Cerridwen

Something urged me to pick up my copy of the beautiful book by the amazing priestess Patricia Monaghan, The Goddess Companion,today. The book is organized by date, with a lovely poem and story accompanying it honoring a Goddess or Goddesses from a different culture, and it is not according to a specific year, so it can be used anytime. I first purchased it at my first First Degree Initiation at Ostara 2002, and I strongly recommend it for any follower of any Pagan path, or any lover of Goddesses or Women’s Spirituality and empowerment.

Today, my inner voice urged me to turn to today’s date, rather than paging through at random as I sometimes do. I did, and the message for today, as my inner self predicted, spoke to me deeply:

I am the womb of every hope
I am the fire of every season
I am the queen of every hive
I am the tomb of every life

I am a drop
of morning dew
I am a star
in the evening sky
I am the light
by which you read
I am a word
in this very book
-Welsh bardic incantations

Patricia goes on to speak about how we need not go on a pilgrimage to find the Goddess in faraway lands..She is right here. At this very moment. That’s right. This very moment. I know it is hard to believe when you are, say, trying to keep your sanity while dealing with an annoying co worker, fighting with your spouse, trying to comfort an infant who is screaming in your ear at two am or scrubbing cat vomit out of a hardwood floor (the delight I woke up to yesterday.). There’s a well-known Zen saying that says, “When in pursuit of the Divine, chop wood, and carry water.”. I interpret that , among other things,to mean”look for the Goddess in every day life, and that every movement can be sacred. That’s right. Every one. The Divine is right there. Right here.

Women are constantly under assault and under pressure in the media and given the message, clearly, with few exceptions to hate their bodies the way they are and to constantly push to be different. Diet and plastic surgery industries make millions of dollars a year. I’m not talking about healthy diet and exercise to feel better and to live a more physically active lifestyle. I mean the constant push to look younger,to be smaller , to fit into those pants you wore in high school, to cover scars, to cover greys, to whiten your teeth, to..to…to…

It seems that the you you are now, is never good enough. That you always need another product, another pair of pants, another nip and tuck, another diet. That aging is a horror and not a blessing, and that you are only worth how others see you and what society judges what you are.

Don’t get me wrong. Men are included here, too. Nowadays, more so than ever, with the products growing more and more by the day to include men and to tell them to get in shape, to sculpt their abs and “buns” (I’ve never heard anyone outside of a fitness ad say “buns”..maybe it’s just me.), to use products to, er, keep them “going” , to cover their grey hair to get a job or a woman (those hair colour ads have literally made me throw things at the TV.). To be macho, but sensitive. But not too macho.Or too sensitive.

What’s a woman or man to do??

I want you to do me a favour right now. Yes. Right now. I’ll wait. Go and find a mirror. Big or small. Look in that mirror and see yourself. Really, truly see yourself. Allow yourself to slowly drift and enter a very very light trance, enough to see yourself beyond the physical traits. See the sparkle in your eye, the shape of your mouth that curves deliciously to speak or to smile or frown, the muscles that can move in hundreds of ways.

Slowly see the spirit emerge. See that there is a Goddess or a God there. Really SEEE it. Say with me.

“Thou art God/dess”.

See it. Believe it.

For you are.

So Mote it Be.

*Doing this daily is an excellent exercise to connect with the God/dess within. I recommend it in the morning and/or the evening as a part of a daily devotion, or as a daily devotion if you don’t have time for one or are just getting started!!*