The important thing to remember is, you are not alone. We are in this together. Our family, our community, our villages, our nations, our human collective – all in this together.

Here are some ideas for how to find your way through these strange and challenging times – some ways back to self, back to centre, back to here, and here, and here….

Talk it out with someone. Speak your fears and be heard, seen, held, known.

Feel yourself supported by the earth, the ground beneath your feet.

Breathe.

Play with your kids. They are some of our wisest teachers. Let them remind you what is most important.

Get all wrapped up in a novel. A good one. Possibly a trilogy.

Indulge yourself in some sensual deliciousness – chocolate works for me. And wine. Malbec to be precise.

Coorie in. Get cosy. Snuggle up.

Help out – offer something useful to someone who needs support. Being of service to others takes us out of worrying for ourselves.

Cook up a lovely nourishing meal that feeds the body and the soul.

Find out what financial support is available to you right now. Contact your bank, your MP, Citizen’s Advice. Know your rights and get clear on what’s on offer.

Moisturise your hands. You’ve probably been washing them so much that they’re dry as a bone.

Have a text conversation with a friend using only gifs. Guaranteed to bring a giggle.

Remember that you are your pet’s favourite person.

Find reassurance in the fact that you have found yourself in hot water before and you handled it. You’ll handle this too. One day at a time.

Wrap yourself up in a shawl, a blanket, a duvet. Feel yourself enveloped in softness.

Let yourself off the hook for not being “productive”. It’s just not a relevant yard stick right now.

Pick up your phone and check in with your loved ones – voice to voice.

Ask for help. And if that makes you uncomfortable, get yourself to YouTube and watch Amanda Palmer’s TED talk.

Make something with your hands. The tangible, the tactile, the feel of working material in your hands can be incredibly soothing.

Compile a playlist on Spotify full of the music you love best.

Come back to your senses. Literally. Find beauty, seek pleasure, let yourself feel really good in your body, in this moment, in this place.

Limit your exposure to the news. It’s important to be informed – but don’t get sucked in.

Don’t panic buy, for fuck’s sake. There’s enough for all of us. And remember to contribute something to food banks. They’re really struggling right now.

Find that still point within and spend some time there.

And lastly, stick together, invest in your connections even if you have to self isolate – especially if you have to self isolate. Remember that the only constant is change, and this too shall pass. Promise promise.

Sending each and every one of you so much love right now. I am carrying you all in my heart and wishing you ease and comfort and peace and a soft safe place to land. May it be so.

The post Some Ways To Come Back To Self first appeared on Amy Palko.

I want to introduce you to a goddess. Because goddess knows, we could use a little divine intervention around here, right? And this goddess is beyond perfect for us right now, as she, my lovelies, is the goddess of health.

Hygeia is the Ancient Greek goddess from whom we get the word ‘hygiene’, and it’s she who we turn to as the archetype of disease prevention and practices that support wellness. It occurred to me as I washed my hands for the 2nd time today already – rubbing the suds across my palms, over my knuckles, between my fingers, around my thumbs, up my wrists, sluicing hot water and rinsing them clean – that it is this goddess who is most present with me now.

I always think of Hygeia as the goddess of healthy boundaries* because she asks us to take care of our natural self-defence systems. So this might include boosting our immune system, eating fresh fruit and veg, getting enough sleep etc. And it will most certainly include good hand washing practice too, but I will add to that caring for the skin on your hands, which might be dry from all that extra hand washing we’ve been doing. Ensuring that our skin is healthy and whole and responsive and resilient is incredibly important as it is a major organ and it is one of our first lines of defence.

However, I am also thinking of how Hygeia helps us to manage the necessary boundaries that we are being called to practice right now through social distancing and self-isolation. How do we cope with the necessary creation of space between ourselves and others? And how do we promote our own wellness and the health of all through our own actions?

Honestly, there’s lots of guidance on this from those with a lot more experience and expertise than I, so I’m not about to rehash all of that here for you. But I do think that a key message of Hygeia is around the concept of public health and how to respond to an epidemic. Because it’s not just about the governmental advice around reducing contact with others, coughing into a tissue, or reducing travel to essential trips only. It’s not just about what we’re keeping out – it’s about tending to what’s inside – our vital spark, our joie de vivre, our life force. And not just inside the individual body – but also the collective body.

Hygeia is one of those goddesses who has her own asteroid, and so we can plot her into an astrological chart. In my own natal chart, she sits in the first house – the house of awakenings, beginnings, of appearance, persona, personality, the house of the vital spark. And she lives in Capricorn which asks that we take things seriously, we approach with deliberate intent, and we remain rooted in the practical stuff of life. Here she is conjunct (sits within 1º) Vesta, the asteroid named for the Roman goddess of the hearth and home, also known as Hestia to the Greeks.

I could write a lot more about Hygeia’s position and significance in my own chart – an astrological chart is like the most magical kaleidoscope – the more you look the more you see. However, I think it’s actually more helpful to direct our attention to where Hygeia is transiting right now – or, where she is for us all in this particular moment.

