Storycito: The Wildest Woman of All

Just from my heart to yours: There is a usefulness to a small satirical story… as medicine to prevent us from small-ifying everything vast and radiant down to a burnt cinder. We cannot be nourished from burnt bread.

Come this other direction, toward the vast mysterium. The doors, the doors of the universe ever stand open… even when many eyes are closed.

Yet be not impatient, for you are the able witness to this world and to the worlds within worlds. By your seeing clearly and teaching gently, you will teach others to truly see. Our existences will be the richer for your bringing the goodness of your gifts forward, bit by bit, adding to them each day.”

this comes with love and with peace,

Dr.E

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ONCE, WHEN SOMEONE TRIED TO TRADEMARK THE WORD “GOD”

by c.p. estés

A ‘somebody’ tried to trademark the word ‘God,’ so it could belong to only them, so only they could say what all godly things meant and what godly rules were to be followed, and what godly things were to be officially taught…

But the youngish trademark official behind the counter said, not unkindly, “You cannot trademark a name unless you are that person. “God” is a name, you see, so you must show proof that you are God.”

The ‘somebody’ replied: “I am not God…uh, except on Tuesdays, I try to dress and talk as though I am, but all that aside, I KNOW about God and that should be enough.”

“I’m so sorry,” said the official. “You’ll have to bring God in here in person to sign this trademark application. You yourself, no matter how much you know,

FIVE FEARS TO FEAR: AND THEN, NO MORE

One more blessing here for you now dear souls. Just put your hand over your heart, or just lean back, or rest your hands palm up in your lap… just relax, and take a deep breath.

FIVE FEARS TO FEAR, AND THEN, NO MORE

by C.P. Estés

Going over and over one’s fears
is empty
and emptying.
There’s something greater that sustains.
We call it Esperanza… Hope.
We call it Querer es podar, Desire is power.
Hope and desire are power.
Fear—ha!
Fear—ha!
Ha, hum—fear.
Pstt, pssh, poof.

Consider that most fear
is not fear of failure:
rather, it’s fear to live fully,
in full power.

Choose your petty fears carefully,
because they can grow truly big teeth.
Instead, draw your attention here…
I have several fears
I would like you to have…
Fear these:

Fear not loving
while you have the chance.
Fear becoming bitter.
Fear cynicism.
Fear turning to stone.
Fear living underwhelmed by everything.

When the culture drags you back and forth between being fearful and being a person who gives blessings…

Give blessings.

When the culture drags you back and forth between being fearful and being merciful…

Be merciful.

When the culture drags you back and forth between being fearful and being forgiving…

Be forgiving.

When the culture drags you back and forth between fearing and loving…
When the great “they” say it must be decided, one or the other,
you can either be fearful, or do the other,

be loving…

refuse to do only one.
Choose all of them.

Be fearful, and bless others.
Be fearful, and be merciful.
Be fearful, and forgive.
Be fearful, and do.
Be fearful, and love.

It is by doing…
by doing the blessing,
doing the mercy, doing the forgiveness,
doing the loving, and doing the doing…
that fear is dissipated.

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CODA: The above photo is photoshopped by a designer and is one of my favorite pictures. It runs with and without the quote on it but particularly, havent you felt this in dreams or perhaps in reality… That your wings are ready, just strong, turgid even, and ready to, deeply anxious to soar? The winged one is a strong archetypal image that has to do with ‘getting it,’ with delivering ‘the needed message.’ So many act as angel to us, and sometimes we to them.

with love,

dr.e

Introversion and Extroversion Are Not “Symptoms.” They Are Gifts.

Recently, the DSM (Diagnostic Statistical Manual) is in the midst of being updated. This occurs every few years. The DSM is used by clinicians in the Western world, to diagnose by traits and symptoms what pathology or mental, psychological, emotional, organic or characterological disorders might be present in an individual.

Curently, some on a working committee, have put forth the idea of calling ‘introversion’ a symptom of a larger disorder. The words introversion and extroversion are, according to nearly 100 years of analytical psychology, not in any way pathological, but rather, ways of perception and ways of processing what one experiences in life.

I wrote the following letter as President of a human rights Institute: La Sociedad de Guadalupe Heritage Institute which I founded in the early 1990s and which has as its mission literacy at all levels–spiritual, written, political, economic, cultural — for the souls of the world.

Here is the letter to the DSM working committee asking them to consider the gifts of introversion rather than tagging it pathological symptom.

La Sociedad de Guadalupe Heritage Institute:

Analyzing and Creating Solutions for Issues

of Immigrants, Refugees, Deportees and Victims of Torture

Early Provisions for the Journey Ahead

Dear Brave Souls of the Tribe of the Sacred Heart

Just some vittles and nourishments for later, once the fireside of The Dangerous Old Woman is banked until next we meet in the clearing in the night forest once again…

from The Dangerous Old Woman manuscript,

“It is women’s work to bring the ultimate art forward: Living in the soul, rather than living in the overculture. To enter the soul, be it, teach it with as much wit, meaning, grace and grit—and cackles—as possible.”

