From Sunday, September 21 until Thursday the 25th, a group of us met with poet, author, healer, medicine woman, and holder of council Deena Metzger.  The setting was an exquisite piece of land of more than 200 acres very close to Bancroft, Ontario.  We spent time in deep, deep council together, sharing dreams and stories that could transform each individual, the group, and our world and all of its inhabitants.  Our retreat was an experience of:

a) looking for signs to help us be in alliance with all beings,

b) engaging in an unbiased gathering of those signs into a story that is both personal and collective, and

c) asking ourselves and each other to listen to the call that is being asked of us so that there might be a future for all beings in a culture of peacemaking.

Time with tree, rock, field, snake, water, stars, bear, hawk, wind, deer, dreams, songs, other humans, and more than I could see opened me to whole-body, all-senses awareness — listening with my whole self.  Through Deena’s careful, conscious weaving and the group’s support, I became cognizant of a calling to offer circles of healing that involve energy work, sound, council, silence, dream, deep divination, drumming, and so forth — a sort of Pythian-Asklepian-Darélike “temple”.  I ask all of you for guidance about locations for these gatherings.  It’s not convenient to host them in my apartment.

I was grateful to be asked, from time to time, to pull a card from the Maat Tarot to notice where the group was at any particular moment when we began or ended a circle or when we had been deep in a process of healing or dialogue.  As ever, the images mirrored the feelings in the room.  Wondrous!

Besides great depth, there were delightful moments of singing, laughter, and camaraderie.  Such balance was appropriate and vital at the time of the Autumnal Equinox.  A special treat was to hear Deena read poems from the manuscript of her upcoming book of poetry.  Watch for it next Spring.

Each person present in our council up north was changed in some way, some very obviously, others more subtly.  The tools that each of us carry into the world are compassion, insight, awe, and beauty.

I invite you to live into these questions:

What is your unique contribution to a peacemaking culture?

What is your own story of grief, healing, and insight?  How does it relate to what’s happening on our planet at this time?  What does it tell us about healing our planet?

How do you notice that Life is speaking to you?  What is it asking you?

Where is your “temple”?  How does it nourish you?  How do you nourish IT?

How might the tools of compassion, insight, awe, and beauty manifest in your life and work?