Alysse Aallyn

Category: #PersonalChange

  • Becoming a Goddess – the Goddess Oracle by Alysse Aallyn

    Wandering Goddess – Dispossession –

    Are You the Goddess Who Can’t Settle Down? – Some goddesses never settle on a place, an identity, or even an idea. They roam restlessly, but not in a peaceful way. We would say they are goddesses of War, except that not even battle – not even decisive wins, can settle them.

    You’re Boiling Inside. – You’re so mad you can’t think straight. You had something and now it’s gone – now you have less you ARE less. Some thief is waging subtle war against you. The fact that you stole the thing originally and you’re a thief too isn’t making you any happier. You were supposed to get this thing, you were in line for it, and now all bets are off.

    Wandering Goddesses Are Escaping the Past – Take your time. You have all of eternity to figure this out. The only reason to put an end to your restless raging is to cease your suffering.

    Are You Suffering? – Make up your mind. Maybe you’re just blowing off steam. Maybe you’re a traveler, you love to wander, and you just needed an excuse. What needs to stop is feeling “not right” in your soul. Because it’s a perquisite of Goddess-hood to be in tune with the universe.

    Broken Dreams – Probably you need to forgive yourself, because forgiving others is just too difficult. Consider the past as Boot Camp. Now you are a goddess. Maybe relaxation doesn’t sound fun to you, but on the other hand, you should never disparage yourself. We all not only make mistakes, we require mistakes to be the foundation of our Mature Selves.

    If Property Is Theft, then We’re all Thieves – What exactly is this lost paradise? A Goddess doesn’t really need “things”, adulation, or even other people. Look out further, to the real paradise, the one you’re earning my understanding the universe. You’ve been through a fire – congratulations. It made you a Goddess.

    Only Goddesses Are Truly Free – Naked without even the clothes we stand up in we are bathed in the love of the universe. Allow yourself to feel it, fill you, enlighten you. Do you hear it? When you slow down, you can finally hear the music of the spheres. 

    Goddesses own nothing. We are not interested in acquiring burdens but in freeing the human psyche of its burdens. To do that, we must first free ourselves.

    Don’t Chain Yourself to a Nightmare– There is much talk nowadays that “the American Dream” is no longer possible. Very relevant to our study of Goddess Oracle! Dreams are our specialty!  But what was that “dream”, exactly? It was a mystical concept of “wholeness” – family, life, work, rewards – that always shifted according to who you are and from where you are looking.

    Once You are Part of a “Team” – even if just a team of two – the look can change dramatically. Is that a loss or a gain? Depends on what you see as value, and what as “hoarding”? We know if we eat more than our cells can burn we get fat, and that if we eat too much too fast we will choke. How can we slip psychically through this physically demanding life, light as feathers, bright as sunlight, strong as fire, without acquiring accretions – barnacles – that slow us and defeat us?

    By Becoming Goddess, That’s How! We no longer fill our tombs with the junk of real life for use in the Great Beyond, “terra cotta servants” who will “wake” to wait on us hand and foot. We are always required to satisfy ourselves with strictly “mental” pictures. Is the detachment of elder-hood a triumph of success or a long wail of departure?

    You Can’t Take It with You and You Don’t Want To – Not if you expect to fly! The “de-cluttering” movement did us all an enormous favor. Marie Kondo asked us to rid ourselves of every object that does not “spark joy”. That’s a high standard! We soon discover that daily life stirs up a lot of “necessary” detritus that sparks joy in literally no one but is a misery to live without. Probably the best way to free ourselves is to challenge the entitlement mystique with sharing.

    Goddess Danger – The whole principle of capitalism is to benefit from the work of others. It doesn’t take much imagination to see the grievances THAT can stir up. And yet “state” ownership churns up grievances of its own. Ownership itself is fraught with exclusion, hostility, and danger. The nature of the Goddess is to “Be” rather than to “own”. Can we still enjoy the world if it doesn’t belong to us and we don’t belong to it? Goddesses say Yes!

