Alysse Aallyn

Category: #SoulTravel

  • Becoming a Warrior – the Warrior Oracle by Alysse Aallyn

    Peace – Serenity –

      If This Card Chooses You – You need to learn to enjoy your time off. Are your reveries organized around beaches, vacations, relaxation, memories of happy times when you had nothing to do but enjoy yourself feeling only the moment?

      Peace is Possible. Serenity is an Idea. Most of us are familiar with the “serenity prayer” written by theologian Reinhold Niebuhr:

      “God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference, living one day at a time; enjoying one moment at a time; taking this world as it is and not as I would have it; trusting that You will make all things right.“

      The Serenity Prayer works as an inoculation against pointless worry, which is seen as “borrowing trouble.”

      Warrior Challenge – Like meditation, serenity is a mental state that takes practice. Make a list of your most pressing concerns. Can you do anything about any of them today? If so, appoint a time when you will take a step towards resolving this concern. If you can’t do anything about it, put it forcefully out of your mind. Imagine your worries as a bunch of balloons. Now let them go, one by one. Put each useless worry on a piece of paper and burn them slowly, one by one.

      Warrior Mantra – Give yourself a “serenity mantra”- a word or phrase you find comforting and centering, and repeat it out loud to yourself. St. Julian of Norwich recommended: ”All will be well”, Coué offered, “Every day, in every way I am getting better and better”, some yoga enthusiasts chant a simple “Om.” You can use a phrase from your own past said to you by a Beloved Person – “now you’ll be fine” “You’re safe” “You’re perfect” “Everything’s all right”or the tried and true: “I love you.” My favorite is from Book of Revelation: “Every tear wiped away.”

      Warrior Danger – Don’t be tempted to become a mentor while you’re still learning. Warriors want to be helpful but this is a snare. Mentoring is an end-of-life honor, but you are still placing the oxygen mask on your own face so that you can stay on your plan. Show friends the basics but don’t walk them through it. You’re busy.

      FOMO -We are all worried about “missing” something. Often that “centering person”, that reassuring person from our past is not just the one who gave us the relaxation code, but is also the same one who told us what to worry about: ie. ”Make sure all the locks are locked” “Have you done your homework?” There certainly are things to be concerned about (“Are you registered to vote?”) but there are plenty of worries we CAN’T address. Return to the serenity prayer and start weeding out – on paper – your Justifiable Concerns. One of the best things about Anxiety – and I mean this – is that it offers an opportunity to ask for help. Yes, I say “opportunity”! Because life is all about RELATIONSHIPS.

      Worries can be chances to forge meaningful, worthwhile relationships. Get ready to experiment. As with any other relationship in your life, your requirements, tolerance, communication goals are unique. Many people yearn to speak to a “professional” – therapist or life coach – and plenty of professionals out there are auditioning for a little – or a lot – of your hard-earned cash. An excellent place to start is with Proven Gurus like Tolle Eckhart or Pema Chodon who can be accessed for free from any library. See what you think. Evaluate their assistance. Inquire further.

      Warriors Know What They Have to Do – Others are envious that we have laid out a plan for our lives, that it is flexible, that it is life-enhancing and that it gives us permission to Enjoy. Be humble about this jealousy.

      You’re Entitled – Others also could find peace if they began to take control of the drama that rages within them. Point them in a hopeful direction but don’t get sucked in.

      Meditation Looks Like Dreaming – The secret is, there is enormous pleasure in being a warrior. You finally feel your strength, and when you know the value of your time, you feel your own value. This is what others yearn for. They can learn it, too. But in the mean time you are enjoying your hard-fought serenity.

      We Need So Little To Be Happy – This is the great realization. One bowl, one mat, one dawn. The comfort of another’s presence or the pleasure of your own thoughts. The joy of another morning, another night’s rest. The confidence of a clear head. Welcome to the Universe.

      Models & Mentors – “Do not let the behavior of others destroy your inner peace.”

