Alysse Aallyn

Category: Creativity

  • Becoming a Goddess – The Goddess Oracle by Alysse Aallyn

    Wolf Goddess – Resistance –

    Wolf Goddesses Dream of Battles – Armor up!  Do you dream of battles? Are you feeling muzzled? Do you wake up angry? Worried? Afraid? Do you gnash your teeth while you sleep? Do you love proving others wrong? When others speak are you eager to jump in and “set them right”? Is your favorite word, “No?” You may be a Wolf Goddess.

    Resistance is Never Futile – We become goddesses for a reason. But what kind of goddess are we?  After all, we can’t make our contribution unless we know which kind of goddess we are. Strangely, we get a lot of push-back on this seemingly basic investigation. First, there’s enormous cultural pressure against us defining ourselves as the warlords compete, waging schemes to entrap us into fighting for them. It’s enough to gnash anyone’s teeth.

    Goddess Challenge – We must be protective of our special gifts. Specify under what circumstances you are relaxed, happy, creative and “In-Flow.” The ‘flow” state is “bliss” – your brain oozes alpha waves as you sink into some interesting exploration, losing any sense of time and feeling at one with the universe. Suddenly, we are experiencing the pleasures of “Eternity” while still very much a part of this sphere.  Is “flow” achieved for you through music? Dance? Composition? Reading? Sex? Some lucky people access this state through meditation alone. It is certainly worth a try; meditation is very good for your brain.

    Goddess Danger – The danger of Eternal Resistance is that it becomes reflexive. Our Resistance must be chosen, carefully thought out and promoted by History and Fact.

    Goddess Opportunity – You are a work of art. Your whole life, your experiences, your very dreams, have brought you to this moment. Your resistance to invasion, to malformation, to co-option, to corruption, has blossomed into an individualized focus that must defeat their blander, blunter, self-serving opposition. You lose nothing – gain everything – by becoming yourself; a unique goddess nonpareil who has never existed before and will never exist again. You are the opposite of a faceless soldier, you are rare, sui generis, customized for this moment of space and time but perfecting for eternity. What fears are left to surmount? What can you dream?

    Models & Mentors – ‘When injustice becomes law, resistance becomes duty” – Thomas Jefferson

    “Every moment of resistance to temptation is a victory” – Frederick William Faber

    “To fly we must have resistance” – Maya Lin

    “The history of liberty is a history of resistance”

    – Woodrow Wilson

    “The more important an activity is to your soul’s evolution the more resistance you will feel” – Steven Pressfield

    #Haiku:  Counter-Pressure

    First –

    Relax;

    Melt;

    Slide;

    Upend

    Onslaught;

    Be attacker’s

    Banana peel

  • Becoming a Goddess – the Goddess Oracle by Alysse Aallyn

     Chain Goddess – Conquering Addiction –

    Uh oh. You’ve become too attached. Remember, Goddesses Rise Above – Investigate. To … what is the addition exactly?  Take it slow.  How is your attachment harming your principles? Values? Relationships? Carefully map it out.

    The Goddess’s Fiercest Battle – Do you dream of imprisonment? Blank walls? Chains? Our neurocircuitry mandates habit-making behavior, but our intelligence recognizes entrapment, and our dreams send out distress signals. If you’re human, there is no way to avoid addiction. Welcome to the Club!

    We Are Wired for Addiction – If there’s no escaping it – that means you will have to fight this battle. But the good news is, this is exactly how you become a Goddess, and Goddesses are Free. Anyone who hasn’t done investigated and broken the chains is still a slave to “factory settings” – hormones, instincts, patterning – just as animals are. Here’s the very challenge you became a Goddess for – your best chance to develop a free will and a free soul.

    Study Your Opponent – Turns out we have tremendous choice over what we become addicted to. Some addictions are less corrupting than others. Visit an AA meeting and the consumption of sugar and tobacco is outright alarming. Are you addicted to gambling? Do you work in sales? Were you raised in a ritualistic faith? We easily become dependent on praise, on safety, on gratification, and our brains (and our general health) show our dependency. These very brains threaten and panic when the “treat” is withdrawn.