Hygeia (10) is currently at 4.45º Gemini – the constellation of the twins Castor and Pollux, that speaks to us of self and other, of communication, of mental agility, curiosity, knowledge, and the crossing of boundaries. Gemini is ruled by Mercury, who was Hermes in Ancient Greece. The name Hermes comes from the word ‘herm’ meaning doorpost, and Hermes was considered to be the god of the doorpost – he was quite literally that boundary between the public and the private. The inward turning one and the one who makes ‘a face to meet the faces that you meet’, to quote TS Eliot.

Hermes’ staff – the caduceus – probably looks very familiar because we often use it as a medical symbol – a central wand with two spiralling serpents winding their way up its length to the top where we usually have the wings that are so associated with Hermes and his fleet-footed nature. Why is it used to represent medicine? Well, Hermes had a nephew called Asclepius, who is the god of medicine, who he rescued from the burning pyre his mother was set upon for cheating on his father, the god Apollo. His mother’s name? Coronis. You couldn’t make this up, could you?

Apollo discovered that Coronis was cheating on him with Ischys via a raven, who he had instructed to act as a spy. Having his fears confirmed, he requested that the goddess Artemis, his sister, slay Coronis, which she did by firing a volley of plague arrows. Seriously, you could not make this up. She was laid upon her funeral pyre, which is where Hermes, rescuer of lost and trapped children, collected up the baby Asclepius from the flames, and gave him to the centaur Chiron – the Wounded Healer and wise teacher – who tutored him in the healing arts. And ultimately Asclepius, whose temple was one of the world’s first hospitals, had a daughter called Hygeia….

The more we look the more we see, right enough!

Ok, coming back to Gemini….

In astrological medicine, Gemini rules the hands and the lungs – so the emphasis on washing our hands and promoting good pulmonary health right now is absolutely supported with this archetypal reading. But in more ‘performative’ terms, we speak with our hands, our breath is how we create sound in the world, it’s an essential component in how we generate sound. And it is this crossing of the boundaries, how we are connecting and communicating, that interests me most right now.

Yes, as I said before, we must follow the teachings of Hygeia and practice those healthy boundaries right now. But, we must also care for our spirit, our soul, our essential self, our sense of wellbeing, the me-in-here of ourselves, however you conceive of it and think of it. When you are feeling healthy and well, it’s not just because you are free of disease and are pain free – health is something more than that. Vitality doesn’t just occur when our systems are functioning at an optimal level. Wellness isn’t quantifiable.

So how do we nurture and support and nourish this part of ourselves, while still doing what we have to, in order to look after both our own bodies and the collective body of our communities, our nations, our world?

Well, one of the ways, I think, is being exquisitely demonstrated by the Italians raising their voices, using their breath for the purposes of song, and joining one another in melody and harmony. Each upon their balconies, sequestered from one another, their boundaries made manifest by the literal confines of their homes. But finding one another, connecting with each other, caring for the community soul together.

So, as Hygeia makes her way through Gemini in the coming months, we will continue to tend to our boundaries with care – for our own sake and for others. And we will do so with an eye to communication, connection, community. Because health is not something that we’re necessarily going to experience by stripping everything back to the individual’s physical experience – although I am absolutely not denying that we must must must look after our bodies right now. But we are being called into communion with each other, to do what we can to support that vital spark, that inner flame. We’re being asked to take care of our community, to make sure our most vulnerable are being supported, and to stay connected so we can continue to tend to the inner flame within each of us.

As I said in a post yesterday, our world is not going to look the same after this pandemic. But I absolutely believe that there is a way through this which has the potential to usher in a new way of being, a new way of connecting and caring, a new way of living and loving. And it asks that we look after both ourselves and each other – body and soul.

*Hat-tip to Randi Buckley whose legendary online course Healthy Boundaries for Kind People is a wonder!

** And also to my Dad – Bob Leckridge – the most wonderful Gemini I know whose understanding and thinking on health and wellness have absolutely informed this piece.

The post Hygeia – Goddess of Health first appeared on Amy Palko.

I will be doing my best by my family, my community, my business, my friends, my husband, myself.

I will be managing my own anxiety, my finances, my loneliness, my house move, my sadness, my health.

The post Hold Tight first appeared on Amy Palko.

For me, this is more of an academic question, as my children are all grown. My worries aren’t so much about how we’ll manage child-care or how to home-school, so much as what will happen if my kids lose their jobs, how will they pay their rent and what happens with the university sector. But, I found myself earlier today – now up, dressed, breakfasted, errands run, laundry sorted – with my hands in the sink washing up the first batch of the day’s dirty dishes, while looking out at the kids playing the playground. And I was thinking that, while I don’t have the answers to my own worries, I might have some answers for parents facing the prospect of educating their kids at home, when the playground is empty and silent and the homes are full of kids seeking focus and fun.

