In response to a perceived threat, I created a DIY ceremony of protection and recorded it live with the permission of the two neighbors who participated. You will also hear a bit of The Seven Directions by the Sami Brothers, Litha: The Summer Solstice Song by Lisa Thiel, and excerpts from the incantations and teachings of Don Oscar Miro-Quesada. Sequitur theme music is by Zympht. The featured image above shows the Pachakuti Mesa or altar table before which the ceremony was performed with the “Misarumi” in the center of the plaid altar cloth.
Run time: 63.5 minutes
Here is a broader perspective on the space and, below that, a close-up of “the Crone” or “the Martha avatar” with Anubis by her side. For scale, that’s a leaf of basil in the right foreground.
Also included is Elizabeth West’s eighth Sunset Windows practice titled Loving It All. The instructions are below her featured image.
Loving It All
1. Start with grounding and breathing. This need not take long; you will know
when you are ready to move to the next part.
2. Ask to be shown an aspect of self that you reject or condemn that you are to
look at.
3. Then, imagine that you are sitting before an altar. Take a minute or two to
create, in your mind’s eye, the altar (or some sort of container space) you’d
like to have for this exercise, that you’d like to work with all week. Put on it
items that feel important or beautiful or meaningful to you, that you want to
help you explore and hold truth. You can create a real 3-D altar if you wish,
but it isn’t necessary.
4. Once it is ready, place one aspect of yourself which you do not love on this
altar. Take a good look at it, and then ask yourself the following questions. It
might help to print or copy out these questions so you can refer to them
easily while doing the exercise. Listen quietly for the answers that arise:
• Do you love less because of this quality?
• Who is hurt, and is it the quality, or is it your condemnation of it, or
both, that causes the hurt?
• Is there any purpose (that has value for you) that is served by
withholding love from this aspect of you?
• Can you forgive yourself? Even for a moment? (Be honest here. It is
perfectly ok if you can’t.)
• Can you find any forgiveness or compassion in your heart for others
with this same or a similar quality?
• Do you need to change anything to be loveable?
• Do you want to change anything?
5. Once you have checked in on each of the questions, make a few notes about
what has come up for you. You don’t have to DO anything or work on this.
Just see it, answer the questions as you can and give yourself permission to
be conscious of this piece of you during the day.
6. In the evening, before you go to bed, take one or two minutes to check in and
see how your relationship with that aspect of self is. Has it changed at all,
even subtly? Have your feelings about it altered at all?
On the following days you can decide if you want to spend more time with the
original issue, or if you want to move on to another part of yourself that you
relegate to the corner. You have already ‘built’ your altar, so feel free to return to it
each morning.
