Wednesday, October 1, 2008

But Wait! There's More...


This project started as a book. I began writing about the global culture of women, the feminine principle on the planet right now, as I was experiencing it all around me, wherever I went. It became obvious that the project, an invitation for women to speak what it is we know as if human survival depended upon us doing so, came out of that initial book. Well, now that the GCW has been full-steam-ahead for two years, now that women's stories are filling the database and communities are cropping up here in the US with plans to expand the invitation to make sure it reaches all women - as many as humanly possible - the book has come back. It's time to finish what was started. But it's not as simple as it seemed back then. One thing I have realized is that so much is at stake at this point but also, so much needs to be included. We have women's stories. Beautiful, powerful, courageous every-day women - who are the reason that human culture still exists on the planet - have offered their hearts and voices toward the weaving of a global tapestry of female power and celebration. And to truly capture what it means to be them, to be you, to be me, this book will have to include far more than our stories. Our stories are the intimate description of our experience. The offering that has the power to build indestructible bridges of Love between women, families, villages, even opposing countries and religions. A book that speaks to this fullness of feminine power power and celebration needs to include inquiries into how we're coupling, birthing and raising our children, building and sustaining thriving communities despite everything, how we're educating ourselves and each other, how women with assets are supporting those with visions, how women are re-shaping religion and returning to spirituality. And more, it must include material on both the optimal and realistic care and feeding of our female Souls. We need to tackle questions like, 'can the feminine survive within the nuclear family?' and 'How do women who are filled with vision truly earn a living without selling themselves out?' There is so much - and we're expecting your help! We're now asking for your thoughts, written or spoken, on all of the above and anything else you feel is pertinent to this endeavor. In essence, what might end up being created is a manifesto and bible for full, unabashed, wild and authentic female expression in the new millennium. Isn't about time something like that were offered?

Bounty, Beauty and Baskets of Gratitude


It has been quite a while since I posted last. To say that many things have happened, that this journey continues to unfold in the most miraculous way, that each day is filled with events and magic that certainly were not on the schedule, well...trust me when I say that though there haven't been regular posts, a lot is happening in the evolution of the vision of the GCW. So, over the course of several catch-up posts, let me see if I can bring you all up to date. Blythe's journey into organic gardening (which was the vision and invitation she received during our trip to the borderlands of Texas/Mexico this winter) has been a wild success. Seeing her - in her backyard - standing in the midst of the orbit of wildness she has nurtured is like experiencing a modern-day Lillith come to reclaim what is rightfully Hers. Yes there was backbreaking work, most of which she did entirely by herself! Yet, standing with her in her garden I get the distinct vision that, truthfully, her intention, her willingness to be taught by the soil, by the sun, to learn by listening and ask without hesitation (which all require the quiet grace of faith rather than the power-over wrangling that is man's domination over the unapologetically abundant thing we call 'nature'), that these abilities she values are what have made her garden the outrageous expression of fecundity and celebration that it is. Sunflower explosions, packed mounds of frosted kale, feathery tulsi leaves, hearty marigolds standing sturdy in their spaces. It's all a reminder that life wants to happen. We know, as we move through our days, that when we witness the absence of life, great energy has gone into making it so. Naturally, death happens all the time, but natural death happens in service of life- to create life. The death we have wreaked on the planet is a one-way death. Death out of relationship. Death out of Fear; so alienated from our own Selves and our origins and bankrupt because of it that we cannot allow the miraculous fecundity that is naturally all around us to persist. Blythe has said "yes!" and for that I am so grateful.

Friday, June 6, 2008

Medicine


I've been in an on-going conversation with women for the last several years that starts with a question, "what do you do in your daily life that feeds your female soul?" Depending on who I ask this question to it can be like a stick of dynamite thrown into a well. In many circles it's not ok to assume there is a difference between women and men, female and male. Well, since everything I have experienced since I was about four has taught me that not only is there a difference it's of the utmost importance that we re-learn how to celebrate these differences, I simply start from this place of certainty and go from there...and this project is an obvious tribute to what seems so very obvious to me; that the unique qualities that women are born with have necessary medicine for the planet, for humanity. This medicine has been silenced for many centuries, millenia in fact. So, if you're with me so far, the question "what do you do that feeds your female soul?" becomes a matter of life or death. or at least it could, if you allowed yourself to carry the beautiful weight of importance with you. If you allowed that your full thriving is integral to the full thriving of all life on the planet. And I will tell you that when I sit with my female clients I tell them that I am deeply invested in their ability to nourish and nurture themselves because it so profoundly effects their ability to contribute their full female selves to the world.

So here is where I get my own medicine, where I find nourishment for my female soul and I would Love to hear from you about where you get yours. This could blossom into a profound global conversation, a cross-cultural smörgåsbord of options for us each to choose from in our search to nourish that beautiful wild wisdom and voice deep inside each of us who is, perhaps, longing to have her day in the sun, her night in the moon...

Today a dear friend, Ixeeya, came over to offer henna to my body. She is a ceremonialist and ritual dancer, a world traveler. To her these things are life itself. So when she shows up at my house (for any purpose whether it's simply so we can roll around in the grass or run into the hills together) she brings the energy of queen and priestess. She brings ancient energy. She does henna as a ritual art. And she came over to offer me something to take on the two-month trip I'm taking with my boys to visit family and to begin to create a film which asks people the question, "What is beautiful in your life?" We rattled and saged and called in all the guides who might be coming with us on this journey. And as we did this I received a clear message: I needed an arm band on my left arm and a wide band around my right thigh, high up...these two things were the amulets that needed to come with me. So she began.