      – The Dalai Lama

      “God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can and the wisdom to know the difference.” – Reinhold Niebuhr

      “Serenity of spirit and turbulence of action make up the sum of life” – Vita Sackville-West

      “Enjoy the peace of nature and declutter your inner world” – Amit Ray

      #Haiku: Peace

      Melting heart;
      Compassion
      Purges
      Life’s shudders
      Restores
      Unruffled Depth

    1. Becoming a Warrior – the Warrior Oracle by Alysse Aallyn

      Inspiration – Intuition –

        When This Card Chooses You – You need to find a way to hang on to those little ideas that keep flickering across your mind-screen. What inspires you? Are you waking up filled with exciting ideas you long to write down? Do you feel the potential of philosophical, profound revelations in your dreams which can never be captured in your waking state?

        Your Subconscious is Calling Out to You – You are experiencing a split between your Rational self and your Prophetic Self, a split which is not only potentially dangerous but completely unnecessary. Probably someone in your education blocked your inspiration by demeaning this interactive channel to the Collective Unconscious of Past and Future and warned you to ignore it. Often teachers think they are “protecting” us by modeling ignorance of the importance of intergenerational trauma, ignoring collective wisdom and its symbols. Education is a good thing when it teaches you to recognize, master and increase resources but it is certainly a bad thing if it countermands, neglects or destroys the yearning inside of you for a deeper connection to all of history and humanity.

        Warrior Challenge – We can re-open this channel, but we will have to think about its potential in a more positive way. The great physicist said that all profound truths contain their opposite (i.e. are not dichotomous) and so require new theories about the Real and the Unreal. These ideas are not mutually exclusive. We must learn to flow with them, rather than fear & resist their bubblings of power.

        Warrior Danger – “Either/Or” thinking is destructive because it requires we abandon vast methodologies of knowledge. “Reductionism” reduces the world to “things” on the presumption that people are transient and “things” are more permanent. But if the magic of the universe encodes in relationships rather than objects this reductionism kills true discovery & thought itself.

        Warrior Opportunity – Accept and ready yourself to explore your inspirations. Learn to separate them from fears and wishes. Cultivate your intuition, that precious gut instinct that warns us who and what to trust and who – and what – to back away from. Accept that – like all good things, this is a Process – thus endless (ie; to be enjoyed for all eternity.) Accept that it is a skill to be honed – one you will keep forever.

        Develop Warriors’ Gut – You sense things. After you sleep on it, you know things. Develop these instincts through drumming, foot massage, chanting, meditation, whatever activities bring you “out” of your head.

        Confront Your Real Self – You can use a sauna as your own private ‘sweat lodge.” The goal is to locate your original self to ask its opinion.
        All too often people in our consumer culture seek a psycho-active product for brain “transformation”. You will need brain “purifying” instead. Consider the substances you fear being without. Caffeine? Nicotine? Carbohydrates? Alcohol? Pain pills? Consider trying to go without for short periods of time to develop your tolerance. Try intermittent fasting under the guidance of a responsible nutrition coach. Track your emerging thoughts in your Training Journal.

        Models & Mentors – “Intuition is the whisper of the soul” – Krishnamurti

        “A good artist lets intuition lead him wherever it wants” – Lao Tzu

        “Follow your instincts – it’s where true wisdom manifests itself” – Oprah Winfrey

        “Intuition and observation are the sources for our knowledge” – Rudolf Steiner

        #Haiku: Inspiration – Intuition

        Faint voice
        Clear
        Harder you listen
        Heart
        Symphonics – re –
        Connecting
        World

      1. Becoming a Warrior – the Warrior Oracle by Alysse Aallyn

        The Lovers – Alliances –

          When This Card Chooses You – Check your friend list. Do you dream of love, sex, connection? Hand-holding, hugging, family celebrations? You were born to search for Alliances. An alliance is symbiotic, good for both sides of the equation. To reach out, you must each decide your motive (“I Could Use a Friend”) and approach with the CERTAINTY that you are WORTHY of friendship. This last one is tricky because we are all looking for validation. This is the source of many “imposter” dreams where we find ourselves naked in front of the entire class, unprepared on Test Day!

          You Are a Giver and Worthy of Help – We can’t get through this alone, and we don’t want to. Luckily, we are surrounded by other humans, struggling, just like us. If we pledge to help each other, we can dispatch terror and celebrate joy! Comforting! But how can we tell the difference between Builders and Exploiters? We don’t want to end up as someone else’s meal.

