Dear travellers of rough waters You are warmly invited to join in this 3 YEARS PROGRAMME for the reGENERATION of our SOULS VOYAGE: a SCHOOL and SANCTUARY for the SOUL TWO RIVERS rivering through the 3 years programme Sept 2024 to Dec 2026 - Registrations are open until June - limited to 25 students ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ TWO RIVERS rivering through the 3 years programme 1 - FEEDING and LEARNING of the LANGUAGE of SOUL Altar making - wild offerings - sacred postactivism - unlearning practices - feeding the soul - Grief Composting - fierce love - soul activism - intuitive writing - die the small deaths - welcome the rebirths - eARTh ART making beauty... 2 - BECOMING a DOULA for the birthing of ELDERS guided by a cohort of teachers and by my twin books: 9 passAGES to Die Alive and PathoSophy: A Living Art- Wisdom born of Grief and Suffering ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ The next Q&A session with Azul Thome the creative visionary behind it is this Tuesday 9th April 5pm EET (Eastern European Time) for 90 minutes max. CHECK YOUR TIMEZONE I am so moved to now be ready to present to you the hive of 2024 and part of 2025 after much dreaming, spinning and weaving through the winter and early spring. While the world is falling onto itself, Soul is like a great underground River of deep imagination. We will voyage to and with Her in much praise and offerings. I PRESENT TO YOU THE ENSOULING CREW that will guide, challenge, inspire, feed, teach, share and accompany you on the VOYAGE! They come to you with their Water Body and a Sentient Being. The cohort is not only human. That was also a long time longing, to see teachers and guides with their wider family of entanglement… Here they are! With profound gratitude for their souls and medicine. FOR MORE INFORMATIONS
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"The human soul is hungry for beauty… When we experience the Beautiful, there is a sense of homecoming".
| This morning I would like to write about the toxic spell I am under with COVID19, the proposed journey from pathology to pathosophy through the sacred work of grief composting and the vital feeding of Soul. What happens if we move from allopathy to allosophy? What is the root of the collective terror and disorientation we feel? Can the disappearance of our nomadic freedom be the awakening call for loving more furiously and for radical generous cœurage? I am writing so when I forget again and fall under the strong spell cast on us, I can at least return to it. May it be so, inshallah and inshgaia! I have no answers. I am sharing my experience of the last 2 months when I was not sure I would come back from madness and illness. The last 9 months has seen me feeling dis-eased, very disorientated with a brain unable to do simple tasks I have been experiencing deep physical and psychic pain while feeling uncontrollable raw emotions. I am deeply exhausted with cough and breathlessness. The above list holds the perfect materials for an alchemist and a medicine person to be born and/or practice. The above list also holds dangerous materials and definitions for a corrupted system to use to control us and put on under a spell...the spell of terror, blind obedience and of course increase isolation from all that matters... DEPRESSION in OUR SYSTEM unable to grieve I took a risk to seek support from the allopathic system of my gp practice 2 months ago. I was immediately put on antidepressant, painkillers and valium. I took it all and walked again on that path of medicated pathology. I had to find something I had lost the last time I was there. So I put the pills on my altar and prayed for a safe return. After a few days of swallowing the pills I gradually stopped crying, the pains in my body dulled and a feeling resembling a voiceless stupor wrapped over me. I became controllable again, pacified and numbed. WILD GRIEF, MOVEMENT and FOREST After a few weeks I stopped it all and allowed myself to feel what i had parked for the experiment. First my immense grief, sorrow and rage moved again. I allowed my body to move and paint, stitch and embroidered through the many stages of pain and I relearned to lay on the forest skin while breathing with the trees, my kins. I needed to leave the home of Soul to return to it with some refreshed clarity. I am unsure if it is wise to use myself as the raw material but sometimes we are required to be the laboratory, the alchemist, the temple, the dangerous path, the prima materia and the patient all at once. PATHOLOGY and PATHOSOPHY Being conditioned to pathologies, our experiences of pain, strong feelings and suffering all our life we seem to look for something to fit these symptoms into. ME, Chronic Fatigue Syndrome, depression, psychosis, bipolar, autism, manic, etc... When tired and alone we just want to rest there, for a moment, for a sense of veneered belonging, a home, however dysfunctional it is. I noticed that when I think of dying it gives me the same feeling of rest and belonging!!!? That makes me suspicious, it awakes in me to the possibility that something dangerously unfriendly is going on in our world right now. A world that makes us want to rest and belong in the arms of the system that harms and controls us... Are we part of a human system that would rather see us dying than living? Looking at the evidence, it is probably the case. After all our healing system is all about illness, not about well being, kindness or the thriving of life. People who are truly alive are dangerous! Perhaps because they are fearless, interconnected to the web of life and compassionate... These pathologies