Getting henna'ed is a beautiful process. Ixeeya is an artist so she does not rush. She is also studying to become a shaman and she lets the spirit world move through her as she creates whatever piece she is painting onto my body. It took her two hours to do half the thigh band. This process was wildly intimate: for half the time she was crouching between my legs to get the portion of the band that runs between my thighs. And it reminded me that this is how sisters must be with each other if we are to be in right relationship with ourselves, our bodies, each other and our male lovers. We must touch each other intimately, lovingly, frequently. Tenderly touching another woman is, in many ways, like making Love to ourselves. You can't fully tell from the picture above, but this band has a snake, a wild pony, a bird of prey, the sun and the plant spirits all intertwined in a collage of beauty. On Sunday she will do the back half of the thigh band, putting the moon directly opposite the sun. She will also do the arm band.

After that I took myself into the hills, on a trail that, at the moment, has wet mossy rocks like ancient daughters of Ma herself looking down on the path, unapologetically gushing water with sandy beds, vividly colored wild flowers and tall grass. I ran and ran, following the path, until I was called to leave the trail. I went straight up the side of the hill until I found myself standing outside what seemed like a sacred place, a place of rock spirits and tree spirits with the setting sun streaming through the wet pine needles and branches. Everywhere I looked I saw life and it beckoned me. I stepped into this circle of high piled rocks, pine trees and wild flowers. There I did yoga. I did sun salutations to the setting sun with wide hip stretches to say "yes" and "thank you". I did tree pose in front of a beautiful young pine whose branches were reaching and stretching in fluid motion up to the sky. As I stood strong on my right leg I felt the power of the thigh band offered by Ixeeya wrapping itself around the sturdiest most muscled part of my leg. I did head stands in front of this tree, feeling the roots of me plunging into the earth to mingle with hers and the spirit of me lengthening my spine, up my legs and shooting out the souls of my feet and my toes toward the sun; a primal surge of electric current that nearly all living beings on this planet experience. After I was done I thanked everything and everyone that was responsible for my full self, I thanked my ability to feel all things (both pain and joy), thanked my ability to Love all things and I walked down the path seeing everything I had passed only an hour before in a new light.

This, for me, is medicine. And it keeps me tapped into the true power of what and who I am. What do you do on a daily basis that feeds your true self? What do you do that speaks to your female soul?

Wednesday, June 4, 2008

In Memorium


Just a few days ago a true matriarch passed away, (or "went home" as her granddaughter says) after 95 years of service in this world. Iva, who told her story in several installments (because if you live to be 95 it takes a long time to tell you story), was born in Kansas the oldest of five sisters. Iva met and married her husband when she was in her late teens. They had two children; a son and a daughter both of whom died before Iva. Her husband died when he was in his early forties leaving Iva to raise her children and her children's children. Now she has three grandchildren, six great grand children and more than ten great,great grandchildren with more on the way. Iva worked four jobs after her husband died, to make sure she could support everyone who needed (or might ever need) her help. Up until the day she died she was still concerning herself with her social security pension, even attempting to stick around long enough to get the June payment. When her granddaughter said, "it's OK grandma. You can go now. There's more than enough for everyone thanks to you. You can lay it down and go now" Iva seemed to listen, peacefully passing away in the early morning hours as the sun was just beginning to crack through the dusk.

Iva was a lover of women. I'm not referring to her sexual orientation but rather her life orientation. She was devoted to the women in her family. Her home, when I knew her, was a safe haven for women to go, lie down, make a cup of tea, tell their stories, ask for advice, sit at Iva's feet and simply cry...whatever needed to happen Iva's home was the place where you could let it down, speak it. I fell into this matriarchal culture of Iva's home so easily, like a seal slips into water. And there was a tacit expectation that when I walked through that door I was agreeing to engage in Truth Talk...and nothing else.

After Iva's death I was told of a family secret that had, as so many of them do, effected nearly everyone in the family, on some level or another. The family secret was a dark one and it cast its shadow on everyone and everything. After hearing about it I could see why so many things were the way they are...really, once you know the Truth everything tends to make perfect sense. Even if it hurts or makes us enraged, all events from that point on make perfect sense. This is why I Loved to do family therapy...once even just one person has the courage to speak the Truth you experience the 'ah-ha's' falling into place like dominoes. After I was honored with the Truth of this family secret, everything fell into place and I found myself sitting at my altar that night, tears streaming down my face speaking to Iva and all women still alive: Tell the Truth...speak the Truth. Perhaps I will go to my grave asking Muriel's question: "what if one woman told the truth about her life?"

This post is dedicated to the courage of women everywhere to step into the magnitude of our power by speaking our Truth. Surely if there is one religion, if there is one practice worth devoting ourselves to on a daily, hourly, minute-by-minute basis, it is the fearsome and irrevocably powerful act of speaking our Truth. Do it out of Love for the rightfulness of all things. Do it because you know that Love can only flourish in the presence of Truth. Do it because it is the necessary first step in our transition to a world in which all life is sacred.

Tuesday, June 3, 2008

There is in all things an invisible fecundity,

a dimmed light, a meek namelessness,

a hidden wholeness.

This mysterious Unity, and Integrity,

is Wisdom, the Mother of all, Natura naturans.

Thomas Merton

Monday, June 2, 2008

Silence...


Well, first off I feel I need to apologize for the poor blogging habits I've picked up as I've found myself juggling many things that seem to hold equal priority in my life: women & sisterhood, my two amazing children, a steady income, a personal life, a love life, and perhaps of most importance, my growing need to daily offer myself up to the wild places on this earth in order for me to stay powerful enough to nurture and stay present to all the above mentioned things. All of that seems a fairly poor excuse when you think that all blogging requires is ten minutes to process one of the many miracles and magic that occur in any given day. So, really there is never an excuse to not blog. And I'm determined to (try to) stay on top of it.

