the Subversive work of Grief as a Sacred Initiation?What does it take to shift from a Rough Initiation to a Sacred Initiation? By Azul Valerie Thome Since the last Extinction Rebellion Actions in London last April an enquiry and body of work emerged. As I observed people on Waterloo Bridge awakening through Grief and yet not even knowing her name I became concerned. That concern turned into curiosity then actions into creating a serie of offering ~ online and on land ~ with the golden thread: What does it take to shift from a Rough initiation to a Sacred Initiation? Soul will always initiate us whether we like it or not. Right now we are being taken through a passage as a species and as a planet. We are being dragged right now from a state of being to an other state of being. A transmutation, a non return mostly unsolicitated and feared. It could be different. It is bewildering not to be preparing for a regular rite of Passage with our Elders. It is heart renching for noone to be waiting for us on the other side of such passage, waiting for our stories and gifts which would, in an intact culture, be essential for its well being. We could still mature through it all, we can make amend, fix our mess, restore Life on Earth and in our own hearts. We could also crumble into despair, shame and blame. In that gap between words there is CHOICE. The choice to see our lives to serve all that is Sacred between humans, our Natural World and our Invisible World. The choice to offer to Life our self honesty and self forgiveness woven in with our courage and creativity. And the choice to make the World of our Longing while being Initiated by our sacred, wild, transformational and Rebellious Grief. I took the wonderful 5 Gates of Grief of Francis Weller a little further, a little deeper. Here is where I have arrived. THE 5 GATES OF GRIEF AS INITIATORY GATES From a point of SEPARATION, we awaken and come through a GATE OF GRIEF, into a space of sacred INITIATION of maturing practices to come back through our GRATITUDE to our natural state of BELONGING. 1 - From the Separation we have created between Life and Death, where we have pushed the pause button on youth to demonise and mock death, we have created a world out of balance. Our relationship with the autumn and winter of Life has been abstracted from our embodied imagination. Therefore the transition between life and death is something feared in stubborn denial. From here we enter the first GATE of GRIEF: What we love we will lose - calls an INITIATION into the mystery of death and into the GRATITUDE of our capacity to love within that mystery. 2 - From the Separation between what is ‘acceptable’ with what is shameful and ‘unwelcome’ in each of us we enter the second GATE of GRIEF: The Places That Have Not Known Love - That place calls for an INITIATION into the mystery of adulthood and maturation and into the GRATITUDE of being able to welcome back home to our Soul all that has been outcast and sent into exile. 3 - From experiencing the Separation between humans and the other than humans we enter the third GATE of GRIEF: The Sorrows of the World which calls for the INITIATION into the immutable bond with all of creation and with deep GRATITUDE that we Belong to our Living World. 4 - The Separation between our Stone Age ancestry and our great effort to eradicate our deep time memory calls us to enter the fourth GATE of GRIEF: What We Expected and Did Not Receive. It calls for an INITIATION into our Deep Time lineage and into the GRATITUDE of Remembering Who we are and Where we come from. 5 - The Separation with our Ancestors created by various unspoken traumas, illnesses, secrets and unreleased suffering is another fracture in our presence here on Earth. We enter the fifth GATE of GRIEF: Ancestral Grief - calling for an INITIATION into Elderhood and into the GRATITUDE that we can Restore and Renegotiate our family tree. “Grief is subversive, undermining the quiet agreement to behave and be in control of our emotions. It is an act of protest that declares our refusal to live numb and small. Here is short film where I explored walking through the 5 Gates of Grief as Gates of Initiation and Deep Belonging