    Goddess Challenge – This parasite doesn’t care if it kills the host. If you fear you are approaching a cliff-edge, you probably are. One test is to go on a “retreat” where your customary gratifications are not available, and attempt to form new, healthier gratifications, like sleep, prayer, meditation, the arts, cooking, sports, friendship. See what happens! Is your personality threatening to disintegrate?  Good! Let’s build a new one!  High time to ask yourself: who am I really? This is such a good idea, we should build it into our lives, periodically. Just to keep us recognizing that recurring cliff-edge where Soul and Self are lost.

    Goddess Danger – Free Goddesses live with the possibility that we will lose our autonomy. Most people want to evolve, know they SHOULD change, but fear they CAN’T.  There’s no shame in needing outside help. As we pointed out under “Cooperation” and “Alliances”, Goddesses need teams. This is the purpose of interventions, to demonstrate to our eyes and ears that we are harming ourselves and our relationships. Denial is a powerful defense mechanism, especially when we think we’ve finally found a substance/process that “magically” allows us to live on our particular cliff-edge – a dangerous job, risky sexual behaviors, risky recreational behaviors.

    Worst-Case Scenario – is that an addiction becomes our identity. We always have the choice of refusing to change – giving up focus, goals, principles and relationships to keep up our self-abuse. Some hardened wretches will tell anyone who listens that life itself isn’t worth it without their life-threatening self-abuse. They are choosing to die as slaves.

    Goddess Opportunity – You not only CAN free yourself, you MUST to deserve and preserve your Goddess Status. It is your spiritual obligation to live this territorial existence as an enlightenment opportunity. Familiar with the saying, “Live simply so that others may simply live” ? That mandates sharing. That means ALWAYS studying your consumption, NEVER allowing yourself to turn into a greedy pig and scheduling time to be alone with the universe and with God.  To check on the hardiness of your Soul.

    Models & Mentors – “You can’t defeat the darkness by keeping it caged inside you” – Seth Adam Smith

    “All addictions are ways to not feel our feelings”

    – Ellen Burstyn

    “Sometimes you can only find heaven by backing slowly away from hell”

    – Carrie Fisher

    “Success is the sum of small efforts, repeated day in and day out”. – Robert Collier

    “The most common way people give up their power is thinking they don’t have any” – Alice Walker

    #Haiku: The Columbine – Addiction

    Brain cells beggared;

    Lovelorn

    Oxytocin receptors misfire:

    “Feed me!”

  • Becoming a Goddess – the Goddess Oracle by Alysse Aallyn

    Diamond Goddess – Success –

    Goddesses Upgrade their Definition of Success – A surprising number of remarkably successful people aren’t “happy”. I put happiness in quotes because happiness wasn’t their goal, they were just hoping it would be a gratification of widely acknowledged success. But here’s the shocker; it isn’t. And that shouldn’t surprise anyone because the conditions of success – the eternal busyness, the ruthless ranking, the endless competition – crowd out both peace and bliss. So – do you give up on Success? Or do you give up on Bliss?

    Goddesses Redefine – they don’t allow others to tell them what to think. A pat on the back is nice, but goddesses are removed from the crowd. It’s awkward telling a wild orchid “you’re doing a great job.”

    Goddesses Dream of Bliss – Do you dream of adulation? Applause?  The Diamond’s checkered history reminds us that the journey, not the arrival matters, because goddesses say the “successful life” is one long journey to eternal perfection. The tired and footsore goddess needs heartwarming visions to sustain her joy for the voyage.

    Success Is a Worse Hazard for Goddesses Than Failure – If the journey, not the arrival matters, battle-hardened goddesses may collapse on reaching Road’s End.  Nothing pulls a goddess out of her cloud like subservience to other’s opinions.  Future plans are inevitably torpedoed in pursuit of a momentary “approval” fix.  If “success” is static and stasis is stagnation, then surely the process of improvement – the Goddess’ Mantra – is what we really want.  Success itself is a mirage.