Having said that, if you're interested in reading something each day you may be required to tune in to two blogs because as of the 10th of June my two boys (Henry, 13 and Simon, 10) and I will be on the road for two months traveling around the US and Canada on an odyssey of reverence and celebration. We will be asking people, any people, all people, what they feel is beautiful in their lives, inviting them to share the objects/subjects of their awe with us in spoken word on camera, and in the process being reminded of all that is, and has been, so eternally right about this world. It is quite similar to the GCW in many respects. The vision of the GCW was borne out of an observation that women seemed to remember how to celebrate, seemed to remember what was worth celebrating, even in the most dire, unsafe and/or impoverished conditions. This is not to say that men don't have this ability, but I will say that from my own experience this profoundly important task seems to be somewhat a function of the female gender. At least it appears to have become so over the last few millenia.

So, this odyssey will include men's and women's voices. We will ask everyone we have the courage to approach. No doubt we will alter our focus and the wording of our invitation as we embark on and test out our questions on unsuspecting innocents. When Blythe and I were in the borderlands back in February and March it took me a good one and a half weeks to feel as if I knew what I was doing on the trip or knew why I, specifically, had been chosen for this journey. And it took a solid week before I had found the confidence to simply assume that every woman I came across was waiting for an invitation to share her wisdom with the world.

So here we go for round two...a slightly different focus on the surface, but really, not different at all. I still firmly believe that any fundamental and sustainable change arises from a place of perceiving beauty ~ a place of deep wonder and celebration with the world ~ rather than one of fear, hatred or dissatisfaction.

If you'd like to be involved please let us know by emailing us with your thoughts on what is beautiful in your life and why. Send us pictures of the thing in your life that is most beautiful to you (whether animal, vegetable, mineral or...). We will post these offerings to our blog site...which is still underway so you don't get to know the address just yet...but soon, so soon....

Saturday, April 26, 2008

Sisterhood


So, we live in a time of great fear. No revelations here. We are terrified we won't have enough money. Once we get enough money we're terrified someone will take our money. Fearful our mate will leave us or scared blind that won't find the love of our lives. We're in lock-down with our children, no child left behind in the spectrum of all possible catastrophes; 'don't get hurt playing football!' 'Why doesn't my child want to play organized sports?!' We're conversely in turmoil that people are thinking too many things about us and that not enough people are thinking about us at all.

And today, talking to a powerful and intelligent man, a man who is in the 'know', we drifted to the conversation of women being sisters to each other vs. women who back-bite and claw. In his line of work, a trial lawyer, he admitted that he frequently sees the mean version of female. In my line of work I see just the opposite. Feeling myself get defensive (for not much of a good reason in this case, for this is a man who thinks my gender is beautiful inside and out) I told him my reality is the norm. Really...more often than not women behave like sisters toward each other. Statistically and anecdotally, women support our own kind more often than we back bite and steal, lie and cheat each other. Media doesn't want this truth to be know, for it doesn't sell as many issues as the other personification of women. In this day and age the only power available to us is the vicious kind, the kind we wield over each other like a sharp-edged saber. But that is the patriarchal concept of power: power-over. Women, in vast numbers all over the world, wield the female version of power: power-with.

Of course, we are human and if we perceive our lives to be threatened and we don't readily see the power of deep sisterhood in our lives, we will respond the way People magazine would have us believe is the norm. If we believe that our very survival is effected depending on whether that man loves us or this company hires us, and we have no other input to negate that fight or flight fear, we will respond accordingly. We will play dirty. But even with global living conditions for women heading ever-increasingly into the toilet, even though public health statistics for women and our babies show us to be in deeper mortal threat than even fifty years ago, most of us, most of the time, choose sisterhood. I've seen it in New Orleans in the wake of Katrina, in South Africa amidst the AIDS pandemic, in that part of Mexico now referred to as Texas...in fact, all over this world. Sisterhood.

And, just to let you know the power of this truth? Sisterhood is the next revolution. The only one. Sure solar power is great. Removing George Bush is still important. But if, as an intentional global practice, the women of the world stood together, cried together, told the truth together, raised our babies together, perhaps even lived together (yes, with out men), well...I do wonder where the world would be right about now? It's a beautiful thing to contemplate.

Friday, April 11, 2008

We Are All Masters....


Because of the way this whole journey seems to work, I don't often have the opportunity to gather women's stories anymore. I'm busy doing administrative, fund raising and strategic things. But yesterday I took the time to sit with a woman and hear her story. Every time I do this I am brought home to the simplicity and power of the vision of the GCW. Every time I sit with a woman and witness her Wisdom I am moved to tears (literally, always) by the beauty of the feminine principle. I am reminded of how damn lucky I am to have been born in this body, a female body, in all its mercurial perfection.

I often listen for the one moment in the story that feels like it is the reason I am gathering her story and not another woman. There is always (at least) one statement or paragraph that is that 'ah-hah' for me, the reminder that is exactly what I need in this very moment. So, Sharon, who is a wise and powerful soul, who has lived several lives as a midwife and mother, who could mother the entire planet without breaking a sweat, was speaking about the things we take on in this world that aren't really ours. In this breathtaking gentle-like-water voice she said, "Truly, all we have to remember is that we are all masters. Anything that takes us away from that is not ours, truly...it's not ours and we can simply let it go!"

I am on a path. You are on a path. There are times in our lives when we are faced with things that remind us of our human-ness; of the fact that we have hearts that get broken; times when our trust and faith get challenged, perhaps even shattered temporarily. Is this not a gift? Isn't this a moment that allows us to test the resolve of our knowing that we are all masters. That we can be completely heartbroken and know that we are still fully alive, still on our path. With Sharon's gentle permission, I stepped back on my path. With all the pain I had been feeling lately as I work to redefine an old relationship, I stepped back on my path and took a deep breath.

Thank you, thank you Sharon. We women have so much work to do, far more work than we're already doing. We'll only get there if we remember we are all masters...we are all beauty incarnate. We are all essential gorgeous beings. We can be broken hearted, we can grieve deeper than the earth's core. We can feel rage powerful enough to incinerate a redwood. We can do all this and realize that this is simply proof that we're on our path; alive and feeling, responding to a world that is hurting, grieving, raging, pulsating and thriving while she spins. In sisterhood we will remember this. In sisterhood we will set to work cultivating a planet in which all life is sacred. Aho.

