Queen of Swords

We define ourselves, in part, by the stories we tell about ourselves. We choose certain aspects of ourselves and make them prominent by the way we privelege them in how we talk about ourselves to others -- and in our own internal dialogue.

Long-time friends may remember that several years ago one of the primary features of my story of myself was that I was a woman whose heart had been badly broken twice in quick succession, and who never expected to love again. One day, while making an entry here, I realized I was tired of that story. I didn't feel an active desire to be in a relationship again, but I knew I didn't want that to be my story anymore. I stopped telling that story to myself or to others.

Not too many months later, _storyteller_, with uncrowned_king looking over his shoulder, left his first comment on my journal, starting me on the road to not one but two amazing loves.

This morning I wrote an entry that at the last moment I decided to make private. It wasn't anything super-secret or extremely decliate. It was stuff I've posted about frequently before -- and that was the trouble. I realized that I was tired of telling certain stories about myself, tired of living certain narratives that trap me in pain and frustration.

I need to change some of my stories. It's time to stop telling the story of a woman with a Masters Degree trapped in a day job that gives her no satisfaction. It's time to stop telling the story of grief over my lover's death. It's time to stop telling the story of the reluctant mother.

It's time to start telling the story of the priestess and spiritual director and author. It's time to start telling the story of the woman who has been blessed with a love that transcends time and space and the material world. It's time to start telling the story of the amazing relationship I have with my terrific daughter.


Careful the tale you tell, that is the spell warns the Witch in Sondheim's "Into the Woods" -- and it's the truth.

The facts of my life are no different at this moment than they were two hours ago. But I'm telling a new story -- which means I'm creating a whole new world for myself to inhabit and I'm shaping a whole new destiny.



What stories are you telling about yourself?
Are you telling the story of the person you really want to be?

Well, the inventory turned out to be a much more grueling project than I'd realized -- but it was also even more worthwhile. I'm tired this morning, but feel far more settled and together internally than I have in weeks.

I'm sure a big part of this has been the after-effects of my July initiation. If something like that "takes" then everything gets stirred up at a deep level. The fact that my primary realization has been that my entire life must be built around Spirit if I'm going to be happy certainly follows from a priestess initiation.

For the next couple of days I'm focusing on getting Wolfling grounded in junior high, then I'll go back through my document and start lifting the pieces I want to prioritize. But before that -- I'm just realizing, as if receiving a tap on the shoulder -- I need to engage in the more subtle process of mapping the interconnections between the various aspects I've indicated as being most fundamental/critical.

Fascinating process. . . .

If anyone has prayers to spare today, Wolfling could use them. Her usually bold spirit is quailing a bit at the prospect of starting junior high, and she can use some extra encouragement and positive energy around her.

I had the pleasure of having athenian_abroad and our mutual friend Nick as houseguests last weekend. The three of us go waaaay back: Nick and I to 1978, with athenian_abroad becoming our friend in 1981. Lots of history.

On Sunday morning, Nick slept in very late so athenian_abroad and I had several hours hours to ourselves to talk, and he had some very good questions and helpful insights about where I am right now and what I want to do. To me, his very presence is inspiring. He's brilliant. Talking to him makes me feel like I really need to gain some clarity in my thinking and become better educated. There are not many people who have that effect on me!

During our conversation I had an important realization: that I've been stalling out on most of my big goals because I'm allowing myself to be derailed by emotional reactions to the tasks/steps instead of allowing my excitement/commitment to the big goal itself to inspire me and move me forward. For example, I know I want more spiritual direction clients. I feel alive, excited, meaningful when I have a session with my one client -- or with a spontaneous direction-like encounter with a friend or stranger, and I would really like to make enough income from my vocation to free me from needing to work a full-time day job -- but it's all too easy to stall out over creating the marketing pieces (business cards, brochures, website, article for local special interest papers) which will actually introduce me and what I do to a wider audience. I say I want more friends, want to get more involved in certain communities, but when activities appear on my calendar I look forward to them for a week but when the time comes I say "I really don't feel like going out."

That's short-sighted. It's childish. I'm letting my "don't wanna" inner kid prevent me from making progress on what I say are important goals.

This is the same inner kid who gets bored with spiritual practice, cooking healthy meals, and getting on the treadmill. She's a spoiled brat -- a real pain! -- and I've been letting her get away with murder, letting her get away with tantrums and obstruction which I would never tolerate from Wolfling. She's pleasure-focused, short-sighted, prefers comfort and indolence to achievement, satisfaction, and meaning. A little of her is good and healthy -- but she's been ruling my life and it's long since time I put her in her proper place. But it's going to be tough to change those habits of thought and choice.

