Animal Guides: Spider

About a month ago, Spider announced herself in my life in a somewhat startling, then very beautiful way.

On the night of the last Super Moon at the end of July, I brought all my crystals outside to soak in the moonlight. I joined them on an air mattress and was sleeping relatively peacefully, until sometime in the middle of the night when I awoke to feel a spider bite my top lip, right in the center. In my half-asleep, bewildered state, I announced to the spider, “That hurts! Who does that?!?” I rolled over, already feeling my lip swell under my fingertips. I managed to fall back asleep fairly quickly, thinking that the spider had some nerve biting me (on my lip, no less) while I was minding my own business, sleeping.

The next morning, my upper lip was swollen to several times its normal size. I endured a few hours of talking strangely and drooling a little bit, but with my magic natural detox, my lip looked pretty much normal by midday. I filed the incident under “Unusual, but not significant,” and moved on.

Two days later, I participated in a traditional Native American dance ceremony. At some point in the late morning, I noticed some very tiny spiders appear on me. I escorted them down to the safety of the grass, only to discover more and more baby spiders show up throughout the next several hours. They appeared as if out of nowhere to crawl on my body and my clothes, and I gently transported them to the grass and nearby plants where I wouldn’t accidentally smoosh them with my movements. I asked both of my dance neighbors on either side (about 5 or 6 feet away) if they had any tiny spider visitors, and I felt surprised when each of them told me that they were completely spider-free. Apparently there had just been a hatching immediately over my head. The rain of baby spiders continued through the early afternoon, and while I thanked Grandmother Spider for sending me her grandchildren and tried asking her what I was supposed to learn, I was sufficiently distracted by the dance ceremony itself (read about it here) and did not have enough attention for an answer.

When I eventually did get to meditate with Spider energy a few days later, the information that came through resonated deeply with me:

Spiders are the weavers of life. Through their weaving, everything is connected. They help form the bridge between the past and future, the subconscious and conscious, male and female, waking and dreaming life, physical and spiritual realms. They embody infinity, and their webs’ spiral shape represents the First Cosmic Key of the Universe, from which all other forms manifest.

Research from outside sources revealed that Spider is the keeper of ancient languages and alphabets, and that the geometric shapes found in a spider’s web became the first symbols of written language. Spiders are storytellers! How cool is that?

It blows my mind that I could be so deeply connected to Spider without consciously knowing that I work with her energy. Maybe that’s why she sent one of her children to bite me in my sleep, on my lip, infusing me with a strong dose of Spider medicine to aid in my own storytelling of weaving the bridge between human and Divine realms. (I even use the term “Thought Spiral” when I’m describing the long, multidimensional path an idea takes when it pulls together many seemingly unrelated concepts that ultimately connect to form a complete and cohesive picture. Thank you, Spider.)

All that said, working directly with Spider medicine has not felt completely intuitive to me. Some animals (generally mammals and birds) are so much easier for me to jump right into a very embodied understanding of what it means to access their energy. Maybe it’s partially due to cultural conditioning, maybe it’s because their movement and body shape are so unlike my own, but I definitely need to sink deep in order to fully honor this guide and do her justice.

That’s partly why I’m so excited to teach my Animal Dance workshop next weekend in Portland, OR. While I guide others through the process of discovering their Animal Totems and moving into a place of embodied understanding, I plan to do the same with Spider. I am so grateful for the opportunity to facilitate this journey! Working with my own Animal Guides has been a rich, truly educational experience that helps me discover more and more layers of my own consciousness and personal evolution. I can’t wait to help others access the wealth of knowledge and powerful wisdom available to them from their Animal Guides.

If you would like to register for the workshop, please do so here.

Workshop information here: http://joyofenergy.com/healingclassesandworkshops.html

To sign up for my newsletter and receive notifications about future events and workshops, do so here.

Thank you, Spider. And thank you to all my other Animal Guides and many teachers.

The Dogma of Tradition

Dogma, regardless of the school of thought or belief system, is still dogma.

I received this reminder in a very unexpected way over the weekend when I participated in a traditional Native American dance ceremony. The opportunity to dance came across my radar about a month and a half ago in that insistent, nudging way that Spirit so often uses to get our attention. I knew immediately that I needed to participate and experience connection with Source through the magic of this ceremony.