Tuesday, March 18, 2008

A Theme...


Today I walked with a dear friend and sister...she took me to a place that has flowing water (rare for these parts). A place called Bear Creek with babbling, dancing, clear, breathtaking, affirming, flowing water. There is still snow on the ground right now, though not for long. The sun was shining brilliantly, the song birds singing joyously for Spring is most assuredly here.

As we walked we talked about our yearning, our longing, the sense of urgency that comes from living in a global culture that has silenced something that, to us, feels as crucial as water, as air, as oxygen. We talked about the starvation we feel for the wild and free creative spirit and energy that is the feminine herself. 'How do we survive?' 'How can we continue to struggle with concepts like money and rent and profession, when all we care about is finding, celebrating and dwelling within Her?'

We acknowledged that so much of our daily thought and energy is taken up with our projection, onto other women in our community, of perfection. We imagine that other women have figured out the money thing, that other women have figured out the partnership thing, that other women are having regular mind-blowing, spiritually fulfilling, deeply honoring sexual encounters. And yet, I have not met a woman who truly has. For the last five years (really, for my whole life) I have been a woman to whom other women speak their Truth. It has just happened that way. And certainly that is why I am doing what I'm doing now: resurrecting and celebrating female Truth as if human survival depended upon this one task. I can say that despite appearances I have yet to meet a woman who is not struggling under the weight of urgency, of longing, of loneliness, of deep primal (primary) desire. This has become our common female odyssey, even if we refuse to acknowledge it.

And so, I am left, once again, wondering what might happen if all women committed to speaking our Truth. Really...if you knew you were alone in the forest, with only the songbirds and the trees to hear you, what would you utter? What burden would you lay down? What Truth rests heavy on your shoulders, or in your heart? What if you knew that the fate of the world rested upon your utterance of this familiar Truth? What if it were really that simple...what would you dare speak to the hills, to the birds, to the sky?

As my dear sister and I came to the end of our walk, we arrived at a spot on the trail that the sun had thawed. It was as inviting a spot as I've ever experienced. There we removed our shoes and socks and let our bare feet sink deep into the wet ground. The mud was thick and rich and warm. We walked and pranced and prayed in silence as the wet earth seeped up between our toes saying "Yes...this is yours. Now, what will you do with it?"

This moment, every moment, is yours and yours alone. You are here right now. Take off your shoes, sink your feet into the rich earth and let the mud seep deep. Speak loudly and assuredly...tell someone your Truth and do it as if all life depended upon the success of your endeavor...because dear sisters, it most assuredly does...

Monday, March 17, 2008

A Beautiful Ceremony...


As promised we held a welcoming ceremony tonight, to offer some of the first story excerpts that were gathered from our Texas/New Mexico trip and to tell stories of the journey, of the women, of the land. Men, women and children gathered in my 900 square foot home to witness and read and ask questions...to help us 'land' from a journey that, I'm now convinced, won't ever truly be done.

It was a powerful evening. First of all, we don't usually do our Story Spirals with men. And tonight we had beautiful, strong, reverent men in the room. It worked. It is healing to provide space in which men and women can speak their truth knowing all that will happen is deep listening and respect. It is healing every time.

It was also powerful because a sampling of the beautiful wisdom that was spoken to us on our trip was unveiled and offered into the world. Only the beginning for sure. But already, within moments of the evening conclusion, I had received an email from one of the men in the circle. As he had left the gathering he had asked if he could take one of the excerpts home because he was so moved by its innate poetry. In his email he offered the story transcribed into a poem, each phrase powerfully honored by the addition of space on both ends. The title of the excerpt-turned-poem is 'The Weight of Her Burden'.

There is nothing like being witnessed by another person, nothing like being truly seen. And the process tonight was not only a chance for the women who just returned from this journey to be welcomed home, our travels to be commemorated. Far more, this evening was about honoring and witnessing what is quickly becoming a globally vibrant conversation and offering...and the power of having men as part of this journey is a long-time dream of the GCW's founding members...Thank you....

Saturday, March 15, 2008

Women in Reality



A Few years ago, as I was just beginning to put the conversation together that is now the Global Culture of Women, I became obsessed with gathering women. Luckily, I have very forgiving friends, for despite the fact that I bombarded my circle with new classes, workshops, interviews, councils (you name it, they came) they still talk to me today.

One of the offerings that came out of that period of this ever-shifting journey is a course/conversation called "Women in Theory & Reality". The goal was to illuminate the disparities between the mythology of our female lives and the actual, ground zero, reality. The idea being that if we women actually told the full Truth of our lives this would unleash transformation on the planet like nothing we could imagine. This belief is largely what inspired the GCW. Muriel Ruckeyser said, "What if one women told the truth about her life? The world would split open." We live in a world of double-speak. We live in a world that has been spin-doctored to the point where even we, women, often put a saccharine coating over our own realities, even with our closest friends.

For this reason, it has been one of the long-standing desires of the GCW vision not to allow it to get too bogged down in descriptive words. Really, there aren't words within the English language to describe this vision anyway. We won't be missing much by keeping Her safe from jargon. In 'The Great Hoop of Life' Paula Underwood states "English is one of those languages based on naming things rather than describing them. As such it trains us to categorize everything that comes into our lives, in spite of the fact that so many things are neither this nor that."

To know the full reality of our female lives (both the incredible despair and the infinite breathtaking beauty) we have only to take ourselves to the land I just returned from: the borderlands of Texas, the country that is neither this nor that. Where people have been living on land their mother's, mother's, mother & father farmed. Where heritage means you can remember ten generations back because your ancestors made a point of telling their stories and their grandchildren made a point of listening to them. Where a wall is being built that separates families and communities that have been within walking distance of each other for centuries. Where Mexican men, women and children are incarcerated and held without bail or representation for months on end. Here there is no saccharine coating strong enough to cover reality. And it is most certainly not this or that...it is both/and and everything in between. Like the micro-pollutants alive and well within the Rio Grande on any given day coupled with the fact that it is impossible to negate the innate serpentine beauty of that river...it is both/and.