    We’re Competing With Ourselves – Abraham Lincoln famously said people are about as happy as they make up their minds to be. If we define “success” as adulation and approval by others, haven’t we given away the ultimate power over our lives? Most people define success in purely material ways – it’s the only way to explain the salaries CEO’s pay themselves, while they freely admit nobody “deserves” that much money. They don’t seem to be using it very responsibly either, so I would judge them as “unsuccessful.” If the most important standards are your own personal ones then the only person to please is yourself and those you love.  Let’s rephrase this challenge:  are you content?

    Goddess Challenge – When success is “arrival”, a “finish line” is implied. Do you really want to be finished? As we desire constant progress, then reaching the goal is death. But the opposite  – endless striving – is just  a treadmill. A “rat race”, in point of fact. So the ultimate success must be “contentment”. To be content we must assess our lives and come to terms with our missteps. Sometimes we discovered something even more wonderful that we didn’t even know we were searching for.

    Goddess Danger – Success is a drug: be careful. Don’t get addicted. Our society views everything as a competition, and the fundamental danger is you comparing your INSIDES (i.e., how you feel) with everyone else’s “outsides” (i.e., how they LOOK.) You know that’s nonsensical.  We don’t visualize each other’s sadness and pain, only display and showmanship.

    Goddess Opportunity – is to feel compassion for another’s hurt and struggle. Feel compassion (and forgiveness) for your own hurt and struggle. Assess your place on life’s path. Maybe you’re still on the edge of some great discovery, if so, keep going! Maybe it’s time to take stock of how far you’ve come and have a look at the big map. I like resting, thinking, reading and writing.  Retired, I do exactly what I want to most days, surrounded by love. Feels like success to me.

    Models & Mentors – “without continual growth & progress, such words as improvement, achievement and success have no meaning” – Benjamin Franklin

    “Start where you are. Use what you have. Do what you can” – Arthur Ashe

    “Rules for success: 1. Believe in your ideas 2. Pick good people  3. Earn Respect 4. Always be a student 5. Enjoy what you do 6. Ask for advice 7. Learn to say No 8. Create the best products 9. Don’t take things personally 10. Create the future”

    – Bill Gates

    #Haiku: The Future Is Now

    Quotidian

    Maps built

    From shreds of

    Daily goals –

    Invisible glue

  • Becoming a Goddess – the Goddess Oracle by Alysse Aallyn

    Rose Goddess – Vulnerability –

    Goddesses Are Vulnerable Because of Heightened Perceptions –  You wake up trembling. Are you helpless in your dreams? Do you dream of children, of your own childhood? In Goddess Oracle, the rose represents the soft evanescence of youth when the merest thumbprint of emphasis can leave eternal impressions. As the emblem of beauty, the Rose warns us that this quivering, temporary vulnerability may be the very definition of loveliness.

    Goddesses Are Temporal Because Life is Evanescent – We are human, and while we live revel in our humanity. As goddesses we defend and define youth, beauty, and humanity, in order to deserve all three.

    We Remember Where We Came From – You well recollect how you were molded. Is it a pleasant nostalgic vision or a horror story? Do you resent all the other actors in this drama? Remember, resentment is a poison only we consume – we are the only ones it harms. Value Your Training – good and bad – as you value your humanity.

    Roses Have Thorns – Celebrate Yours – Everyone sees the thorn-stripped rose the florist sells, forgetting that roses were born with protections, just like the rest of us. Contemplate your Goddess Superpowers. Of these, long-distance perspective, serenity and mindfulness will serve you best. Comparative History explains many situations.

    Goddess Protections – Our Training, our Mental Agility, our Commitments, our Alliances – and most especially our long multiverse worldview. Others may surrender and fade away, but as we are designed for eternal power, we relish the bliss of Sight, Feeling and Thought. It is the essence of life to struggle, to mentally picture a goal and to design and redesign a gorgeous, life-changing, vision-enhancing map for all who follow.

    Goddess Challenge – Can we turn the building blocks of our own past into a constructive, hopeful framework for the future? Can you mentally accept and explore the powers of a hardening maturity?

