balance and harmony

Yesterday at our women's circle we celebrated the New Moon by making an intention for ourselves, to see it manifest during the coming month. Mine was to create sacred space to rest and create projects in. It is the only way for me to restore sanity and balance in my harried world.

Our Western world, is so keen on making us crazy busy!

I buy into it, scratching off items on my too do list to make myself feel productive.

Today, I took an extra hour after meditating to consult my inner self, my guides, my higher self, whatever you want to call the presence of the Universe inside me. I actually used a deck of Native American animal cards, to find out what was up with me. Whatever works for you...

I put on some yoga music, flute and drum, with voice, and lit some candles.

Breath, and the thirst to go inside and be still - were my highest need.

I even found a place on Oprah's web site that gives you four easy steps to being still. If Oprah thinks we need it, we probably do!

Calm yourself, stay inside, don't let the winds of busy-ness drive you crazy. Find your center and focus, one step at a time. Make room in your life for this balance and harmony.

"Be humbled by your thirst, it is your god calling out to you to be fulfilled". Maharaji, Mexico City, 10 October 2007

luv
musemother

Thanksgiving poem

please click on http://www.msmenopause.blogspot.com to read a poem called Living by Denise Levertov.

Every day is the last day. Give thanks,

musemother,
now blogging at msmenopause for your reading pleasure

Breathing Deep

The phone rings, you jump out of bed, before you're even dressed or showered there is the list of things to do, the daily monster.

You hop on the computer, read your emails, remember you haven't fed the cats, run downstairs.

Have a cup of tea, throw some waffles in the toaster, run back to answer that email you left open.

Once back upstairs, you see yourself in the mirror, hair uncombed, pyjamas on, and remember you wanted to do some yoga before you started your day. It's already 9:30 a.m. The day began a long time ago.

Sigh.....in the middle of my 'to do' list and the course work I want to write about, there is also the weekly blog. And I have no new insights or inspiration this afternoon, (what, already 2:00 pm?) except that life is flying by to quickly. I did stop and do some yoga and some breathing work, because my stomach was tight and achy and anxiety was kicking in.

The only remedy I know is the STOP technique. Stop, think, organize and proceed. When I get too panicky and running wild and scattered, it's hard to feel satisfied at the end of the day. Better to stop, breathe, find my center, and flow with the universe once again.

The list is like a genie, threatening to cut your head off if you don't give it another command - Do this, make that, call here, go there. It keeps us running all day. Keep the genie busy climbing the pole of your breath, up and down, while you get the real work done.

So breathe deeply, friends, that's my clue for today.

musemother

Musemother moves to msmenopause

I am going to be moving my blog to http://www.msmenopause.blogspot.com (right next door, click on it).

All the posts on menopause from this blog will be moved over there, plus new ones added, like today's The Secret of Conscious Intention.

Please stay tuned to all three blogs, Wisdom for women (see links) and Ms Menopause for weekly bursts of insight, information and inspiration.

Have a lovely fall day,
Jennifer alias musemother

Feminine Mysteries and Menopause

This week we start a class discussion on the Feminine Mysteries, so at lunch time I was walking in the soccer field with Mollie the shi-tzu/bichon mix, my cute 2 year old, and telling her my thoughts on women and their bodies.

It seems that long ago and far away, women knew their place in the universe. In a far off mythical land (that may actually have existed), women knew that their bodies were part of the creative plan for the universe. Young women were initiated into the 'mysteries' of creative spirit through various religious ceremonies. Rituals centered around the cycles of women's blood, when they were fertile, when they were not, when they were in phase with the moon; the success of planting and agricultural crops all depended on this relation that women had with the moon.

Menopause is the third of the three initiatory phases for women. The first being menarche, the second pregnancy and birth. In menopause, something sacred and mysterious also happens. The women stop being fertile, they stop menstruating, they hold their blood inside them.

Scientists may see menopause solely as a bodily function, but menopause also has a spiritual and psychological function. It is a journey of moving inward. The problem is that “most women have …forgotten that such a place exists", according to Kristi Meisenbach Boylan in her book The Seven Sacred Rites of Menopause (Santa Monica Press, 2000). "For the past quarter of a century they’ve practiced self-denial, self-control and self-discipline to the point of having very little self at all.” Their inner lives may have atrophied as they worked hard, raised families, and done volunteer work, running themselves into the ground with being too busy to take care of themselves. “Once she has given all that she has to give, the outward will convince her to give more, even if it means giving up breathing. That is why women break down around the time of menopause, not just physically, but emotionally and mentally.”