You see, we decided when my eldest child was just 2yrs old that we would home educate. We chose to do so for educational purposes, rather than religious or social, and we proceeded to educate our 3 kids from home all the way through until they were each 16yrs old. At this point, they went into further education, higher education, and employment. During our home-ed journey we engaged in lots of activities outside of the home, the kids were all involved in a variety of groups, team sports and classes, and we brought in tutors for music lessons, but, alongside that, we spent a lot of time in each other’s company at home. The onus of their educational progress fell on our shoulders, and some days that felt light as a feather, and other days it could flatten you with the weight.

But, we muddled through, we did our best, we gave them the loveliest childhood we could, and we allowed them to follow their curiosity and to make their own educational choices. This means that we did not ‘home-school’ – we ‘home-educated’. We followed an approach called ‘autonomous education’ which was child-led and required us to facilitate their educational experience rather than dictate the direction or the form. Our days did not resemble school days. Our home looked nothing like a classroom.

Ok, so why am I telling you all of this? Well, it occurred to me that I know a lot of ways to keep kids occupied and how to provide an educational experience outside of a school setting. Just in case you find yourself in a similar situation due to the social distancing measures being introduced in various countries, then maybe this list will offer you some inspiration and/or reassurance…

* Choose a family project – the North Pole, the Tudors, Fairy Tales etc. – and find activities and media to support the project theme. Watch an BBC wildlife doc, decorate a Tudor Rose, write your own adventure story… Google is your friend here. So many resources out there and project ideas to explore. Invite your kids to help choose the theme!

* Storytime – picture books for wee ones, and chapter books for your older kids. Start on a series, settle in for the long haul, and share in the tale together. Anne of Green Gables, The Chrestomanci Series, The Lord of the Rings… Invest in your storytelling, do voices, bring suspense, try comic timing. So much more engaging than reading in a monotone.

* Youtube Tutorials – there are so many different platforms offering classes, but some of them are pretty pricey. Whereas, YouTube has a wealth of video tutorials and it’s all for free! Especially good for older children. Make sure you have Restricted Mode activated to filter out (most) mature video content.

*Board/Card Games – a great source of entertainment and of learning. Taking turns, counting, reading, spotting patterns, sequential numbers, decision making and more.

* Household Chores – ok, so probably not going to be the most popular option on this list, but tending to all things domestic is an incredibly important life-skill to have. Cooking a meal together, figuring out a shopping list, knowing how to read an electricity bill, diy fixes, furniture assembling, clothes mending etc. Practical things that they’ll be grateful for when they move out on their own for the first time!

* Grow something – cress on cottonwool, a broad bean in a jam jar, an avocado stone, some herbs to try out in the kitchen. Has there ever been a better time to start a wee veggie plot?

* Learn a new language – duolingo, YouTube videos, movies/tv shows with english subtitles… there are so many resources for broadening a vocabulary and stringing sentences together. And something fun to learn en famille.

* Outdoor exercise – obviously, if you’re having to quarantine, then you need to follow the guidance. But if you can, get out into the garden. Or if you live near green space where you won’t be near other people, get out for a walk, a run, kick a ball, fly a kite, jump some waves, walk the dog. Kids need to run off their energy – and often, in my experience!

* Sleep – kids are often chronically tired. Their bodies are growing. They’re over-stimulated by screens. And school starts a lot earlier than suits the majority. If your kids are sleeping a lot, maybe that’s because they’re needing to top up their dreamtime. And perhaps that’s no bad thing. They’re not being lazy. They’re exhausted. And sleep can bolster your immune system.

*Repetition – we often learn by doing/watching the same thing over and over. One of the great things about home ed is that your kids can repeat something as often as they want/need to until they get it, or until they’re bored, or until they find that next thing that they want to do again and again. My kids had favourite activities – lego building, beading, etc. And they had favourite stories they would return to frequently – I’m not sure how many times our Spirit – Stallion of the Cimarron dvd was played, but it was a lot!! Or how many batches of fudge or crepes my middle son made – more than we could eat!! Or how many hours my daughter would practice her violin. Or how often my youngest son would play historical strategy games. Trust me, when they’re done, they’ll let you know!

* Routine – your daily structure does not need to look like the school day. Why would it? But it is important to have some kind of routine in place as it can be comforting and reassuring, and not just for the kids! Mealtimes, bath times, outdoor play, story time – the warp of your day, while all the other activities can be the weft.

* Arts & Crafts – it’s easy to pull together a wee crafting station full of sellotape, empty egg cartons, yarn, crayons, stickers etc. We used to have an Ikea unit with plastic trays full of materials that could be used for any number of creations. Especially handy when used in partnership with the family project!

* Imaginative Play – a dressing up box is another essential! Veils and scarves and fabric pieces are great for creating whole landscapes across the floor where toy figures can adventure, cars can race, dinosaurs can roam. A collection of hats, masks, face-paints (safely stored!) can really support play and imagination so have a store of those too if you can.

