{Inspired by Women’s Health Week I wanted to share some of the gifts I’ve received from participating in the Four Seasons Journey – one of the best things I’ve ever done in terms of my health and power as a woman!}
We Quest, kneeling at the ‘Altar of Wild,’ as Nymh so gracefully puts it.
Three days and three nights alone in the bush. With water, without food. With shelter and warm clothes, without fire. Simplifying life down to essentials in order to heighten our ability to listen to the full and ever-present conversation flowing around us.
A conversation that includes us. This is a powerful part of our re-membering.
There is nothing to ‘do,’ nowhere to ‘go,’ no food to prepare and eat, no one else to look after, no human company to talk with. We immerse in the Stillness. We are Witness to the Sacred at play all around us, in every moment.
We keep vigil on the last night, “crying for a vision,” with all the archetypal potency of the Third day. Alert and waiting for whatever arises. Or we sleep, listening for a vision in our dreams.
Base camp tends the hearth-fire, incanting prayers for safety and clarity, drumming the invisible connections between all.
In the heightened state of VQ – for soloists and those at base camp, both – the volume is up on all the channels! Dream channel, relational channel, nature channel… we listen for what we need to hear and act upon.
And the soloists return! Such tender mingling… I still remember this returning hug (above). It was only in this meeting that I caught a glimpse of how far into the Stillness I had travelled…
Our experience of wilderness solo unfolds as we live it, each woman’s story unique, yet every experience is life-long Medicine to be inspired by, returned to, reflected upon, integrated, remembered, grappled with, applied anew, integrated more deeply, and so on, forever.
“I have been given so much.
To whom much is given, much is required.
I am clear in my vision.
There is nothing holding me back.”