site of the Bodhi Tree where the Buddha became enlightened. As they parted company he felt the need to leave this story with her….

    Once upon a time a monk came to Bodh Gaya and started praying earnestly to the Buddhist statues Then he thought he saw the Buddha praying to the images too. He was shocked. “You are the Buddha” Why are you praying to yourself?” The Buddha replied: “That is my point. Pray to yourself, not to anyone else.”

    Earlier he’d passed on another story the Buddha used to make a point about his teachings…. ….

    Coming to a stretch of water a traveller was in desperate need to cross it so he built himself a raft and rowed himself across the river. The Buddha posed a question to his listeners, “What should he do with the raft? Should he decide that it had been so helpful to him that he should load it on his back and carry it with him wherever he went? Or should he simply moor it and continue on his journey. In just the same way, my teachings are like a raft, to be used to cross the river but not to be held on to.”

    NAnny McPhee
    Nanny McPhee

    It seemed quite apt when I watched the movie Nanny McPhee about a widower and his seven unruly children last night. The children take great pride by frightening off all the nannies he employs until the magical Nanny McPhee comes into their life. In the course of her altercation with she utters the following …“When you need me but do not want me I must stay. When you want me but do not need me I must go”.

    It fits quite nicely with the analogy of the raft. She was there to carry them to a new understanding of their place in the scheme of things and preparing them for the next phase of their journey.

    The God Delusion
    The God Delusion

    Following on from Ten Thousand Miles Without a Cloud I began reading the God Delusion by Richard Dawkins. It is an in depth discussion on Atheism looking at the ways religion doesn’t inspire us to an ethical and moralistic world view. He brings observations from his own and others studies showing how science and in particular a Darwinistic outlook can help us see the ideas we need to embrace as human beings aiming to live together in harmony with each other and the natural environment. Similar to Buddhism he sees the concepts of compassion, generosity and charity  present in the Darwinian model of evolution and natural selection.

    Whatever it is that can act as a raft to bring us to another shore of understanding in my mind must be beneficial. Within all of these ideas the sense that communities working together for the common good comes through. This cooperation within each particular species whether it be human, animal, insect, is what enables evolution.

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    Creative Mythology

  • Bless you Ellen Burstyn

    Posted on by AndrewMichaelChallies Comment

    A new wind has blown through my reading habits. Prior to finding Ellen Burstyn’s “Lessons in Becoming Myself”. I had been trawling through myriad self help books gaining some insights here and there but without finding much that touched my soul. I seem to find the books that connect me to something deeper on the bargain tables in book stores and it happened again. There was something in me that just had to read this.

    As in “UP” here was a shining example of what I like to think of as Creative Mythology. On the first page there was a reference to Mnemosyne, the Greek Goddess of Memory, mother of the 9 Muses fathered by Zeus. Somehow fitting as each of them seemed to touch her life in some way. Music, dancing, history, love, comedy, tragedy, epic and lyric poetry, and astronomy were all under the governance of the Muses.

    The book worked on different levels. Ellen appears to follow a couple of perspectives, that of her spiritual journey and also her journey as an actress. Both combine to evoke a profound life. Simply read as autobiography it gave wonderful insight into Ellen Burstyn and if I’d been unaware of who she is I might have thought I was reading a novel.

    Ellen models beautifully the way to craft a life, showing the way to follow a dream, of letting go of the riverbank and moving into the flow. Sure, along the river there are rapids where the ride holds peril and Ellen’s story is not short of those. There are stretches where the river slows and the flow is gentle, allowing her be more conscious of how life is unfolding and she recounts these with keen attention.

    I was moved by her struggles with addictions and relationships and how they mirror my own. She spoke of them with detachment observing them from the writers perspective seeing how she was touched by them at that time but now no longer. I’d like to say that for the me that’s still working with them.