Wolfling is spending this weekend with her dad. I'm going to use the time alone to do the personal inventory I posted about yesterday -- and take a long, serious look at where I am, where I want to be, and what I need to do to get there.

As ever, I return to the quote by Sean Connery from the movie The Untouchables: What are ye prepared ta do?




I know I've made posts like this before and they haven't been followed by much real action. (It's embarrassing.) But I need to keep having the realizations over and over until they stick. I need to keep trying new things, taking the baby steps, if I'm going to get anywhere.

Tallman's Archetypes for Spiritual Direction continues to resonate with me and inform my daily choices as I pause to reflect on whether I am acting from a healthy/heroic energy or a Shadow, particularly in the area of the Sovereign and the Abdicator shadow, as it relates to my hearthkeeping.

I continue to play with my perceptions of the archetypes, listing my heroes and heroines in a matrix and checking off which archetypes they model.

The problem was that for several of them, there was something missing. For example, Veronica Franco (as portrayed by Catherine McCormack in the movie Dangerous Beauty -- that's her in the icon on this post) -- is a highly educated courtesan, definitely a Lover. But she's more than that. She takes a stand against her society's treatment of women, and the Church's repression of human sexuality. But it didn't feel right to label her a Warrior. She displayed some of the traits which I associate with the Warrior, but it didn't fit her energy.

After a lot of contemplation, and after looking at the mandala I had been slowly putting together, where I had placed Inanna at the center, I realized that what was missing for me was the Rebel. As Veronica demonstrates, the Rebel has traits in common with the Warrior: a willingness to confront, to resist, to be willing to die for something greater than self. But for me part of the Rebel is simply about being able to see outside the frame, to resist the dominant paradigm, to say "there is another way." I suppose Tallman would call the Rebel a combination of the Seer and the Warrior: one who sees another way and then goes to the mat in the name of those convictions (again, Gandhi comes to mind), but for me, this particular energy/orientation calls for it's own category.

( Some of this goes over ground I've covered here before. It seems to be a lesson I need to keep coming back to so I can fully integrate it. )

This has been an interesting topic to ponder the last few days: my emotional perceptions of the difference between these two concepts, and how focusing on one or the other makes me more effective in pursuing what I truly want.

I think "power" is a wonderful word. It sings of potency, of energy, of vast resources. It is formidable not only in itself but in its potential. I have always wanted power: the potent energy to do, to accomplish.

( More behind the cut, out of respect for your Friends page ) Then there's "agency," a word that I only recently learned can refer to more than an "organization." A person who has agency is a person who makes choices, and who acts. It is a word of personal sovereignty, of the kind of freedom that transcends external circumstances.

I don't feel "powerful." I very seldom have, for all that I have been blessed with talent and priveleges. But for the past week or so, I have been affirming my own agency again and again and again. And I have been doing. I have been moving forward. I have become more confident, more in control of my own life.

I have never thought of myself as the Cinderella type, waiting for a prince to come and rescue me. But I do seem to have always been waiting for others to drop things in my lap, to present me with opportunities, to draw me out, to encourage me, to enable me. I've been waiting not for a prince, but for my fairy godmother to dress me up, give me my coach, and send me to the ball, where then I could dazzle everyone and win my heart's desire. Lacking a fairy godmother, I gave up on the ball instead of going shopping for a dress and calling a taxi -- or limo service.

( Another cut for space )

I don't feel powerful nearly as much as I would like. But I have come to believe in my own agency. I have the freedom to choose, and to act. And that's where the changes are coming from.

Since I'm having trouble coming up with quality content these days, I'll shamelessly follow after my dear friend bookchick, with the Interests meme:

Look at your LJ "interests" list. If you have fewer than 50 interests, pick every fifth one. If you have between fifty and seventy-five interests, pick every seventh one. If you have over seventy-five interests, pick every tenth one. If you have fewer than ten, pick all of 'em. List them on your LJ, and tell everyone exactly what it is about these things that interests you so much.

I have 140 interests (some of them redundant).

Beauty and the Beast: I'm a fan of the Disney movie, largely because Belle reminds me very much of the girl I was: coming from a small town, being "not like the rest of us," always reading and dreaming of magical adventures. I've also come to see how often I've acted out the "Beauty and the Beast" relationship pattern in my life: loving men who were "beastly" but believing that if I loved them faithfully and passionately enough they would turn into princes. So far my success rate is 0, and I've resolved to change that pattern.