          Warrior Danger – When someone is trying to mangle your self-esteem, recognize this. Even if it comes in the guise of “friendship” this person is an enemy. This is not what friends are for. When someone is trying to “capture” you, i.e. limit and control your possibilities and behavior, that person is a hostage-taker looking for slaves. NOT a friend.

          Warrior Challenge – How to recognize friends? Friends are honest: “I just don’t like that dress but maybe it’s me.” Friends are forgiving, ‘I’m sorry, I was having a bad day. I know you’re sorry, too.” Friends are fun, “Let’s cheer ourselves up.” Friends are helpful: “Let’s figure a way out of this.” Are you honest, forgiving, fun-loving and helpful? You’re ready to be a friend. Friendship is a good place to start. Be the friend you want to have – warm, funny, loyal, truthful.

          Love Enriches – It Does Not Deplete – – Friends are a mirror in which we see ourselves. We can experiment with possibilities, we can expand our reach. Our intelligence is doubled, as well as our efforts. Our sorrows are halved and our ideas are increased exponentially. Reach out! You never know until you try. And there’s always the possibility of Love and deepening sexual connection.

          Love Transforms As A Warrior Transforms – Things you thought you could not do seem possible now because someone believes in you. Believe in yourself because they do, and honor them by believing in them, in return.

          Locked Back to Back the Warrior Pair Sees Everything – Gaze turns outward at the world, not inward on each other. Are you chewing or strengthening? Learn the steps of your tango. Add new steps of your own.

          As You Change, the Couple Changes – Compare Training Journals. Are you evolving? Can you evolve together? Is it safe to speak the truth? Does one partner try to dominate? Does one partner use infantile behaviors to get “their way”? There is no “one way.” As joint warriors, the couple has goals also. Compare. Allow differences. The truth will be revealed.

          Models & Mentors – “You are my sun, my moon and all my stars”
          – e.e. cummings

          “All that we love deeply becomes a part of us” – Helen Keller

          “Love makes your soul crawl out of its hiding place” – Zora Neale Hurston

          “Love is not proud or boastful, keeps no record of past mistakes – love rejoices in the truth”

          – II Corinthians

          “Laugh as much as you breathe, love as long as you live” – Rumi

          #Haiku: The Lovers

          Falling upwards
          Into you
          My other wing, my second
          Clapping hand

        1. Becoming a Warrior – the Warrior Oracle by Alysse Aallyn

          The Storm – Conflict –

            When This Card Chooses You – Something’s coming. Are you having bad dreams? Of natural disasters like storms, volcanoes and flooding? Do you fear war, robbery, violation, home invasion? Or do you dream about your loved one’s face turning bitter and their words cutting sharply? Conflict is inevitable. It is even necessary – birth pangs seem terrifying. In dreams we rehearse our fears until some of us fear to dream.

            It Always Comes Before You’re Ready – Here it is – the reason you became a warrior. You have to battle or go under. The force against you is superior – no question about that – you will have to be wily and know when to expend energy and when to conserve your strength.

            You are a Force Field. You are a magnet for desire, change, for evolution itself. This comes by virtue of your warrior birth. Others may tell you to stand back, take your place in line or wait your turn but your appearance into this chaotic universe triggered no such guarantee. We are here to learn to use our power.

            Conflict Makes a Warrior – Force stirs up resistance. Actions create re-action as we swing back and forth in our determination and direction. We clash and crash. Sometimes we regret it bitterly, “why did I do that?” Sometimes we fear loss or harm so much we become immobilized. The challenge is to assume your stride, elucidate your goals and plan a direction.

            Warrior Danger – It’s all too easy to make others fear you. The one with the biggest weapon THINKS he wins every fight. But what looks like compliance to you could be revolution – you will be toppled and lose your heart’s desire.

            Warrior Opportunity – Learning to use conflict constructively and creatively is a Superpower. Other people are force fields, too? If there is any way to blend these powers and head in the same direction, we become invincible. Welcome the knowledge provided by the Storm card in your Warrior Oracle deck.