    Goddess Challenge – Do we possess objects when we are not physically present? Can we ever possess people? Do we WANT to take responsibility for another’s entire existence?  How do our dreams of freedom comport with our dreams of possession? Who – or what – is held captive? Goddesses deliberately free ourselves – mentally and spiritually – but this is a commitment that must be refreshed daily due to the temporal demands of our physical existence. That means goddesses forgive ourselves daily. Just to keep in practice!

    Being a Goddess Means Acknowledging Wounds are a condition of life.  Goddess come to terms with their wounds, evaluating them, celebrating them (often giving thanks for them), creating conceptual at projects about them and strategizing around them.

    Many Wounds come from happenstance, birth order, parental crises, national dilemmas, international catastrophes. We’re all pushed out of the nest before we’re ready.

    Models & Mentors –  “The more stuff I donated the more I was able to breathe, the more trash I threw away, the more weight I felt was lifted, the more I was able to see a new life, the more joy I found” – Zina Harrington

    “Clutter is postponed decisions” – Barbara Hemphill

    “Life is your masterpiece. Edit frequently and ruthlessly” – Nathan W. Morris

    “To the spoils belong the victor” – F. Scott Fitzgerald

    “Freedom is the oxygen of the soul” – Moshe Dayan

    #Haiku: The Thief

    If

    Property’s theft:

    My greed’s your crime

    I consume –

    Disperse –

    Your evidence.

  • Becoming a Goddess – the Goddess Oracle by Alysse Aallyn

    Lotus Goddess – Healing Rituals –

    The Goddess’s Greatest Gifts – Do you dream of restoration, of nostalgia, of lost youth? Magic? Let the healing begin.

    Goddesses Believe in Magic Because They Have Seen It – It’s a magical world, where flowers push upwards through cement, the wounded rise and entanglement theory alchemizes quantum computation. Bravely, we put ourselves in the way of harm, and harm is done to us. But we believe in the magic of perfecting through transformation. These scars, these wounds, these experiences make us smarter, harder, brighter and as beautiful as the universe itself.

    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 Goddess’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 – Show Respect –  We are each other’s masters, we are each other’s pupils, we are each other’s lovers, siblings and rescuers. Drinking healing ginger tea from a  translucent porcelain chalice, we lift our cups to one another. We bathe together in steaming pools. I release you as you release me. When darkness falls, we touch one another’s hands before departing. To fulfill our yearning, we may blend bodies.

    Goddesses 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.

    Goddess Challenge – Paradoxically, no “medicine” can succeed unless we “accept” our healing spiritually. We must feel “worthy” of restoration, deserving of transformation.  What truth do we embody?  Think deeply. We are not self-punishing but state 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.

    Goddess Danger – Healing cannot occur in an atmosphere of self-hatred and self-blame, but many of us are STILL “blaming” ourselves (and others!) 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.

    Goddess 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 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 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

    Pond Goddess – Judgment –

    Goddesses Choose to Be Unhaunted – We are armed by our disciplined practice in harmony with the laws of growth and the demands of nature.  But Goddesses sense threats; we all live in the shadow of wrongdoing and injustice.

    The Tears of the Goddess –  What are your fears? Are you dreaming of police? Prison? Are you haunted by religious fears of hell and condemnation? Are you confused about innocence in general and the worth of your virtues in particular? Some people say we can’t break God’s laws, we can only break ourselves against them. That’s certainly true of the laws of Science!

    Who Judges the Goddess?

    We know other people are looking. We know we are always being assessed, ranked, possibly dismissed. We defensively assess, dismiss and gossip about each other. All of us wish to be judged by our intent, by the content of our hearts, rather than by results, which owe so much to fate.

