Author: Alethea Kehas

Author of A Girl Named Truth and The Labyrinth, and owner of Inner Truth Healing & Yoga.

I Dream of Laundry, Resisting Letting Go #dreams #denial #death

On By Alethea KehasIn Dreams, Reflections14 Comments
Photo Credit: Pixabay

Another night passes fitfully, laden with soiled laundry, much of which is not my own. Each night I slip into uneasy sleep only to find myself sorting soiled clothes of family and sometimes strangers in homes that I once lived in. Washing. Ever-washing to try to get them clean of the stains left behind.

There are always machines waiting to spin the soiled garments clean. Sometimes too many to the point of the absurd. Homes becoming laundromats to cleanse the filth of the outer layers worn to shield the inner. The symbolism does not escape me, yet the dreams continue and I must ask myself why I turn backwards, again, to release the stains of the past.

If you study the mysteries, you may be familiar with the symbolism of robes/clothing worn to cover up, or mask, the true self. We often hide what we don’t want others to see, but most importantly, what we don’t want to see ourselves. Yet what resides inside the layers needs no washing.

Stripping ourselves naked requires trust and vulnerability. And it requires faith and letting go.

Each night as I pour through the soiled garments, a stack of towels waits for me. Their surfaces colored with floral blooms, drawing my eyes to their tall stacks. Yet the towels will do nothing for the garments, and I have yet to strip bare and immerse myself in a body of water to find my own cleansing. To release and rebirth.

Instead, I travel back through past homes, even though they are no longer mine. Seeking belonging, no doubt, but also approval. Acceptance. Healing. “Heal me,” my mother begs, showing me a leg riddled with arthritis, her face grotesquely distorted, too big for life and thrust too close for comfort against mine. How can I say no? She is my mother after all. The one who birthed me in this lifetime.

Sometimes life seems more cruel than kind to the human mind that tries to find reason and logic. If I could collapse time it would be by thousands of years and not a mere lifetime of long months. I would go to the place of heather and stone and find the one who wears the feathered cloak and embrace home.

I know why I am sorting through these endless garments soiled by life each night, yet I cannot quite let go of them. “It’s time,” they tell me, and I want to shout back, “I am not ready to let go of her, though.”

“You will and you must. Just like the bird trapped inside your porch, you will release this tie to life. Just as you must release the others that hold you back.”

The wren appears in uncanny ways, surprising me with her visits in the daytime. “I will never be truly gone,” she reminds me, but I want to hold her. To cup her feathered body against my heart. Just once, before I let her go.

A (typical) morning in my life with two cats and two dogs (let’s overlook the teenagers for now) #parenting #rescuepets #yoga #yogawithpets

On By Alethea KehasIn Reflections, yoga8 Comments

It’s Wednesday morning and I’m up before dawn to ensure one of the teenagers I said I would not mention, but already have, does not miss her morning class. I’m emptying the dishwasher while steaming a kettle of water for tea and a too loud clink gets an echoing bang from the other said teenager I promised not to mention. Did I mention it’s Wednesday, which means in our small town in NH there is no school (unless you’re taking classes elsewhere).

Yoda the wise one

Abandoning the chore, I decide to salvage some peace and descend into the dungeon of the house to visit the cat-who-distrusts-dogs, Yoda. Yoda, as always, is elated to see me (unlike the teenagers we’re trying to overlook for now) and promptly comes over for his morning pets. As I settle in for a good hand grooming of the feline, my eye catches upon a white and gray mass near the hand weights. “It can’t be,” I think.

I pull the string to turn on the overhead light.

Photo Credit: Pixabay

Yes it is. Stuck to the wire of a portable fan, and even more stuck to the black mat on the floor, is the flattened carcass of a mouse. As I gather spray cleaner, paper towels, and an old bread bag from the shelf beside the cat food, kept in the dungeon for this very purpose, I recall the evening five days ago when Yoda leapt through the cat door and deposited his live catch before my feet. I had my answer.

The desiccated rodent remains now (mostly) cleaned and scraped from the floor and tied inside the (single use) plastic bag and in the garbage bin. I crank open the tiny window, and get ready to settle in for a morning workout under the supervision of Yoda.