            Study Your Opponent – Some clever scholar has separated these opponents into groups & classes. Read up! Some opponents – physical contests, weather conditions – don’t even have a brain. So who – or what – are you playing against?

            You Are Playing Against Yourself – your own fear, incapacity, beginner status. Seek mentoring so you have advice along the journey. Who is the sensei who will guide you? Someone who desires both your safety and your growth.

            Reward Yourself – The best place to do this is your training journal. Think hard about every contest and how you performed. Assess your challenges and accomplishments. Way to go!

            Models & Mentors – “I used to tell myself, boy, if you can survive this, you can survive anything” – Tom Lichtenberg

            “Laughter is the proof that our tragedies don’t define us. Laughter is the survivor’s language” – Josh James

            “Cancer didn’t bring me to my knees, it brought me to my feet” – Michael Douglas

            “If you want to awaken humanity, awaken yourself. If you want to eliminate suffering, eliminate what is negative in yourself. Your gift to the world is our self-transformation.” – Lao Tzu

            #Haiku: Sleuth

            Named is
            Tamed.
            Brainstorm:
            Exceed
            Outstrip
            Surpass
            Unveil
            Lay bare
            Prevail

          1. Becoming a Warrior – the Warrior Oracle by Alysse Aallyn

            Creativity – The Artist –

              When This Card Chooses You – YOU ARE AN ARTIST ! You possess the warrior power of making Something out of Nothing. Think. Feel. Look at the tactile world around you and reach out your hands.

              Warriors and Artists immortalize themselves. Sometimes their works are so intriguingly beautiful that we are drawn in and our critical senses – our fear – is tranquillized while we allow the artist to work magic upon us. Artists aspire to be magicians of the mind and soul.

              Warrior Challenge – You create something unforgettable because you do not want to be forgotten. You want to open hearts, minds and brains just as yours were first opened, long ago, when you looked upon this amazing world for the first time and felt the power & potential of what you saw. Warriors feel the same thing. We march to a different drummer we feel inside ourselves. We are inner, not outer directed.

              Warrior Danger – There is possibility here for such overweening pride that you place your own psyche above Creation in importance. If you seek to divert worship of creation to yourself your own soul will harden unto death, and your creative powers will be extinguished.

              Warrior Opportunity – Join the goddess in creating something entirely new that the world will not want to live without. The joy of sharing, the rapture of being known, the ecstasy of expression, of gratitude of being understood, will be yours.

              Are you an artist because you say you are or because they say you are? Well, are you a warrior because you say you are or because they say you are? I think it should be obvious that is TOTALLY NOT UP TO THEM. You MUST decide you are a warrior, you have to FEEL like a warrior and they can NEVER “tell” you what you are. It’s exactly that way for artists, too. It’s a temperament, a way of viewing the world, and because it’s in harmony with Creation all around us, it’s enormously satisfying. Really gets those alpha waves going.
              The warrior in you needs to protect your creativity. It is always under threat.

              Hustle Culture – Art can’t hustle but the merchandisers and the monetizers hasten to tell you: “Close enough – let’s get this thing to market.” But you need to find out what’s there – why this subject, these tools are drawing you. You need to think, to explore, to experiment, to start the process of 10,000 “failures” Edison said are the steps to success.

              The Creative Warrior – If you’re not a creative warrior, you’re someone else’s warrior and that’s a living death. Strategize. Speculate. Get out that Training Journal. Dream. Speak to your soul. Allow it to shine.

              Models & Mentors – “Creativity is seeing what everyone else has seen and thinking what no one else has thought.” – Albert Einstein

              “Creativity can’t get used up. The more you use the more you have.” – Maya Angelou


              “Creativity is just connecting things.” – Steve Jobs

              “There is no innovation, no creativity, without failure.” – Brené Brown

              “What’s so fascinating about life is the constant creativity of the soul.” – Deepak Chopra

              #Haiku: “The more neurosis, the more wisdom”

              Difficulties create
              Enlightenment;
              Recognize,
              Participate.