* Teaching – we often learn best through the act of teaching itself. Inviting a child to teach – either you or your other children – will solidify knowledge for them and also introduces new concepts, methods, knowledge etc to others.

* Trust – your children are innately curious, and they will find their way to what lights them up if you let them. Support their instincts, create opportunities, and be invitational in your facilitation of their learning.

Lastly, enjoy this time with your kids as much as you can. It is such a blessing and a privilege to get to know these wee people, and to witness them become big people! I do not regret for one moment our decision to educate our kids at home. It wasn’t always easy, but it was often fun. At a time when fun may be somewhat thin on the ground, may this post inspire you and your kids to find it where you can.

The post For Parents Facing the Prospect of School Closures first appeared on Amy Palko.

When you consider the above quotation in conjunction with your My Word goddess for the year, what does it stir in you?

If you hold to the truth that the goddess (as an expression of the sacred feminine) is experiencing life as you, does this truth impact your connection to your goddess?

What I’d like to invite each of you to explore in your journals is the following creative exercise. It should take you around an hour, and it’s in 2 parts, with the first designed to support you to drop into that place within where divine focus is yours and the sacred draws ever closer…

First of all, read over the description of your goddess again, before closing your eyes and bringing her to mind. What do you imagine she looks like? What would she be wearing? Does she have anyone or anything with her? A wand? A wolf? A crystal? A scroll? What are your first impressions of her? Maybe she reminds you of someone… Or maybe she makes you think of something – a poem, a song, a memory.

Allow yourself to freely follow your imagining and your associations, before turning to your journal and writing the name of your goddess at the top of the page and setting a timer for 10 minutes. Freewrite until the 10 minutes are up, allowing your pen to flow across the page without stopping to correct spelling or punctuation. There are no rules on what to write about – just go with the flow and trust. The only rule is to keep the words flowing.

At the end of the 10 minutes, scan what you’ve written and circle any word that stands out to you. Try not to over-think this, and move fast. Alternatively, just circle all the nouns (the naming words) in your writing.

Now, choose one of the words you have circled, write it at the top of a fresh page in your journal, set your timer for another 10 mins, then freewrite – same rules apply. Again, at the end of the 10mins, circle the words that seem significant to you, choosing one, and placing it at the top of the next fresh page. And repeat.

You should now have 3 pieces of freewriting. I call this process “Spiralling” with each 10 minute freewrite taking us deeper and deeper into our truth, allowing us to form a clear connection with ourselves and our knowing. If you are short on time, you can reduce the time for each round of writing from 10mins to 5mins.

The Spiralling process is preparation for the 2nd part of our creative exercise; however, I would also suggest that it can form part of a regular writing practice.

Ok, so next…

Write down a list of 13 statements that you would use to describe your goddess. They can be detailed or concise. They can be abstract or direct. They can be personal or transpersonal. To give you an example, if you had Yemaya as your goddess for the year, your statements might be as follows…

Yemaya is….
1. calm seas and smooth sailing.
2. the white horses galloping atop roiling black waters.
3. hope.
4. the siren song of surrender.
5. the promise of more.
6. shifting tides and hidden currents.
7. life’s ebb and flow.
8. unfathomably deep.
9. the mystery writ large.
10. healing waters.
11. a bountiful mother.
12. hiding treasures that may never be revealed.
13. lapping at the edges of an awakening consciousness.

Once you have your 13 statements, rewrite each statement inserting “I am” at the beginning, thus creating a poem to the goddess, a poem to the self.

I am calm seas and smooth sailing.
I am the white horses galloping atop roiling black waters.
I am hope.
I am the siren song of surrender.
I am the promise of more.
I am shifting tides and hidden currents.
I am life’s ebb and flow.
I am unfathomably deep.
I am the mystery writ large.
I am healing waters.
I am a bountiful mother.
I am hiding treasures that may never be revealed.
I am lapping at the edges of an awakening consciousness.

Read your poem out loud to yourself. How does it feel to speak these statements? How does this poem feel in your mouth, in your heart, in your belly, in the soles of your feet? How does it stir your soul?

These are the 13 qualities of your goddess self that you are being called to meet in the year ahead. And now that you’ve identified them, there are various ways in which you can bring them more fully into awareness. For example, you can create collages that focus on each quality. Or you can choose one to work with as your sankalpa for yoga practice. Or you can use them as a jumping off place into another Spiralling writing practice in your journal.

**********

If you have yet to order your 2020 My Word Goddess Reading, don’t worry – there’s still time! The readings are available to purchase until the 31st January 2020, which is when they come off the market, and the 2021 readings will be made available from December. Follow this link to find all the details and to order yours today.

The post Revealing the 13 Qualities of Your My Word Goddess first appeared on Amy Palko.

I think Hekate was a knitter….