The reality of our female lives is an intimate indicator of the reality of all life on the planet. This trip showed me, in vivid and sometimes shockingly grotesque detail, that all life is in grave jeopardy. Yet the irony of this moment is that in order to get out of it, in order to change it, we have to allow ourselves to be motivated not by what is wrong but by what is so perfectly right. We have to allow ourselves to perceive, be blown away by and remain fiercely dedicated to, the beauty and perfection that is all around us all the time. Armed with these visions, the grotesque, unjust and inhumane could be reversed, healed and transformed easier and faster than waiting for an elected official to do it for us.

Each day, day in and day out, for the 22 days we were on the road, I witnessed the most extraordinary Love and devotion to life. The most extraordinary unconditional nurturing, humanity and courage. The most extraordinary generosity, faith and trust. Over and over I saw this in the women whom we sat with, as they told stories, spoke their Truth. Each time a woman speaks her Truth the spin-doctored mythology of our lives is split wide open and in this space, in this schism, Love is the only thing that grows. And let me tell you, from where I sit, it's nothing but gorgeous...

Wednesday, March 5, 2008

Border Beauty



Sitting with Martha in her outdoor sanctuary in Terlingua Texas, mid-morning: This town is directly on the border of Mexico...on a clear day you can see the mountains of Mexico looming large and beautiful. Martha grew up just north of here in a town called Marfa, a roaring metropolis compared to the tranquility of this beautiful, ancient town. Terlingua is the town that became famous for, among other reasons throughout history no doubt, the length of miles the high school kids had to go to get to school – over an hour by bus each way, each day, on winding roads through the hills all the way up to Alpine, Texas. Needless to say, the drop-out rate was enormous. That’s all been remedied now thanks to a Superintendent who was focused on the education of the children in her district. Now they stay right there in town and attend school.

As she told pieces of her own story, Martha spoke about her Woman's Voice. This is her passion. At 45 she is feeling a very different Voice alive within her - one that doesn't really worry what others think about, that is concerned first and foremost with speaking her values. She is a school teacher, a librarian, an avid gardener, an activist, a mother of two teenage boys, a wife and a woman's woman (she is aligned with the women in her community and speaks of this connection and female community as her lifeline). When I asked her what helps her stay strong in her Voice she looked around her and acknowledged the abundance of nature that thrives in this arid, hot environment; the plant life she has surrounded herself with...a patio overlooking the Chisos Mountains of Big Bend (incidentally, their outhouse shares this same sublime view, complete with a 270 degree view of Mexico and a composting toilet). Her garden 'room' (for this is truly their living room) is surrounded by a dry rock wall that curves in the most female fashion around their property perched on the hill. Plants are everywhere...really, everywhere. They’re growing out of pots, out of cracks, out of walls...out of each other’s pots, everywhere you look there are plants overflowing their containers. Martha says, “I have to have my hands in dirt, it’s the Mother, the Source. I think we all, all women, must put their hands in dirt, even if it’s just in a pot that is in our house.” Thanks to Blythe (who is constantly aware of the visual representation of the energy that is in front of her) I am looking at every woman's hands and Martha's are powerful - earth hands.

After we said goodbye to Martha and worked our way down the winding desert driveway, our ever-expanding car was newly adorned with three gorgeous plants in two big pots. She gifted us with Agave, Aloe and Blooming Onion pips from her garden. The Blooming Onion is Border tradition; when a woman has to leave the area for some tragic reason the women gift her with a Blooming Onion and it’s her responsibility to let them know when it blooms...like announcing the birth of a child, the word spreads like wildfire through the grapevine that so-and-so’s onion has had “babies!”

Saturday, March 1, 2008

Refinement...


Many months ago, when the awareness of this trip made its way into my consciousness, I said ‘yes’ for several reasons. For the last several years I have tried to practice offering those thoughts and ideas that I perceive as ‘mine’ up to the world with no expectations that I have found an ‘answer’ or that I am ‘right’. It feels to me that, if they survive this trial by fire, if they still feel ‘true’ after they’ve been handled and passed around, then they are true. And also, in a bold departure from my cultural indoctrination, it has been my experience that truly co-created ideas are the strongest ideas. They are often ideas that not only blend the wisdom of the current cognizant generations but also those that have come before.

So, I said ‘yes’ to this walkabout because it felt as if it was time to simply offer this project up to everyone and anyone. It was time to leave home, hit the road, stop in towns we had never heard of until we bought the map. It was time to sit with women whom we had never met before that moment; time to invite each and every woman who was interested to join this conversation, offer their wisdom and step in as midwives. It felt like all this was crucial to the truth of this vision. And, with still one week to go, this trip has provided exactly this (and so much more that isn’t easily conveyed in words).

This trip has delivered a quickening and refinement of the vision, so much so that it feels as if the mission statement needs to be revisited.

This ‘project’ is less of an entity than it is a calling, an INVITATION. She is an invitation to all women to speak our truth and wisdom to each other. “What if one woman told the truth of her life?” asks Muriel Rukeyser. “The world would split open.” Yesterday I told my story to Janet Meek, midwife, earth-mama and revolutionary heart-centered female being. After I said my last words, blew my nose and looked up at her through teary eyes she said, “I feel like my heart has been split open.”

It is not that we must gather women’s stories. First and foremost, we must tell our stories.

Our stories, each and every one of them, are medicine. Each story provides us a way home.

The Global Culture of Women is an invitation for women to speak our Truth and Wisdom. It is a loom on which the great and gorgeous collective body of Women can weave the individual threads of our Female Wisdom and Truth together, creating a new tapestry of human consciousness.