were named and defined by whom and for whom? Why have we accepted them with such docility? Same question can be transferred onto every part of our society, politics, laws, truths, all over the world ... These pathologies become prison cells, they take away our freedom, stifle our imagination and crash our dignity. They enable medication to be passed on without proper check about its true effect. Power is never shared with the sick and the suffering one. Our return to the web of life, to our wild grief, to our songs, dance, art, poetry, old stories and empowering myths are never part of the prescription. We are never asked about our relationship to our visible and invisible allies and to our well and wise ancestors. All of these threads are never spun by doctors and patients.. They are bellitelated, shamed and laughed at most often. They are flipanteley and dangerously named as irrelevant matters and discarded. If you have ever been in a psychiatric hospital you will know what I mean. Hospitals are the same. We love you nurses and some docs. It is the system and the anesthesia I am addressing here. OTHER WAYS I am reminded of a few of my mentors. Francis Weller about depression: " depression is a plea from the soul to stop all you are doing and go down on your knees to feel your grief" Martin Prechtel who said to a director of a psychiatric hospital: "Aha this is where you keep your shamans!" and of Malidoma Somé : What a real shaman sees at a mental institution So if we look at the spell of ALLOPATHY: "treatment of disease by remedies that produce effects opposite to the symptoms," The definition says it all. How can I break the strong spell of allopathy . I call on Sophia, I call on Allosophy: "wisdom born of the other" "Allo" means 'other..."Al": means 'beyond'... Where is 'Pathosophy' in this? where is "the wisdom born of suffering, of feeling" Where does she reside? Why is the breath of freedom and respect that come from the enquiry not encouraged by our medical system? I let you guess. SOPHIA Sophia is the feminine aspect of divine wisdom. You can see that She is not what the people in power will want to foster in the people they are meant to serve and protect. Recently I have been offered another emerging pathology : "long covid or post covid, or covid syndrome". In the uk the medical system is setting up a series of test at the end of November to identify us and create a new illness. The illness will lead to new medications . I rested there for a few days, in the seat of being part of the reffered one for the new experience. My ego and love of pioneer adventures got confused. I even felt relief again to belong to some study of suffering even if unknown. To fall into the void, to fall into the unknown frightens me, so I grab prematurely onto some offered solutions, like a shocked amnesiac, anaesthetised zombie. I realised this morning that I had given up the fight for beauty. That by being offered a comfortable and easy solution my whole being was weakening even more, divatilasing. By being offered a pathology woven in the terror of Covid19, added to the growing control of our lives, the world wide authoritarianism and a mad making system I became even more unwell. I was under a spell. I am under a spell. And the forgetting keeps happening, the falling asleep - again and again. It took me to look into the eyes of a painting I made in the forest to wake up to my strength again. That tree is becoming my temple. |
“I had drunk so deeply of grief and innocently gambled so hard with fate and irony that a special kind of vision was gathering in my eyes, not entirely clear just yet. This was the same look people saw in your eyes when you have died for beauty and come to live accepting nature as life with no promise of paradise, and mad at people who couldn't see that.”
― Martin Prechtel,
And words from Khalil Gibran on
PAIN
“Your pain is the breaking of the shell that encloses your understanding.
Even as the stone of the fruit must break,
that its heart may stand in the sun,
so must you know pain.
Much of your pain is self-chosen
.It is the bitter potion by which the physician within you heals your sick self.
Therefore trust the physician, and drink his remedy in silence and tranquillity:
For his hand, though heavy and hard, is guided by the tender hand of the Unseen,
And the cup he brings,
though it burn your lips, has been fashioned of the clay which the Potter
has moistened with His own sacred tears.”―
Khalil Gibran, The Prophet
The Message of Water was given to Azul Thomé on 2nd December 2016 by the River Dart, Devon, UK after she fell on her knees asking the river how to love when there is so much loss? | "I was deeply touched by this message and felt the water call me to translate her words into the spirit of a song, that Mother Water could speak through music to our hearts and call us home... |