    Goddesses Preserve & Build  – We do not destroy. The philosophy of “annihilation” is a psychic snare. Ultimate obliteration is up to God alone. Terrible things happen to ordinary people and they are changed forever.  We may wish those things hadn’t happened but regret prevents us from focusing on reality. We need to understand the world we’re in and map it for those who follow after. History and literature explore the coping mechanisms around disaster and the strong people it produces.

    Goddess Opportunity – Resilience is the art we cultivate.  We soon realize resilience has its own beauty; this rose may be cut down but the plant is hardly dead, in fact it offers an outpouring of constant roses. That is true beauty.

    Models & Mentors –  “Vulnerability is the birthplace of love, belonging, joy, courage, empathy, and creativity”

    – Brene Brown

    “Being vulnerable is the only way to allow your heart to feel true pleasure”

    – Bob Marley

    “Sometimes you have to drop your guard so your heart can breathe” – Emma Xu

    “The strongest love is the love that can demonstrate its fragility” – Paulo Coelho

    #Haiku: On the Vulnerability of Poets

    Dis –

    Composing

    To re-see;

    Melting to

    Re-form;

    Masking to un –

    Mask.

  • Becoming a Goddess – the Goddess Oracle by Alysse Aallyn

    Vine Goddess – Dependency –

    To Be Human Is To Be Entangled – Goddesses cannot be entirely free of entanglement, but their ability to “rise above” helps them see when an attachment becomes unhealthy clinging.

    Fear of abandonment is the cause of unhealthy clinging – Goddesses never fear being alone, understanding solitude as a fount of deep thought and dreaming.  In Goddess Oracle, the Clinging Vine reminds us of all of the unpleasant aspects of needing others’ constant support to function. We Americans prefer to live by the fantasy of independence and self-determination. It’s just too threatening to imagine what might happen if the wall we’ve been covertly clinging to, suddenly comes down.

    Goddesses Require Freedom of Action – We are all dependent on society for basic functions. At what point does mutual dependency become constrictive? Clinging vines can’t stand up by themselves; they need an immoveable object to cling to, and soon they become defined by that object as if they, too, were immoveable.  Are you locked into a position of support for someone else?

    Goddesses Define Freedom in Their Relationships – Recognize and resist parasitic and exploitive relationships where the benefits are unbalanced. No need to over-react. Start drawing boundaries. Teaching the clinging vine to stand up for itself is doing it a favor.

    No One Stands Alone – The truth is, we’re all in this together. Billionaires, leaders, CEO’s, all actually need much more support than the “ordinaries”. But they insist on maintaining freedom of action – for good reason. Don’t make destructive deals involving your future. Goddesses need to Become and their futures are always a Mystery.  We are responsive to the fluttering of butterfly wings as well as the shifting of tectonic plates. Divest of pointless, usually “inherited” shame (from the collective unconscious) and acknowledge the truth that humans are, for good and ill, social creatures.

    Life Is a Negotiation – Make an experiment of listing your dependencies – bank, mail system, social security? Vehicle, gas availability, fuel affordability? Grocery stores, restaurants, our own two ambulatory feet? Weather, peace, law enforcement?

    Recognize the Fragility of These Systems. Confronting fear creates ruthlessness but goddess never check their brains at the door. We are strategic, planning, evolving. Our maps will always need an update and a redesign.

    Goddess Challenge – Are we hanging ourselves in loops of dependency? How can we free ourselves? What could we do to claim more psychic and physical independence? While Mormons may require a “year’s worth” of canned goods in the basement, the rest of us recognize the need for an emergency savings account. We are beginning to understand how a threatened supply chain can snap. Begin imagining some future failure scenarios and hash out the possibilities; if the elevator fail, is it possible to take the stairs? Your dream life will reward you with a lessening of existential anxiety.

    Models & Mentors –  “Don’t set yourself on fire to keep other people warm” – Alysse Aallyn

    “Fear is the memory of pain. Addiction is the memory of pleasure. Freedom is beyond both.” – Anonymous

    “Don’t work harder on someone else’s problems than they do” – Ross Rosenberg

    “Enjoy togetherness but allow space. Respect differing beliefs. Accept, don’t try to change each other. Appreciate the other, but always be prepared to survive alone” – Darlene Lancer

    #Haiku: Dis – Ability

    Limitations dissolve

    Hand in hand we

    Surmount

    Mental boundaries

  • Becoming a Goddess – the Goddess Oracle by Alysse Aallyn

    Wildflower Goddess – Beauty –

    Are Goddesses Shy? – Our elevated plane makes others suspect Goddesses seek exposure and acclaim. Not so the Wildflower Goddess, who thrives in secret, out of the limelight. 