Hekate – goddess of the underworld, of the crossroads, of midwives and witches all those who live in the liminal and throw body and soul across the thresholds. Hekate is also the one I think of as the compassionate witness. After all, it is she who accompanies Persephone throughout the shadowy terrain of Hades – not to rescue her from her initiation, but to offer the sacred gift of witnessing.

Today, I am thinking of the meeting place between knitting and compassionate witnessing. Stitch following stitch, row following row, from cast on to cast off, the knitter stays the course, she turns up, she settles in, she listens, she offers silent support or words of love, she sees the pain, the grief, the sadness, and she weaves it into the fabric, she helps it to find its place in the family of things. All the while, she knits. Garter stitch mostly – a practice in presence and holding the tension.

Hekate as a goddess archetype is not here to save us, but to strengthen us, support us, and to remind us that this too shall pass. With time, with tending. With patience, with persistence. With love. And yes, I think, with yarn.

The post I think Hecate was a knitter…. first appeared on Amy Palko.

However, I’ve hopped online and after just 10 minutes, I feel overwhelmed and heartsick. Partially at the news of horrific acts being perpetrated by our governments, and partially at some of the comments I’m reading in support of those acts. And I find myself thinking that it’s hard not to lose faith in the basic goodness of humankind.

But, you know, it’s actually the systems that we’re living in, the ideologies, the warped values of the societies we all participate within which are driving us, collectively, to the sanctioning of these unspeakable acts.

We are all a part of a global narrative which is invested in our dehumanisation as it strips us of our empathy. So that some human beings are seen as less than others – less deserving of care, of love, of protection, of resources. Simply put, they are seen as less human.

And along with that dehumanisation, we have the lauding of ‘the nation state’. But when the upholding of an invisible line drawn upon the land or the sea trumps your humanity and your capacity to see, and to feel the desire to alleviate, the pain of another human being, then the result is what we are seeing right now.

Children separated from their families. Scores drowned in the Mediterranean. Humanitarian crises springing up left, right and centre only to be met with accusations of bias and an abdication of responsibility.

The truth is, however, that collectives are formed from many individuals – vast complex organisms composed of millions of us, susceptible to the manipulations and machinations of powerful forces that structure our sense of what is important and what is possible, and largely ignorant of their own potential and often unactualized power.

All of which to say, as individuals we can make better choices. We can choose empathy over ideology. We can choose humanity over nationhood. We can choose the wellbeing of people (of all people!) over the inflation of populism. And in that way, strive to influence the implementation of inhumane policies enforced in our name.

Yes, I would imagine like many are feeling this morning, I am overwhelmed and heartsick. But, also like many of you, I am angry too. Because unlike those raising their plaintive protesting cry that ‘this is not who we are’, I think it is frustratingly and heartbreakingly clear that this is who we are. This is exactly who we are.

I read a wonderful book last year by Mohsin Hamid called Exit West – highly recommend. At the heart of the story is a question: what would happen if doors suddenly held the potential to transport us from where we are to another part of the world entirely?

As is so often the case, I think fiction holds the keys to seeing what might be possible. Not the magic realism of doors that open up onto new vistas. But the moving towards a time when people matter more than the ideology of nation states.

Ursula K. Le Guin tells us that “we read books to find out who we are. What other people, real or imaginary, do and think and feel… is an essential guide to our understanding of what we ourselves are and may become.”

So, yes, we need to take action – as individuals and as a collective – to apply pressure to those in positions of power (our representatives!!) who believe they have our consent to inflict trauma and torment on those they deem as ‘less deserving – less human’.

But we also need to look at the bigger picture and decide whether we want to continue investing in the current narrative as it barrels towards some inevitable and tragic conclusion.

Or if it’s time to write a new story… one that more clearly mirrors this idealised image of who we believe ourselves to be and which honours the lives of all as sacred.

Because, honestly? If we keep choosing the same story, we can only expect things to deteriorate further.

********************

So, I’m wondering… and this is where I’ve come to at the end of writing this piece before my client calls begin…

What are the works of fiction that you have read and would recommend that you think could help inform the creation of a different story for us all with regards to human rights, immigration, empathy, ideology, compassion?

And by works of fiction, I mean novels, tv shows, movies, short stories, plays etc.

Perhaps a new global narrative starts with a reading list…

“Any human power can be resisted and changed by human beings. Resistance and change often begin in art, and very often in our art, the art of words.”
~ Ursula K. Le Guin

The post We need a new story… first appeared on Amy Palko.

We are in the midst of a powerful full moon in Scorpio – can you feel it? The tension of the opposites playing out with an intensity that calls each of us to tend with care while we navigate this new territory revealed by the bright moonlight. Depending on where this full moon shows up in your natal astrology chart, the effects of the full moon will be played out on particular stages of your life – identity, money, home, faith, self-expression etc.

For me, this full moon is illuminating my 4th and 10th houses – the house of home and the house of social status. This is the dance between the private self and the public self – the parts we want to keep held close to our heart, sewn into the hems of our clothes, whispered into the pages of our journal, and the parts that we have on full display, what we want to be known for, that which we want to be recognised by the world beyond.