She says there are many stages of peri-menopause, and they are all about getting to know yourself from the inside, and learning how to draw boundaries so that your energy is not sucked dry.

“Once a woman masters the ritual of holding the blood within, she intuitively knows when to release her spirit and gifts to the world and when not to. She learns this from the wise-woman who she is now one with.”

The cessation of menses is a liberating time, but also a time for grieving. Maternal instincts may unexpectedly surface, the biological clock has ticked away. This is a necessary loss that must be grieved.

However, the good news is, she becomes electrically charged by holding this blood within. New ideas, new projects pop into her head left and right. Depression lifts, anxiety passes, she is sharper mentally, physically and spiritually than ever before. “It’s as if they suddenly wake up and remember that they left something simmering on the back burner. This is when the menopausal moth emerges from the chrysalis as a butterfly.” (but sometimes what comes before is the bug soup period, the messy meltdown: fuzzy thinking, hot flashes and insomnia, lack of focus, lack of confidence, feeling like jello).

Now, in her butterfly phase, she learns to speak it like it is. An older woman can tell it like it is until it hurts. And she develops an intolerance for injustice. She sees the truth, and gets her power back. She learns the ability to say NO and mean it.

I think you will enjoy this book, which uses the myth of Avalon as a metaphor for the withdrawal into inner realms.

namaste,
musemother

http://www.ipgbook.com/showbook.cfm?bookid=1891661132&userid=3E92D4DA-803F-2B7A-7005BFB6C66E0F2C

link to the Independent Publishers Group page for The Seven Sacred Rites of Menopause

Descent into Menopause

For any of you interested in a Jungian approach to menopause, I recommend reading Descent to the Goddess, A way of Initiation for Women, by Sylvia Brinton Perera. She analyzes the myth of Inanna, (before Ishtar, middle-eastern) in psychological terms, and describes it as a story of modern woman's quest for wholeness. Her theory is that we who are 'daughters of the father', well adapted to a masculine world, have repudiated or repressed our full feminine instincts and energies. And that in this 'stripping down' or descent to the underworld, we find healing.

The story of Inanna is a fascinating on its own, as it is the oldest written myth (on clay tablets) of a feminine divine power, known as Queen of Heaven and Earth in ancient Sumer (5,000 years ago.)

I read this book through the worst year of my peri-menopausal descent, which I described to myself as the 'bug soup' stage, when the feeling of melt-down, loss of power and energy, mild depression, weeping, and general upside-downness, took over.

Here is a short excerpt from the book:

"The basis of women's experience of childbearing and of all blood mysteries that create and maintain life is that Nothing changes or grows without the food or some other sacrifice. ....
the myth of Inanna's descent and return is centered on this archetype of exchanging energy though sacrifice. ...She needs to sacrifice her dependence on the patriarchal gods to find her true home in the feminine ground of being.

"What I have seen in myself and other women who are successful daughters of the collective, often unmothered daughters of the animus and the patriarchy, is that we suffer a basic fault. We do not have an adequate sense of our own ground nor connection to our own embodied strength and needs adequate to provide is with a resilient feminine, balanced yin-yang processual ego.

...there is a deep split, maintained by loyalty to super-ego ideals that no longer function to enhance life, a loyalty that keeps the ego alienated from reality....thus we need to undergo a descent to the underworld levels of the dark goddess (Erishkigal), back to ourselves before we had the form we know, back to the magic and archaic levels of consciousness ...back to the body-mind and the preverbal tomb-womb states, searching back to the deep feminine, the 'dual mother' Jung writes about.

On the way down we shed the identifications with and the defences against the animus, introverting to initially humiliating and devastating but ultimately safe, primal levels. (awaiting rebirth). ...We feel as if the old meanings are loosened, as if we are suspended out of life, without energy.

What helps: "Creative improvisions, touching, holding, sounding and singing, silence, breathing, nonverbal actions like drawing, sandplay, building with clay or blocks, dancing, ... maternally nurturant and companioning behavior....

the descent to the earth, the darkness is the yin way. Like Inanna, we must submit, going into the deep, to allow the transformative mystery to take place."

Wow, I know, this is heavy stuff, and written in Jungian jargon. However, read between the lines. Some of us have some deep healing to do, some of us can benefit from therapy, and some of us just need to loosen up and play more. Less book knowledge and more body knowledge. Less ego ideals and more feeling ideals. Less 'overarching boss of everything' mode, and more 'tend and befriend' mode.