            1. Becoming a Warrior – the Warrior Oracle by Alysse Aallyn

              Autumn – Regret

                IF THIS CARD CHOOSES YOU – Something’s bothering you. Do you lie awake at night recalling bad moments from the past? The Regret Warrior Oracle card says you need tackle the problem of “change” NOW. What moods flood in when you close your eyes? What would you change NOW? How do you WANT to change?

                Why are people so afraid of looking inside their psyches? Because of Regret, that’s why. The things we’ve already done or that we already are that can never be changed. Sorrow floods in – now we feel helpless, we hate ourselves and we can’t fix anything. We fear we are in for a bad, cold, frigid winter of discontent.

                LIGHTEN YOUR LOAD – No one can do this but you. You are serving as prosecutor against your own life and guess what? – that’s not fair. Fundamental Attribution Error means people blaming individuals for actions that were the result of mass decisions or life circumstances over which they had no actual control. Look into it, if you want to. (Sometimes we need to.) Or you can just forgive yourself and move on. After all, we’ve got the future to think of. Warriors won’t be stymied.

                WARRIOR CHALLENGE – First, forgive yourself. You were held hostage by fortune (we all were) and inevitably you went full-on Stockholm Syndrome and identified with your attackers and tried to please them. (We all did. It’s called Society.) Now you’re madder at yourself than you are at them. Forgive yourself.

                WARRIOR DANGER – The moment you drop that burden, you’re in another part of the forest. Surprise! This wasn’t the plan but here you are. The Danger is – you’ll give up. Don’t. NEVER GIVING UP IS THE WARRIOR’S SUPERPOWER. We CREATE paths where none existed. You can easily see from every fairy tale and hero’s journey you’ve ever studied that now we’re getting to the Good Part. By testing your muscle you get to grow your muscle. If your muscle is never tested, it withers. So get ready.

                WARRIOR OPPORTUNITY – We don’t know everything. Even Jesus demonstrated surprise about the way things turned out. Be gentle as a dove, he advised, but wily as a serpent. Serpents can get out of anything. (Ask a herpetologist.) And so can you. It’s just a bigger world than we knew – both inner and outer – so get mapping. I guarantee you – IT GETS BETTER.

                YOUR Superpower: Our brains are constructed in a way that allows us to move backward and forward through time, watching and judging ourselves from the outside, always considering multiple possibilities, outcomes and problems. We have a tendency to regard this power as a burden and envy those whose lack of questioning seems to make them more carefree. But it is this exact superpower that designates us as Warriors.

                Even When We Enjoy We Regret: There’s always something we could have done differently. And that unknown outcome is bound to seem preferable to the reality in which we find ourselves. Don’t waste time on regret. You drew the “Regret” card to remind you that time – even pleasurable time – is always limited. Restrict the amount of time you spend on regret! Congratulate yourself on your ability to play a multi-level game, forward and backward through time, peopled by a panoply of characters. Open up your Training Journal and take a God’s eye view of your world. See anything different? Fresh? Exciting? New?

                There’s Lots to Enjoy About Autumn – It’s a beginning, not an ending! The world is freshening up to divest those tired leaves and grow some sharper weather! Always consider the exercise possibilities. Maybe you can stay out longer! There’s a lot of fellow Warriors in the Polar Bear Club!

                Models & Mentors – “I’d rather regret the things I’ve done than the things I haven’t done.” – Lucille Ball

                “There are no regrets in life, only lessons.” – Jennifer Aniston

                “We have only one life, and the second life begins the moment we realize that fact” – Confucius

                “I was designed by my Creator to not only feel pain and love but to become whole inside it. I am a Warrior” – Glennon Doyle

                “Autumn, the year’s last, loveliest smile” – William Cullen Bryant

                #Haiku: Regret

                Coulda
                Woulda
                Shoulda
                Didn’t. Now you
                Wish
                Things
                Different.
                Clean slate.
                Write.

              1. Becoming a Warrior – the Warrior Oracle by Alysse Aallyn

                Summer – Relax –

                  If This Card Chooses You – You need to relax! Can Warriors afford to relax? Seems counterintuitive, doesn’t it? Well, Lesson #1 is that being a warrior is Counterintuitive. Other people rush away from the burning building – planning on being EVEN MORE SCARED the next time. Well, we are going to master our fear. We are going in.