And so this full moon comes with an awareness of my own visibility in the world, it calls me out into the light, all the while the shadows continue to offer such tender and gracious acceptance.

Because I don’t know about you, but for me, I am in a near-constant relationship with my own visibility, which, at times, can feel quite imprisoning. Which, I think, is something that many women experience, for we have been conditioned to experience ourselves as the subject of the world’s gaze. John Berger spoke to this in his book Ways of Seeing…

“A woman must continually watch herself. She is almost continually accompanied by her own image of herself. Whilst she is walking across a room or whilst she is weeping at the death of her father, she can scarcely avoid envisaging herself walking or weeping. From earliest childhood she has been taught and persuaded to survey herself continually. And so she comes to consider the surveyor and the surveyed within her as the two constituent yet always distinct elements of her identity as a woman. She has to survey everything she is and everything she does because how she appears to men, is of crucial importance for what is normally thought of as the success of her life. Her own sense of being in herself is supplanted by a sense of being appreciated as herself by another….

One might simplify this by saying: men act and women appear. Men look at women. Women watch themselves being looked at. This determines not only most relations between men and women but also the relation of women to themselves. The surveyor of woman in herself is male: the surveyed female. Thus she turns herself into an object — and most particularly an object of vision: a sight.”

And Margaret Atwood also spoke of this in her novel The Robber Bride…

“Male fantasies, male fantasies, is everything run by male fantasies? Up on a pedestal or down on your knees, it’s all a male fantasy: that you’re strong enough to take what they dish out, or else too weak to do anything about it. Even pretending you aren’t catering to male fantasies is a male fantasy: pretending you’re unseen, pretending you have a life of your own, that you can wash your feet and comb your hair unconscious of the ever-present watcher peering through the keyhole, peering through the keyhole in your own head, if nowhere else. You are a woman with a man inside watching a woman. You are your own voyeur.”

You are your own voyeur… I find that incredibly haunting, for truly, it so deeply resonates.

And so when I then read the following from Clarissa Pinkola Estes in Women Who Run With the Wolves, I am so struck with longing, I almost lose my breath…

“Does a wolf know how beautiful she is when she leaps? Does a feline know what beautiful shapes she makes when she sits? Is a bird awed by the sound it hears as it snaps its wings? Learning from them, we just act in our own true way and do not draw back from or hide our natural beauty. Like the creatures, we just are, and it is right.”

We just are, and it is right.

As we move through this powerful lunar influence of the Scorpio full moon, the dark places of the psyche that Scorpio rules – sex, death, taxes, fears, anxieties, truth, intimacy – are bathed in light and brought into soft focus by persistent moonbeams. No matter if the axis of this full moon falls in your chart the same as my own, there is something of the shadow in each of us that is calling to be seen and acknowledged.

And for that reason and so many more, I am grateful for this week’s goddess. Who, I should add, in her asteroid form is sitting close by the Sun as it casts it light upon the opposing Moon. Her story, her wisdom, is very much in the mix here too. Read on to find out who she is and what she wishes to share with us….

*******

This week’s goddess is… Inanna.

This ancient Sumerian goddess once visited her sister Erishkegel in the underworld and was stripped of everything in the process. However, she was reborn into true sovereignty, and her story tells us a lot about the process of identity creation and the power of facing our shadow self.

When I opened the door to today I am facing a white wall and the sun is somewhere behind my right shoulder. It is casting my shadow in sharp relief onto the wall, and I find myself fixated with just how perfectly rendered it is. There are no fuzzy outlines. No vagueness to its form. Crystal clear definition. A shadow self – myself reflected as if in a dark mirror. I ask Innana if she has a message for us, and she says…

“See your shadow”

And when she says “see” she means “SEE”. We’re not talking about a cursory glance here. This seeing goes to the very heart of things. This seeing is sacred witnessing.

And yet, how can we play sacred witness to our shadow? It’s such an amorphous, intangible thing. Slippery and evasive.

Well, I have found my shadow is most present when I make judgements about others. I project my shadow – the parts of me that I am refusing to see, refusing to claim as my own – onto others. We all do.

And so, when I make a judgement about a celebrity in a gossip mag, or a fellow passenger on the bus, or a politician on the news, or a noisy neighbour etc. that is my opportunity to see my shadow. To witness it being expressed, even if it remains unspoken.

For example, when I watch others behaving in ways that I judge to be intolerant, my shadow is calling my attention to all the ways in which I too am intolerant. It’s not doing this so that I can castigate myself – beat myself up for being a horrible person. It’s doing this so that I can bring that aspect of myself into awareness. So that I can then consciously choose to operate from a place of loving compassion for both myself and for others, from a place of integration, from wholeness.

What judgements have you been aware of recently? How is your shadow being illuminated? What does Inanna want you to know?

PS  The Goddess Guides for May are all set to be sent out tomorrow. But there is still time if you would like me to send one out to you.

