My path of devotion
I didn't trust my own path to meditation. It came to me again a few days ago while I was practicing Adyashanti's approach to meditation which is not a technique but allowing awareness to go exactly where it wants to go, letting it flow however it wants to flow, not trying to control anything. Doing this I learn all the ways I tell myself my awareness should be here rather than there, I should be this rather than that, but just like a couple years ago when I was listening to Adyashanti all the time, when I really allow myself to sink into it, what I feel is goddess. I didn't choose goddess, really. I don't think I chose to "believe" in goddess, I just felt her, like she claimed me. Her energy is often quite erotic and sensual to me, especially when she calls me to surrender. I really wanted her to flog me. And I guess she did.
There are times when I feel her presence so strongly I can't help but go into a bit of sub space with her. Everything I'm holding onto so hard, she asks me to give up. Sometimes she asks me to give things up in ways that scare me to death and I resist, resist, resist. A couple years ago I felt like she was trying to "sabotage" my life. I mean, I do adore her Kali nature. Really she calls me to take risks with it and step outside my normal boundaries and she teaches me that some things have to fall apart for renewal to happen. And though the surrender feels so good in the moment to actually follow her call and surrender in life is really really hard, I resist so much which is why my willingness to surrender to her is such a powerful thing. More and more, as I feel her as a presence infusing my life, and I feel held, I feel willing to surrender.
I experienced her again in a meditation a few days ago and realized, this is the practice that heals me most, that takes me where I need to go (though there's nowhere to go really). When she comes my meditation is just, sort of, following her lead. She'll tell me, focus on this chakra, or meditate on this image, or... and I'll just do it, and things will move around inside of me, and I'll start wondering what's going on and who is it that I'm listening to and what am I actually getting out of this? Because there's a part of me that's like, meditation, especially the kind of meditation that feels like playing around and follow the guidance of some goddess energy that I don't even know if I'm making up, better be doing me some good in some way or it's just sort of energy masturbation! More and more though I'm realizing *this* is the energy I have to trust. I've been trusting other people's meditation techniques and telling myself what I should/shouldn't be doing and what's a waste of time and what's not but implicit in that is the idea that my natural inclinations are somehow not the right thing to be doing, and it's about time to just let go of all that and listen to goddess. Or listen to my self, my true heart. Which I'm starting to think is pretty much the same thing.
As I sunk more and more deeply into this meditation, I felt the hurt in my heart that feels like it's been there forever (I've been working for a couple weeks on slowly untying the knots that are there, but I need to be patient with myself). As I sunk more deeply, I felt her even in that pain, and it ceased to be pain, just coiled up goddess longing to break free. An awareness that all is shakti. She will sometimes do these really strange things to me: like, she just put my heart in her mouth and tasted it and sucked on it and delighted in it. No wonder when I started experiencing these things I felt like I was making it up. But I realized the thoughts that I so often judge, the inclinations and desires I have, the emotions, the places my awareness goes, it's all shakti. When I feel her, it all feels right, and I am exactly who I need to be right now. I can trust the process. When I don't feel her with me I feel empty. And I've looked for her, unknowingly, in so many places, but not right here.
There are so many meditation teachings that aim to get us to a place where we can accept what-is and to love everything that we experience but something had always felt a bit hollow or empty about that for me, like something was missing, and it's like goddess devotion is my path to that. I feel like there are mystery teachings out there that I haven't found, teachings on how to really practice goddess devotion in a concentrated way, or things that will help me make sense of the sorts of experiences I have and go deeper into them. Yet, when I do a google search for "kinky goddess," I don't find any of the right kinds of results. Who is writing about the goddess that takes one to sexual and sensual transcendence, the goddess who plays with one's heart with her tongue? She seems to be taking me there on my own, even without the support of others -- it's just the part of me that thinks, all I'm doing is sitting here feeling this stuff and calling it goddess and she's sucking on my heart and what the fuck?
When I feel her surrounding me, when I know that all that I experience is goddess, somehow that connection attunes me to energies that have probably been felt for millenia and it's only then that I feel this sense of belonging that allows me to get to a place where everything I experience is welcome. And it's like when I feel some part of me I can't love, she'll hold it, and she'll see it with this love that I can't see it with myself, and she'll be like, "This too, dear, let me have this too. Yum." And so she transforms me so that more and more I see myself and the energies I carry around with me as divine, so that really the goddess I am worshipping and surrendering to is myself. I mean, I feel her outside myself, the whole cosmos infused with her, but I am part of that, and she is me. Perhaps she is so strong for me because she's calling me back to parts of myself that I have long siphoned off and must reown. When I submit to her, and when I long to submit to her and do the things she calls me to do, what I'm surrendering is my ego and the parts of me that resist my true self. So it is in surrendering to her totally that I feel my power.