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| SOULand Schedule at Woman Fest 2019 THURSDAY 8th 11AM TO 11PM ~ INNER COUNCIL OF A WOMAN QUEEN ~ 20 WOMEN 4PM TO 6PM~~ BLACK TENT FOR MENOPAUSAL WOMEN ~ 20 WOMEN FRIDAY 9th 11AM TO 1PM ~ WILD GRIEF AND FIERCE LOVE IN TIMES OF EXTINCTION ~ 20 WOMEN 8PM ~ AZUL WITH JEWELS ~ GRIEF CEREMONY SATURDAY 10th 3AM TO 5:30AM ~ DREAM CIRCLE, GRIEF COMPOSITNG CIRCLE AND NEW DAWN~ 20 WOMEN 4PM TO 6PM ~ WOMAN INITIATION ~ THE 4 SISTERS: GRIEF-LOVE-DEATH-REBRITH ~ 20 WOMEN SUNDAY 11th 11AM TO 1PM ~ WEAVING WOMEN BACK INTO MATTER ~ 20 WOMEN To get in touch with Azul to offer your gift into the Black Tent: azulthome@gmail.com |
From a full heart! Warm greetings from beautiful Totnes, UK and the river Dart ~ The seal and the heron are here, flowers have exploded in Eros beauty and all trees are now with a 1000 greens... This is a well overdue Newsletter! https://mailchi.mp/f3db1b…/the-initiatory-dance-of-rebellion I don't know about you but it has been incredibly EPIC in my life and the ones around me since the start of last November ...#extinctionrebellion #strike4climate #culturedeclaresemergency #deepadaptation #earthprotectors ... SOULand has been engaged in the above adding threads to its active prayer: Making the World of our Longing in small and steady ways Below are some these moments with links. And few INVITATIONs to JOIN SOULand Programme more details as youscroll down: ~ WOMEN INITIATION~ A yearlong Ensouling and Creative journey ~ GRIEF and SOUL APPRENTICESHIP~ A year long for men and women ~eARThONLINE SHOP~ Open ~ Earth Temples in Cities~ London first? ~ SOULand Grief Apprenticeship enFrancewith Pablo Servigne and Nans Thomassey ~ London Water Pilgrimagelaunches XR Actions on 15th April ~ Extinction Rebellion April's Actions in London. Our Totnes community had a strong and wonderful presence on Waterloo Bridge that we occupied and transformed into a Garden Bridge for 7 days and nights. The Black Tent was there as an Earth Temple for rest and mend our broken relationship to our Living World. It was a deeply transformational experience. We are now gathering the learning and soon will be preparing for the next Actions... ~ POLLY HIGGINS ~ R.I.P When our dear Polly died on 21st April I fell on Waterloo Bridge while the police made a mass arrest and rebels sang love songs, Greta spoke at Marble Arch that day and it was Earth Day ~ The next day I felt moved to create a ritual of 40 days of mourning and Ancestralisingvigil for Polly Higgins~ Ways of honouring our dead ~ to accompany the ones we love to the shore of their ancestors. This will be made into a little book for her hubby Ian and team. Here is Day 27 of (40). If you want one booklet emailme with a bit about you and Polly :soulandinfo@gmail.com ~ Culture Declares Emergency~ Arts and Culture organisations and individuals declare a Climate and Ecological Emergency SOULand has declared Emergency and so have I as an Individual! Deep Adaptation proposed by Jem Bendell~ Learning each day about the 4 R's after our gathering last December with Jem and 35 others rebels. ~ Resilience ~ Relinquishment ~ Restoration ~ Reconciliation Who best but the bees to know these 4 R's ~ My latest flag of the Dark Matter and Anima Mundi Series: The Bees... They have been here for 120 million years... SOULand Programme and projects ~ GRIEF and SOUL APPRENTICESHIP~ A year long for men and women in 2019 and 2020 ~ Women Initiation~ A Yearlong EnSouling and Creative journey in 2020 ~ Earth Temples in Cities~ wild and wonderful dreams To create one on the edges of Waterloo Bridge, near the River Isis/Thames where the IMAX cinema is at the moment. Working group happening in Totnes twice a month. EVENTSand PROGRAMME the next few months SOULand at FESTIVALS 19th to 21st July Hawkwood College, UK ~ Seeds Festival in Stroud I will bring my eARTh, theEarth Temple in the CityVision, a Grief Composting Ritualand a Water blessing ceremony ~~~~~ 8th to 12th August, near Frome, UK~ WomanFest UK I will be there with the Black Tent and part of SOULand Programme AZUL eARTh New eARTh pieces: " Dark Matter and Anima Mundi" and "Archetypal Daimons" now available to purchase as Cards, Print and Giclé on canvas. A Little Shop is now OPEN ~~~ SOULand dans la Drome en FRANCE ~ SOULand Grief Apprenticeship enFrancewith Pablo Servigne and Nans Thomassey 15 Juin a Die~ Azul Valerie