The May Goddess Guides contain not only your very own goddess of the month, but also the group goddess of the month (Cybele – Goddess of Wild Women), the group oracle of the month (The Star), the Celtic Tree Full Moon interpretation (Willow – Enchantment), and an introduction to the month’s astrological archetype (Taurus).

So, if you would like to know which goddess will be stepping forward for you this Beltane, then please do sign up. There are 2 subscription levels – the second of which includes monthly 1-on1 time with me where we dive deep into what’s present for you in this moment, before turning to the tools at my disposal – ogham, tarot, astrology and more….

Subscriptions can be cancelled at any time. However, my hope is that discovering your goddess of the month will become a highlight for you as it has become for so many others.

To sign up, simply follow this link and you’ll find more details along with payment options.

I wonder which goddess will step forward for you…

The post Does a wolf know how beautiful she is when she leaps? first appeared on Amy Palko.

In my work as a goddess guide, I am continually reminding my clients that they hold the wisdom that they seek, and that they already hold the tools that they need to use in order to access it. As is so often the case, we teach what we know, and so when I was struggling to come up with my word for the year, I turned to what I knew, and I picked up my tools. In this case, it was my own very special (and well-handled!) deck of goddess oracle cards.

This deck does not look fancy. It doesn’t have pretty pictures on it. It doesn’t sit in a lacquered box. This, my loves, is a working deck. The edges are a little worn. My handwritten names of each goddess are a little messy. The backs of the cards are just plain white.

But what you don’t see is the magic. I work with this deck every day. It is composed of the names of the goddesses that called me into this work – each of them kindred, confidantes, loves. My energy is threaded all the way through this deck, each card’s edge rubbed smooth by my hands. I hold this deck so often throughout a day… sometimes, I give it a shuffle and then put it back down again. Sometimes, a draw a card. Sometimes, I just let them sit nestled against the palm of my hand.

So yes, when I was struggling to find a word that would be my guide, my north star for a whole year, I picked up my deck, began to shuffle, and drew a card with the name of a goddess upon it.

How does this help me to find my word? Well, every goddess has her story, she has her special powers, she has her life themes. And so I worked my way through each goddess whose name is in my deck, and I jotted down a selection of words that were evocative of each one. Then, I would either choose one of those words, if it was singing to me. Or, I would use those words as jumping off places, and begin trawling through online thesauri looking for synonyms.

Once I found a word that I thought could be a possibility, I would then look up the etymology of the word, to discover its roots. Where did it come from? What does it mean? For example, did you know that ‘thesaurus’ comes from the Greek thēsauros, meaning ‘storehouse, treasure’? I just found that out when I googled to check if the plural of thesaurus was thesauri – hahaha!

Ultimately, I end up with a word that I find myself turning to again and again over a whole year. A word that helps me to cleave closely to my desire, to my intentions, to the course that I’m charting through my life.

To give you an example – and I’ll just speak to this briefly, as I’ll probably return to write to this more fully in the new year – my word for 2017 has been ‘craft’. I was gifted this word by the goddess Iduna – the Goddess of Soul Food. Over this past year, she has taught me so much about embodying my soul and expressing my soul through the tangible creation of beauty and love. The word ‘craft’ comes from the Old Germanic word for ‘strength’ – and so I chose it because I wanted to get stronger in the ways that I showed up for my art by honing my skill – by developing my craft.

I had thought that was going to be through writing. I was all prepared for it to be writing! And then I discovered it wasn’t about writing at all – it was about knitting. And, again, I’ll only mention this briefly, as truly I could write a whole book about knitting – hahahaha!

My journey through the year with the word ‘craft’ as my touchstone has taken me in directions I never would have imagined. And as I end this year, I am taking with me a whole wealth of gifts… finely knitted shawls in so many colours and so many soft and precious fibres… a community of women who have lit up my life… a strengthened creative bond among the women of my family… an embodied intelligence tangibly delivered through skilful hands.

So what about this coming year? What about my word for 2018?

Well, as I said before, I have always chosen my word. But never before have I experienced a word choosing me. And that is exactly what has happened this year.

Before I begin to work on my list of My Word Goddess Readings, I begin by discerning my own goddess guide for the coming year. This feels like a planting of an intention, a setting of the scene, a sacred introduction… And so I can tell you that my goddess for 2018 is Artemis – the Goddess of Goal Setting/ Goal Getting. She is the protectress, the archeress, the wildly independent one who makes her home in the green places.

A sat with this knowledge for a bit, before picking up my needles and beginning to knit. I’m working on a snuggly shrug in a shade of bright rusty orange right now. The soft wool/alpaca blended fibre passing through my hands, as my fingers flick the yarn up and around the metal points of my needles. I find that knitting helps me settle my energy, so that I can discover what I know to be true.