Millie the queen of the house

In bounds Millie through the same cat door that allowed entry of the rodent I just disposed of. Full of energy after her night in the coat closet, Millie is ready for second-breakfasts and not so ready for pats. As Millie-who-thinks-she-might-be-a-dog, or as we call her a “cog,” polishes off the scraps of Yoda’s treats and the remainder of his breakfast, I zero in to steal some snuggies. Once again, my eyes hijack the intended moment.

“Is it?”

Photo Credit: Pixabay

Yes it is. A tiny black tick is working its way into Millie’s white coat. Fingers pinch the bugger while the other hand quickly finds the roll of masking tape (also on the shelf for this very purpose) to snuff out the life of the invader.

Thirty minutes later I have managed the semblance of a workout with my trusted guide, Yoda (Millie, true to her nature, has found better things to do with her time) and have also caught myself up on half an episode of ‘The Great British Baking Show.”

Yoda

I figure I’ve at least faired better with the first half of the morning than some of the contestants under the tent. I give Yoda a few more pats and make my way upstairs where the dogs are already taking their second naps of the day on the couches.

Not from this morning, but still typical of my attempts to share the couches

I reach for my laptop to go through the morning’s mail and give Rosy a slight nudge so I can sit down beside her. A waft of dog-perfume greets me as my rear-end meets the cushion. “Never again,” I tell myself for the five hundredth time, “Will I buy a couch with non-washable cushions.” Friday, which we’ve dedicated to renting a commercial washer and hopefully scrubbing the scent of cleaner into the couches, cannot come too soon.

Rosy (bottom) and Zelda (top), caretakers of the cushions

Rosy, on the other hand, appears quite content with her couch, and not too thrilled with a human invading the tiny space beside her. Soon enough I leave her to her nap, and head upstairs to my yoga room with my shadow (aka Zelda) at my heels.

My shadow

Ten minutes later, as my busy mind is finally beginning to settle into the flow of the postures, my fifty-pound black shadow with fur, claws, and a very loud mouth, leaps onto the window seat and starts hollering her displeasure at an unseen presence.

Photo Credit: Pixabay

Just for good measure, I check to make sure. Yep. Not an intruder in sight.

I settle back on the mat, while my shadow settles her head on the windowsill to keep watch, and slowly the flow of life returns. But not for long. With a charming chirp, the cog announces her reappearance.

Again, not from this morning, but still typical of my mornings

There is no resisting the cog. Even the dogs, who despise all other felines, have been charmed into near-adoration by this would-be-dog. Adjustments must be made, and the mat must be shared while Millie graces the day with her presence.

Not to worry, though, she’s soon vanished (again), and I nearly, just nearly, get a complete practice in before the not-to-be-mentioned-teenage-son makes his way downstairs and starts rooting around the fridge for some breakfast.

Life Outside the Window #naturephotography #newengland #unity

On By Alethea KehasIn Reflections11 Comments

It is raining here today. Thankfully. The water cools the heat that should have left by late September and covers the dirt in the empty stream beds. I have never seen such dryness where I live. The lake where we spend much of our summer has receded by feet from the shore. The sandy cove popular with swimmers, now a vast mudflat exposing the spindly legs of a dock that no boat can go near. It is surreal. It is so uncomfortable to observe, I could not take a photograph.

Each day brings a new challenge to face, asking us to learn how to live on the edge, and quite often inside the roiling elements of life. Too often, I find I am chasing after my breath and asking it to expand out of the constriction of my lungs. I go outside during these moments and lay on the good earth to sync my heartbeat back to the Mother. It is the best way I know how to live inside chaos.

The area where I live has become beloved in a way I never thought possible. A simple acre of land surrounding my home is somehow enough to show me the vast wonders of creation. Life contained, yet not contained. The birds come and go and so do the squirrels and the chipmunks. The trees stretching networks of roots too vast to comprehend the mystery of what it means to be rooted. We can move without moving, and with my belly pressed against the grounded life that deep stirring fills the ache of belonging.

Life has become a game of tension and release and I often wonder who is really controlling the bind. I wonder how far we need to go back to remember the vast connection that both binds us into division and frees us into unity? This juxtaposition of a truth that seems alien to our rights if you feed into the beliefs of the mind struggling for separation.

As I listen to the fall of rain and the birdsong of gratitude I am reminded of how false the hold is. The entangled mind that tunes into dissonance feeds a disease that spreads through all minds if the frequency is found and listened to long enough. Why boil the internal waters if what the body needs is a cooling into peace?