Comparative Religion: Peoples' religious beliefs fascinate me. The similarities and differences between religions fascinate me. I have a Masters Degree in Comparative Religion, and am working on ways to use that education -- and my eclectic personal spiritual path -- as a basis for workshops and retreats for people who want to learn more about the variety of ways in which people respond to the Divine.

Decadence: I love luxury and sensual excess: lush textures, rich chocolate, fine steaks, long massages, sleeping in followed by breakfast in bed, room service, hours and hours of lovemaking, and all the other delicious, excessive non-essentials in life. I wish I could afford more of them.

Guinevere: Guinevere fascinates me as a mythic figure who has been shaped to serve so many different versions of the Matter of Britain. My favorite versions of her are heroic, most especially her portrayal in Parke Godwin's novels where she is flawed but formidable (excerpt here: http://jsh32.tripod.com/heroines/id7.html). See also: http://jsh32.tripod.com/heroines/id6.html

Inanna: The Descent of Inanna is a powerful myth of initiation and transformation, one which helped me heal after I escaped from an abusive relationship. Inanna is a complex figure, combining the realms of war, sovereignty, prosperity, learning (she won the mes, the arts of civilization, from her father after she got him drunk) and sexuality. My Comparative Religion thesis was about sacred prostitution, a practice which is often linked with her name. (I can explain why this isn't necessarily an accurate perception, but this isn't the place for that discussion.)

Lilith: The third-in-a-row mythic female figure prominent for sexuality and violating boundaries. (And me a seminarian. . . even if I am on leave at the moment. . . ) Lilith appears in the ancient poem Inanna and the huluppu Tree, but attempts to make her a figure of Jewish midrash are erroneous. The Alphabet of Ben Sirach, which is the source for the famous story of her refusing to lie under Adam for sex is actually a satirical work. Still, the story has tremendous power, and I count myself among those who consider Lilith a "patron saint of bad girls" and rebels. During my last semester in college I wrote my own midrash on Lilith, exploring what it was that caused the divine harmony of the first man and woman to be disrupted by Adam's insistence on being on top. It's still one of my favorite pieces of fiction.

Myth: In the academic study of religion, "myth" means "sacred story" not "those quaint stories told those poor, primitive, deluded heathens." Myth is one of the most powerful ways we have to communicate, for good or ill. I want to become better at writing and telling myths.

Prayer: Prayer is talking to the Divine. I go back and forth between formal techniques and spontaneous conversation. I need to do more praying, and I need to get better at praying with others.

Royalty: Ever since I was very young, I've had a very mythic understanding of royalty. I've always seen royalty as a position of ultimate privelege and ultimate responsibility. I started writing stories about hieros gamos/sacred marriage consecrations and king sacrifices before I was out of junior high. On the mythic level, royalty, like the priesthood, is a pivot point between the People and the Divine. (And I'm a Protestant mystic who belives that direct connection to the Divine is the birthright of every human being!) I don't care about modern royals; but something about the ancient practices, especially the Middle Eastern and Celtic, resonates very deep within me.

Shakespeare: I was a theatre major, and I've worked on three production of Hamlet, directed The Taming of the Shrew, and believe -- like many -- that Shakespeare is one of our wisest observers and illuminators of the human experience.

Storytelling: I've written stories since I was very young. I tend to talk in stories and tell stories to provide context for any situation, observation or opinion that I hold. I want to become skilled at oral storytelling, be able to spin tales to delight and provoke young and old alike.

The Stars: The stars have always beckoned to me. I've never been a nature girl, but the night sky mesmerizes me. My "magical" daydreams were not of going to fairyland, but of journeying among the stars. I love the episode in the movie Contact in which Ellie talks about the sounds the different stars make. I love the idea of being intimately familiar with the voices of the stars.

villains: A really good heroic story needs a really impressive villain. As a sometime gamemaster of role-playing games, I am challenged to come up with formidable villains. I find it a challenge not because I don't have villainy in my own heart, but because I'm afraid of what I'll betray about my own shadow side if I really use that part of myself for role-playing. I love a really "good" villain. Croup and Vandermere, from Neverwhere are high on my list of favorites.

Writing: I can talk a blue streak when I'm in the right mood and the right company, but writing is my primary way of expressing the deeper parts of myself, whether through journaling (paper journal or here), writing to friends, writing stories (both for public viewing and my own private explorations), or academic writing. My longest-held dream is to publish a novel.