When I completed my registration and had all the introductory conversations with the leaders, I received a long list of specific items I would need in order to participate. I spent weeks assembling the ceremonial tools and attire, carefully following all the directions. That was the first sign of what I would take away from the weekend, but I didn’t see it at the time.

Fast forward to Saturday afternoon, when the group of dancers received instructions from Leadership regarding the extensive list of rules for the ceremony. Throughout the teaching, I heard a lot of “Never do _____,” “Make sure you always ______,” and “You are not ever allowed to ______.” The words “never” and “always” tend to be big red flags in my book, but I absorbed the teaching and took great care to memorize the protocols.

On Sunday, when we held ceremony and danced for about 12 hours, I made sure to follow all the instructions. I walked in the correct direction, I never turned my back a certain way, I always carried my specific items, I used the scripted language when offering prayer, I made sure never to cross certain lines in the space, and I didn’t sing. Out of respect for the privacy around this tradition, that is the only specific detail I will share: the dancers were not allowed to sing. I felt completely taken aback when they told us on Saturday that only certain people sang during the ceremony. For me, sharing my voice and channeling my heart song feels integral to my connection with Spirit. Not allowing me to do so felt like robbing me of one of the sacred tools of my own practice.

In fact, I spent so much time throughout the day making sure to follow directions that my moments of feeling a deep connection with Spirit were rare, and usually when I was not actively dancing. I experienced flares of anger at being instructed in such a rigid system how I was to go about connecting with Spirit, and at one point was completely dumbfounded at the hypocrisy when the Dance Chief called a dedication dance to “burn away all that which does not serve us: bigotry, ignorance, and (you guessed it) dogma.” Fully realizing the irony, I dedicated a dance to eradicating dogma while stifling the urge to blurt out, “Are you kidding me?”

Let me make it clear that I hold nothing against these people or against appreciating tradition for tradition’s sake. I feel so honored for the opportunity and I greatly enjoyed connecting with many welcoming members of the community. I also feel certain that these people understand that there are many paths of Spiritual practice and appreciate that everyone follows their own journey.

That being said, it is very hard for me to accept a tradition that utilizes mechanisms of control and exclusion to promote Spirituality as anything I would ever want to pursue. This holds true for any tradition/school of thought/religion, not just the one I experienced over the weekend. Again, I appreciate these traditions and ceremonies for their cultural value and their importance as precursors for the continually evolving energies we experience on Earth, but telling someone that they have to follow all these rules to connect with Spirit feels very “old paradigm.” (I absolutely loathe the terms “old paradigm” and “new paradigm,” but I feel called to use it here. Hopefully that indicates how strongly I feel about this issue.)

Imagine the case of art: there was a time when artistic dogma dictated that you were only supposed to work with certain media, that portraying people or items in ways other than the prescribed norm was “wrong,” that you were never supposed to mix certain colors or work outside the artistic ideals. Many artists throughout history were considered crazy or profane as they pushed the boundaries of what popular opinion considered “art,” but they were later recognized as revolutionary for their stylistic choices (sometimes during their lifetimes, sometimes not). Eventually, society honored them for breaking out of artistic dogma and creating their work intuitively. Today, artists who receive formal training learn certain techniques and skills, but their instructors encourage them to develop their own style and produce original work that comes from their own internal truth.

So why is Spiritual practice not taught or passed down in the same way? That’s probably the biggest thing that I emphasize with my Reiki students: there are certain techniques and procedures that I teach them, but ultimately I tell them that their practice will continue to evolve over time as they cultivate their own intuition. The only times I offer specific “must do it this way” directions are in health- or safety-related situations that require certain protocol. Otherwise, I am always delighted to hear stories from my students or clients as they share their excitement with me regarding a new development in their intuitive practice. I am always happy to offer mentorship and guidance, or suggest directions for further investigation, but I never tell anyone what their Spiritual practice should look like. In fact, my Spiritual Mentorship page looks like this: http://joyofenergy.com/reikiclasses.html In every class description, I emphasize the importance of cultivating one’s own intuition.