Thome en Conference avecPablo Servigneet Nans Thomassey 16 Juin pres de Die~ Azul Valerie Thome offreun Cercle de compostagede Deuil 12 au15 Decembre 2019 pres de Die~ AprentisSAGE de l'Ame et du Deuil arrive enFrance Plusd'infos:soulandinfo@gmail.com ALSO... an ONLINE Grief and Homecoming for XR a Grief Composting for the Rebellionin Totnes, UK ~ 26th June a Water Ceremony will happen in Oxford on 14th July by Isis River. a WomBelt :Weaving Women back into Matter, Totnes, UK ~ 3rd August A bientot dear all and stay connected in these troubled and extraordinary times... Rest in Peace and in Love dear Polly xx with Love, Azul Valerie Thome www.souland.org |
"SOULand is a response to our uninitiated, traumatised, collapsing and transforming world. "Initiation is a invitation to wildly court and lean into the SOUL of four Sisters - Grief, Love, Death and Birth. There is no true initiation without the ‘small’ death of our personality, our set positioning in life or our childlike naivety. The Message of Water | SOULand: Making the World of our Longing... Longing is the language of SOUL. A current moving through us, whispering wildly to us how to come back Home to Anima Mundi ~ The Soul of the World. What does longing have to do with an Apprenticeship to Soul and Grief? . Most of us behave as if we were homeless to our SOUL and orphaned to our Earth with great consequences. When we feel deep longings moving through our bodies and through our dreams we are blessed by SOUL. So what happens to these Longings? Why are we in such dire state if SOUL constantly speaks through our imagination, hearts and dreams? Are they like seeds falling on concrete? What does our SOUL need? These longings moving through us... could be bringing us to one of the initiatory gates of grief. Grief of not being welcome, wanted, enough, or of not knowing enough, have enough support, money, skills etc...Paralysis, shame and envy can become the new guests in our beings. Grief is a gate that most of us want to avoid at all costs, even if it costs us our lives ~ therefore we never move beyond the call of SOUL. An initiation to empower us to create the world of our longing is miscarried. We stop, numb and stay small not to feel our sadness, our numbness, our fears and anger. We are not skilled in Grief neither in Love. A terrible poverty takes place in our heart and imagination. SOULand provides collective spaces for the release of our sacred grief, so we can meet ourselves as creative gifted human beings ~ a little more empowered and resourced to make the World of our Longing as a great gift... ~~~ Grief Composting Circles The Grief Compositing Circles are communal rituals of 4 hours infused with beauty and connection with all beings, humans and all others. Grief in this context is the welcoming of anger, fear, sadness, despair, numbness and the mystery of all these emotions as we welcome them in a collective safe space. The Circles hold an important part in total darkness as if in a compost heap, a womb or a kiva. Sounds and wailing are freely used to encourage our wild and sensuous selves to be present. Wild means of the sensuous land and waters, not feral or out of control! The circles weave also the work of Francis Weller ~ Joanna Macy ~ Sobonfu Some ~ Steven Jenkinson and Martin Pretchel among others. ~~~ Conversations with Grief and Water Conversations with Grief of Water is a series of interviews with women and men engaged fully with our collapsing world, our dying systems and our grief. People engaged with deep love and longing to fully participate in our world in ways of soul and beauty. They respond to the message of Water received on 2nd of December. So far I have spoken with and recorded Joanna Macy, Simon Be, Li An Phoa, Jon Young, Francis Weller, Manda Scott, Pat McCabe, Megan Hollingsworth, Stephan Harding, Pablo Servigne and Stephen Jenkinson... each one bringing a thread for a cloth weaving in the past, present and future... I anticipate mystery and our bone memory to be awakened by it. |
"Thank you SOULand for turning your gentle light onto long forgotten place and spaces which were desolate and ghost like within me. " Apprentice
"The strong, robust and respectful container you wove created a space for me to express my grief in all its wild forms. I love that.