By about the second row, I had my word. But it’s a strange word. So, I wasn’t sure… I began to second-guess. I’ll sit with it, I thought. I’ll let it marinate, let it stew. And if it sticks, then it sticks. I let a few days pass without giving it a huge amount of thought. After all, I’ve been busy busy busy working my way through my long list of readings! And then yesterday, my word claimed me.

A notification popped up on Facebook while I was answering some messages there. Someone who had purchased a reading for herself had informed a friend that she had bought one for her also, and she’d tagged me in the post. In the comments was a gif that contained my word…

No prizes for guessing what my word of 2018 is! Yep, the word I have been sitting with all this week is ‘concentrate’.

I first considered it because, as I was knitting, I found myself visualising the experience of seeing the forest through the eyes of Artemis. I felt the bow in her hand, the earth beneath her feet, the breeze ruffling her hair. And then I felt the experience of taking aim, drawing the arrow, the tension in the bow, and the strength of my own core muscles… everything about the experience was a concentrated effort. I had to fully be in my own skin – wholly as myself – before I could hit my target, my goal.

So, I began to think of the word ‘centre’ – the way that you need to centre in yourself to find your point of balance so that you can take the kind of actions that will allow progression – whatever that may be towards. But right on the back of that consideration, the word ‘concentrate’ found me. It comes from the Latin – to bring towards a centre, and has various meanings including to focus attention, to gather people or things, and to reduce a diluting agent to created a ‘concentrated essence’.

Now, just as with the word ‘craft’, I don’t know where this word will take me. And if I attempt to determine too closely the ways in which it will express, I will undoubtedly get it wrong. So, the trick is to hold it loosely, let it breathe, and trust in your own capacity to be attentive to its subtle nudges. Although, it would appear that there’s very little that is subtle about ‘concentrate’!

I would be so honoured to help you to choose your word for 2018, my love. After a few years of gifting myself with these readings, I decided to offer it as part of my business, and bring it’s gifts, its wisdom, to others. I’ve been offering it now for 7 years, and every year, it expands, it deepens, it dances. And so, this year, I have included even more words for you to choose from by including a selection inspired by an oracle card chosen specifically for your goddess, and the astrological transit of the asteroid named for your goddess.

My recommendation is that you read the quote, the evocation, the description, the prompts. That you visit the Pinterest page and spend time with some of the images that catch your eye. That you speak each one of the suggested words out loud. And then do the action that brings you peace, brings you clarity, brings you home to yourself – it might be a walk around the park, or it might be making soup. It might be your yoga practice or it might be writing in your journal. Or it might even be knitting.

Let the words settle. Let your imagination wonder. Let your thoughts flow with your breath. Let your word find you.

And then yes, you may wish to do what I did, which is park it for a while to see if it has staying power. You can explore the definitions online, look up its roots, check out its synonyms. Test it out. Try it on. Trust me – you’ll know when it’s the one.

If you would like your 2018 My Word Goddess Reading, then simply click on the link below for all the details and purchasing options.

2018 My Word Goddess Reading

And, as always, if you have any questions at all, do just ask. Oh, and once you do know which word you are choosing for the year ahead, do let me know. I so love this practice and find it endlessly fascinating!

The post Do you choose a word for the year? first appeared on Amy Palko.

As always, I will be sharing our goddess of the week in my free Goddess Guidance group on Facebook.

However, I will also be celebrating the first day of the Practical Magic Business Circle with all those who have chosen to enter in, who have chosen to do business differently, who have chosen to deepen into the giving of their gifts, the receiving of their soul medicine and the expression of their uniqueness.

And, honey? I would be so profoundly honoured to be entering into that journey with you this coming Monday.

*******************

Here’s all the details….

When: 7 weeks from 10th April to 26th May

Where: In a secret Facebook group with calls and office hours hosted on GoTo Meeting.

What: An online Goddess Guidance circle designed to support women to birth, tend, and evolve their businesses in alignment with their desire. This particular circle offers an exploration into the element of fire to add heat and spark back to your business, to reinvest your work with passion and devotion, and to dance in the radiant light of your own becoming.

Why: Because business is the key to self-liberation.
Because business is deeply fulfilling when you are engaging with your passions and aligning your work with your desire and your values.
Because business supports you as you serve others and send love out into the world.
Because business allows you to share your message with the world.
Because business is a vessel for your gifts.
Because business is a creative practice.
Because I truly want you to experience this for yourself, whether you’re just starting out and your business idea is still at the very beginning stages of development, or you’ve been growing your business for a while now.

How much: £300 GBP (with an option to split the payment over 2 months)

*******************

To claim your place in the next Practical Magic Business Circle choose one of the following options…

Click here for Full Price £300

Click here for the instalment option 2 x £150 option

Once I’ve received notice from Paypal, I will send you a message containing a link to the PMBC questionnaire, and I will build your altar for you in our secret group including your Sacred Rebel Oracle reading. I will then add you in so we’re all set for Monday.

Doors close on Sunday, so do claim your place asap, my loves.

The post The beginning is nigh…. first appeared on Amy Palko.