                  Let’s Panic – I had a panic attack at age 5 (I got lost outside a movie theatre) and another at age 11 when I descended deep, deep, deep into a cave. (I think the guide was deliberately trying to scare us.) I didn’t know at the time what these episodes were – my parents and sisters saw them as embarrassing annoyances – but looking back it’s clear what was happening to me physically as a result of what was happening to me mentally.

                  Relaxation In the Face of Panic – Learning to tolerate psychic dissonance, to be interested in it and challenged by it is what we’re all about. It’s a sign that we’re in the presence of the Deep Stuff – the things that galvanize our deep subconscious and if we can just seize control of that, we’ll access our true power.

                  Learn Relaxation Techniques – There are so many and you should experiment with all of them! Learn what works for you and – key – what you enjoy. You will find yourselves using these techniques all the time. To get to sleep, to get through difficult experiences or just to access your subconscious when you have a question.

                  Breathe Deeply – The very first thing is mastering control of the breath. Pregnant women learn all kinds of helpful breathing techniques in Lamaze; panting, counting; deliberately slowing down and speeding up your breathing. In yoga you will learn Lion Breaths to make you feel powerful. They are very similar to the gasps and shouts in martial arts and will affect your opponents. Watch the Maori war dance on YouTube.

                  Get Out Your Training Journal – write down the techniques and your reactions. Appoint a time to practice these every day. Your breath connects you to the universe and all living things.

                  Models & Mentors: “The first thing to learn is the breath.” – Confucius

                  ‘Breathe In. Let Go. And remind yourself that this very moment is the only one you know you have for sure, and give thanks for that.” – Oprah Winfrey

                  ‘Feelings come and go like clouds in a windy sky. Conscious breathing is my anchor”

                  – Thich Nhat Hanh

                  “While we breathe, we hope” – Barack Obama

                  #Haiku: Every Breath You Take

                  Life isn’t numbered
                  By breaths you take but
                  Moments
                  That take breath
                  Away

                1. Becoming a Warrior – the Warrior Oracle by Alysse Aallyn

                  The Goddess – Power !

                    What It Means When This Card Chooses You – You are one of the Elect. Most people feel that because the Goddess card represents power it’s the most valuable card in the Warrior Oracle
                    deck. But we are all familiar with fires that get out of control, rage-fueled spirals, explosives that blow up in your face and escalating weaponry. Owing to the Goddess’ power, much can go wrong.

                    You Have The Power – The true meaning of this card is that you have the force within you to get things done and to bend unfriendly circumstances to your desire and will. Isn’t that what we all want – a little magic?

                    You Are Iconic – But the Goddess card is about more than magic, it is about the inherent magic that is especially, irreplaceably You. You have a power no one else has, incorporated in your being, your possibilities, your desires and your memories. This takes a lifetime to accept because we all nervously want to be Someone Else and experience existence through the armor of Having only an Outside instead of just the very vulnerable Inside in which we all feel imprisoned.

                    Dreams Instruct You – Your dreams bring all these passions together as psychic poetry, elucidating what you think you want, what you hope you want and what you are afraid you want. The ultimate magic is to seize conscious control of this potent power source.

                    Warrior Challenge – The challenge is to truly connect with others, reveal our world Inside, and avoid blasting their apparently impenetrable Outside with our terror, our longing and our fear.

                    Warrior Danger – We cannot take hostages and we must never become a hostage. Freedom is a fine line to walk. If we wish to reach out, we must treat others with respect and claim like respect for ourselves. Accept your “experiments”; do not fear them but allow them to take you where you need to go.

                    Warrior Opportunities – There will be stumbles and terrors aplenty, also successes that LOOK like stumbles and terrors, but which we only realize on reflection were real leaps forward. This is why we must carefully assess our daily efforts without being harsh with ourselves. Speak gently to yourself as you would to a most beloved child. You are your own Most Beloved Child. It is not selfish to commit to this belief, it is simply placing the oxygen mask over your own face FIRST so that you can administer this life-saving force to others. Find someone with whom you can share your journey, without fear or judgment. This connection will teach us everything we need to know about how to connect with others.

