Alysse Aallyn

Category: #Mysteries

  • Becoming a Warrior – the Warrior Oracle by Alysse Aallyn

    Chrysanthemum – Healing Rituals:

    If This Card Chooses You – you have reached the point of access to the gifts of the Warrior. Let the healing begin. Are you a believer in magic? Do you dream of restoration, of nostalgia, of lost youth?

    Warriors Believe In Magic – Bravely, we put ourselves in the way of harm, and harm is done to us. But we believe in the magic of restoration through transformation. These scars, these wounds, these experiences make us smarter, harder, brighter and more beautiful.

    Understand the Meaning of Your Scars – These are life’s tattoos, which have ennobled you. It is your honor to embody the story of the universe with your blood and your bone. But It is the Warrior’s Brain that brings us closest to God. The mystery of suffering is that it educates us into the greatest mystery of all –that God is willing to suffer with us because Love means holding each other through pain and infusing our strength into another’s sadness.

    Bow To Each Other – We are each other’s masters, we are each other’s pupils, we are each other’s lovers, siblings and rescuers. Drinking ginger tea from translucent porcelain cups, we lift our cups to each other. We bathe together in steaming pools. I release you as you release me. When darkness falls, we touch one another’s hands before departing. If we can bear it, we touch bodies.

    Warriors Recognize That We Cannot Diagnose Ourselves – We offer ourselves for the universe’s good and so it takes a world to cure us. Healing and diagnosis alike will come from the welcome lips of another. It has been scientifically proven that even plants respond to kind words. We yearn for the laying on of hands, for the gentle rituals that pass us from one stage of life to another.

    Warrior Challenge – Paradoxically, no “medicine” can succeed unless we “accept” our healing spiritually. We must feel “worthy” of restoration. What are we fighting for? Think deeply. We are not self-punishing but stating as clearly as we can that life is valuable in all its forms. If you are only as “young” as you feel, are we only as “healthy” as we allow ourselves to be? Forgive yourself. Accept change. Contrary to our fears, it is change that keeps us young.

    Warrior Danger – Healing cannot occur in an atmosphere of self-hatred and self-blame, but many of us are STILL “blaming” ourselves for twists of fate, for unlucky genetic, social and medical outcomes. “Fundamental attribution error” consists of blaming individuals for group effects. We are all caught up in the machinery of temporality. Never forget that we are souls who happen to have bodies, not bodies who happen to have souls.

    Warrior Opportunity – “Restoration” is such a glorious promise that early Christians found themselves ensnared in decades of argument about PHYSICAL resurrection. How would it work in cases of burning and dismemberment, exactly? It is easy to laugh at these painfully ridiculous theological conflicts. One is reminded of St. Joan of Arc’s response to interrogators at her trial who asked if angels appeared to her naked – “Do you think God cannot afford to clothe his angels?” Accept the power accorded to you by the universe. Accept the strength of your own mind, the control given by your chosen attitude. Healing is not just possible, it is a life-force in which we can all participate. Jesus came to us as a healer.

    Models & Mentors – “Healing yourself is connected with healing others” – Yoko Ono

    “What happens when people open their hearts? They get better.” – Haruki Murakami

    Your body cannot heal without play. Your mind cannot heal without laughter. Your soul cannot heal without joy.” ~ Catherine Rippinger Fenwick

    “We are healed of suffering only if we experience it to the full – Marcel Proust

    “Maybe the dragons in our lives are princesses” – Rainer Maria Rilke

    #Haiku: I Don’t Know

    Admit ignorance
    No shame –
    It’s healthy –
    Empty glass
    Asks for water

  • Becoming a Warrior – the Warrior Oracle by Alysse Aallyn

    Columbine – Addiction:

    If This Card Chooses You – Uh oh. You’ve become too attached. To … what? Investigate. Take it slow. Is your attachment harming your principles? Values? Relationships?

    The Warrior’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 Free. Anyone who hasn’t done it is still a slave to their hormones, instincts, patterning – just as animals are. Here’s the very thing you become a Warrior 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. They threaten and panic when the “treat” is withdrawn.

    Warrior Challenge – This parasite doesn’t care if it kills its 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 gratifications. See what happens! Does your personality threaten to disintegrate? Great 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 cliff-edge where Soul and Self are lost.