The emphasis on personal responsibility and sovereignty is a welcome addition to allow me to find my own way." Apprentice
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 |
How can a human-built space restore a broken relationship with the natural world? The temple is a place to welcome all, locals, passer-bys or refugees. We would like to offer the opportunity to engage and explore the different facets of this project : | How can a human-built space restore a broken relationship with the natural world? The vision is for Earth Temples to be built on the edge of all cities and respond to this question. The Earth Temple is a round place to rest, reflect, reconnect and restore our relationship to the natural world. It is a place of belonging to the Earth that is open to all; a place of beauty, made of local natural materials, and designed to include the presence of all beings of the natural world. We are sharing this vision along with first architectural drawings to invite you and hear from you if and how you would like to imagine engaging in bringing this vision into life - from model making to the finding of place, the realisation and the tending of the space. The design of the Earth Temple Touching the drawings on paper, you may imagine the warmth within thick walls of Earth and the unique sense of refuge in the city found in the silence of this space. The Earth Temple is envisioned to be 26 meters wide, round, made of natural material found on site. Its four entrances are designed to celebrate the Sun in the East, Water and Plants in the South, Earth and Soil in the West, Air and Animals in the North. An olive tree stands in the center as a symbol of peace and the sculpture of a woman and a man seating. The roof is made of glass. Within the walls are places of rest and underground at the center is a kiva, a dark cave, a place of reflection and deep listening. The temple is a place to welcome all, locals, passer-bys or refugees. At the first gathering in Totnes around the vision of Earth Temples, we started imagining Totnes as a potential place to welcome a first Earth Temple. We would like to offer the opportunity to engage and explore the different facets of this project :
Please do get in touch with questions and remarks, or suggestions of people to contact to make this happen. The vision of Earth Temples in Cities was brought to life by Azul-Valérie Thomé, designer of rituals, artist and activist devoted to restoring humanity back to a deep relationship with the Earth. She holds an MA in Ecological Design Thinking from Schumacher College and is currently based in Totnes. Azul Valérie Thomé for SOULand www.souland.org MEETING ARE HAPPENING IN TOTNES in 2019. See Facebook Page for more details or email me :soulandinfo@gmail.com |
It seems to me that we are still negotiating with a truth which is: We have reached the end of the human experiment. We have not learned. We stayed immature, amnesic, separated and anaesthetised to the impact of leaving our Earth's Living Web. We objectified all, controlled most and destroying with great success. We can blame the 'authority'. We can shame ourselves and our species. We can zone out. We can kick and scream about it all or... We can live the next few years wisely and make amend. I love this word, making a-mend... we can act as if we are sorry for the mess we created, we can mend what we broke and regain a little sanity and perhaps dignity as well , lifting that heavy burden we all carry in our Soul. We can become a movement of deep gratitude. We can make the most beautiful gestures of restoration and thanks to our Earth's sentient beings. It is good medicine for the Soul I feel. I understand that if we have not learned to lean into communal Grief, into Interconnected Love, into the Beauty of Death and the Mystery of reBirthing we are profoundly empoverished in meeting our short precious time left in Life on Earth. We must skill up and enter conversations with the FOUR SISTERS: Grief, Love, Death and reBirth...they long for us to enter the forest and seat with them again around the Chidlren's Fire. The Message of Water gives us an other 3 years. What I am saying here is not sordid, negative of prophetic. It is what most of us might feel in our bones right now with little context to place this extraordinary experience into. So I would like to propose: Let's become and make our lives a Gift to Earth ~~~ a Give Away ~~~ of such sacred beauty that the whole universe will sense its true grace. Let's use the next few years to create the most outrageously beautiful and generous departure. Well, that is what I will be doing and working with the next 3 years. I