This is just a hint of what the transformative process is like. It's not everybody's journey, but enough of the women I know have been through burn-out, depression, divorce and major health challenges in their mid-40's, for me to recognize the truth of this part of the journey. For me, it started just before my father died, and it's taken me from age 47 to 52 (about 5 years), to come up for air. But now, I feel the cocoon splitting open, and my damp wings are scintillating in the sun. My energy has returned, and I feel closer to the Queen of Heaven, than to the Queen of the Underworld.

have a compassionate self-care day,
and write me if this passage speaks to you,
musemother

Women's Mysteries and PMS

In western culture, we have adopted a belief that menstruation and menopause are taboo subjects, and only recently have we seen open discussions in newspapers and magazines about women's topics like these. But we have lost the sense of the old taboo time, or sabbatu.

When we threw out the taboo system surrounding women's cycles, we also threw out the notion of rest time for women. Often, the physical illness or dis-ease associated with our periods and even menopause stem from a psychological need that women have to be separate for a time, to rest and withdraw. Esther Harding, in her book Woman's Mysteries suggests that this is not a sign of neurosis, but a clue from the unconscious about a reality: that mental, emotional and physical disturbances of which a woman is unaware creep into our conscious life as 'menstrual disabilities', or PMS, and that these are related to the loss of rest time and alone time.

She suggests that we need this rest time, the same way we need sleep to nourish us and dreams to put us in touch with our unconscious, and that we would gain greater understanding about our own psyches if we had time to slow down and listen to our intuition. This was behind the 'moon lodge' of Native American women. A secret women's society, with laws and taboos surrounding it, sought to bring balance and harmony into women's lives and the whole community by allowing women regular contact with the deeper, internal nature.

A woman should heed the feelings she has pre-menstrually and recognize any disturbances as a manifestation of her need to be by herself, to temporarily withdraw from the demands of external life, and contact her deeper nature. This rest produces a healing effect and restores balance, according to Harding, a Jungian psychologist.

This week is the waning of the moon, leading to the dark of the moon, a period when irritability, inertia or restlessness may surface in a woman's cycle.

By replenishing the well of feminine being, we gain new energy, feed our relationships and creative proejcts. But active inner listening is required.

Pay attention to your cycle, ladies. Watch the moon's phases, and discover where you are. If you are menopausal and past menstruation, then pay attention to your energy levels, to your level of harmony within. Lay low if necessary, recoup, restore, and rest. Take cat naps. Avoid arguments with teenagers or bosses. Put major decisions on hold. Order out!

We have no external taboo to provide us with this rest time anymore. It's up to each one of us to tune in, and heed the signals. Tuning forks at the ready!

restfully yours,
musemother

Poem for middle-age

I think most poetry is appreciated differently by people in middle-age. There has been more loss, more love, more experience of life, to make reading poetry a bitter sweet salve. I think of the many women I know, above 40, approaching 50, who are rediscovering themselves, making a new life or new identity after divorce or after children leaving home, who look at themselves in the mirror and see new wisdom lines on their faces and wonder where the 16-year-old self they have lived with so long as disappeared to. This poem is one of my favorites, because it suggests that now is the best time to savor that meeting with oneself, now is the time to Feast on your life.

Enjoy!
(see more poems on menopause and mid-life at www.wisdomforwomen.blogspot.com)




Love after Love
by Derek Walcott

The time will come
when, with elation,
you will greet yourself arriving
at your own door, in your own mirror
and each smile at the other's welcome,

and say, sit here. Eat.
You will love again the stranger who was your self.
Give wine. Give bread. Give back your heart
to itself, to the stranger who has loved you

all your life, whom you ignored
for another, who knows you by heart.
Take down the love letters from the bookshelf,

the photographs, the desperate notes,
peel your own image from the mirror.
Sit. Feast on your life.

Core Truths

In yoga this morning, a wonderful thought came to be, all by itself: I can let go of being angry with myself.

Now, I didn't know that I was angry at me. I thought/knew I was angry at my mother, my father, my ex, my spouse, my kids, my aunts, my cousins, my friends.....there's a lot of things I could be angry about. But it felt suddenly clear in my head that most of the old anger was aimed at me. Not good enough, not smart enough, not tidy enough, never 'enough'.

The other night, swimming in the turquoise reflection of a lit pool, a similar thought came to me: I can let go of past hurts. I was just swimming in circles and my husband said, you look like you're sixteen! That was nice, but I felt more like I was six, dog paddling freely in the dark with a huge smirk on my face. I even yelled out to him, I can let go of the past! (which must be a relief to him, too).

There's such an exciting newness to this. (If you knew me, you'd know it's been hanging on too long). I love that it arises spontaneously, after so much 'hard' thinking, reading, working on releasing old stuff. In yoga this morning I loved feeling the strong pull to breathe from down in the Core of me, to dive into the source and breathe it up through the bottom of my feet, into the heart, into my body's core.