    Warrior Danger – We always live with the possibility that we will lose our autonomy. We want to change, we know we SHOULD change, but we CAN’T. There’s no shame in needing outside help. 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. We then have the choice of refusing to listen – giving up our relationships to keep up our self-abuse. Some hardened wretches tell anyone who listen that life itself isn’t worth it without their life-threatening self-abuse. They choose to die as slaves.

    Warrior Opportunity – You not only CAN free yourself, you MUST to deserve and preserve your Warrior 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 Warrior – the Warrior Oracle by Alysse Aallyn

    The Statue – Law:

    If This Card Chooses You – You have a legal issue. Is there some illegality in your secret life? Are you stepping over lines in public or private? Remember, lawbreakers break themselves.

    Do you dream of judges? Lawyers? Court? Are you obsessed with TV programs about justice? When justice is delayed or denied, do you obsess about that? Are you feeling unjustly punished? Do you envy or rage against those who have “gotten away with something”?

    Warrior’s Desire For Justice is Hardwired – Ever feel unjustly punished? Do you envy or rage against those who have “gotten away with something”? “Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be filled.” In my view, the mere concept of Complete Justice is heaven enough. We are repeatedly warned that it won’t ever match our earthly ideologies, that we are children scrapping in a sandbox who haven’t noticed, much less comprehended, the real issues.

    What Is Our Armor? – What laws resonate with you? Do you believe in karma? How would you define it? What laws make you angry? Which laws would you modify? What is your attitude towards the police – protectors of order or agents of mayhem? Dick Nixon was famous for talking endlessly about “restoring law and order” until just before he was forced to resign because of his multiple crimes. Many Trump followers insist everything Trump has done is “justified because Democrats are worse.” Is this a race to the bottom? Where’s the off-ramp?

    Warrior Danger – “Judge not lest ye be judged” is a scary proposition. How would we come off if our standards were used against us? Come to think of it, what are our standards? Are they fluid? Flexible? Jesus also said the “letter” i.e. “written rule” KILLS. That it’s the “spirit that gives life.”

    Law Is Our Armor – Warriors dream of a “spirit-filled” Law. Maybe you wanted to go to Law School but life intervened. It’s never too late to study any subject that’s close to our heart. We become warriors because we wish for heroes; I think that’s the sole reason for the wild popularity of the Marvel movie series. Do you admire heroes because they break the rules, or because they uphold them? We acknowledge the need for rules, but how can we make sure they’re “spirit-filled”? In what areas of your life are you too rigid? In which are you too flexible? Imagine yourself speaking in court, making a case for yourself. What arguments would you give? Ask your dreams to start imagining a Justice World. How would it look?

    Models & Mentors – “Law is not law if it violates the principles of eternal justice” – Lydia Maria Child

    “The only stable state is one where all are equal before the law” – Aristotle

    “Law is the public conscience” – Thomas Hobbes

    ‘Able in argument, accurate in analysis, strict in study, candid with clients and honest with adversaries, today I shall not, to win a point, lose my soul” – St. Thomas More

    “If we desire respect for the law, we must make law respectable” – Louis D. Brandeis

    #Haiku: Karma

    Come round –
    Go round.
    Love reaps love
    Law reaps
    Justice
    Violence reaps
    Whirlwind.

  • Becoming a Warrior – the Warrior Oracle by Alysse Aallyn

    The Tulip – Illusion:

    If This Card Chooses You – You need a re-set. Your operating instructions are faulty. But where did they go wrong? That is what we must figure out. Do you find yourself frequently fantasizing about some magic dissolution of “the rules”? The problem with mirages – especially those we long to believe in – is that they become illusions. Falsehoods. We need so desperately to cling to an obvious fantasy we willingly surrender our ability to discern fact from fiction.

    Illusions are Powerful – The seventeenth century Dutch needed a desirable luxury exchange item the privileged could trade back and forth for status reasons. Yes, that was the tulip bulb. It was a bubble – of course– the bottom fell out – of course – and left a whole lot of previously comfortable people bankrupt. We don’t have anything like that, these days, do we? Or do we? People are rushing to invest in crypto because of its complete lack of regulation. But without rules, it’s laughably easy to steal people’s money.