    Goddesses Are Comfortable Alone – Are your dreams so beautiful you regret waking up? Do you imagine possessing great beauty yourself, caressing another’s gorgeous flesh, or having a dream lover turn those diamond eyes on you? Do you dream of beautiful places, caverns, waterfalls, chapels – that are spectacular in their glamor? We are all visual learners, attracted to beauty, hypnotized by color. Our relationship to the universe is naturally worshipful.

    Goddesses Don’t Waste Time Admiring Themselves – We’re here to preserve the beauty of the natural world, and of others. We alert when the planet slips into disharmony, but our love of beauty suggests how it can be restored.

    Beauty Is a Guide to Order and an education in symmetry. Wildflowers’ magnificence is otherworldly. It stands in contrast to the managed world which constantly attempts to freeze & fetishize the ephemeral, even the eternal. Wildflowers’ mysterious evanescence suggests what true beauty is. To become a servant of the seasons is to fill our lives to overflowing with constant pleasure.

    Train Your Goddess Eye – Take joy in your surroundings. Japanese samurai practice flower arranging, for the purpose not only of relaxation, but discernment. As there is “forest bathing”, so there is “flower bathing.” But nature is wide and we are part of it. The Goddess Mandate is vast and all encompassing. Puppies doing anything, kittens doing everything, a dance class of toddlers (all doing the wrong thing), flowers coming up through cement, a piece of brilliant stained glass on a battered utility truck, a book of cave paintings, the swirl in our coffee, old photographs, our beloved’s sleepy morning face – once you start “collecting”,  you realize beauty is all around you.

    Look in the Mirror – That is what beauty is – those lines, those scars, each one a history. That light behind the eyes is a directing soul, in tune with its guardian angel. Accept yourself.  It is necessary for the Goddess to love Self, in order to truly See, much less Love –  others.

    Unclutter Your Soul – Clutter is frustrating for the brain. We all love sharing beautiful pictures, but aggressively, officiously  “beautiful” people have been hogging the space. Be discriminating in the cherished mind-pictures that you gather.  Think of the wildflower. Is endless staging the path to joy or depression?

    Goddess Danger – We find ourselves caught in a frenzy of “likes”. A “like” button can have a plethora of meanings, but if we don’t take care, we will begin to “need” likes the way a drunk needs booze. Otherwise we fear we’re nothing. Specious approval from strangers – or at least attention – can never fill your heart. The quiet joy of certain pleasure inside your own head as you follow your bliss –– that’s lasting pleasure. Relax, refresh, renew.

    Models & Mentors –  “Everything has beauty, but not everyone sees it” – Confucius

    “Beauty is a light in the heart” – Khalil Gibran

    “Beauty begins the moment you decide to be yourself” – Coco Chanel

    “Don’t think of all the misery but the beauty that remains” – Anne Frank

    “Beauty is reality seen with the eyes of love” – Rabindranath Tagore

    #Haiku: Hold Still Forever

    Beauty

    Herded toward capture –

    Resist!

    Reserve your right to

    Disappoint

  • Becoming a Goddess – the Goddess Oracle by Alysse Aallyn

    Birdsong – Art

    Goddesses Share the Power of Their Vision – to those whose Souls Cry Out for Definition – Birds sing. It’s who they are. Goddesses dream of artistic products – paintings, sculpture, film – and artistic endeavors such as performance and construction. Do you get ideas for fresh pieces and experience exciting nonconformist thinking that seem to evaporate upon waking?

    Art is Our Reason for Being – Art is the judge of our poetic confrontation with the world, the cure and the cause.  It is also our prime avenue for non-verbal healing. Only non-verbal healing can address pain that can’t be quantified.