    Goddesses Cultivate Discernment – We are familiar with the experience of disliking some experience until a friend teaches us “how” to like it. We treasure the interesting adventure of seeing the world through another’s eyes , feeling with their hands, tasting with their tongue and remembering through their memory. An out of body experience for sure, as well as a bonding exercise. Seeing ourselves through another’s eyes can be very uncomfortable. How about history’s eyes? What will be said about us? How will we be remembered?

    Goddess Challenge – Youth produces Bad Experiences and Bad Experiences develop Sophisticated – i.e. “Good” Judgment. Seriously, you need to be able to see some of these Bad Experiences coming because in our competitively capitalistic society these can be “extinction” events.  How many decades of your life do you have to devote to unethical corporations, scammy multi-level marketing schemes, bad marriages, unreliable friends and “secret” investments? Our time, youth, energy and assets are limited. Know your limits.

    Goddess Danger – Fear and Regret are potent forces. Sometimes it is possible to be too cautious. But can you just “dip a toe?” The principle of “dollar cost averaging” suggests that you must keep “paying yourself back” for investments that seem to be paying off big, so if they suddenly plunge, you will never have actually lost money. In other words, mapping!  Study your progress as you go. This requires that we not get swept up in the experience with your mind unbalanced by inebriating substances. Ask yourself honestly, is it possible for me to stand outside the crowd when the crowd becomes a mob?

    Goddess Opportunity – Goddesses take the time to develop themselves outside “the group.” Do you have a group of goddesses or is such a thing an oxymoron? How often do you do things because “the group” is doing them? How smart is your group? Who controls it? How close to the cliff ARE you? Think about the nature of leadership. Of models. Goddesses who evince compelling discernment are challenged and respected. Sometimes you lose your taste for the group, or you find a new group that suits you better. Goddesses evolve.

    Fearlessly.

    Models & Mentors – “Good judgment comes from bad experience” – Will Rogers

    “At the end of the day, you need someone who listens to you without judgment” – Payal Rohatgi

    “A rush to judgment makes a fair trial hard to get”

    – John Grisham

    “When you judge another you define yourself” – Wayne Dyer

    ‘It is easy to dodge our responsibilities, but hard to dodge the consequences of dodging our responsibilities” – Josiah Stamp

    #Haiku: Dear Jane Austen

    Formalized play

    Mines nature’s

    Riot;

    Edit

    Emote:

    Judge

    Love

    Rewrite

  • Becoming a Goddess – the Goddess Oracle by Alysse Aallyn

    Tulip Goddess – Illusion –

    The Tulip Goddess Masters Magic – the Art of Illusion. Much illusion is the art of Misdirection – allowing the credulous to deceive themselves. The Goddess of Magic has noticed that the development of  Maturity is NOT popular with everybody, because it prevents the Narcissistic Acting-Out so gratifying to the determinedly undeveloped. Unfortunately those who pursue power, instead of self-development, often achieve their goal.  The Goddess is always being governed by her inferiors. We aren’t in heaven yet.

    The Road to Enlightenment – is long and painful and currently has a bad press. The Tulip goddess understands the human desires behind wishing and subjugation – handing your soul over to a “collector” for “processing” feels like a relief.  A magic dissolution of “the rules”.  But the Goddess recognizes that mirages – especially those we close our eyes to believe in – are illusions. Falsehoods. Clinging to obvious fantasies triggers willing surrender of 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 any rules, it’s laughably easy to steal people’s money.

    Some Illusions Are Life Strengthening – Others are Life-Depleting. The Goddess knows the difference. Goddesses avoid fantasy thinking. Goddesses traffic in absolute 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 goddess end up battling FOR falsity – it’s the worst of all possible situations.

    Goddess Challenge – Face facts. Learn to recognize the difference between believable experts and carnival barkers.  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 increasing suffering throughout 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 – When group members rush 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.

    Goddess 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.

    Goddess Opportunity –  Relax! Goddesses 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 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

    The Light Goddess – Enlightenment –

    Goddesses 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. Life is a quest for ultimate understanding that will make sense of all the confusion. 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.