Wednesday, February 27, 2008

The Miracle Gender

Sitting with Jane, in the home that she grew up in, the property she was born on, surrounded by family heirlooms. Sitting at her kitchen table, sipping ice tea with lemon, creating a space for a story of breathtaking power and integrity to be offered to the planet. This activity, the act of gathering a woman’s Truth, is so far beyond the English language’s paltry capacity to describe it.

Jane is in good company in a group of women who say something like, “well, I’m not sure what good my story can do...but I’ll offer it up if it will help the project.” And then she proceeds to tell a story of a life that has been lived (and will continue to be lived), with the most exceptional integrity, guided by the deepest fiercest Love; a story that has the power to unite the female gender.

There are moments in the story gathering process where the wisdom and Truth that is being offered is so full it feels impossible to speak about it. It just becomes one of those moments that must be integrated into each individual’s soul in her own time, in her own way. As Jane sat at her table, having quickly dismissed the Fear card, she spoke about the moment in her life when she went to her father to request that he (re)teach her how to shoot a gun. The first time he taught her it was because he felt strongly that she know this skill, just as he felt strongly that she know what the taste of squirrel was like. These are just things a Texas farm girl needs to know, according to her practical Dutch father. This time, however, she was seeking his help so she could protect herself from the aggression and abuse of her second husband, who had already broken into her home and raped her once. She knew that if he succeeded in breaking into her home again he would probably kill her. With four children to take care of she wasn’t about to let that happen. So, when the eventuality happened that he broke into her home again she grabbed the gun and stood her ground for a moment long enough to consider what it might mean for her to shoot and kill the father of two of her children. It occurred to her that she couldn’t shoot him. That shooting him wouldn’t be right.

In this moment, on this planet, the reality is that it isn’t a rare thought for a woman to imagine whether killing her intimate partner is justified. There are thousands of women behind bars in this country alone, imprisoned for the crime of protecting themselves against an ex-partner turned deadly aggressor. The most frequent cause of death for women globally is violent death at the hands of a man we have at one point been intimate with.

And here sitting with Jane I am offered a third definition of the Feminine Principle: the capacity to expand to Her surroundings, to continue to become what is needed in any given situation, despite being mortally threatened Herself, the ability to become something greater than what Her individual needs might dictate in service of those who are reliant upon Her for their survival.

This is where the mundane meets the magic...where it’s probably not possible to fully comprehend the miracle that is the female gender. This magic is probably sitting right in front of you in the form of your sister, your mother, your auntie or best female friend...I urge you to gather her story today...don’t wait. Don’t wait another minute...

Sunday, February 24, 2008

Three Generations of Warrior Women

This morning we had the incredible honor of sitting with three generations of powerful Texas Hill Country warrior women. With just a little more planning (this gathering was organized at 6pm the night before!) we could have had four generations but Great Grandmother Annabel Lee (McClary) Pillow was in Fort Worth five hours away during this incredible moment. She and the littlest female among this power-clan (3 year old Maya who was sick at home with dad) were invoked early on in the interview. Throughout the interview two more females of the clan, Jessica's five-year old sisters, were dancing around the property, dipping in and out of the interview.


First we sat with Jessica, who is 15, daughter of Lisa, 40, and granddaughter of Kathleen who is 62. Jessica talked about dance and the connection with dance and perfection, nature and perfection. She spoke of women and nature, and at such a young age has already learned that, for her as for so many females we've talked with, nature is a profound resource for feminine wisdom. "Nature is perfect. It's almost the only thing that is." Later she adds to this short list: "Women are perfect too. And when I dance I get to remember that." We had the truly breathtaking opportunity to witness Jessica in her perfection: dancing middle-eastern belly dance on stage with her instructor/mentor and another elder. There is a righteous power waiting to spring into planetary action within the body of aware young women. I think of it as I think of this project; a filly with all the power of a team of thoroughbreds, but she's not ready to run in an all-out gallop, not quite yet. For this, to know when the time is ready, she has elders who see the power in her. For all those women who have, against all odds, insisted that women's empowerment goes hand in hand with women's embodiment, we say "yes!" because we've just witnessed it with our own eyes.

It's easy to see where Jessica gets her convictions. Jessica's mother, Lisa, a biology professor and basketball player (she's 6'2") got the 'proof' she was looking for, for the perfection and power of the female gender when she went to graduate school in the natural sciences. "Everything is labeled in the feminine. And the female chooses. She is always the one to choose....Women are powerful. Just powerful. Sometimes we forget that and that is a shame." When I ask what role men can play in the lives of powerful women she answers, without hesitation, "My husband protects me and my daughters. They feel truly safe. Protection is what men can offer us.”

Sitting with these three generations of strong warrior women you get a powerful dose of sisterhood – but there is a definite ‘leader’ of this tribe; Kathleen, who at 62 has become the one to bring indigenous wisdom, ritual and culture to the family. She has taken it upon herself to shift the lineage of her family to one that includes a space for deep female wisdom. When daughter Lisa speaks about spirituality and what that means to her, why it’s so important and how she is ready to merge a deep sense of spirituality into her marriage, Kathleen looks out over her property then offers (in a somewhat playful but quite serious tone) “We can have a ceremony here, a circle, we can all drum and dance; Jessica on horseback wearing a leather dress, barefoot with her beautiful bone necklace on.” Kathleen breaths sisterhood, really. She has come to her own deep well of female spirit and now considers it an honor and responsibility to live it. Yet she does this with humility, a ‘we’re all in this together...' sort of energy. Sitting with Kathleen is a rare chance to feel both like a sister and an apprentice at the same time. This has become another definition of the Female Principle to me: the fact that we are all ‘both/and’ all the time – both teacher and student all the time; without that understanding precious wisdom and energy fall through the cracks.



