Evaluation: In my first two posts about my current Goddess Pilgrimage to Crete, I invited you to think about your stage in your present Heroine’s Journey as you adopted me.
In my hybrid of Joseph Campbell’s mono-myth with feminist scholar Maureen Murdock’s model, the primary six levels of the Heroine’s journey are: Odd World, the Name to Journey, Refusal of the Name, Arrival of Mentors, Crossing the First Threshold, and Encounters with Exams, Allies, and Enemies. These archetypal levels had been overlaid with Murdock’s Separation from the Female, Identification with the Masculine, Gathering of Allies, Highway of Trials, Assembly Ogres and Dragons, Discovering the Boon of Success, and Awakening to Emotions of Religious Aridity and Dying.
Briefly: At dwelling on Vancouver Island, Canada, I used to be overworked, other-focused, burnt out and overwhelmed with horrific household crises. I used to be petrified of doing the Goddess Pilgrimage alone. I lastly accepted divine help and flew to Crete. I examined constructive for COVID on the primary day of the pilgrimage.
Stage Seven – Strategy to the Inmost Cave – Initiation and Descent to the Goddess
My craving to attach with the female started at 13, studying Gloria Steinem and Ms. Journal with a flashlight below mattress covers. I couldn’t fathom the unfairness of my world. Absolutely somebody had a made a critical mistake. How may you expertise a lot inequity, abuse, and powerlessness simply since you had been born feminine? At 16, I labored with older ladies to create a Ladies’s Shelter in northern Alberta the place there was nice want. My life’s mission at that tender age was to rectify a critical mistake made by the adults. Sadly, I steadily fell below the patriarchy spell, succumbed to the promise of reward (success) if I behaved, and developed work dependancy. 45 years later, it grew to become pressing that I reconnect with the female to avoid wasting my life.
The primary day of the Pilgrimage in Heraklion, I examined constructive for COVID and was transported to Resort Idi, close to Zaros, Crete. I entered quarantine below the watchful eye of Mount Ida, a mountain I used to be destined to know intimately, a mountain I unconsciously named Mom Mountain. Alone, sick and exhausted, I slept for hours, hoping to get up to a adverse COVID take a look at so I may rejoin the official pilgrimage.
Smart reader, you could have predicted what my ‘supreme ordeal’ would entail, the contours of my innermost cave, and what my ‘initiation and descent to the Goddess’ would appear like.
I didn’t awaken to a adverse COVID take a look at.
No.
In truth, I might not get well and awaken to a transparent adverse pathogen take a look at for one more eleven days, on the very finish of the of the pilgrimage!
Stage Eight – Supreme Ordeal; Pressing Craving to Reconnect with the Female
How would Mom Mountain train me to be nonetheless, to obtain, to heal and get well from an unbelievably aggravating 5 years filled with traumatic crises, one after the opposite? She would shepherd me, inviting me to put down in Her bosom to rage, to cry, to heal, and to lastly meet my deepest self within the quiet and stillness below Mount Ida.
I had spent most of my life attempting to proper a flawed, attempting to ‘rescue’ ladies, attempting to insert myself into the lives of others and assist them see their very own energy. It began with my love for my mom, and my need to assist her. Then this want to assist morphed into care-taking and codependency, ignoring my very own wants, and having fun with the ego strokes that come from placing others’ wants forward of my very own. I assumed I had all of it discovered once I opened my personal observe and beginning serving ladies day by day.
I used to be alone in my quarantine for awhile earlier than 4 extra pilgrims joined me.There have been now 5 ladies convalescing whereas the others had moved on to different websites and actions. I used to be following a CDC routine the place two consecutive clear negatives in a 48 hour time-frame had been required earlier than I may re-join the bigger group. I examined day by day, to the purpose the place my childhood nosebleeds returned. Would I be capable of be part of the group at present? No? How about now? No? Perhaps on Day 5?
The reply was “No. Not but Terry.”
I used to be nervous about interacting with my 4 sister pilgrims. Would we make one another sicker? Might we meet outdoors, masked a number of ft aside on the resort property if we maintained distance? How may I assist the others come to phrases with being quarantined? Maybe I may kind a therapeutic group.
The 4 different quarantined pilgrims ‘let’ me lead an Autumnal Equinox ritual. We known as within the instructions and components; we invoked Mom Mountain as a result of She wouldn’t be ignored; we shared our matrilineal line within the model of Carol Christ, we mentioned how the Goddess we got at first of the pilgrimage was making Herself recognized.
I say that my avocado sisters ‘let’ me lead that first ritual as a result of I believe they acknowledged I wanted to. I ultimately realized I wished to strive not main, not taking up, not rescuing, not being the morale booster, not attempting so onerous! I fought with myself over relinquishing my default care-taking function. I had by no means stopped in my life.
I used to be fairly sick so I lastly surrendered. I allowed myself to step away from the group once I wanted to, to be silent and nonetheless on my little portico outdoors every day, to put in writing, replicate, sleep, relaxation, and get well. Resting was one of many hardest issues I’ve ever executed! I apologized for stepping away however my avocado sisters refused my guilt.
My mom by no means wanted me to rescue her.
My sisters by no means requested me to be the heroine.
I may higher share my items by changing into complete myself.
Wow.
The photograph is me looking my wee “cottage” window at Resort Idi within the village of Zaros within the Psiloritis mountains. Thanks avocado sister, Doreen!
To be continued tomorrow . . .
BIO: Theresa (Terry) People, MA, RCC, CCC is a Spiritually Built-in Psychotherapist, educator and writer. She serves ladies in her personal observe, SpiritFirst Counselling, in Comox on Vancouver Island, British Columbia, Canada. She facilitates Sophia Ladies’s Knowledge teams, and leads workshops for empowering ladies. She provides self remedy methods and religious practices on her web site and her Creator FB web page as a result of she believes her life’s mission is to assist ladies empower themselves. She is the writer of Counselling Approaches to Religious Points, a Masters Stage Curriculum for MA candidates focused on infusing religious sources in remedy. Terry can be the writer of One other Spring: A 12 months of Self Remedy & Religious Therapeutic Practices. She awaits a writer who acknowledges the worth of empowering ladies together with her ebook. You’ll be able to entry her items, meditations, and techniques at https://www.fb.com/TerryFolksSpiritFirstCounselling and right here at https://spiritfirstcounselling.ca/weblog/