Sometimes, it feels like when I was little, swimming with my sister in the Ottawa River. We would hold our breath and see who could stay the longest underwater. Once we are down there, sitting amongst the river grass and mossy stones like water babies, the world above seems far away. Above, the wind is rippling the surface of the water. We watch the waves dip and move as the sunlight throws shadows and rays of light, and yet light rests on the surface. The underwater grasses or weeds move too, but in silent motion. The fish don't even notice us, we are that still.

When I dive inside, I am sitting inside this well of peace.
Inside of me, a calm harbour while the wind rages outside.
Inside, an embrace, holding and being held.
Life's pulse and rhythm my only song.
A comfort and sweetness from the feeling that I belong.
No effort, only feeling and letting myself rest.

Let worry and defeat melt away.
Let fear and bothersome thoughts melt away.
Here is home and a Presence of something larger.
An ocean of peace.

My core, mon coeur, mi corazon.

Think I'll stay inside today,
nameste,
jenn

Healing prayer

Navaho chant for healing:

Dark young pine, at the center of the earth originating
I have made your sacrifice
Whiteshell, turquoise, abalone beautiful
Jet beautiful, fool's gold beautiful, blue pollen beautiful, reed pollen,
pollen beauitful, your sacrifice I have made
This day your chlid I have become, I say.

Watch over me.
Hold your hand before me in protection.
Stand guard for me, speak in defense of me.
As I speak for you, speak for me.
As you speak for me, so will I speak for you.

May it be beautiful before me
May it be beautiful behind me
May it be beautiful below me
May it be beautiful above me
May it be beautiful all around me

I am restored in beauty
I am restored in beauty
I am restored in beauty
I am restored in beauty.

tr. by Gladys A. Reichard, as published in Women in Praise of the Sacred
ed Jane Hirshfield

Belly Heart Soul

Breathe Sing Pray
Belly Heart Soul

I am breathing this morning through the fear and tightness in my solar plexus, and learning to breathe into trust in my higher self. I also pray for acceptance of all the unloved parts of me I carry in my shadow, nestled there in the pit of my abdomen. I open my heart and accept my light.

"When you own the parts of yourself that make you feel uncomfortable, you no longer hold anyone else responsible for your pain or happiness. Then you shine with your own light, like the sun, which is the only thing that casts no shadow." The Four Insights, Alberto Villoldo

Shadow says: not good enough, unwanted, unloved, messy, unsuccessful, never happy
Then we cast those undesirables on others and say, yuck!

Heal what I carry inside me, or I'll keep projecting my self-hatred onto others.

We also project our beauty, because we have trouble embracing it too.
We fear our own sunlight, and play small.

In the EFT technique, while tapping acupressure points on the body, one repeats: In spite of my (pain, emotion), I love and accept myself completely.

Openness begins here, with my own light shining.

In spite of my nervous belly, I open my heart to love and accept myself completely :) With the help of the mirror inside, I find my light.

"Without having known your truest nature, you may know other people, but you will be an alien to your very existence. You cannot be an alien to yourself. You must know....Because what you're looking for is within you. It always was and always will be..

You are blessed beyond what you know. It is time to discover every blessing you have been given so you can be thankful, so you can be fulfilled." Maharaji (for short video clip, see www.wordsofpeace.com)

nameste,
musemother

Three Daughters of God and the New Moon

"Long before the coming of the austere patriarchal system of Islam, the Arabic people worshipped this trinity of desert Goddesses who were the three facets of the one Goddess.

Al-Uzza (‘the mighty’) represented the Virgin warrior facet; she was a desert Goddess of the morning star who had a sanctuary in a grove of acacia trees to the south of Mecca, where she was worshipped in the form of a sacred stone.

Al-Lat, whose name means simply ‘Goddess’, was the Mother facet connected with the Earth and its fruits and the ruler of fecundity. She was worshipped at At-Ta’if near Mecca in the form of a great uncut block of white granite.

Manat, the crone facet of the Goddess, ruled fate and death. Her principal sanctuary was located on the road between Mecca and Medina, where she was worshipped in the form of a black uncut stone." (McLean, The Triple Goddess, 80.)

Apparently the three goddesses were represented by meteorites or aeroliths, stones that had fallen from heaven, just as the Kaaba stone in Mecca.

Now, look at the new moon tonight. The crescent moon is a powerful symbol of Islamic countries, even on their flag; but it is also very ancient.