I was working on my memoir yesterday and feeling really ungrounded and anxious and defeated; I mean, I was writing about abuse and a lot of hard stuff. I was writing about what Rebecca pointed out to me a couple years ago about having so much love and passion and eros to send out there but not having enough consistent outlets to feel like all that's inside of me is not wasted, and that has been the dilemma that I haven't been able to figure out how to resolve. When I have whole deities of love inside me how can I possibly find ways to express that in a world that makes it so hard for so many of us to offer our gifts?
So I just lay down and did some grounding and then, completely unexpected, goddess started speaking to me: "You're not really trusting me. You're not really devoting yourself to me. You think you are, but look. All that you have inside you, it's as big as that vessel that shattered when the world was created, and you look around, wondering what's gonna hold it, and then you feel defeated before you've taken a step. Why do you keep forgetting me? Offer it to me, offer it all to me. I'll take it gladly, I'll see you like no one has ever seen you and delight in you and I'll return to you so much love and abundance that you will walk in the world in beauty and power and it will all be available to you. I will transform your heart. I will give your power back, all of it, just give everything you have to me. It's all okay, it's all beautiful, every bit of what you are. I will take it and cradle it and play with it if I feel so inclined and I'll make it part of me and then I'll give it back to you."
I felt her incarnating before me in a transgender form at one point and I was really able to sink into that. Then, after writing all of this, in a blog called Mystical Beloved with some absolutely gorgeous writing, I see pictures of Shiva and I think, "Is that a god or a goddess?" and of course! In Hinduism/tantra the feminine is the active principle which Shiva needs to function; if Shiva isn't filled with Shakti he's going to be impotent! In one of the images Shiva is called the "male god who embodies the ideal of feminine beauty." The author writes:
"In Krisha’s iconography, he is often depicted as displaying outrageously feminine beauty with wide hips, doe eyes, and feminine body language. This imagery is intended to be romantically and erotically exciting for both male and female devotees of all sexual orientations.
Yet, since straight male worshippers need some way to rationalize their homoerotic feelings for Krishna, they are told to conceptualize themselves as Radha, the female lover of Krishna. So the masculine-feminine wires are all mixed up. Both sexuality and gender identity become fluid in the realm of spiritual practice, which is glorious as far as I’m concerned. The Krishan-Radha dynamic is almost identical, minus the pictures, in Judaism, where male Rabbis conceive of themselves Kabbalistically as God’s female lovers."
From the very beginning my own transgender experience was a tantric one. I realized that when goddess started coming to me, I think, and then I forgot about it.
And how my kundalini awakened, actually was through relationship. I wanted to find a being out there that I trusted enough to see and hold everything inside of me, and I thought about goddesses but goddesses weren't resonating. I hadn't met the goddess yet. Angels and such, I couldn't really touch, they felt too distant, but... then there was Jesus. So I offered zir all the pain that was in my heart on my out breath, and on the in breath I received unconditional love, and this offering myself and receiving took me into a deeper and deeper state until my body just started buzzing with euphoria and a pinpoint at the base of my spine shot upwards. And so I started doing that with goddess, except rather than being right in front of me as Jesus was, she was there but also infusing me, she was me, she was everything, and it was so much more sensual... I felt myself starting to vibrate and I felt my root like with my first kundalini awakening and it was about to transform my energy configuration, but something took me out of that state. I was in this state of deep relaxation and all around good feeling and the whole "outlet" dilemma kind of... became moot.
Then today goddess told me to put my collar on and I wore it for half the day. She wants me to go out in public with it and to let myself be with the feelings of shame and inappropriateness and being exposed. She wants me to know that I have *her* permission to go out like this and that's all I need. Somehow, right, I'm still working on trusting her fully. I still really want the permission of someone, to tell me that's okay. I want to be able to go out like that, with other people, and then alone, and to... experiment, I guess. I hate the voice that says, "Oh, no, you can't do that, you'll make people uncomfortable, you shouldn't bring kink out into the world like that, be proper!" I need to defy that voice. Because I let my fear of those things limit me *way* too much.
I want someone, a human someone (I'm still learning to totally surrender to goddess!), to give me permission to do that, to be willing to go out with me like that and not feel a bit of hesitation. Someone who will wholeheartedly give me permission to go to the edges and play with them! To tell me there's no shame in it, to understand the sacred nature of it, to actually be thrilled for me because they get the sacred importance of it. It's like, wearing such a symbol of submission in public... or just something so... edgy I guess... brings up all my fears of being exposed and judged and that's a good thing because when I'm in a sub place I'm so receptive and I can let any shaming or rejection roll off of me (or enter into me so tenderly that I feel myself through it) and actually heal me. Because if I can be that in public and be powerful then there is so much more of myself I can be, too. Especially in expression of my authentic gender. It's like an elastic you want to play with at a certain tension but sometimes you need to stretch it way beyond where you would typically play with it in order to give it the flexibility you desire. It's a sacred tool. It's so scary but I feel like I need it so much for my healing. It's scary to hear a "no, I don't think you should do that." I mean, I even feel really weird about wearing such things at places like burner festivals because it's so not the vibe everyone else is giving off -- I don't know if I've ever seen anyone wear anything like that at a burn? -- but if it's really about radical inclusion and self-expression then why even there should I feel like I'm somehow being inappropriate? All these voices telling me to be appropriate are so strong!