will not be spending the precious time we have left blaming, shaming, hoping, neither running away from the task and invitation at hand. We are the ones they are waiting for. Let's turn round and join the greatest possibility of all: To join the web of life once more in a great restoring celebration of wild imagination and deep care.. If the Water, the IPCC report, the UN, Extinction Rebellion, Mission LifeForce, and others were 'wrong' . If we have much more time to live as a species to make a-mend can only benefit all living beings. It reminds me of a book I read many years ago: One Year to Live by Stephen Levine. If we have three years to live would we live the same life that we are living now? There seem to be a sacred invitation from Life to become initiated into a wiser and more mature species. It is up to us to make this rite of passage a conscious one or a very rough one! Azul Valérie Thomé | We have reached the end of the human experiment. We can become a movement of deep gratitude. We must skill up and enter conversations with the FOUR SISTERS: Grief, Love, Death and reBirth again We are the ones they are waiting for The Message of Water gives us an other 3 years. |
“It’s Important”. We shared our deep longing to be engaged in the profoundly bewildering times of our collapsing and transmuting world. thus bringing up an immense grief, un~skilled and feared in many of us. They are not dead. Death being food for the birthing of new life, no ~ they are extinct! ... can we ponder on the difference in our own heart and the impact on our soul? Each of us will carry a stone representing an extinct species. | “It’s Important”. “It is love”, wrote Poppy, 8 years old, at the end of our Totnes Life Cairn community meeting. We gathered in Totnes, last week, to design together the creation of a memorial for the honouring of Extinct Species for the 1st December 2018 on Sharpam Estate*. Most of us had read the IPCC report* adding weight to the Message of Water* and most recently Extinction Rebellion* and Rising Up* all rippling in each one of us as we sat. We shared our deep longing to be engaged in the profoundly bewildering times of our collapsing and transmuting world. How can our actions really matter? How can we attempt to make meaning when reading the published numbers* of our extinct species being between 100 and 150 species a day? Every 24 hours ~ animals, invertebrates, fungi and plants will never court, sing, nest, seed, dance their life bringing rituals again. They are not dead. Death being food for the birthing of new life, no ~ they are extinct! ... can we ponder on the difference in our own heart and the impact on our soul? As an designer of eARTh rituals including Grief Composting Circles I know that we cannot and must not meet this stage of awakening alone. We are increasingly noticing that we need to gather and rise up in circles and community groups to meet the enormity of the consequences of our long term disconnection to the inter connectedness with all of Life thus bringing up an immense grief, un~skilled and feared in many of us. We seem to be totally astonished by the depth of our love for our Earth. The child’s presence, her holding of Love as a beacon alchemised the space and the meeting. Her mother sat there by her side, strong and open. I felt that Poppy’s presence brought some sanity to our community. I remember doing the Council of all Beings* with a whole classroom in london some years ago. Each child chose an other than human being to speak for and from. Animals, rivers, mountains, tiger, worms and bees entered the class room among others . The children made masks to personify each of the sentient beings. They then spoke from that place sat in council with a talking stick. I then understood that children know what is going on here on Earth at this time. I feel that children deeply need and deserve beautiful, strong and lovingly held spaces where they can bring their voices to the adults and to each other about what is going on in our world. Thank you my dear Poppy for bringing your beautiful self and your lion heart to the meeting of the memorial for extinct species - a life Cairn which will be created by our community on 1st December 2018 . We will depart from STEAM PACKET INN at 11:30am in a procession towards the site on Sharpham Estate about 30-40 minutes walk away, following the river Dart. Each of us will carry a stone representing an extinct species. We might stop a few times for a song or a poem. We might carry a mask of be face painted . We will then, once on the site offered by the Trust, place our stones, naming these animals, plants and other organisms that are no longer on our Earth... We will then have a grief ritual with music and songs and allow what needs to move, move through us. After a while we might feel a natural move towards celebrating who is still alive that we long to protect. It is important and yes it is love! Join us! All welcome. Azul Valérie Thomé More details at SOULand Facebook event Page: Life Cairn in Totnes |