    We’re All Rubes Here – Other people are investing in admittedly worthless “tokens” – just in case they go up in value. Does anyone remember the Beanie Baby craze? I had a friend who stored Mrs. Butterworth bottles in her basement – she had a basement FULL of Mrs. Butterworth bottles – because they were just BOUND to be worth something – someday. Have you seen what happens when everyone runs to the same side of the ferryboat? It tips them into the water! Successful investing involves being where the crowd isn’t – before they get there. Luck –and manipulation of the credulous – is often involved.

    Some Illusions Are Life Strengthening – Others are Life-Depleting.
    I can’t stress this strongly enough: Warriors Need to Avoid Fantasy Thinking. Of all people, Warriors must traffic in reality. We create worthwhile magic, the kind that protects and enhances – so we can’t be deceived by the “magic” that punishes and stigmatizes. Your map must represent actual ground, not pie in the sky, or you won’t be able to maneuver across it. We understand the attraction of The Mirage. The problem with mirages – especially those we long to believe in – is that they evolve into illusions which create delusions.

    Illusions Become Delusions – The Buddhists say life itself is an illusion. But they mean that metaphorically, to keep you from become “attached” to the “ephemeral.” The physics, gravity, chemistry and hydraulics of everyday life are hardly illusive. Above all, we should avoid clinging to fake food and pushing away nutrition. When warriors end up battling FOR falsity – it’s the worst of all possible situations.

    Warrior Challenge – Let’s face facts. Learn to enjoy reality as a bracing polar dip. Are you trapped by an illusion that you used to need but now is killing you? You can identify this by your increasing suffering over an increasingly problematic life and your diminishing pleasure over things that once were reliable joys. Is it a relationship? An activity? A belief? Look at the problem honestly. Find others going through the same experience and generate honest discussion.

    Flying Monkeys Abound – If any group member rushes in defensively to shame and discourage you, to convince you you’re not feeling or understanding what you KNOW you ARE feeling and understanding then realize you’re being gaslighted. What you’re trying to exit is a “cult” that is NOT devoted to the health of its members but to their diminishment. Stop communicating with those flying monkeys and find somebody who supports the truth of your actual experience AND your desire to feel better.

    Warrior Danger – The path to re-making yourself is fraught with danger and you will require all sorts of help. Don’t be discouraged if your feelings are volatile and transitory and you are confused about their reality. Move slowly, consulting Models & Mentors – kind others who respect your autonomy, individuality and with whom you feel safe.

    Warrior Opportunity – Relax! Warriors will become adept at shifting vision from night vision to day vision, forward and backwards through time, manifesting others’ auras until we can all see possibility and love.

    We Transform Illusion Through Skill – The impossible takes longer, because language is not as flexible as reality. You are embarked on an exciting growth challenge where you leave a constricting carapace behind. Sometimes the “shell” was protective and served for a time to keep you safe while you matured. You don’t need to disparage the old you, or the old relationship; it served its purpose. Often people who have been through a trauma say afterwards they wouldn’t change the past, because they treasure and embrace the person they’ve become.

    Models & Mentors – “Argue for your limitations, and sure enough, they’re yours” – Richard Bach

    “The world is an illusion we must take seriously.” – Aldous Huxley

    “The light at the end of the tunnel is not an illusion – the tunnel’s the illusion” – Alysse Aallyn

    “Separation from each other is an optical illusion of reality” – Albert Einstein

    ‘Limit, like fear, is often an illusion” – Michael Jordan

    #Haiku: Coach Don’t Play

    When you learn the game
    Rise above the game;
    Insight
    Renders you
    Magic

  • Becoming a Warrior – the Warrior Oracle by Alysse Aallyn

    The Poppy – Success:

    If This Card Chooses You – Maybe it’s time you upgrade your concept of success. Do you dream of adulation? Applause? The Poppy, source of lifesaving modern analgesics, represents eternal sleep and endless dreaming. Perhaps it reminds us that the journey, not the arrival matters, because the successful life is one long journey. The tired and footsore warrior needs heartwarming visions to sustain joy for the voyage.

    Success Is a Worse Hazard for Warriors Than Failure – If the journey, not the arrival matters, battle-hardened warriors collapse on reaching Road’s End. The Poppy, source of lifesaving modern analgesic morphine, also represents loss of self and a derailment of energy. Future plans are torpedoed in pursuit of a momentary fix. Greeks and Romans used these orange and red flowers as offerings to the dead – Westerners emblazon them on tombstones. Could it be that the very idea of “success” is something of a mirage?