"Each aspect of this trinity corresponds to a phase of the moon. ..Al'Lat has three names known to the initiate: Q're, the crescent moon or the maiden; Al'Uzza, literally 'the strong one' who is the full moon and the mother aspect; then Al'Menat, the waning but wise goddess of fate, prophecy and divination. Islamic tradition labels them 'daughters of Allah', or banat al-Llah, firmly associating al-Llah as a pre-Islamic deity paired with the three forms of the Goddess." (from an article on wikipedia)

The meaning of the moon cycles is apparent to women who are aware of the feminine mysteries. The moon follows the same cycle as women's bodies.

"In women's blood mysteries, when women are attuned to the lunar rhythm, they will ovulate at the Full Moon and menstruate durng the Dark Moon. During this bleeding time, if women resond to their inner selves, they will instinctively draw inward and rest in the quiet, dark, sweet stillness. " article, Mysteries of the Dark Moon, Demetra George in Woman of Power

Even in the darkest times, a light will shine. Krishna also said, "Even in your darkest hour, I will not abandon you."

There is a new light in the sky tonight. Let it remind you that the light within continues to shine, even if it wanes for a while and grows dim, it returns; it is always there.

Happy New Moon,

musemother

Sexy menopausal ladies

Hey women who have paused their menses, or are about to....here's a thought.

There is something very sexy about being menopausal. You can make love when you want to without worrying about where you are in your menses cycle, for one thing. And once your kids start working and don't follow you on vacation anymore, a lot can happen during day-time hours. The thing is, most of the time, I don't feel like it. Too tired, too late, too this or too that.

So it's been a long, dry spring. But after two weeks vacation, I can honestly say that the juicy-ness has returned.

Doesn't take much, does it? Just unplug the phones, drive nine hours, leave your computer and email behind, head for the ocean and a small house on a hill. Sleep in every morning till 9:00, eat lots of eggs, bacon, coffee and hot milk. Swim in the salty ocean, or the ice-cold salmon river. Read a good book. Sit around the fire and drink wine and watch the flames. Sing songs, play guitar. Share your bed with your newly-relaxed husband who is also on vacation.....or some other likely candidate.

Voila! rest and relaxation and the sexiness returned. We have enjoyed each other's bodies more in the past 14 days than in the past 6 months!

So, there are no secrets here, no big earth shattering news. Just more of the same news about self-care, self-love, slowing down, taking naps every time you can, allowing some pleasure to seep back into life. Ahhhh......and the quiet nights around the fire sipping wine.

The wind, the rain, the sun, the heat, the crisp evenings, the humidity, the salty air, the flowers fullness and abundance, the pool, the sound of soccer games, the whole fertility thing - blooming going on to the max. It's about that!

Enjoy your summer, while it's here.

musemother

Ms Menopause

In my bottom drawer, underneath the silky pyjamas I hardly wear and some old bathing suits, I have a great pin-on button that says I love my Menopause: J'aime ma menopause! A while ago, I attached it to a small round leopard skin pillbox hat. When I put on my matching long gloves, and wear my pointy fake leopard skin glasses, I transform into my alter-ego, Ms Menopause.

Watch for her appearance in a neighborhood near you.

What does she do? she brings you good news, that menopause is a blessing, not a curse.

She brings red candles and red costume jewellery in scarlet gift bags for women celebrating their Crone-dom at a menopause party.

She bakes cupcakes and decorates them with red icing and big hearts! If you're lucky she'll organize a potluck lunch and sing Happy Crone's Day to you.

She tells bawdy jokes and helps women laugh about their sweaty nightgowns and faulty thermostats.

She dresses up as Ishtar,Queen of Heaven at the full moon and lies on her lounger while other women have their monthly periods, encouraging them to take the day off.

She reminds us to breathe from the belly and not get our knickers in a knot when patience wears thin.

She carries around a bag of nettle tea, oatstraw and black cohosh to bring harmony into our hormones.

Ms Menopause is a only a figment of my imagination, but I think she would do good things in the world.

Remember, what you resist will persist. What you bless flourishes, what you curse falters. Don't look at your body in the mirror and tell yourself how flabby you're getting or how wide your thighs are spreading. Love every inch of this amazing body from Venus.

More thoughts and a new blog when I return from the ocean,

musemother alias ms menopause

Mothering and Menopause

Sometimes I wish I could start all over again with the mothering thing, now that I'm so wise in my 50's. Of course, it would be easy peasy with babies and toddlers, (if I were 20 years younger), cause they can't argue back like teenagers can. They also don't hold you to promises you made two years ago in the thick of an argument.