    Art is a Language – Develop Your Own – Your inner self is signaling to you that it is time for you to explore art expression – mastering its terms, and to start inventing terms of your own. Only art can establish the secure connection with others required to nourish you now.

    Everyone Connects Through Art  – Every single one of us chooses mode and objects of expression, consciously or unconsciously, every single day. We buy one object over another because it gives us pleasure; we arrange our living spaces to express some intangible quality about ourselves – a self-definition that signals to others who we are and where we are on our journey.

    Artists & Goddesses  Are Free – Art demands individuality. We begin by copying but we must move on to expressing our uniqueness or our soul can’t evolve. If we are happy being part of an unthinking mass we are truly “unborn.”  This exploration will grant you a deep peace about being alone with yourself, a strong confidence in who you really are and a feeling of spiritual value.

    Art Offers New Battles to Fight – This journey is awkward at first, and in other people’s eyes it may remain awkward forever. Why wouldn’t you copy what’s popular? Why not mimic the uncontroversially successful? The problem is, while you are doing that the core of your self-hood is dying like an unwatered plant. And if your soul is dying, you are dying. Also, being bullied by the “art enforcers” is not what goddesses can tolerate.

    Sometimes We Bully Ourselves Worse – Perfection is not the answer – it is the enemy. Remember – we flee stagnation. Our soul’s “perfecting never reaches an end – that’s the definition of immortality. Constantly shaming yourself as a no-talent, pretending poseur is horrifyingly destructive to your precious infant specialness struggling for life.

    Goddesses Support Themselves – The fact that a work is unsuccessful, even a horrific mess, doesn’t mean it isn’t an advance for your vision, insight and style. These are the building blocks of creation. Don’t get hung up on approval. You need teachers, not fans. Read The War of Art by Steven Pressfield.

    Models & Mentors – “Creativity takes courage” – Henri Matisse

    “It’s not what you look at that matters, it’s what you see” – Henry David Thoreau

    “The only thing worse than being blind is having sight without vision” – Helen Keller

    “You were born an original, don’t die a copy” – Jon Mason

    “Life beats down and crushes the art in your soul to remind you that you have one” – Stella Adler

    “There are no rules, only confidence, aplomb, style & joy” – Neil Gaiman

    #Haiku: Disclaimer

    I don’t write haiku

    They write me

    Jaw slack

    Eyes closed

    Ego playing

    Dead

  • Becoming a Goddess – the Goddess Oracle by Alysse Aallyn

    The Field – Fate –

    Goddess World is Fateful – We are all about to go through some things. Do you dream of costume drama? Historical characters? Ancient books? Do you consult tea leaves? Are you superstitious? We are all caught in the mesh of history, but goddesses see clearly what the rest of us only feel. The field is too vast to fully appreciate;  “Ordinaries” find the pull of forces too powerful to resist or even rise above and visualize. Those caught in wars, in genocides, in natural disasters, are brutally unlucky. But the techniques of the Goddess can substantially save, improve, even alter their fates. Goddesses hold the clue to extract us from this multiverse maze.

    Goddess Are Called – by History. The Multiverse allows us to rise above the crushing by the gears of  chaos.  According to the philosopher Hegel, “Heroes are singular figures “whose vocation it was to be the agents of the World-Spirit.” Such heroes interfere in and remake the world from the point of view of the Multiverse –  everything CAN happen everywhere all at once.  This sacred vision dramatically alters “the complex of historical relations which appear to be only their interest, and their work.”  Remember, the Goddess’ Code is “Never Surrender”. Never consent to the misuse of human dignity.

    Goddess’ Challenge – Always try to comprehend the bigger picture by comparing it to several other proven scenarios. Were those who fled Germany before Hitler shut it down, France before the Terror or Indonesia before the tsunami just “lucky” or had they learned to read the signs? Rulers by whim are even more dangerous than the weather, for their brains inevitably become echo chambers rotting from within. The larger the council of power the better – true democracy is best, but even then there are those self-destructive ones among us desiring to “shake things up”; loving chaos for its own sake. They may dream of riding a whirlwind but no one can ever truly tame a whirlwind. As the Chinese say, you can ride the tiger but you can’t get off. The challenge is to see the whirlwind – and the tiger -coming.

