It seems that there hasn’t been many times within my life recently, where I have truly felt a sense of pause. Where I can do very little, and for that very little to continue beyond the odd blissful empty Sunday afternoon. Or the couple of hours here and there you can sometimes find, when the children are at school or at a club, and nothing needs doing.

This past several years I have been on a deep learning experience. It has taken the form of an intense period of introspection, whilst simultaneously developing new skills and learning. New ways of being and each informing the other. And as well as a beginning it has also been a completion of a kind. A return to something I began a long time ago, and a braiding together of disparate threads, offering a more embodied future, where all the things I am have a fluid and integrated feel to them.

So what has been going on?

So last year I began a twelve month Shamanic Healing programme. I still catch my breath a little when I say, or write that. It is certainly something I have held back from sharing with people. Not apologetic, but perhaps a little unsure as to how others might perceive it. That it might be seen as something strange, a little too pagan for everyday life.

It certainly wasn’t something I had planned as being on the horizon, or even knew very much about until recently. But as a series of events unfolded, and I met the lady who would go on to become my teacher, one thing led to another and I found myself fully committed to beginning something which would take me deep within myself, and in doing so would change so much about where I was heading going forward.

Part of the shamanic work I have been involved in has been exploring the nature of shadow work – the darker parts of ourselves we often keep hidden and yet can tell us so much about who we truly are if we care to go that deep. It is often the chance to really explore what holds us back. And by bringing those dark shadowy parts of ourselves in to the light, and by doing so accepting them, we can find a kind of release and liberation.

Running alongside the course I decided to decided to train as a Reiki Practitioner. The two worked beautifully together. Learning about some of the hidden aspects of myself informed how I approached Reiki, and how I wanted to use it for the benefit of others.

Another aspect of Reiki is that in your learning preparation, it works to clear you of old energy patterns that lie within you. And so alongside the Shamanic healing work I was exploring, I was also letting go of some very old patterns; stored experiences and old wounds that I had carried around with me for a long, long time. In short so much of the past few years has been about letting go, whilst all the while steadily moving forward with a new and guided intention.

And it has all been welcome. Those changes have been incredible, however hard the process of change and release may be. Some have been subtle, softly embedding themselves within, whilst others have been really quite obvious, a pulling up and a shaking down. A 360 degree tour of my spiritual psyche and a re-examining of changes that have been so impossible to hide from.

Maybe my age too has been a factor in all of this. I am 50 next year and entering the Autumn, menopausal season of my life. Change is happening. And this next phase of my life is important in the sense that it is softening and the accepting stage of who I am. Menstruation and fertility – two parts of a woman’s identity and which have had such big impacts on my life these past twenty years will give way to something else – something slower, deeper. Wisdom of years lived, and the proud experience gained during those times.

For the moment I am taking some well needed rest and pause. The training and the learning will take a little sabbatical for a while as I wait for everything learned to embed, to become part of who I am. Then it is to begin working with these new skills and ways of being. I want my work to start taking in everything I have discovered. And by work I mean all those elements of who I am and what I do. From my writing to my role as a mother, my healing work and the plans I have for that ahead. Being a woman, an older woman, all these changes will influence and shape how I live and what I do within those days of living.

I don’t think I have ever felt so purposeful and sure of what I am doing as here and as now.

But first comes the rest….. 🍃✨

Oooo