We sit in Council of all Beings, we Tend to the Children of all Species, we Initiate our Young ones, we claim our Elders, we Ancestralise our Dead and we recreate Community as a service to all of Life. Our Declaration is : "no laws and no decisions shall pass that in any way could harm the children of all species" FACEBOOK EVENT PAGE DURING THE EXTINCTION REBELLION INTERNATIONAL ACTIONS IN LONDON 7th to 20th Oct 2019 | Earth Wisdom Tenders We are called the ‘Earth Wisdom Tenders’and are an eclectic group of people who are learning to deeply listen to the earth and the non human world, to honour their wisdom and knowledge, and to hear what they need from us right now at this time of crisis and extinction. We are guided by the wisdom of the past and indigenous cultures and peoples of the present, we work with the cycles and rhythm of the earth, the planets and cosmos and with what we perceive as the great mystery. Many of us feel grief and great poverty that we have lost these missing practices that were and are woven in intimacy with our living world. In the past we may have been labelled as pagans, druids, witches or hippies. This longing to find a place of belonging and healing has created a re-emergence and a rewriting of these ancient ways, through ceremonies, rituals, initiation and rites of passage, to enable our deep soul connection and wisdom to reawaken. We sit in Council of all Beings, we Tend to the Children of all Species, we Initiate our Young ones, we claim our Elders, we Ancestralise our Dead and we recreate Community as a service to all of Life. We are called the Earth Wisdom Tenders : Tending to all Life on Earth in our troubled time "We are Earth Wisdom Tenders... When all sentient beings are our sisters and brothers When we remember that we belong to the living web of Life When no laws and no decisions shall pass that in any way could harm the children of all species When we know that our Earth talks through us of her deep knowledge and wisdom We are Earth Wisdom Tenders when no land, no waters and no one is owned, colonised nor commercialised for power and control. Our dear Earth is 4.5 billions years of age, she is our Wise Elder whom we learn from and tend to”. With Love and Cœurage Earth Wisdom Tenders |
"Oh Liberty, hear us, and speak in behalf of but one individual, for a great fire is started with a small spark. Oh Liberty, awaken but one heart with the rustling of thy wings, for from one cloud alone comes the lightning which illuminates the pits of the valleys and the tops of the mountains. Disperse with thy power these black clouds and descend like thunder and destroy the thrones that were built upon the bones and skulls of our ancestors."
— Kahlil Gibran
All Welcome | These Bones represents all our Ancestors who have not been Honoured ~ of all Species. These Bones represent our Mother Earth Stones Everyone longs and deserves an honorable ancestralising It is our Duty of Care to tend to our dead We will Gather the Bones, sooth them with pigments, red ochre and oil, we will create an altar on site and let the tide take our prayers. It will be temporary Altar for the Ancestors of All Species to be tended to, blessed and loved with courage. We will seek the support and healing from the Well and Wise Ancestors to gather and bless the living to thrive during the Actions and beyond BRING: Drum Rattle Pigments and oils Songs |
Women all over our Earth are gathering and rising from the ashes of genocides, slavery and betrayal. There is a new tide and all of life is at stake! Time to mature and offer our gifts fully with the support and blessing of our Sisterhood! Women...
The sisterhood is gathering... | When I was kindly invited to the first WomanFest near Frome, Uk last year, I had no sense of what I was going to. I just could not say no! Something in its calling courted me. All was in place for the Grief Composting Circle and WomBelt to be offered to this extraordinary and timeless gathering! My luggage were mostly filled with yarn and my heart growing with trepidation to arrive on the edges of what we know where life thrives! I was not sure why I went all the way from Slovenia to Frome...until I got there. I soon found a tree, tied myself to her and wove a WomBelt ...for three days. I invited many Women to write on a tiny scroll the World of their deepest Longing. Each piece of fabric was carefully rolled up and inserted in the 4 meters WomBelt. Many tears and heart sharing were witnessed by that sweet tree, delighted she was to see us women so raw and real. The belt was then offered to Tiana Jacoult who held the original vision of WomanFest. We know what it costs to hold Visions to better our world. We need support from all willing. Three of us wrapped the belt around her womb and hips to bless, protect, guide and praise all of her future actions in service to our world's well being and sanity. Women all over our Earth are gathering and rising from the ashes of genocides, slavery and betrayal. There is a new tide and all of life is at stake! Time to mature and offer our gifts fully with the support and blessings of our sisterhood! SOULand will be present at WomanFest this year in a Black Tent created especially by the Blissfull Belltent . We will be in the woods at the radically participatory WomanFest 2019 this Aug. We will be there for the Maturing of Women's Soul offering tasters of the full programme of SOULand. ~ Inner Council of a woman Queen ~ ~ Black Tent Council for menopausal women ~ ~ WomBelt: Weaving Women Back into Matter ~ Returning to Earth what has been Stolen ~ ~ Grief Composting apprenticeship ~ ~ Soul ripening emergent rituals ~ ~ Earth Temple ~ ~ eARTh: Art Infused with Ritual... for Earth! All this to prepare and ripen each woman to offer her praise to Life, her Genius and her Innate Gifts to our dear Mother Earth in our incredibly enlivening, troubling & transmuting times... Azul-Valerie Thome SOULand: Making the World of our Longing www.souland.org |