GRIEF COMPOSTING CIRCLE~ BOOKING ESSENTIAL 14:00 to 18:30 CLOSED CIRCLE A 4 hours deep and beautiful Ancient Earth Wisdom based Ritual to Compost our Grief and return to Love Part happens in total darkness. A space for all grief not only focused on Remembrance day. It is not a substitute for regular self care and therapy. at WOODLAND PRESENTS in Devon All donations will go towards the creation of our Life Cairn in Totnes | REMEMBRANCE EVE ~ OPEN TO ALL 19:00 to 21:00 OPEN TO ALL At WOODLAND PRESENTS in Devon COME WITH SOME DRY WOOD and A CANDLE if you can. We will have a hat going round to harvest donations of a few pounds from each of you to support the happening of our Life Cairn in Totnes on the 30th November. and 1st December 2018 |
"an 'Apprenticeship to Emptiness'." "It was to be... I would represent and speak from Extinction. We all sat as a Council." "They hear and communicate with plants, animals and their cosmology is present" | During a 'Council of All Beings', last month, I was 'chosen' by Extinction. We were to gather on a tiny island in a Belgium lake. As you can imagine I tried to negotiate a better 'deal' something a little easier like a River or even the last One-Eyed Faisant for example...nothing was to be n-e-g-o-tiated It was to be... I would represent and speak from Extinction. We all sat as a Council. For the people who have done this ritual before you know the structure. First we speak to one other as a Council of All Beings ( apart from humans). We then address the humans. We tell them of our suffering and hardship due to their activities and choices. Then knowing how humans need support to learn and act differently we give away some of our 'medicine', some of our energy/quality/skills and nature . Extinction spoke through me these words to Humans: " I am offering you an 'Apprenticeship to Emptiness'. I am offering you the capacity to free yourself of always needing to 'Understand'. Instead I invite you to dive in the Heart and in the Body. To come back into the flesh and to create and birth together a new species . To re-Incarnate into a new Species. " Could that mean I wonder that the 150 to 200 species of animals/plants and fungi who are being extinct EACH DAY...Could that mean that their songs, their ways of life, their Love for their kins and the web of life... Could that mean that their ways and sensitivities could be what the new generations of human children carry and manifest in our world? I meet an increasing number of children who are of high connectivity and sensitivity. Children and youths who cannot enter or engage with any of the collapsing systems anymore without great costs to their health and well being. They hear and communicate with plants, animals and their cosmology is present. I bow to their parents who are being initiated by these young being. So perhaps the 1000's of species being extinct each week. Perhaps that their energy and beauty are being reincarnated into a new species that look like humans but are a more evolved, connected and awakened species re-in-carn-ated from all that we are loosing right now. I am opening a conversation would you be touched by this topic. I hold no fundamental truth but rather I attempt to bring messages that are being regularly passed on from what is perhaps called the collective imagination,. The very same one that created the world we are now in! Thank you Valerie Thome for SOULand.org |
The Last Forest appears to my left. A haunting scene gathered in my eyes calling my full attention.
A circle of empty logs where 4 very large slumping characters sat there.
A small fire flickers in the center...
I approach. I present myself and make an offering. I ask them who they are and why they seem so sad and depleted:
"Us four: Grief, Love, Death and Life are seating here lonely, despondent and sad around a tremblotant fire. It has been to long since your species has joined us for conversations. We are the backbone of your existence, come back and seat with us...we have been gradually disappearing from your Psyche. Come back and weave conversations with us...come back"
'
18 women sat on these logs | The 4 Sisters are now alive in our psyche |
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 |
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