                    Fear & Trembling: Where would we get the courage to become warriors? Human history begins with an enormous fear of God or whoever is causing all that lightning, those earthquakes and striking everybody down. Killing small helpless, pretty things was meant to be flattering and propitiatory to this God (I don’t get it either.) then Jesus came with a message about how God was really loving, generous and wanted the best for us. We know how that turned out.

                    Becoming a Warrior: As children, we struggled to understand where we fit on the power spectrum. I tried killing a snake and experimented with bullying other children the way I was bullied. I didn’t care for it. The only relief was in thinking about, researching and understanding what was going on. My earliest researches, as for many children, were in astronomy and dinosaurs. The cold magnificence of the planets and the complete wipeout of the dinosaurs gave me a way to stand back from the immediate suffering of the schoolyard. I then moved on to the early Egyptians who tried to solve their problems through magic and art. The art was visually appealing and the magic was emotionally soothing.

                    Pick Your Battles: I saw that most schoolyard fights were a reaction to the immediate suffering of pain or confusion, and that they magnified, rather than solved, those problems. There was a manifest holiness about this discovery. It rescued me from the torture of everyday life and elevated me to a plane where every other contributing thinker had already become immortalized.

                    Study & Strategy: I read everything I could get my hands on in history and biography (research) and in fairy tales (magic). When I fell in love with the novels of C.S. Lewis and Rumer Godden, the world judged my taste good – when I discovered Agatha Christie, it did not – but it turned out everyone else was reading her too. Agatha is a short course on human nature (original sin) and a proponent of both the scientific and Socratic methods. She’s great training for a Warrior. I wrote it all down in my Training Journal.

                    Claiming Your Power: By the time you’re a teenager you can see you have some power – some mental, some physical. The question is developing it and finding appropriate gurus. Avoiding the dominance/submission game.

                    Keep Going – Recognize that you have been touched by the goddess and honor her by being grateful for the glorious gifts of life.

                    Models & Mentors: “I did not deceive you. I permitted you to deceive yourself.” Agatha Christie

                    “An Indian proverb says everyone is a house with four rooms – physical, mental, spiritual and emotional. Most of us live in one room or the other but if you don’t visit each room each day you are not a complete person.” – Rumer Godden

                    “You are never too old to dream a new dream or set a new goal” – C. S. Lewis

                    “You have to believe in yourself” – Sun Tzu

                    #Haiku: Wyvern

                    My power
                    Beast bristles
                    Fire;
                    Eats critics
                    Guards path
                    Sleeps in my
                    Mirror

                  1. Becoming a Warrior: the Warrior Oracle by Alysse Aallyn

                    The Life Force: Energy !

                      What It Means If This Card Chooses You – You are gathering force for a great work. Do your dreams pulse with some energy gathering within you? You are readying yourself for some great task.

                      YOU ARE A POWER – You are struggling to find your force. You feel the power and strength of as yet undefined wishes and the longing to create your place in the world. No guide exists to this wilderness, you will have to map this forest yourself. Be brave.

                      YOUR CHALLENGE – There are plenty of traps ahead. Do not become discouraged. Accept that the flow of energy pulses with your every heart beat, with your sleep/rest cycle, with the obligations you willingly seek to smooth your path.

                      YOUR DANGERS – Some of these obligations become too heavy, others seek to deter you from your set course. Still others offer false maps that seem to promise the ease of “I don’t have to do this alone.” We are all alone inside our heads and you – and only you – must be satisfied with the map you create. If you aren’t there’s no fellowship or wealth that can compensate you for that loss.

                      YOUR OPPORTUNITIES – We revel in and with our fellow travelers. There could be a soulmate among them – for a time or for a life. Accept the wisdom of others, the wisdom of the path, consult other maps in designing your own. Be prepared to alter your map – joyously – with each new and fresh discovery. There will be many. Salut!