Anyway, Moms can rest easy now, all the handy resources you need are on-line. I was just sent a link for a great website for Montreal Moms, appropriately called www.momtreal.ca so if you're a mom in the neighbourghood check it out. Things have improved a lot since I was a mom of young babies, and resources are neatly listed on this web site so you can find what you need, and where to go, what books to read and even where to get great cupcakes!

re Menopausal Mothering - menopause makes me tired, and I haven't really found too much menopausal zest yet, although I hear it's coming. But I am finally willing to say good-bye to the Little Mother in me. I mean the over-zealous, ever capable but over responsible Wendy who treats her husband like Peter Pan, and her kids like the lost boys. I think my kids (15 and almost 17) are turning out pretty well, in fact they are pretty incredible. So it's time to let go and stop micromanaging. They can do laundry, they sometimes cook *under pressure, and some day they will put all my daily lessons to good use out there in the world. The kind of mothering toddlers need, they don't need anymore, i.e. constant surveillance. One of them is off by himself to Cortez Island in B.C. to help my nephew build his house.

So I'm off the hook for most of the day, which is a relief. One of the side effects of menopause is that I need lots of naps, so I am getting in touch with my own inner toddler. I have enough to do just taking care of my beauty rest and my own projects, without worrying that someone is sticking their fingers in the sockets while I sleep.

This free time allows me to work at home. I spent the morning reading and researching class material for an upcoming women's centre class in the fall, The Feminine Mysteries (yes, that does sound exciting!). It's a good balance - they sleep till noon, and I get time to read!

In the middle of this reading, I filled out a questionnaire to find out who my inner goddess is. To my surprise, it wasn't Athena, the father's daughter brainiac, nor the wild huntress Artemis, but Hera (the wife and empress) and Persephone, Queen of the Underworld, healer and mystic that I most resembled. Well they were all pretty equal, even Aphrodite was up there on the scoreboard. Proving that neither motherhood or menopause have been able to extinguish all my sexual genes. And the draw towards connecting with inner wisdom that comes with menopause is spooky but real. (see The Goddess Within, by Jennifer Barker Woolger and Roger Woolger)

Anyway, somewhere in my notetaking and reading, I came to terms with what bugs me about being a menopausal mom and stay-at-home wife. And I am now willing to let go of it. I am willing to walk away from the overly capable, responsible (and cranky) Little Mother I was bred to be, as eldest of eight children, and just take care of me, for a change. Just tuck my chin and nose in, out of every body else's business and take care of my own business.

(at least for today- tomorrow is another challenge!)

rambling on,
jenn

2 Poems for Wednesday

Here
Grace Paley

Here I am in the garden laughing
an old woman with heavy breasts
and a nicely mapped face

how did this happen
well that's who I wanted to be

at last a woman
in the old style sitting
stout thighs apart under
a big skirt grandchild sliding
on off my lap a pleasant
summer perspiration

that's my old man across the yard
he's talking to the meter reader
he's telling him the world's sad story
how electricity is oil or uranium
and so forth I tell my grandson
run over to your grandpa ask him
to sit beside me for a minute I
am suddenly exhausted by my desire
to kiss his sweet explaining lips

and here is one of mine, for no reason I can think of, except
reading Garrison Keillor's book, Good Poems, I am inspired to post
one of mine, unpublished as yet:

Bach’s Suites for Cello Unaccompanied
or The cell in Cello

“Every union of parts must make a whole and exhaust
all the notes necessary to the most complete expression.”
Bach’s biographer, Johann Forkel, 1802.

Morning’s silent, snow-covered hills,
weekends at our highland retreat.

Quiet not to wake the kids,
we heat up the morning sheets.

Your tongue pulses deep in my cells,
rejoices in the salt and sweet.

We knit a union of our parts,
until, exhausted, pause, complete.

(as Yo-yo Ma’s rosined bow
dances to a nervous peak.)

greetings,
jenn

Feminine Sexuality as Creative Force

“Whether we are weaving tissue in the womb or weaving imagery in the soul, our work is sexual: the work of conception, gestation, and birth.

“The Mother has but one law: create, make as I do…transform one substance into another…transmute blood into milk, clay into vessel, feeling into movement, wind into song, egg into child, fiber into cloth, stone into crystal, memory into image, body into worship.” Meinrad Craighead, (celibate artist) - The Feminine Face of God

Sex is the mysterious binding energy that keeps the electrons spinning around the nucleus. It is the energy of God and spirit expressing itself in ever-changing, ever-evolving physical form. It is the life force that results in flowers blossoming in the spring and bringing forth fruit in the fall. It is the attracting energy that binds every part of the universe. …In humans, ‘it’s the desire and longing that attracts two people together to create something new' …thoughts from Christiane Northrup, M.D.