    I was enchanted by her life. So much so that I had to read it a second time. I noted passages and pages that spoke to me. The one that is sitting with me now is one I didn’t note. She talks about working with and being mentored by Lee Strasberg of the Actor’s Studio. The feeling I got from the passage was that what is happening in the moment whether part of the performance or not, is perfect not only for the performance but also perhaps for the actor’s life outside of her art. And so it is for all of us being able to perceive the perfection in the present moment. That was brought home for me as I watched the trees from the kitchen window seeing them in the early morning light noticing a nuance I hadn’t seen before and reflecting on Ellen’s perceptiveness as she notices the nuances of characters as her roles evolved.

    In another profound passage she tells of being drawn into learning through doing crossword puzzles and as she discovered new words she was initiated into study. I can imagine there was a sort of a family tree evolving as she was led from a reference in one book to seek out another. Looking always for what might be the ultimate truth, that truth that will allow us to live fully in the present. And being aware, as Sartre said, of a “God-shaped hole in my heart.” Wow.

    Ellen confronts her fears and has epiphanies on her journey. She meets some of the 20th century’s more famous people outside of the acting fraternity and is touched by these encounters.

    Her strong connection with Sufism as a spiritual path because it honours the wisdom of all religious traditions again mirrors my own experience.

    Ellen never shys away from seeking help in understanding herself when confronted by an aspect of her psyche with which she was uncomfortable and thence taking another step to becoming fully alive, fully present.

    The photos from her personal collection show Ellen’s evolving radiant beauty while her roles show the diversity of characters she played.

    The latter stages of her path were spent without companionship. It was a beautiful ending to find her under the auspices of the god Eros.

    Blessings

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  • Up: Part Two

    Posted on by AndrewMichaelChallies Comment

    Cue the entrance of Russell the “Wilderness Explorer”, a boy scout type character seeking to do a good deed for Carl to complete his “Assisting the Elderly” badge which will take him to  “Senior Wilderness Explorer”. Each of the three times he suggests doing a task for Carl he is greeted with an emphatic, “No”. I found this reminiscent of encountering an entity I am unsure of in a shamanic journey. When this happened I’d question the entity three times asking if it had come tp be of benefit to me. If the answer was yes I’d seek more information from it. The feeling about the story was that Russell was a representation of Carl’s inner child.

    Russell remains on the porch of Carl’s house. He has interrupted Carl’s plan to use some old stock left over from his time as a Balloon salesman. Carl begins filling the balloons with helium and the house wrenches itself from its piles and starts floating away with Russell still on the porch. Again he knocks at the door. This time there is no turning back and Russell is along for the adventure. Carl is flying his house to Paradise Falls.

    Significant in my life are the storms that have arrived shaking me up and whipping me onwards.  They are also beset by a storm which does the same and carries them close to their destination – they land on top of a ravine overlooking Paradise Falls. With their combined weight as ballast they begin to trek round the ravine pulling the house along with them. It seemed as though Carl was doing most of the work even though Russell was also attached to the rope that was connected to the house.

    Reminding me of hero’s journey on the trek there are areas of wasteland, they encounter allies, in the form of a dog called Dug that has a collar enabling speech and also a colourful bird that Russell names Kevin. There are also challenges on the path. The bird turns out to be the one also being sought by Charles Muntz who has become obsessed over it to the point of paranoia. He has a pack of vicious dogs that are searching for Dug who was sent out to track Kevin. I can see in the image of Muntz the seeming obsessive requirements of consumerism and materialism, always wanting the next best thing, not knowing how to let go of the need.

    I see the character of Dug as a representation of innocence, a key step on a journey towards a soul consciousness. Kevin, this colourful mythical bird, I believe symbolizes the soul itself and Muntz’s obsession with discovering it actually denies him the experience. It is Carl’s humble embracing of adventure to honour Ellie’s memory and his acceptance, albeit grudging, of Russell a motif for his inner child that has allowed him this one-on-one encounter with his Soul.

    Things deteriorate as Muntz becomes psychotic when he discovers Kevin is with Carl and Russell. Muntz flies his airship to the Falls where he makes off with Kevin and sets Carl’s house on fire. The flames dowsed Carl heads off in pursuit of Russell who followed Muntz to get Kevin back.