                      HOW I BECAME A WARRIOR: I had three sisters so feel I was really raised by them, rather than by my parents. Each offered a modality for Being that was intriguing to me, the quiet, sensitive, observant one. My eldest sister was very cooperative with my rather demanding parents until it came to her love life, then she slammed the door on them. She was a Love Warrior. My second sister pretended to fulfill parental demands but she was actually full of subversive ideas. She was a Covert Warrior. My little sister just wanted everyone to get along and have a good time. She was a Peace Warrior. And me? I needed lots of alone time to study other people, read, think and design various futures. I was a Thought Warrior. I discovered people have much stronger mental powers than they give themselves credit for, and these powers can be developed.

                      Planning: My diary has always been my staging area for figuring out what I want to do next, assessing reactions and sketching out scenarios. It helped me learn detachment – I am not locked into any one idea, and because I considered or experimented with something it does not define me. Your key in Strategy Sessions is to cultivate a sense of freedom.

                      Warrior Danger: People will spend their time trying to get a handle on you so that they can control you, and they are not above using your own training journal to shame you. Don’t let it happen. “These are exercises,” you must tell them, “To develop my flexibility as a warrior I must play with multiple personae. The Life Force requires it.”

                      Becoming a Warrior: Exercise is important to Warriors, especially thought warriors and introvert warriors. Becoming just a Brain in a slack body is imprisonment. Try out every different sport that is offered to you. The one that worked best for me was dance.

                      How did the people you admire manifest the Life Force? Jesus spent an epic 40 day & nights in the desert. Margaret Mead lived in Samoa studying the Samoans. Carl Sagan describes his “defining moment” as visiting the World’s Fair at four years old. It exploded and expanded his mind. Who are your models? Research them and study their transitions and experiments.

                      Magic & Mystery: A you accept yourself and accept your changes, you are confronting the dynamic of change, which is the manifestation of energy in existence. We are all alive and moving. This is a dance and you are the choreographer and star. Erik Erikson said “A good life is like a weaving. Energy is created in the tension. The pull and tug, the struggle, is everything.”

                      Commit to tiring yourself out during the day with thought, exercise and interrelations so that you can enjoy healthy sleep at night.

                      Models & Mentors – ‘Every thought has an energy. Thoughts send out a magnetic frequency” – Rhonda Byrne

                      “Energy is the power that drives every human being. It is not lost by exertion but maintained by it – for it is a faculty of the psyche” – Germaine Greer

                      “If you want to find the secrets of the universe, think in terms of energy, frequency and vibration” – Nikola Tesla
                      “The more positive energy you throw into the universe, the more positive energy you get back” – Nitin Namdeo

                      #Haiku: Catalytic Action

                      Partake:
                      Energy blooms;
                      Whirlpools
                      Dance;
                      I am
                      Limitless
                      So are you

                    1. Secrets of the Self -how I became a warrior by Alysse Aallyn

                      The Rose – Vulnerability –

                        Sharing poetry is the most painful vulnerability. That was when I realized for the first time that pursuing life of art requires the warrior sensibility. You have to keep going, no matter what other people say and what they recommend. Some advice is good and some isn’t. We all need to develop our warrior instincts and our warrior sensibilities.

                        Poetry is a language it takes a lifetime to learn to speak. Luckily, other people speak it! Back when I was a new mother for the first time, I advertised for poets and assembled a book of over 50 poems, representing over 40 poets from 26 states, writing about the experience of being female, and called it The Feathered Violin. We printed 450 copies and shared it widely, all around the country.

                        In terms of sheer daring, this may have been one of the most daring things I’ve ever done!

                        POETRY

                        The world that seems to us so still


                        And echoes no reflection of our will


                        Somehow produced the seed that in us all


                        Resurrected us from worm to fish, to crawl


                        Upon the earth, to stand and then


                        Return a child to creep and crawl again


                        In some unending pattern, sane or not


                        Judging by the brain that this same seed begot


                        And yet within our every cell lies curled


                        A revolutionary flag to be unfurled


                        And lead us on to who knows what potential end


                        Beyond the reach of enemy or friend?


                        Can it be that simple balls of spinning glass


                        Possess the strength to lift from this morass


                        All that we are; though we don’t understand


                        This torch we pass so tenderly from hand to hand?