    Success Is How You Define It – 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? Many people define success in material ways – it’s the only way to explain the salaries CEO’s pay themselves, while freely admitting nobody “needs” 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 the challenge: are you content?

    Warrior 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.

    Warrior 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 can see that’s nonsensical. We don’t visualize each other’s sadness and pain, only display and showmanship.

    Warrior 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

    “There is always light – if we’re brave enough to see it, we’re brave enough to be it “

    – Amanda Gorman

    “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

  • ALYSSE AALLYN

    Alysse Aallyn is the author of four well-received thrillers, Find Courtney, Depraved Heart, Woman Into Wolf and I’ll Sleep When You’re Dead, one historical novel (Devlyn) and a book of short stories (Awake Till the End.) Her work has been translated into German and Italian. She has three published books of poetry – The Sacred Quiver, The Hot Skin, Haunted Wedding and The Five Wounds and edited another (The Feathered Violin.) She trained in theatre at Circle in the Square Theatre School and Martha Graham School of Dance. She appeared in the part of Isabella in Jean Giraudoux’s The Enchanted at the New Yorker Theatre. She has held writing fellowships at Brooklyn College and LaSalle University. Her novel Depraved Heart won a 2011 CT Press Club fiction award and her play Queen of Swords was a semi-finalist in the 2014 National Arts Council First Play award. She has been invited to read her original work at The Folger Shakespeare Library in Washington, DC and has taught creative writing at Catonsville Community College. Woman Into Wolf was a semi-finalist for The National Playwrights Conference (2016) and her play Our Father’s Restaurant was performed on Pacifica Radio. She has also appeared as a crime commentator on ID – TV’s Blood Relatives. Her play, Let’s Speak Vietnamese was published in Dramatika Magazine. She directed The Maids and played the Mother in Jules Feiffer’s Little Murders for Theatre Upstairs. Other plays she’s written are The Honey & the Pang about Emily Dickinson’s posthumous career, Cuck’d – a modern Othello, and Caving, in which the theatre is transformed into a cave for a spelunking dare. Rough Sleep, (based on her novel I’ll Sleep When You’re Dead) was produced by Manhattan Repertory Theatre (W. 45th St) in 2019. Her latest play, The Dalingridge Horror, (short version Leonard & Virginia) explores the partnership between Leonard & Virginia Woolf in their own words and was a finalist for the Tennessee Williams 2021 award. Her newest poetry collection, Haunted Wedding appeared in 2022 from Thriller Library.

    Her current work is The WarriorOracle – Becoming a Warrior on the path to enlightenment.

  • Becoming a Warrior – the Warrior Oracle by Alysse Aallyn

    The Daffodil – Enlightenment:

    If This Card Chooses You – You are coming closer. You are on the cusp of a major discovery that will explain much. Are you dreaming of books, reading, classes, school? Do you often feel you are on a pursuit and the prey is within view?

    Warriors Seek the Light – We are all born in a condition of yearning. As children, we try desperately to understand the world we find ourselves in. The truth is we are all warriors on a quest for enlightenment. We know there is a message out there for us, we know we have the capacity to understand it, but we are waiting for the lightning strike of “enlightenment” to put it all together.

    The Truth Is Simple – Jesus said we have to become children again to enter the kingdom of heaven. This certainly implies that “enlightenment” is more a state of mind than any received wisdom. The daffodil, that simple fresh flower that is the harbinger of spring, is Warrior Oracle’s symbol of the mystical understanding and the lightning universal comprehension we call “enlightenment.”

    Warrior Challenge – Enlightenment literature recommend two things: a good teacher and time alone. Every night when we go to sleep we enter the alone-time of our own mind. We can prep ourselves in advance with some “good teaching”; Socrates, Plato, Montaigne, Eckhart Tolle, Pema Chodron, Deepak Chopra, Stephen Batchelor, the Dalai Lama – savor these models until you get a sense which one speaks especially to you. Then set aside twenty-minutes or a half an hour for reading (or listening) right before sleep.