Sex as sacred/sacrament:…in the broadest sense, sex is spirit seeking expression in physical form. That’s why sexuality is so profoundly linked with spirituality – an idea that is familiar in many other cultures. In countless ancient temples throughout Southeast Asia, for example, there are carvings of divine beings locked in sexual embrace – a form of spiritual communion.

In India there is a tradition of temple priestesses that goes back thousands of years. These women were trained from girlhood to consecrate their bodies and sexuality to God. Though men came to the temples to have sex with them as a sacrament of spiritual cleansing their sexuality could not be owned by any man. Imagine living in a culture where sex was a sacrament rather than a sin! (above from Dr. Christiane Northrup, Mother-Daughter Wisdom)

Last night I was at a comedy gala in French, as part of the Juste pour Rire series on this week. An older comic, Yvon Deschamps, used Genesis and Eve "la grosse epaise" that got us into trouble with God and lost us our immortality, as part of his schtick. At first I laughed. I noticed my husband guffawing too. Then I lost my sense of humour, as he repeatedly blamed Eve, the silly sexual woman who ate the apple, for all our woes. It's not a joke anymore, I thought. He made a few jokes about how Adam made her from clay "en glaise" (anglaise or English woman), which got some laughs. But I remembered an alternate story that posits that Eve made Adam from wet bloody clay, and gave him his name, Adam which means red earth.

Creative women with their sexuality dip-sixed for thousands of years by various religious tropes, need to challenge the dominate myths that depict the Mother of All Creation as a stupid idiot, (rough translation of "grosse epaise"). If it wasn't for Pandora, who was made with "all gifts" from the gods but intended as a scourge to inflict torture on Prometheus for defying the gods, and also blamed for releasing all the evils and plagues into the world, perhaps Eve could be dismissed as a harmless prototype.

But while I admit to briefly losing my sense of humour, I really wish a female comic would get up there and tell the story properly. But then, a sexual woman with a sense of humour could be dangerous thing.

Sexuality, women's bodies: our link to the spiritual and creation: a blessing, not a curse.

thoughts for the day,
musemother

Middle-aged beauty

Most of us seem preoccupied by the inner turmoil and body landscape during menopause - the emotional rollercoaster, the hot flashes, the night sweats, but the Change also effects what's going on in your face, which affects your radiant beauty.

I have been looking (and feeling) tired for a few weeks now, and while a brief three day get-away helped me rejuvenate, once I got back to 'business' and the daily list, whoa, my face looked saggy and dark again.

Fortunately, without knowing how I would feel this week, I had booked a facial about three weeks ago - something I haven't done in over 10 years, and didn't really like the last time, but my esthetician convinced me I was in need. Actually, once I got there she said my skin was severely dehyrated and asphxiated! (I lied and said I didn't use soap on my face, but some days I barely splash it with water).

To my surprise, it was lovely, absolutely divine - no blackhead pinching or rough rubbing of the skin. Just a gentle exfoliation and lots of creams massaged into my face and shoulders. I lay there for over an hour, listening to calm music in a candlelit cubicle. while my lovely, gentle careworker, Vickie, attented to any discomfort and took her time with me, a newbie in the facial department.

I told her I wouldn't probably be good at following any regimen, so she didn't try to sell me the expensive three-step system for follow-up care. But this morning, I opened up my Wisdom of Menopause bible by Christiane Northrup, to the page: Skin Care from Your Refrigerator. So if any of you want to make your facial treatment using the source of all those plant and fruit acids the expensive creams are derived from, here is a partial list from that book.

Antioxidants, fruit acids. and plant hormones are what your skin needs in middle-age.

Plain yogourt on your face nourishes and hydrates with lactic acid and milk proteins
(unsweetened).

Thinly sliced cucumber on your eyelids and cheeks relaxes and sooothes.

Green tea bags, moistened and put on eyelids give an antioxidant lift.

Mashed up fruits: peaches, strawberries or apples mixed with finely ground oatmeal makes a nourishing facial mask.

Give yourself about fifteen minutes to let the skin absorb the nutrients. Et Voila!

It's good to know you have everything you need to be beautiful right in your fridge. Everything you put on your face should be something you would willingly put in your body, cause it gets absorbed into your blood and cells through your skin.

Love your face! smile a little more often today,
and think beautiful :)
restingly yours,
musemother

Dear Belly,

We have had a difficult relationship, starting very young. I didn't want to have a belly that showed, like my mother did, nearly always pregnant with a round belly.

