Remember

Posted in

• Memories
• Prayer

• katrina's blog
• Add new comment
• 168 reads

Buying a Vowel

My brother called me late last night. And although he said initially that nothing was the matter, he then proceeded to tell me just how hard his life has become lately. He seemed surprised that he was admitting this all to me on Thanksgiving just minutes before midnight.

And he laughed the entire phone call.

He said with what he was up against, that crying was not an option. His words seared into my heart and by the end of the call I too found myself laughing. And when he eventually hung up, I too found it impossible to cry, I was so heart sick, I was past tears.

I wandered blindly around my kitchen compulsively reaching for food till it hit me. The reason my brother called me minutes before midnight on Thanksgiving … is because I am the only person who he can tell the truth about his life. And at the moment, his life is fucking impossible. And that brought me back to brink of tears again, only much, much deeper. I fell asleep finally on the verge of sobbing.

This morning as I lay in bed, I thought about all the people in my life where crying is not an option at the moment. There is too much coming at them and it looks like it is starting to speed up. My brother is facing heart stopping stress, backbreaking work and utter exhaustion to hold off complete financial ruin … and he is losing the fight. My friend K is facing a life threatening illness with very slim chances of fending off having to make a terminal choice. And my friend S just buried her father and has to fly home to the west coast while leaving her grieving mother on the east coast. And then there are the myriad of friends facing hard choices about what to do with their ailing parents who increasingly need almost constant care.

Everywhere I look, I see loved ones facing some very hard choices and looking desperately for some new options, some alternatives to what seems like impossible choices.

And so today ... For my brother, my friends, and people suffering everywhere who may feel sometimes that crying is not an option … I pray to the gods. I pray that the tightness loosen, and that the rough areas recede. I pray for sweetness and joy to fill their lungs and heart in whatever way brings them some respite. I pray for concrete answers to desperate prayers. I pray for forgiveness and resolution. I pray for compassion and miracles. I pray for lightness and real laughter that eases away despair. I pray for divine intervention and love. I pray for second chances and fool’s luck.

Today, I pray that in this hard, hard world of constriction, restriction and limits, that my tears, my real and welcomed tears on their behalf, will give them what they need to buy a vowel.

Posted in

• Prayer
• Witness

• katrina's blog
• 2 comments
• Read more
• 305 reads

Answered Prayers

I shared during one of my workshops recently, how as a child I had prayed almost every night. I mostly prayed for finished homework and chores. I also shared how disappointed I was at what I considered a general lack of response. I thought this meant that the god of the Catholics was uninterested in my heartfelt prayers to escape work and tedium. I ended this story by saying that what I had learned over time was that I had simply been praying to the wrong gods.

I now know who to direct such prayers. And nowadays, my prayers are answered. I do not mean in that universal abstract kind of way either. My prayers are answered concretely and in the here and now.

One of my answered prayers was revealed to me yesterday. I had set November 15th as the go/no decision date for my Descent workshop and as of yesterday, my workshop is a go! Yay!

I had asked for a sign that this was the kind of work I should pursue, and the answer was revealed with a resounding Yes!

And yes, I have enough participants which is wonderful, but more than that, I discovered an error in my tracking spreadsheet that when corrected suddenly made these workshops less risky and overall easier to plan. So in the same day, I received sufficient registrations AND discovered a way to do more of them. Wow!

Some may say that this was simply a revelation of an error I had made, and thus it does not count as divine intervention. And in many ways that is a correct statement. But here is the woo-woo part, as Thorn often refers to situations like this, I have used this exact spreadsheet in many guises for event planning over the last eight years. And in not one of those events, had there been an error of this magnitude or scope. And the fact that I did not notice this particular error till after I made my heartfelt prayer is also significant.

To me, timing is everything. And today I feel remarkably better about my work and the steps I have taken to share it with the community at large.

I guess I could also say, I have learned what to ask for in prayer too. I no longer ask the gods to do the work for me. I ask them instead to guide me in my work, to help me do my work, and more importantly, to reassure me that I am on the right path.

And today, I feel reassured … cuz my prayers have been answered.

Ashe. Amen. Blessed Be!
Katrina

PS: Also as of today, I will open late registration for Descent. So there is still time to join us for our journey into mystery.

Posted in

• Prayer
• Spirit
• Magick

• katrina's blog
• 1 comment
• 330 reads

Giving Thanks ...

From Thanksgiving Meditation 2006 by Rabbi Michael Lerner

...The universe did not have to evolve in the direction of creating conscious creatures who could yearn for love and could appreciate complexity and could rejoice in the abundance and manifest kindness. Thank you universe, thank you the consciousness of the universe, thank you the evolutionary force of the universe, thank you God, thank you the Force of Life and Healing and Transformation, thank you however inadequate my formulation of your name and your being, for having evolved in this particular direction so that life would emerge from the elements, so that consciousness would emerge from life, so that kindness and love and attraction to peace and justice would emerge from consciousness....

What a profound recognition of all that we have to be thankful for, in the here and now and in the eternal march of life and consciousness.

Thanks be to the goddess, as well for allowing us, no ... compelling us to question everything, even our own existence. Nurturing our curiosity, our arrogance, our compassion, our desires, our humility, and our self doubt -- what a loving and giving creatrix.

In the words of Psalm 48, "Within your temple, we ponder your loving kindness, oh god."

Within this temple of Malkuth, we ponder the kindness of a loving god ... and we give thanks...

And I give thanks for all of you as well...

... whether you are weeping, laughing, dancing or struggling ... I am thankful for the joy of your salty tears and the musk of your moist desires. I thank the gods for each and every one of you.

Ache, amen and blessed be [From Mary's Daughter: Giving Thanks ...]

Posted in

• Prayer
• Spirit

• katrina's blog
• Add new comment
• Read more
• 685 reads