    Warrior Danger – Zen teachers say that if anyone represents themselves as a Zen teacher they are cannot be. Gnostic gospels say prophets asking for money are false prophets. Search for a guru is fraught with landmines. This is why I mention specific names of teachers available at any library who will not be trying to gain any ascendance or dominance over you personally. Be aware of giving your spirit into another’s care. If they have demanded submission they will be cruel. The sin against the Holy Ghost is the only sin that cannot be forgiven, and it is the sin of running roughshod over our spiritual receptors. Once trust and faith are destroyed, it is difficult to “become a child again” because of the terrible things we have known and seen.

    Warrior Opportunity – Broken places let in the light and healing is always available. Even when scarred by false prophets we feel there is a magic of universal love and resilience available to us. A variety of healing ceremonials – my favorite is the “miracle bath” and the “laying on of hands” – will reconnect you to the possibilities of joy, love and the insight leading to enlightenment.

    Models & Mentors -. “Knowing others is wisdom, knowing yourself is enlightenment.” – Lao Tzu

    “Enlightenment is your felt state of Oneness with Being” – Eckhart Tolle

    “The road to enlightenment is long and difficult and you should not forget snacks and magazines” – Anne LaMott

    “Suffering is temporary, enlightenment is forever” – Buddha

    “Enlightenment does not come from the mind, it comes from just being. You are already enlightened. You have to realize it to allow it into your experience”- Anita Moorjani

    #Haiku: Enlighten-ment

    Dissolution reassembles;
    Enlightened wave knows
    It’s
    Ocean

  • Becoming a Warrior – the Warrior Oracle by Alysse Aallyn

    Foxglove – Medicine:

    If This Card Chooses You – It’s time to pay attention to your physical well-being. This doesn’t necessitate a doctor visit, it could mean you know perfectly well you’re doing something to threaten your health and it’s time to quit.

    But Sometimes a Doctor Visit is Necessary – Do you dream of hospitals? Doctors? Shamen? Magic pills? One of society’s proudest boasts is our seemingly mysterious ability to cure illness, or at least palliate its effects. Your dreams say you yearn for healing, and something in you recognizes you need help.

    Do You Trust Your Doctor? Maybe it’s spiritual healing that’s required. Try a naturopath, acupuncture, massage therapy – searching for that instinctively helpful healer. Revisit advice on managing gurus – they must not be greedy and must demonstrate they have your best interests at heart. Seek references from friends. Anyone attempting to isolate you and wall you off from information is not your friend.

    The Warrior Path Is Exhausting. We need constant support. No shame – it’s part of the calling.

    What Makes A Warrior’s Heart Race? – Anyone developing their own map gets lost frequently. How can we find the right path? How can we develop the confidence to choose the “right diagnosis” for what ails us? When should we request a “second” or “third” opinion? How can we stay on the “right” course, or even assess the “rightness” of any course, considering all our past mistakes?

    Warriors need “heart strengthening.” “Foxglove” the source of digitalis, (a powerful heart medication) tells us: Listen to your heart. Get out your Training Journal and start making notes. What questions do we wish to ask? Who do we want to be? Where are we trying to go?

    Warrior Danger – Can we tell the difference between a “fortifying” or a “harming” path? TV pharmaceutical ads list grisly side effects for pills tackling the vaguest malaise. Who can overlook these threats? Perhaps the ultimate “danger” lies in ignoring the warnings our “dis-ease” gives. What does “I want to be young again” really mean? We are all mortal. We have just so much time left to plan. To “become”.

    Warrior Opportunity – Some people are more confident following an “experts recommend” course, others adapt and customize as they go. Joy is the moment when planets and moments all click into alignment and we feel we accepted as a beloved child of the universe. Let’s unclog our ears, remove the plank from our vision and simplify our world to recapture the moments of joy experienced in childhood. If a loving, guiding force rescued us over and over again, we can summon the confidence to find several human healers to guide us through the healthcare system.

    Models & Mentors – “Hugging is good medicine” – Karen Salmansohn

    “Medicine is the art of amusing the patient while nature cures the disease” – Voltaire

    “Medicines cure diseases, but only doctors can cure patients” – C.J. Jung

    “Medicine cures doubt as well as disease” – Karl Marx

    “The arts are as essential to everyone’s lives as clean food and fresh air” – Renee Phillips

    #Haiku: Overcoming Narcissistic Disappointment

    Cuts hurt
    Scars heal
    Skin becomes
    Distinctive; you
    Become interesting.

