Holding What Must Be Held
Trying to share elements of a personal practice with others is a game of extracting the parts that are useful (the practice) from the parts that situate the practice in a personal cosmology (the personal). It's something that I see a lot of people get wrong and often results in focusing on, as Tayannah Lee McQuillar might say, "the sizzle and not the steak". It's something that I'm going to try very hard to not get wrong here.
After the last couple of years of taking shelter from the veritable shitstorm of a lifetime (and I don't think I'm alone here) the clouds are starting to part and some of the sprouts planted before the shitstorm are beginning to germinate (shit is a great fertilizer after all). I didn't really know what any of those plants were going to grow into, I just buried those seeds in the ground and hoped for the best. Stuff is starting to poke up now though, and it's a very exciting time.
One of the things that poked up recently is my own connection with my ancestral lineage, a line that is as broken and fractured as anyone's in the "new world". It's the start of what I suspect will be a lifetime of work. Fortunately, there's been some interesting clues and signposts along the way that have connected parts of my story that didn't seem previously related. (Hint: IT'S ALL RELATED) Anyway, something connected recently that's had a significant positive impact on my life, and while I'm not going to share the specifics, I do want to share what I think I've learned in the hopes that the pattern may look familiar to others. Maybe it will make a connection for you that wasn't there before.
Challenges & Stuff
Everyone comes into this existence with their own unique set of... let's say stuff. Some of that stuff helps us along on our path, and some of that stuff is challenges we must overcome. Figuring out how we tackle the challenges is itself a challenge. Sometimes just getting an objective perspective seems impossible because of how fundamental some of these challenges feel to who we are as people. How can we take action on something that seems impossible to untangle from our own sense of self?
Well, at least for me, one of biggest challenges doesn't need any action at all (even though I was certain that it did). This came as a revelation from contact with spirit in the form of a laughing voice stating: "Oh that? You just have to carry it, silly." Like that's supposed to be obvious. Spirits... 🙄
This challenge was given to me to hold through this lifetime, and then bury. I'm the conduit through which it finds its way to the universal trash compactor. It will die with me and all I have to do in this life is contain it. As an engineer I automatically assume that every challenge is a problem waiting for a solution, but this isn't a problem to be solved; it's a pile of potato peelings that I just have to carry to the compost. That's it.
I don't want to trivialize the difficulty of carrying this particular pile of potato peelings out to the compost (it's hard as fuck actually), but now that I know the task, things are a lot easier. I know what I need to focus on.
Take This Trash Out KTHNX -The Universe
So if you are dealing with a recurring life challenge that seems impossible to fix, maybe it's not something that needs fixing at all. Consult the bones. Consult your ancestors. Consult the spirits. Maybe you just need to contain it so that it doesn't spill all over the place (particularly onto others) and simply carry it all the way to the finish line.
I hope this is medicine for someone. It certainly was for me.
Figma Class Coming Soon!
Now that I'm back from vacation I've finished up the Figma class content and will be sending out the invite soon, so stay tuned! Here's the synopsis in case you are all like: what the hell is Figma and why do I care?
Figma For Magicians
Drawing seals? Designing your own grimoire/book of shadows? Creating illustrations for planetary talismans? Creating a new cartomantic deck? Whatever part design plays in your practice, I'm going to show you how Figma will make your life just oh so much better. Stop using crappy expensive software from a company that starts with "A" and ends in "dobe". The design world has moved on (and so should you!)