“Grandma? Can you tell me when everything got better in the world?”
“Oh yes little one, that was the year 2020, when the earth took a big breath, we were able to reverse the damage and heal. No one poisoned the water anymore or grew food that wasn’t good for humans. We didn’t make any more technology that hurt us or earth or creatures. That was the year that we realized what was important and began to heal collectively.”
“What does healing collectively mean, Grandma?”
“It means that instead of a small group of us, out here calling for justice and reason, it became a large group. Suddenly everyone together saw, that what is good for one must be good for all.”
“What changed for you and Grandpa after that?”
“Well. We stopped working like crazy people, trying to get somewhere that doesn’t exist. We stopped needing so much to be so comfortable. Instead of retiring, we began to focus on our real work. And we, along with everyone else, saw to the welfare of our brothers and sisters. And….we fell back in love again.”
“Were you out of love before Grandma?!”
“We still loved each other, but we had gone into some kind of numbness, some disconnection. We weren’t listening to each other or the earth. All of that disconnection went away between us. A lot of us didn’t survive that time, but those of us who did, who live to tell the story the way I am telling you now, woke up. We are sad that it took so much loss. But it did. It was during that time, that we ‘made’ your mother because we had plenty of time at home!”
“Wow, then I exist because you had to take a break! Maybe that is also how the polar bears didn’t die!”
“That’s right darling – in a way – you are the life that came out of those hard times. And also lots of other creatures began to thrive again. “
“I’m sad so many people and animals were hurt because we weren’t listening.”
“Me too darling one, but we are listening now. And so are the leaders of our united nations, they woke up too – and we really needed that to happen.”
“Does a hard story sometimes become a good story, Grandma?”
“Most of the time it does, but it takes some mighty story tellers to make that happen!”
“Maybe I will be a storyteller when I grow up then! Maybe I can tell this story at school for show and tell.”
“That sounds just perfect! We need good storytellers around here.”
“To bring hope and courage?”
“Yes, to bring hope and courage. But also truth. Because hard times will come again, they always do. The question is not if hard times will come. The question is how did we show up when the hard times came? Did we do what we could do?”
“I want to do what I can do”
“Me too”
New Moon Greetings Dear One! Here’s what I have for you today…
Tomorrow we have a free call with over 1000 women about personal medicine with me and my friend, Amy Ahlers, and then we have an online healing journey starting with medicine painting. I hope to see you in one of these spaces if you are looking for a focus during this time. I keep wondering how I can turn this into a vision quest that serves my community and my own home. ~ SS
Times like these stir up the stories, don’t they? I woke up thinking of myself in this image today.
I remember that closet and those critters. Right after this, everything as I knew it changed.
My family was a part of an early women’s movement. We helped women in abusive relationships get justice, and safety. No one had ever brought a rape trial to court in Sonoma County at the time.
Because of the help we gave to women, we got death threats and my cousin and I were in danger. I will never forget one of the last days in our home in Glen Ellen, California. I was out on the porch, and saw the men who had made the death threats drive by on their motorcycle. I knew I was leaving my home, that I loved and nothing would ever be the same.
This is our house, Shone’s Country Store – that second story was our home.
We were both sent away to our father’s homes, which we had never spent time in before. And when we got back, our family lived somewhere else, in another town, gone from Sonoma.
We had been separated and were never the same kind of unit that we once were for many many years. At 23 years old, my cousin Bridget and I called everyone back together. For a year we gathered monthly and read Women Who Run With the Wolves, and told stories and played the drum and made art. That said, it was never the same as it was before.
We are in a time right now, after which nothing will ever be the same. My Grandmother’s both told me – a time like this would come in my lifetime. And here it is. A time of awakening for many of us – threaded with fear and death – yet still – there is hope in many hearts.
Right now – it is a great time for some housekeeping – in our relationships and life. What remains unhealed? Unforgiven? How can I change the story I am living today into one that has hope?
I can see how the childhood story I shared with you above has informed my choices for what to be when I grew up. I wanted justice for women and have worked for this most of my life. I think I must be always trying to ‘gather the women’ to heal that separation – forced by violence. And likely at an unconscious level, I am always trying to get home to safety. The loss of that home and the years following, where my mom and I moved at least once a year, put us in a perpetual state of ‘on the run’ energy in a way. Only I didn’t know that until the past few years when I started to see the pattern.
We all know that early childhood stories impact us and also how collective stories impact us – after which nothing is the same. And in most cases, when we try to heal them and discover the hidden patterns, we go back in time, revisiting the trauma over and over.
Well in Intentional Creativity we have taken a HUGE stand for something different than going back to heal a story like the one I just shared with you. When I first tried it in a class in my courses, I wasn’t sure it would work. Would we be able to go as deep if we didn’t revisit the trauma in the same way? Was there another way? Yes.
The first few times I taught the idea of “healing your story” in a new way, was indeed different than I do now. Yet the results were profound. The capacity to see the patterns in a new way – and then to change them – from a field of healing instead of a field of trauma were revealed to us and hundreds of students who have done our programs since. We no longer go back to heal, we go forward to heal. It is a step by step process and it can take some practice to get the new neural patterning.
I had revisited that story many times and still it wasn’t moving, and I wasn’t seeing the pattern. As soon as I saw it, truly, I had the power to change it. The healing power of Intentional Creativity in action!
Is there a story stirring in you that is seeking healing?
Are you ready for a revolutionary approach that is working?
Would having a focus for your time and consciousness right now, be a gift?
I will admit, on one hand it is a strange time to be sharing our programs. On the other, we literally have just the thing for hard times, personal medicine. Further, our team has been working on these offerings for months – so we are sharing our gifts with you during this time.
We are internalizing this trauma – there is no way for us to experience this level of suffering and not be impacted. Yet there is something we can do actively – to intentionally turn our focus towards something that is both FOR US and also, SERVES OTHERS. Working with our own story is what all of us are already doing – if you add creativity to the work – hopefully it will be a gift to how you are spending your time.
Blessings on your path, and as we all keep saying, we are in this together!
On Sunday I led our Red Madonna Community in virtual church. Medicine for my soul…
One of my dear friends and matriarchs, just sent this song to me, so now I am sending it to you. An Orchestra plays Beetoven’s 9th from their homes. I love it – listen as loud as you can.