    This seemed to be a key moment in the movie for me as Carl has to ditch all of his household effects to allow the balloons to lift the house off and after Muntz and indeed this maybe required by the soul wanting us to be conscious of it – the releasing of attachment to material things.

    Carl catches up to Muntz and following a duel, Russell, Kevin and Dug are saved while Muntz falls to his death. Kevin is returned to her chicks. Carl, no longer grudgingly, but lovingly accepting of Russell takes him back to the city where he stands in as a father figure when Russell receives his badge and becomes a Senior Wilderness Explorer. Carl has a new lease on life becomes a volunteer in the community providing mentorship to not only Russell but also other young people.

    Akaroa Heads
    Akaroa Heads

    I took this prior to producing this post and the sense is that soul consciousness is like sailing out past the heads to the ocean beyond. There maybe an initial sense of emptiness. But within that there is also a sense of potential and possibility with new waters to navigate and new lands to discover when we leave the safety of the harbour and engage in our new found awareness of life.

    Blessings

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    Creative Mythology Soul

  • Up: Part One

    Posted on by AndrewMichaelChallies Comment
    Up_Poster
    Click Here for the Trailer

    I am quite fond of the word constellate. It aptly describes the way ideas form as I consider a new post. The inspiration for this came from seeing “UP” from Pixar. A brilliant example of Creative Mythology.

    Three generations of our family have seen it and thought it was magic. The animated format sat well with my nephews. And both my sister and mother were touched by it.

    The first half of the story tells of two childhood friends, Carl and Ellie growing up, getting married, coping with the discovery she can’t bear children, allowing their life to unfold without manifesting their dream, the wife then contracts an illness and dies. This connects me to my own mortality and my own seemingly frustrated aspirations. The second half follows the husband drawn into an adventure with a young boy who needs to assist an elderly person in some way to enable him to become a fully badged “ Senior Wilderness Explorer”.

    This second act of the story triggered my imagination seeing it as symbolic of a journey to be become fully conscious. While the opening seemed to form the background for the rest of the story as I considered it more deeply I found it held as much symbolism as the second. There was much to stir both thoughts and emotions.

    Thomas Moore describes children in Soul Life his audio retreat as being “raw carriers of soul”. This attribute was borne out by the curiosity of the two children in “UP” and their first meeting in the derelict house. With further thought I see them as the male and female elements of the psyche and the house as being the soul before one begins to sense a connection to the divine. An attitude of curiosity is essential as we walk upon the earth even though it may lead to injury as happened to Carl as he listened to Ellie daring him to be adventurous in this rickety old house. Carl winds up in hospital.

    They are both excited by an explorer, Charles Muntz who is introduced early in the movie having found the bones of a previously undiscovered bird and he then goes off to “Paradise Valley” to search further for a living specimen telling everyone he won’t return until he has one. Consequently he disappears. Carl and Ellie wish to search for this childhood hero, find “Paradise Valley” and the bird. Ellie begins a scrapbook for this adventure.

    They get married and buy the derelict house and begin to do it up. A jar with the words “Paradise Valley” on it sits on the mantle piece and they put all their spare cash in it for the trip. Life intervenes and the money they’re putting aside gets used for other things.

    Doing up the house could be seen as working on our relationship with the sacred and the marriage as the union of the divine male and female.

    Ellie becomes depressed when she finds out she’s infertile. I sensed the tragedy and sadness. And yet in these times of consumerism and materialism perhaps it points towards the rejection of our inner children. The playfulness and wonderment seem to get lost in the striving for the next best thing.

    Life carries on then Ellie gets sick and the doctors are unable to do anything for her. Perhaps we’ve also lost connection to the feminine energies in our strivings. Carl sadly lays Ellie to rest and seems lost without her, taking on the aura of a grumpy old man. Until one day there’s a knock on the door…..

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