  • Becoming a Warrior – the Warrior Oracle by Alysse Aallyn

    Clinging Vine – Dependency:

    If This Card Chooses You – You are suffering an entanglement. Do you secretly fear abandonment? Are you afraid of being alone? In Warrior Oracle, the Clinging Vine card reminds us of all of the unpleasant aspects of needing others’ constant support to function. A clinging vine can’t stand up by itself, it needs an immoveable shoulder to fasten upon. 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.

    Warriors 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 shoulder to cling to. Are you locked into a position of support for someone else?

    Warriors Must 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 we ordinaries. But they insist on maintaining freedom of action – for good reason. Don’t make destructive deals involving your future. Warriors 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 warriors never check their brains at the door. We are strategic, planning, evolving. Our maps will always need an update and a redesign.

    Warrior 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 Warrior – the Warrior Oracle by Alysse Aallyn

    Hummingbird – The Soul:

    If This Card Chooses You – Your soul is speaking. Listen. Do you ever dream of hummingbirds? Of the ‘impossible” flight of the bumblebee? According to C.S. Lewis, we are not a Body with a Soul, we are a Soul with a Body. Our body may be very mutable, but our soul can be eternal. Do you dream of past lives? See yourself in historical contexts? Do you have dreams of utter bodilessness in which you are totally free, seeming to travel invisibly through the power of your mind?

    What Are Warriors Fighting For? Immortality is not a given, but an achievement. Souls are under threat. What is the Sin Against the Holy Spirit that the Bible talks about, the one sin that cannot be forgiven? It is any attempt to slaughter the soul, the stifle your inborne, God-given ability to detect the numinous and to access the sphere of eternality. Warriors therefore fight the greatest battle there is, to protect the power of their own Souls and those of others.

    Accept Your Immortality – Can we destroy our own immortality through abuse and disbelief? Sadly, yes, and some of us act like we want to! If “heaven” represents eternal bliss and “hell” eternal pain who would ever choose the latter? Those who find life itself such a stacked deck they turn away from the gamble. It’s soul suicide. This is as tragic as battling against one of our talents (“I’m never going near that guitar.”) Who exactly are you trying to harm? The direction we need to travel is in uncovering who we really are and freeing ourselves. To become a Self worth being.

    Everyone Has Experienced Flow – We have knowledge of eternality our daily life – actual accessible bliss in which Time and Impossibility vanish while we experience full connectedness with the universe. We become Warriors to master this ability – and to transfer it to others. It makes merely being ourselves a reliable, eternal pleasure.

    Warrior Challenge – Obviously, our minds change the same way our bodies do. We grow up! Think about the differences between you now, and you at say, three years old. Imagine the joyous understanding with which you will eventually “get” what seems now incomprehensible. If you just accept that possibility, you can enjoy the Now.

    Warrior Danger – What Christians call “sin”, Buddhists call “clinging”. We grab on to any passing thing in fear, to halt the frightening mystery of our flight but of course it doesn’t work! The G forces build up as space revolves around us, meanwhile we are clinging to some crappy object, or some person who is experiencing a different trajectory. Let those things go. Don’t be frightened by your feelings, just study them, turn them into huge iridescent bubbles, and spin them away. Learn to enjoy this flight, no matter how wild it gets.

    Warrior Opportunity – Think about the Biblical parable in which everyone is invited to a glorious feast. These “guests” are so threatened by this invitation, they not only don’t go, they murder the messenger. Watch the glorious film, Groundhog Day. Poor weather forecaster Bill Murray is sentenced to living the same reality over and over and over again, trying everything to escape, including suicide. Finally he decides to learn how to just enjoy the life he has been granted, and to be as nice as possible to the other frightened, enraged, confused souls around him. Only then is he able to move on to the next level which turns out to be the rewarding love of his dreams. That is the Progress of the Soul which we defend.

    Models & Mentors – “the living soul, once conscious of its power, cannot be quelled”

    – Horace Mann

    “The soul always knows what to do to heal itself. The challenge is to silence the mind.”

    – Carolyne Myss

    “Without applied awareness of the soul, happiness can’t arise” – Dada Bhagwan

    “The desire to know your own soul ends all other desires” – Rumi

    #Haiku: Last Minute

    Bone grows
    Mind crashed
    Soul merge
    Skin graft
    Intervention –
    Light shaft
    Angel…?
    Laughed.