Friday, February 22, 2008

Nellie & Peg

We arrive in the Texas Hill Country just in time to put on clean shirts and trade in our very dusty trekking sandals for more respectable footwear, maybe some earrings and lipstick (while hunkering in our car in the parking lot). We're out front of Billy Gene's restaurant, where the Women's Interfaith Peace Dialogue is taking place. Today, in addition to spreading the power of peace through roundtable discussion and guided meditation, we are going to hear a woman speak about her experience in the Peacecorps, nearly 25 years ago. What a story...a beautiful story of an affluent young woman deciding to do things very differently and go to Panama to be of service. Because of her decision she has now started a trend in her family. In fact, her daughter now lives and works in Central America having also volunteered for the Peacecorps.

After the talk we sit down with two woman, Nellie & Peg, who have helped found a gospel group called Many Voices, One Soul. Nellie is a joyful African-American woman in her mid 70's. As far as I can tell she knows everyone within a fifty mile radius of Kerrville Texas and if they attend a Baptist church within that radius then she knows their extended family as well, regardless of where they live. Peg is an elegant Caucasian women in her 60's who has worked diligently alongside Nellie to create this community of interfaith voices. I am hoping, without ever having met them before, that we can somehow bring some of these women who are part of the 'Many Voices One Soul 'community together. It is very much a part of the vision of the GCW to celebrate Women's Wisdom in all its expressions, including dance, music, artistry and crafts.

The conversation goes like this:
CC: "It's such an honor to meet you. I know we're only in town for a week but I'm wondering..."
Nellie & Peg: "What do you need my dear? How about a gathering...a gathering of men and women..."
CC: "Well, actually, for this trip we're only sitting with women. Is that going to be ok?"
Nellie & Peg: "Just perfect dear. A gathering of women...hmm...what should we call it?"

At this point they confer with each other in a blur of suggestions arriving, after a minute or so, on "An Evening of Women's Song & Story". They confer again on which ministers will have to be notified so that no noses bent out of shape and also so that no men show up without warning. When women are speaking their Truth it's important to create a sense of safety. Then we all look at our calendars to agree on the date; the following Saturday from 7 to 9pm at the Doyle Community Center. Nellie says she's going to provide her famous lemon cake as well as a beverage and Peg says she's bringing her sandwiches. Since there's no piano at the Doyle Community Center they agree that the singing portion of the evening will be a capella and the story telling will be a la Global Culture of Women. "All filmed of course?" I ask hesitantly, ready to spring into action describing the incredible yoga of filming that Blythe has perfected, the way she can be right in the middle of the action and yet seem so unobtrusive, a sixth sense about filming. But, none of this is necessary. They're several steps ahead of me. They barely even look at each other as they shrug their shoulders and say "Of course!"

By the time the conversation ends, Blythe and I have known these two women no more than ten minutes yet they have agreed to not only participate in but also organize, host and provide food for this potentially very large all-woman's community event.

That's how it goes....

Sitting with Women...

We spend a good deal of time in the car on this trip, because as it turns out, at least compared to the New England terrain I grew up in, this state of Texas is a BIG place. To keep us occupied, to keep us grounded, we found ourselves a copy of Edward Abbey's Desert Solitaire and we're reading it out loud to each other as we take turns driving, and driving, and driving to the next destination, the next community of women who are waiting to welcome us in and connect us to more.

As we were driving along through Big Bend National Park (after spending a night on our way from the Presidio border area to the Texas Hill Country), we read:

"If I had been as capable of trust as I am susceptible to fear I might have learned something new, or some truth so very old we have all forgotten it."

This trip is most assuredly about remembering a truth so very old many of us have forgotten it. The women we are sitting with seem somehow to have remembered, or perhaps they never forgot. I am so thankful to these women. I am spending these days in prayer that we listen to them as if our lives depended on our doing so...

Cowgirl Style

Last night, nestled in the heart of Texas Hill Country, we sat in circle with a woman’s group of cowgirls that has been meeting twice a month on Weds for years now. This group is tight; dedicated to each other and the cultivation of this woman’s community they are weaving. Their time is precious and they keep themselves on a schedule. They gather from 6 to 6:30 for socializing then they get down to business. Yet even their ‘socializing’ is focused on new discoveries that each of them have made, on checking in about anything that might have been relevant from the last gathering. They get together outside of the Weds night gatherings, do social things, teach each other horseback riding, new gardening techniques, share political activities, go out on the town together. Many of them are dedicated to localizing their community, interested in bringing the production of those goods and services that sustain our everyday lives back to the intimate community as much as possible.

Of course, being cowgirls, they know how to kick it up as well. Forever gifting each other with creative offerings, one of the women made Cowgirl fridge magnets for the group. “What, exactly, is a Cowgirl fridge magnet?” you ask? Well, it’s a thing of beauty. After hearing this you’ll undoubtedly want one for yourself. Each one is different sporting a sepia-tone archival photograph of a fierce Texan woman dressed in, of course, cowgirl boots, a cowgirl hat, a sensible yet frilly skirt and a cowgirl shirt. She’s got her leg up on a hay bail, a saddle or some other staple of the cowgirl lifestyle. And she’s adorned with a quote that speaks to the nature of these wonderful women: “I didn’t mean to shoot him, he just sorta fell into my bullet.” When these women laugh it is from the deep belly. They definitely don’t do anything half-way.

We were interested in having these beautiful women help us with a project. We wanted to create a DVD for women who offer us their stories, so that each woman who so courageously tells her story can see the impact her Truth and Wisdom has on other women around the world. We gathered as we always do, only this time we started with a Wisdom Card, so that each woman could experience what it’s like to speak her intimate story with other women. After each woman spoke about Coupling/Intimacy (the card that was drawn by our host, one of the founders of this woman's group), we got into the story reading segment. It was as if the stories, and the women who had spoken them originally, had been awaiting just such a moment as this: when their Truth would be in a bowl surrounded by women who do not balk at anything (at least, not that I can tell). The bowl is filled with stories of all colors and sizes; stories of first love, of last love, of nature and beauty, of heart break and desolation, of depression, frustration, death, torture, murder...they reflect women’s real lives from around the world. And yet, the stories that got chosen by random selection were almost all stories of tremendous pain: really, some of the hardest stories that have been offered to this project so far found their way into these women’s hands last night. And these women read them, honored them, cherished them...and they offered, on camera, from their hearts, such tremendous gratitude for the courage and Love within each story, within each woman whose story was read. It was more than we could have scripted...of course...it always is.

