Lasting change does not happen overnight in my experience. But it can begin in an instant. Like conception, a moment does initiate radical changes for everyone concerned. Fortunately gestation takes time, 280 days, 40 weeks, three trimesters, for humans, giving everyone some time to adjust. My daughter recently had a child and she introduced me to the fourth trimester, the idea being that integration into life outside the womb is another adjustment, obviously. From that first now moment it is a year until all the lives concerned are fully engaged in the changes ignited. And even that is only the beginning.
Conscious engagement with the rebalancing of masculine and feminine begins with an intention to engage the idea. Once this intention is formalized the 'time in the womb' of change is begun. At first changes might not be visible. Nothing of note or significance presenced. But just like the development of a fetus and then a child, there are milestones, benchmarks. Heartbeats, movement, pain, emergence, growth, growth and more growth.
When I heard Ilarion Mercurlieff speak there was an internal 'YES!' which ignited my curiousity around being part of the rebalancing as a woman who embraced men and women with love and compassion. I've never forgotten that I also heard Gloria Steinem speak that same day in Marin at the Bioneers conference in 2011. Ms. Steinem brought attention to the reality that women leaving an abusive relationship are most in danger at the time they decide to leave. To intend to rebalance masculine and feminine is a decision to leave a system that is abusive to both men and women, a system of imbalance. Formalizing my decision to release the pain and anger experienced in my own life as a result of an imbalanced system in a fire ceremony turned out to be dangerous in a very real and visceral way, the breaking of my arm, a potent symbol and reality. I don't know that this happens with every intention to rebalance, but I think it worth contemplation that to move in a direction that is contrary to 6,000 years of trend might be as easy as turning the Titanic away from an iceberg. Be mindful and clear if you decide to move in this direction.
The idea of a having a child and the reality once it is lived in to rarely match. Even the most prepared and studied parents-to-be can not anticipate, not fully, the dramatic life altering changes that come with the birth of their child. So too is the commitment to rebalance masculine and feminine a radical departure from the life known before. To rebalance is to love radically. In the same way radical love is called for when parenting. The grace is that this love is grown over time. This love is grown with practice, imperfection, forgiveness, decision, grief, praise and all the ingredients only discovered in paying attention to what is called forth in and from you.
Conscious engagement with the rebalancing of masculine and feminine begins with an intention to engage the idea. Once this intention is formalized the 'time in the womb' of change is begun. At first changes might not be visible. Nothing of note or significance presenced. But just like the development of a fetus and then a child, there are milestones, benchmarks. Heartbeats, movement, pain, emergence, growth, growth and more growth.
When I heard Ilarion Mercurlieff speak there was an internal 'YES!' which ignited my curiousity around being part of the rebalancing as a woman who embraced men and women with love and compassion. I've never forgotten that I also heard Gloria Steinem speak that same day in Marin at the Bioneers conference in 2011. Ms. Steinem brought attention to the reality that women leaving an abusive relationship are most in danger at the time they decide to leave. To intend to rebalance masculine and feminine is a decision to leave a system that is abusive to both men and women, a system of imbalance. Formalizing my decision to release the pain and anger experienced in my own life as a result of an imbalanced system in a fire ceremony turned out to be dangerous in a very real and visceral way, the breaking of my arm, a potent symbol and reality. I don't know that this happens with every intention to rebalance, but I think it worth contemplation that to move in a direction that is contrary to 6,000 years of trend might be as easy as turning the Titanic away from an iceberg. Be mindful and clear if you decide to move in this direction.
The idea of a having a child and the reality once it is lived in to rarely match. Even the most prepared and studied parents-to-be can not anticipate, not fully, the dramatic life altering changes that come with the birth of their child. So too is the commitment to rebalance masculine and feminine a radical departure from the life known before. To rebalance is to love radically. In the same way radical love is called for when parenting. The grace is that this love is grown over time. This love is grown with practice, imperfection, forgiveness, decision, grief, praise and all the ingredients only discovered in paying attention to what is called forth in and from you.
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