    Goddess Inhabit Danger – Is the danger learned helplessness, our old enemy? Or is it comfort – we’ve created a berth for ourselves that’s just too cushy to leave? Sometime the danger is an inability to imagine evil: “it CAN’T get that bad” or “These people are my friends.” Famous last words. Or is panic the enemy? Don’t risk becoming too terrified to think.

    Goddess Seize Opportunity – Have you noticed, yet, that it’s always the same opportunity we must accept? Wake up. Embrace maturity.  Those who fear being “woke” fear waking from the nightmare to seize control of their own existences; they are seen as cannon fodder by those in power. To become more like God, who the Gnostic gospels call, “Good”, we must Create. To regard each other with the wise generosity of compassion. Study all input intelligently. Learn to recognize and repudiate garbage. Don’t be lured by fantasy thinking of effortless achievements. In order to claim our specie’ opportunity goddesses seek out and create safe spaces to grow, think and learn.

    Models & Mentors – “We are spinning our own fates, good or evil, never to be undone” – William James

    “No matter how dirty your past, your future is spotless” – Drake

    “Our destiny is not written for us, but by us” – Barack Obama

    “If you can influence, direct or control your environment , you can make your life what you want it to be” – Napoleon Hill

    “Life is choice, not chance,” – Jean Nidetch

    “Winners fail until they succeed” – Robert T. Kiyosaki

    #Haiku: Controlled Accidents

    All art’s

    “Controlled Accident”

    You plus God plus

    Fate:

    Steer into the skid

  • Becoming a Goddess – The Goddess Oracle by Alysse Aallyn

    Fruit – Fruition –

    Goddess At Peak – A project of yours is nearing completion. Harvest is approaching. Do you dream of fruit, perfectly ripe?  Do you love to cook and entertain? Are you attracted by movies with long family dinner scenes, everyone celebrating outdoors beneath an arbor? Is touring wine country a popular fantasy of yours? You are a person who is propelled forward by imagining smiles on the faces of others as the work of community and you believe that family harmony is to be celebrated and enjoyed. This vision can keep us going through bitter hardships.

    Harvest Comes Because Goddesses Prepare – You became a goddess because you resisted others’ negativity, hopelessness and learned helplessness. Instead you turned your eyes to the inevitable rituals of seed care, the health promotion of living things, and now you are granted a front-row seat at the celebration of flourishing.

    Goddess Challenge – Keeping these visions alive during the training phase is hard, because the growth cycle is long and can be boring and uneventful. That’s why planting occurs in stages, so all your psychic eggs aren’t resting in the same basket. Learn to enjoy all the seasons, without hungering for a single season. This is a good time to contrast group versus individual gratifications and ask ourselves, “What’s that about?”

    Goddess Danger – Even Goddesses can become thirsty for gratification until it takes more and more to satisfy us. “Winning” is a shallow goal if that’s all there is. Goddesses seek harmony, blending community resources to make the whole family stronger. The worst outcome is to be locked in an addiction cycle and spiraling downwards; no longer part of the growth process, benefitting from training and spiritual renewal.

    Goddesses Rest by Dreaming Forward – Sitting around the fire telling stories, modeling “success” as peaceful sharing rather than as an endless party. Luckily sleep and dreams are the best model of fruitful dormancy. We require those periods and we need to look forward to their relief and imaginative nourishment.

    Goddess Opportunity – Every group celebration of the success and nourishment cycle is different. Are there leftover behaviors that no longer serve you? What fresh, exciting new ideas might you add? Is everyone in the family/community being well-served or are there grumpy holdouts? It’s fruitful to listen to the grumpy holdouts occasionally.  How might they do things differently? If all they want is to harsh everyone else’s buzz, maybe they should no longer expect an automatic invitation to the feast.

    Models & Mentors – “Don’t judge each day by the harvest you will get but by the seeds you plant.” – Robert Louis Stevenson

    “In seed time learn, in harvest teach, in winter, enjoy” – William Blake

    “Every deed sows a seed, though the harvest you may not see”

    – Ella Wheeler Wilcox

    “We are each other’s harvest, we are each other’s business, we are each other’s magnitude and bond” – Gwendolyn Brooks

    #Haiku: Return on Investment

    Summer pledges sweat

    Ecstatic harvest romp

    Inevitable cleanse.