And, in case you’re curios, the definition of ‘Cowgirl’ turns out to be a lot like the definition of ‘midwife’. Cowgirl simply means ‘Company of Women’ girls...there is a trend here, one with the power to gracefully heal a planet.

Lilies of the Desert


We think of the desert as a dry, barren place; a forbidding environment where life is short-lived and tough; buyer beware, eat-or-be-eaten. Yet, for me, it feels like we have come home. This landscape seems to define female to me now; this from a woman who grew up in the Adirondack mountains of upper New York State, where water gushes throughout the year, where mountains are so old though still growing, rounded by time but ever-powerful. Certainly it's not either/or, yet now that we have had the opportunity to sit in community with women of all ages, disparate backgrounds, differing orientations, coming to rest in women's homes, I think of these hearts as the flowering lilies in this gorgeous dry fierce desert. As it has to this land, a lot has happened to the female body...many conquests, some failed, some successful, have taken place on the female landscape. Yet the flowering continues. The cultivation of gardens of community, of beauty, continues.

The gentle leader of one of these communities, Cammie, a woman in Las Cruces, NM who has been taking care of women for over 25 years, who is one of the founding midwives of 'The Art of Birth and Wellness', a midwiffery school, well-woman's clinic and of course, midwife practice, defined the word 'midwife' as 'with women'. "We're all midwives, every one of us who cares about women...even men. If you love women, you're a midwife." She described to us her definition of true community by offering an example of how they do things in her part of the world. The story goes something like this: a woman in their care had a beautiful home birth producing a healthy baby girl. All was good, until the mama began to hemorrhage. She was admitted to the hospital but because she didn't deliver in the hospital her brand new daughter couldn't accompany her. This mama was determined to breast feed. So, of course, the lactating women within this community took turns feeding the mama's new daughter. These women took this new babe home, bonded with her, kept her skin on skin in a sling, slept with her. And, when the time was right, they snuck her into the hospital so the mama could also bond with her new daughter. This is how it goes in this desert, down here. These women are fierce about this. They look straight into the camera and they say, "We are doing this to change the way women mother. We are doing this because this is the only way it truly works."

These beautiful women are as diverse and rooted as the lilies that inhabit this region; all the Yuccas and the Zotolin. Much like the tough desert flowers, you wouldn't want to cross these ladies. They've weathered a lot of storms, seen and done a lot. They've been on the 'front lines' and their dedication is fiery. And still, their hearts are as tender as the heart of the desert lily, tender, deeply sensitive, and vulnerable: fierce and vulnerable/tough and infinitely receptive. The more I sit with women the more this balance has come to define the feminine principle. These women are united within a set of values mostly unspoken. In fact, when we asked them to speak about it, they look almost confused, tears in their eyes and say, "We do things this way because, how could we not?" They took us in, connected us with their friends and relatives, made calls to women they barely know but whom they feel need to be a part of this vision: the celebration of Women's Wisdom across the planet in service of a world in which all life is sacred.

I will spend my life in a bow to these fierce lilies who seem to thrive in this desert, in a land where we all (women and men) face constant attacks, both intimate and public, on our fiercest fullest expression.

Thursday, February 14, 2008

The Borderlands: "The Spaces In Between"

Today, as I spoke with women in Texas whom we are hoping to interview over the next three weeks, I listened to passionate voices fueled by fierce hearts. I listened as woman after woman spoke of her work, her family, her activism...her devotion. I had a conversation with a powerful mother of two daughters who, in addition to raising these girls in the world, is fighting against the legal detention of children in ICE prisons (I've heard these facilities also called concentration camps). She spoke for ten minutes literally without taking an audible breath. Finally she paused and I took the opportunity to interject that we, The Global Culture of Women, would want to hear about her, as a woman, the part of her that transcends the specific activism she engages in. I told her that we ask women to speak about the core values and wisdom that fuel their actions in the world. That we want to hear women speak about their sense of spirituality, of creativity, of mothering and partnership. Through the phone, for the first time in the conversation, I heard her take a deep breath. After a minutes she said, "Hmmm...It's been a long time since anyone has asked me about those things...I think I could talk about those things. "

We are taking this journey to weave an ever wider tapestry of universal female-hood. We have seen that, often, when a women is offered the opportunity to speak her Truth, she will talk about intimate thoughts, experiences and knowledge that serve to unite women. It is our belief that women have a unique power at this moment, a power to halt the speeding train heading for the precipice. And we believe this will only happen if we celebrate just as much as we protest; if we celebrate the beauty and wisdom of women just as fiercely as we use our voices, bodies and financial power in protest against all that has been made so horribly wrong.

"We are walking toward you. We are coming to honor the purpose of your existence." This Aboriginal Morning Prayer is our manifesto...It is our calling, our prayer, our honor, to sit with women from around the world and record their wisdom, creating ever-more inspiring ways to share that wisdom with each other - all women - until we all realize that women share one heart and one breath in service of a world in which all life is sacred.

Tomorrow we will drive from Boulder to Las Cruces, NM and from there we will head down into El Paso, Juarez, Alpine, Redford and Ojinaga, Terlingua, Kerrville, Austin, Del Rio, Acuna, Brownsville, Reynosa and McAllen. From there we will circle around and return to Boulder through Santa Fe, NM. Help us fill each moment with women's Truth! If you know women in these areas who would like an opportunity to participate in this global vision, email us at women@globalcultureofwomen.org or call us at 303-449-8590.

For a full description of the GCW mission and vision and to read the courageous and beautiful wisdom of women who have already participated, visit www.globalcultureofwomen.org