“One of the best things about gathering years is the right to cackle with impugnity”

“As a woman gathers more years, she becomes more bold, which is not the same as brave: Brave is jumping in. Bold is jumping in led by angels. In age, we learn to know the difference. For certain, ‘older is bolder…’”

“In old tales, there are plenty of bitter old creatures railing about shrieking me me me. One of the masteries of age, is to divest of bitterness which acts as a dam to the inspiratus and to one’s sense of calm in ‘being enough.’ Bitterness is self-imposed ‘prison of unhappiness’ where the feelings of isolation and rage seem to enliven us, but in fact, only deaden us to love and creative force.”

“If you are chronically seething, look not so much to your ‘designated enemy,’ but to your envy and your pride… Try to understand both, strive toward correcting the illusions and delusions that create and feed black jealousy and petrified-eyed pride. Envy and pride are angers that come from forgetting your promesas, forgetting your own El destino, forgetting to put Source without source at center, instead of ego-bilge.”

“Like a very young child learning to crawl who becomes stuck under a chair and cries out til the child’s mother pulls gently at its legs teaching it to crawl backward… learn to back out of the tangle. Your heart and soul will thank you, and Lady Wisdom will smile that you are free.”

“Will there be, no matter how one lives one’s life, a lotus of good witches and  a snarl of ‘bad witches’ somewhere within and-or outside each woman’s life? Count on it. As in the old tales, they all show up in many disguises.”

“In my immigrant and refugee family’s old story handed down, the’ whiteness’ Snow White carries is not about her skin color. It is about the eternal purity of her sweet soul, despite all else contravening.”

Peace be with you entirely.

With love,

dr.e

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CODA: the image above is an applique from my collection of The Sacred Heart I’ve cared for through the decades. It is, I think, an idea about the creative force without Source, able to shine regardless of being pierced by thorns.

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Coda, atop is an applique from a little collection of devotional sacred hearts I’ve found and cared for during my lifetime.

The Mother Ship: When A Good Mother Dies

I think sometimes this day, called Mother’s Day is all the more poignant for those of us who never had a mother or who had a good mother, a good-enough mother, who is no longer with us in the flesh, but certainly in spirit.

For those whose good mothers have died…

…for those who were lucky enough to have had what I call, “a beautiful, imperfectly-perfect mother,” but one who too early passed from this world, especially hard when she has been the ground note for her sons and daughters.

Some of us did not have a mother we can remember without fear, but even that doesn’t keep us from recognizing that special bond between many mothers and their children wherever we see it– and blessing that such bounty came to pass for them.

This is just meant to place a hand on the shoulders of those who might miss their mothers, just to take a moment to say, even though your mom is gone or leave-taking in some way, there was and is presence of her still. As long as you are here, she is here.

In some good way, she is here.

Not physically, and I know too, like you, how deeply we humans can be made completely undone by the loss of the physical person to embrace, hear, sit next to, smell, touch, laugh with, argue with, listen to, ask questions of, and love, just love.

Yet, in some way, if one looks and listens, the loved one is near. I tell my children about those they have lost, look for the signs. There will be signs. The souls will let you know. Love is not severed by death. Grow more astute to read the signs.

One of my dear friends just buried her mother, and another dear friend’s mother is ‘disappearing’ from Alzheimer’s— there are many other ways to lose one’s mother… including long-standing estrangement for good reasons, or sometimes foolish reasons, sometimes just a long mismatch or misunderstanding.

From Dr. E.: Blessing-Poem, “Hymn of Gratitude, For We Are Pleased by Dangerous Old Women and Their Wild and Wise Daughters”

Dear Souls: Here is an excerpt from a blessing poem with nine staves: this is the first stave in “Hymn of Gratitude, For We Are Pleased by Dangerous Old Women and Their Wild and Wise Daughters.”

I’d like you to just lean back in your chair, take a deep breath. It’s so nice to breath, isn’t it, speaking of el viento, the wind. Inspiratus finds a hard time getting into people who are breathing shallowly or tightly… you know those who go: huff, huff, huff, huff?

Have you ever noticed when you’re upset and suddenly breathing like a little locomotive, huff, huff, huff, huff? Take a deep breath now: Ahhhh! Place your hand on your heart, or leave your hands open in your lap, palms upward, and relax back. Just relax for a bit now…

“Hymn of Gratitude, For We Are Pleased by Dangerous Old Women and Their Wild and Wise Daughters.”

by CP Estés

For all the elders of the world,

each and every kind ever created,

those who have been carried gently by the waves,

and those who have been half-wrecked

by any number of storms and squalls,

those who have clung to the wreckage long enough

to make it halfway in,

and thence to have gained landfall.

For the elders,

who in all their variegations,

in all their sorrows and talents,

who now stand shy or certain,

semi-disheveled or pulled together,

but nonetheless hip-wide and proud.