I miss sub space so much. I can get myself there, a little bit, or rather goddess gets me there, but it's not the same. One of the best things about sub space is how receptive I am to everything and how nothing can hurt me, everything is safe, there is no shame in anything. Like, a couple years ago, there was this gorgeous person that I absolutely could not talk to, it terrified me; I got so self-conscious especially about my own body. But last summer after I had gotten into sub space we sat together naked and we touched each other and I wasn't afraid to ask for things and when she touched me I really received it and there wasn't a bit of fear there because I'd let all my hangups go in the getting into sub space, and we were able to really share a flowing connection for the first time. And so much gratitude, for every little thing. I feel like wearing a collar in public would have a little bit of that effect, where after a while, whatever anyone might say to me, I could just let it roll. Like, if I have someone with me who really has my back and *gets* that this is a kinky and a sacred experience for me, it's like they're holding space and every time I feel like I get a strange look I can let it hit me like a whip on the back and, with that person there and still cheering me on, it will actually feel good!
Sub space is getting into a space of receptivity to things that we might usually be afraid of or that might usually hurt, like impact, and once I've surrendered to that and all it brings up, then the little pangs that come up in social situations don't hurt either. It becomes so much easier to just take everything in and come from true presence in the world and paradoxically submission is power.
Goddess also nudged me to open up to someone in particular and, well, I basically just told her that 1) I wanted to write her an email and 2) That I wanted to worship her. I don't know why I said that. I meant, worship goddess through her, of course, but yeah. She said she was afraid of her ego exploding. Asked me to explain in my email what that kind of worship might entail. I'm not exactly sure what I want there but somehow I/goddess knew that she would be the perfect person to talk about this to and now I think, maybe, the perfect person to ask permission and to give me permission. Though I need as much as I can get. Eventually probably I won't need outside permission but I think the first step is affirmation and especially seeking the "hell yeah!" enthusiasm of others who can really support me.
The amazing thing is, only now, right after I've written all this, do I start to come across writing that affirms that, for example, the tantric path is one of tuning into the goddesses as deities and eventually those energies are experienced as part of one's own nature. I'm not sure I ever *heard* that before but I was led to that realization by goddess. Also in a search for eros and Goddess I read about a chapter in Sally Kempton's Meditation for the Love of It called Letting Shakti Lead. Here are the steps she describes:
"1. Let yourself become aware of the spontaneous inner movement or dynamism.
2. Welcome and honour the inner dynamic energy as the Goddess and as the authentic self.
3. Ask the inner Shakti “Where would you like to play today”
4. Whatever experiences Shakti leads you to, try to enter inside of it and become intimate with it.
5. If difficult experiences come up, rather than focusing on suffering or dissatisfaction, focus on tenderness, longing, and love-sickness."
Fuck yes! That's pretty much exactly what goddess is teaching me to do and I didn't learn it from anybody! More and more I trust in my connection to her and the guidance she sends me. I mean, I kind of long for some sort of more structured sacred school, but here I have my own tantra teacher who's been showing me all these things, and it's goddess herself!
Before I changed my name, Lily was the name I gave to the divine feminine. I would write "Dear Lily," in my journal and around that time Mother Mary, who I'd never really given a second thought, kept appearing to me, like I had hit on something. It's interesting that this is a process of recognizing goddess and then reintegrating goddess as my own power and that's how my name unfolded. In my journal you'll see the "Dear Lily" entries slowly give way to entries ending in "Love, Lily." I somehow found out in the midst of the Mary appearances that the Lily was her symbol, and I felt called to listen to this song I knew from a few years back, not really remembering the details but feeling like it fit somehow, and it was perfect. And now, more than ever, I feel like this is my song, my prayer.
I adore thee Mother Mary
But would you change me back to a witch
And let me live in the arms of a sorry old elm
Give the gypsy moths a realm of their own
For a postmans fee would I work for Thee
From that tree would I swoop down and leave
A billion blue eggs of eternity
And in no time you'd have your own See
Dont just stare
I mean it, really
Hear my prayer
I give it freely
Are you there Fleur-de-Lis?
I adore thee Mother Mary
But would you change me back to a witch
And let me live in the arms of willow
And fly around not wearing a stitch
For so long has this room been so hollow
We wait at the gate for an echo
In the flesh of your newly cleaned frescoes
Where Jesus holds John to his breast
Wrapped around
And rocking slowly
No one bound
To be so holy
In your gown of fleur-de-lis
I adore thee Mother Mary
But would you change me back to a witch
As a witch would I love you more than any man
So give a wink, give a nod, but give a damn
Be a sport, Mary, and don't tell Dad
He need never know how He's been had
And never you mind about those seven seals
Daddy was a one shot deal
One, two, three
It could be that easy
There we'd be
I with my baby
On a sea of fleur-de-lis
Do-re-mi
It could be that easy
There we'd be
I with my baby
On a sea of fleur-de-lis