  • Becoming a Goddess – the Goddess Oracle by Alysse Aallyn

    Fish – Ambisextrous –

    Goddesses Are Ambisextrous- We Express All Genders.  Goddesses are empaths. Do you identify easily with multiple avatars? Are you happiest with fluid roles in a relationship? Do you dream of the fetish trophies of gender; makeup, wigs, shoes, sports equipment? Do you have frequent “freedom” dreams: flying, swimming? Waking up damp, pulses pounding?

    Love Opens Goddesses – Empathy Ennobles Goddesses – IS there an “opposite” sex? Deep empathy makes us worthy to be our own romantic partners, the subject of our lifelong pursuit.  This is nothing but the honorable, deepest desire to truly know oneself AND others;  to master selfhood and compassion before leaving the planet.  C.S. Lewis says we are not a Body with a Soul, we are Souls with a Body.  We’re incarnated! It’s a thrill!

    Goddess Strategy Requires “Becoming” the Other –  Strengthening our imagination, we see through the barriers raised by the fearful and the pugnacious. What is “winning”? Empaths double – triple – multiply our vision, our power, and therefore our souls.

    Don’t Fear Gender – Goddess who perform the “gender specifics” of rigid roles are limiting themselves. Goddess who look for opportunities to expand their reach encompass the powers, the delights, the ecstasies of all humans. What we absorb, we reflect.

    Incarnated Goddesses Don’t Fear Physicality – We express ourselves with this gloriously gifted, given body, coming through this gloriously gifted, given world.  We expect, even worship, Transformation. Woody Allen says bisexuality doubles your chances to get a date on Saturday night. Anything wrong with that? Goddesses never “force” themselves to “perform” sexually;  (or to “perform sexuality”) that is subjugation.

    Goddesses Move Slowly to Absorb, Interpret, Comprehend – We desire to see, to know, to experience everything. Always move as slowly as you feel comfortable with, keeping all options and emotions alive. The “sexual revolution” was a lot of fun, but it was spoiled for many by a witless prejudice against “reserve.” Revulsion, instinctive distaste and doubt tell us plenty. We are on this earth to hone our “gut” instinct as well as our sensitivities. Gavin de Becker, danger specialist, reminds us that fear is an insight, an intuition, a God-given “gift.” Honor it.

    Goddesses Educate Themselves on Risk – Dangerous “bad sex” stories start with substance abuse, usually undertaken with a nervous desire to get into a more relaxed or even transcendental state; but all it actually does is skip over the “informed consent” that is such an important feature of identity and will. Predators with a need for speed drug their prey! Afterwards the complex feelings of violation and shame can take a lifetime to deal with. These facts mean we must study “trust” BEFORE we study sex. What is trust? Safety? Honor? Let’s work on those issues while we develop a free space to evolve, experiment and grow.

    Goddesses Seize Opportunity – Fresh interpretations of “gender“ make this a glorious time to be alive. I can recall when gender was a prison sentence of compulsion and rigidity! Now it is an invitation to live more fully, to experience oneself and others more richly, to participate in that fruitful, heavenly life for which we all yearn.

    Models & Mentors – “The great gift of human beings is we all have empathy. We can sense a mysterious connection to each other” – Meryl Streep

    “Leadership is about empathy. It is about relating to people for the purpose of inspiring and empowering their lives” – Oprah Winfrey

    “The capacity for empathy leads to a genuine encounter I which heart speaks to heart” – Pope Francis

    “I believe empathy is the most essential quality of civilization” – Roger Ebert

    “Empathy has no script…there is no right way or wrong way…there is only listening, emotionally connecting, communicating the incredibly healing message ‘You’re not alone” – Brene Brown

    #Haiku: Ambisextrous

    Fresh birthed –

    Splash

    Into you

    Drenched,

    Once

    Halved, now

    Wholed –

    Doubling multiplies

    Us