My deepest most passionate longing is to create a place called SOULand where we pray 3 times a day everyday in songs, communion and silence. | No electricity for 20 years, no wifi, internet, mobile phone. They pledged poverty to not take from the already very poor. They make their flour with ancient wheat grown by a neighbour, bake their bread. honey, olive oil, sweet chestnut flour are from their land and sentient beings. Their vegetables are stored in old washing machine barrels to last as long as possible. Each day the 8 wildish sheep with large bells need tending. They help lessening the fire risk by eating the grass on the many terrasses made by the ancients of this land in the Ardeche in France. Each week people from all sorts of background and walks of life, all pilgrims, come to pray and find a portal to spirit again. Some bring walnuts from their fields, butter (getting rarer in France) or chocolate from Carrefour. Abundance always seem to enter that space. Hermits living near by take care of the flowers for the tiny dark chapel made of schist, stones and local wood...so dark it takes a minute to see the simple icons, the long candle and the quiet welcomed stove in a corner. Two 'little brothers' live there in a tiny Monastery 'La Demeure notre Père'. One 'brother' arrived as a young man at 20 years old 43 years ago, Paul. He went for a week from Holland and never left. The other arrived 36 years ago and is now 73, Jean-Michel. They follow and are totally devoted to Jesus and to some books that are not easy to take in as a woman (an other post). ...yet my heart opened like a pear tree blossom in their company this last few days perched in a sweet little wooden cabin by a stream where I lived and prayed. 3 times a day there were set time for praying together in the chapel in communion, in songs and in silence sometimes. I kept staring at Marie, she looked dignified, beautiful and kind there. I needed that energy so gratefully. It has been a road of real mystery and quite humbling which I needed . These people have been sharing their place with a hospitality, generosity and 'bienveillance' that as a non Christian I feel truly blessed by. Their openness to 'the other' has disarmed me...and taught me much. Their impact on our earth is like the one of a honey bee... pollinating, creating beauty, living within mystery and of service to the greater whole. That perhaps is the important element when setting up a place of sanctuary, that it is of service to a Divine entity. Creation, Pachamama, God, Jesus, Allah or anything else that connects us to the great mystery...then perhaps there is a possibility to get a glimpse at what being a human being could be and offer a place of rest and listening. They fought, were grumpy, impatient and rough sometimes... They never pretended to be nor wanted to be perfect. Their humanity on their sleeves, knowing themselves, they fell down so many times and kept getting up to stand for life. They work all the time through waves of elated exhaustion (63 and 73 they are) ~ welcoming a 'stranger pilgrim' and praying times always take priority. We prayed for two/three brothers to find their way there and stay to help out. And they want to keep working until the last breath...retirement? from what :-) they say? Everything for them is borrowed and to be tended to. I think it might be love. They are to me the pioneers of tomorrow. Feeling blessed to have followed my broken heart after the suicide of a friend, to share a moment with these beautiful sacred and scarred souls. Thank you! Azul www.souland.org |
16/12/2017
We will be creating spaces for Soul to feel welcome again. We will learn with passion and little patience to feed, care, court and praise Her back into being.
I look forward to a deep and wild conversation with you all in the company of Grief, Love, Death and Life as if our Wild and Precious Life truly Mattered.
Azul-Valerie Thome
Azul-Valérie Thomé is hosted by Donna Helete San Luis Obispo is the first stop on Azul's 13 month international SOULand Pilgrimage in service to the care, health and maturing of the human soul. She brings with her a vision, sacred questions and a bundle of soul nourishing practices and rituals, including the Grief Composting Circle and the WomBelt workshop to bless, heal, celebrate and protect women's wombs, divinely timed offerings that are in such need right now. Azul Valerie Thome will be traveling from the UK this February on the first international stop of her 13 month SOULand Pilgrimage generously hosted by Donna Helete. Registration for Workshops & Trainings WomBelt Workshops & Apprenticeships for Women ~ 2/7 (Wed.) For all women - all day ~ 2/18 (Sun.) For all women+apprenticeships - all day Each WomBelt (event & apprenticeship) = £65 = $95 depending on exchange rate ~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Grief Composting Circles ~ 2/11 (Sun.) Circles for Men and Women - 3pm-7pm Grief Composting Circle = £20 = $30 depending on exchange rate ~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Grief Composting Circle ~ Basic Training ~ 2/23-2/25 (Fri.-Sun.) 3 Day Training, all day each day. Must attend all 3 days. Non residential. Grief Composting Training = £380 = $550 depending on exchange rate ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Other offerings during the month of February include Individual sessions of Soul&Sanity (50 min.) with Azul in person or via Skype eARTh commissioned art work. Art infused with rituals infomred by our Motehr Earth for the Thriving of Life. Please email Azul directly for an initial chat on Skype: [email protected] Grief Composting Circles are regular collective grief rituals informed by the work of Sobonfu Some, Joanna Macy, Francis Weller and Azul-Valerie Thome WomBelt: Weaving Women back into Matter are events that bring 13 women together to bless, heal, celebrate and protect their wombs, the wombs of other women and of Mother Earth herself through the art of traditional backstrap weaving combined with story sharing and prayers. | |
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