    Enlightenment is Nothing to Be Feared – Forces of darkness are heavily invested in keeping us dependent and confused. They attempt to imply that “waking up” to reality will separate you forever from everything you loved about your past. This is nonsense. To be enlightened is to be far-seeking and far-seeing while comforted by the Ultimate Love that is the promise of the universe. It is to break the shell of ordinariness with its suspicions and superstitions and see the breathtaking grand plan in which we all have a part to play.

    Goddesses Must Constantly Rise – 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?

    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, calcified wisdom. The light that pierces darkness is Goddess Oracle’s symbol of the mystical understanding and lightning universal comprehension we call “enlightenment.”

    Goddess Challenge – Enlightenment literature recommends 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 go to sleep in one world and wake in another. 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.

    Goddess Danger – Zen teachers say that if anyone represents themselves as a Zen teacher they aren’t. 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 Wary 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.

    Goddess 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: Enlightenment

    Dissolution reassembles;

    Enlightened wave knows

    It’s

    Ocean

  • Becoming a Goddess – the Goddess Oracle by Alysse Aallyn

    Mermaid Goddess – Singularity –

    Goddesses Don’t Run with Any Crowd – There isn’t a goddess crowd. Do you frequently find yourself walking in a different direction from everyone else? Do you often feel ganged up on, bullied? Feeling unappreciated, even exhausted? Are you waiting for someone to celebrate You? Maybe it’s time to celebrate yourself.

    Goddesses Anoint Themselves – If someone else anoints a goddess, how can she be a goddess? Goddesses are forever alone, singular in their singularity.

    The Wild Orchid Cannot Be Propagated. It is found in deepest woodland. The Mermaid card represents all the Uniqueness out there, and because there are so many of us, that’s a lot of singularity!  If you doubt that so much uniqueness could possibly exist, consider the humble snowflake.

    Each Goddess is Unique – We may be civilized into groups, but society only advances because of its singletons. Becoming a goddess means insisting on the right to make your own special contribution.  Recognize how much the world needs you, and congratulate yourself for it.

    Goddess Danger – The powerful are only powerful because they assemble armies. They want you fighting for them, not for yourself. Consider your best interests. Armies PLAN to “use you up.”

    Goddesses Will Not Be “Used” – Goddesses train themselves to out-think people and situations.  Confronting the solipsism of Narcissism is a real challenge in our society. People are encouraged to perform, push themselves forward and try to harvest “likes” from absolute strangers by sheer outrageousness, rather than by developing a real, immortal Self. Honoring your uniqueness begins in absolute privacy as you face your soul, contemplate your real self and consider pathways to strengthening these assets.

    Goddess Pride – Humility sharpens our edge and keeps us light on our feet. It’s never too late to change direction, especially when you find out you’ve been traveling the wrong way. Consult your maps and Goddess Journal. There’s always time for a redesign.

    Goddess Opportunity – The goddess path is independent of criticism from those not making your journey. Critics wrestling for control won’t like that. We all need to consult different perspectives to check ranking,  placement and effectiveness but much criticism is sharpened to spike & derail. Recognize the techniques that are attempts to harvest YOU and feed off your power and are designed to re-direct your effort to the critic’s own ends.

    Goddess Freedom – Much human interaction is a subtle or unsubtle jockeying to divide people into camps and to enlist you to carry someone else’s banner. But goddess own their own souls and battle for abstract principles of fairness and goodness, health and growth.

    Models & Mentors – “What sets you apart can feel like a burden, but it’s what makes you great” – Emma Stone

    “If you are always trying to be normal you will never know how amazing you can be” – Maya Angelou

    “Always remember you are absolutely unique, just like everyone else”

    – Margaret Mead

    “Be yourself – everyone else is already taken” – Oscar Wilde

    #Haiku: Conceptual Art Project

    Your life’s

    Hard-fought how-to guide:

    Unique –

    Personal;

    Willed:

    Transformative

  • 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