My biggest takeaway from the weekend feels like a very definite affirmation of the intuitive nature of my practice. I hold great appreciation for traditional ceremony and ritual, and now I feel like I can honor it in a different way for its own sake, rather than looking to it as a mechanism for Divine connection. After all, the “practice” part of Spiritual practice is only a means to achieve the goal of connection with Spirit. When practice itself becomes the main focus, the true intent is often lost. This is why, rather than following rigid protocols and dogma developed by humans, I prefer to receive my guidance directly from (the) Source. My practice will continue to evolve as my wealth of intuitive guidance grows, but I know that, as long as I hold the intention of living in service to Self and Spirit, my work will reflect this state of ease and harmony as I work directly with the Divine.

Spirit Dance

Last Sunday, I experienced something completely new and amazing at dance.

I started participating in Ecstatic Dance about a year and a half ago. Ecstatic Dance, unlike many types of dance, is completely improvised and is most akin to a form of moving meditation. Imagine a giant ballroom full of 200 people all moving completely in accordance with how the music manifests in their bodies, expressing their energies and emotions through nonverbal communication: that’s my Sunday morning. (And sometimes Wednesday and Thursday nights.) The music ranges from very melodic, peaceful meditation-esque tones to heavy electronic dubstep and tribal house. It’s completely fantastic.

Ecstatic Dance

My “sinking in” to have a really good dance usually depends on the music (as a DJ myself, I’m pickier than most), but more so on how I’m feeling physically, emotionally and Spiritually. Last Sunday morning I was ripe for an amazing dance. I felt ready to move some serious energy!

And the music was gorgeous. That morning’s theme was Universal Love, and the DJs outdid themselves with a set so rich and fluid that dropping in felt completely effortless.

As the music grew more and more intense, my moving meditation deepened.

Suddenly, as the controlled frenzy of my dance reached a peak with the music, I looked around and I had no idea where I was. I was vaguely aware of all the people whirling and stamping around me, but I had no clue as to who they were. It could have been extremely disorienting, but instead I felt incredibly safe and thought, “Okay, I’ll just keep dancing!” The floor was the only thing I could see clearly, so I danced this trance state into the floor with all of the euphoria coursing through my veins.

The feeling couldn’t have lasted more than thirty seconds, but it was one of those moments completely distinct from any other, suspended in time. When I next looked up I knew my surroundings, I recognized the people around me and I cognitively knew what I was doing. I found myself almost disappointed to have returned to my awareness, but quickly felt a surge of gratitude, love and affection for dance, for the space and for my community. The rest of my dance was equally fantastic, though I didn’t experience any more trance states.

No specific incidents come to mind now as I try to remember a previous experience with that feeling, but the familiarity of the sensation leads me to believe I’ve done it before. Either that or one could use the argument, “Of course it feels familiar. Everything dissolved for a moment into Spirit, which is ultimately who you are and where you’re from.”

I find it interesting that this experience comes on the heels of my last post, where the message from Spirit was all about me being fully present in my own life and not stepping out of the way inside myself to make room for other peoples’ energy. I didn’t lose my sense of self while I was dancing. I still felt completely safe, grounded and like I existed on some plane—the part that dissolved was everything around me. I feel like this speaks to the importance of being grounded in oneself. I imagine that, if I had less of a connection with the core of myself as Divinely Embodied Being Michelle, the experience would have been uncomfortable and potentially frightening, had I been able to get there at all.

I am grateful every day for my body, which allows me to run around the world and do amazing things like dance, touch everything, and feel incredible sensations.

I am grateful for my Reiki and Shamanic practices, which allow me to feel grounded in myself so that I CAN journey into Spirit and find my way back safely.

And as always, I am grateful to be a Divinely Embodied Being here in this lifetime on Earth.

On a dance-logistic-related note, my next set is Sunday, October 5^th. If you’d like to come hear me DJ some amazing sound healing and get your dance on, come by the Tiffany Center (SW 14^th and Morrison, Portland OR) at 2pm. If you’d like to hear some of my previous sets for sound healing, go here: http://www.mixcloud.com/michellesundance/