I wanted to be thin, but not skinny like my Olive Oyle years. I wanted you flat, not round. I thought children would never take residence there, and when I did find an egg was fertilized, it took a while to hold on to one, after an ectopic pregnancy and two miscarriages. Those cramps were like menstrual cramps. You never let me forget there was a cervix and uterus inside that had been bruised by poking fingers, speculum and doctors.

I laugh at my middle-aged Venusian figure now - but when my pants are too tight or pantyhose bind me, it hurts. Why do I want to 'suck you in'?

When I get painful gas from being nervous you are speaking. When I get flatulence from eating wheat or food that doesn't agree with me, you speak. When I belch and burp you rumble out loud that you're not digesting something. I hardly ever consult you before ingesting coffee and spices or desserts that don't agree with you. I wonder why I don't listen to your wisdom?

The tightness in the solar plexus and diaphragm that doesn't let me breathe in singing or in yoga is related. The tension in my shoulders is all related to my gut feelings, emotions I feel bad about, or not supposed to feel feelings. Rising above was always my motto. Not grounded.

So Belly, I better begin paying attention now, because so much information can come from you.
luv
jenn

Herbal allies, from Susun Weed's Menopausal Years: the Wise Woman Way

A friend's phone call for help with headaches sparked this search for remedies. My favourite source is the above-mentioned book. See her website for helpful information on menopause and wise words from Grandmother Growth. http://www.susunweed.com

The thing to remember is that your body is not letting you down, it's sending you messages about what is out of balance. And in our crazy speeded-up world, a lot of us are out of balance. What I love about Weed's approach, is that her first remedy is always "Rest". Stop and feel what is happening in your body, in your life. Then look at what supplements or herbs can help.

Another friend (wise woman and yoga instructor) just called to cancel our dinner party this evening because of a heavy period and feeling low-energy. She needed to rest and feared she wouldn't be good company. I applaud such right-minded thinking! There are no 'to do's' on my list that should override my being in touch with how I feel (at least, that's how I wish I acted all the time). Usually stress and a weird sense of duty forces us to override our actual body health or intuition about what we need and then we operate on auto-pilot. Hey, there are two ways of living my life, I am learning lately: unconsciously and consciously. It's always up to me.

Which one is it for me today? Am I going to rush through my day making lists, getting things done, feeling rushed, unprepared for what is coming at me this day, or can I slow down, think ahead, use the S.T.O.P. procedure: Stop, Think, Organize and Proceed. You could add, Stop, Feel, organize and proceed, but it makes a lousy acronym. SFOP!

Here's what my herbal bible told me about headaches and remedies:

Garden sage (not desert sage): salvia means "s/he saves", eases the minds and wombs of women; dries up hot flashes and night sweats, regulates hormonal change, eases irritated nerves and banishes depression (contains calcium, magnesium, potassium, zinc and anti-stress thiamine); relieves dizziness and emotional swings, eliminates headaches and nourishes the liver while keeping your blood vessels flexible.

Black Cohosh: calms hot flashes and reduces night seats, relieves headaches and eases joint pain and arthritis, contains aspirin like salicylates that dilate the blood vessels (15-25 drops of tincture) also improves digestion and alleviates breast tenderness and water retention

Stinging Nettle: (Weed's alltime favourite herbal tea) nourishes and strengthens kidneys and adrenal glands; eases and eliminates cystitis, bloat and incontinence, rehydrates dry vaginal tissues; eases and prevents sore joints, stabilizes blood sugar, reduces fatigue, reduces and eliminates headaches, nourishes the digestive system, the nervous system, among others (infrusion of dried herb 1-4 cups a day) (do not use flowering nettle for food or medicine)

Oatstraw: stabilizes blood sugar levels, maintains firm teeth and strong bones, reduces cholesterol and improves circulation, nourishes nerves, reduces frequency and duration of headaches, maintains restful sleep patterns, eases bladder spasms, vaginal dryiness, uterine pain, incontinence, improves libido! (dried herb infusion 1-4 cups daily)

Read the book for further details on these healing herbs. I can attest to the wonderful properties of Nettle, Oatstraw and sage. Black Cohosh I know less about.

Take it from me, it's easier than popping pills and has less side effects. Some of those 'weeds' in your garden just might be helpful allies for your health. I've even heard it said by an energy healer and naturopath that we attract the weeds we need the most for our health, i.e. the plantain and dandelions in your yard are not noxious weeds but herbal helpers.

Take care, have a nice weekend, and a lovely magical 07-07-07!

musemother