Seeding the stones: Keeping A Promise to a Dragon and a Stone Part 4 #vthikes #dragonlines #dragonstones

On By Alethea KehasIn Animal Messengers, Gaia & Elementals, Memoir, the labyrinth, Travel Adventures, Warriors of Light10 Comments

We left the eye with more questions than answers. Inside my mind’s eye I could still see the figure of white light standing over the pyramid stone. Waiting for our arrival. Waiting for the white pillar of crystal I had promised to seed at its base.

So much to see and discover off the beaten path.

It was a short walk, through the tangle of roots and moss, to get back to the stone that had filled my thoughts for two months. I dropped my backpack nearby, and began digging through the contents for the wrapped selenite and Sophia’s small pyramid of rose quartz. As I searched for the pink stone, a noise rustled the forest into alert and we knew hikers were approaching.

Worry set in a bit as I wondered if we would be interrupted when it really matter most, but I soon discovered that our visitors were, in essence, just what we needed. A heaviness had set in after leaving the guardians and the white boulder. I, personally, felt a bit of an unease as to whether we were really meant to be near the “eye,” or had tried to “look” too closely at what was not meant to be observed. But there had been the wren, and I had to believe there was a purpose to our visit, even it if was not wholly revealed.

Ari the wolf-like rescue dog. Eager to make new friends.

The wolf-dog appeared before his human companion. Later, Deb would remark about how even her appearance seemed more than accidental. A tall blond with blue eyes filled with an ethereal light. She and her rescued husky brought a joy that was much needed. That had somehow dissipated after our climb.

Ari and his caretaker had lightened our collective mood, and after their departure we decided to take a few moments to ground ourselves with some food and water. It was clear, through our visitors, that we were not meant to rush.

Trusting the inner guidance I was receiving, I suggested we form our own pyramid to seed our offerings and then join our energy with the energies surrounding us.

It was a natural unfolding, the white pillar slid into darkness, settling well below the base of the mighty stone above it, while Sophia and Deb seeded their stones at the points of their calling. No one else appeared from the trails as we gathered together again to extend our arms into three sides. Each voice, in turn, opening to words of gratitude for our presence being allowed. And, our offerings being received.

Our work soon felt complete, and a quiet fatigue settled in as we began to make our descent down the mountain. Although we shared words, we were also individually wrapped in the processing of our experiences. I, wondering if the lines might shine a little brighter than when I had first arrived on the serpent mountain two months prior. And, perhaps, a little more opened. Lines rejoining as the crystals settled back into the body of the Mother.

“It’s a snake!” Deb announced, as I shrieked and jumped back into the arms of Sophia.

“Oh gosh,” I apologized. “I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean to scare it away.”

Not the snake from that day, but similar.

A garter snake, well into adulthood, its brown and tawny body blending with the earth, slithered away from our path and into the underbrush of the forest.

I thought of Shesha, the snake-boy from my book. The fourth character in the six to appear that day. And we all thought of Isis. It seemed a fitting guide for the end of our journey.

The small blue car coasted down the mountain with more ease than it had ascended. As we turned the corner to join the main road, a bear arose from the wooden face of a store placard. There, before me, was my sign from Sula, the bear-girl. All that was left was Dell. The otter girl. I realized the chances of seeing an otter that day were slim, but still I wondered if the hexagram would complete itself.

Less than twenty-four hours it would. Opening the screen of my computer, an otter would appear. It was time to await the next journey. Wherever and whenever that might be.

The Eye Opens: Keeping a Promise to a Dragon and a Stone Part 3 #VThikes #dragonlines #leylines #sacredsites

On By Alethea KehasIn Animal Messengers, Gaia & Elementals, Memoir, Reflections, the labyrinth, Travel Adventures2 Comments

When we arrived at the pyramidal stone that had caught my eye during my first visit, I found myself worrying a bit about encountering other hikers. The stone is not far from the intersection of three trails, making it likely we would not be alone. Yet I need not have worried. All beings we met seemed to be messengers even when they were not aware that they were.

This image is from my trip in July. Can you see the face near the apex?

I pointed the stone out to Sophia and Deb, who could not deny the significance of its shape. It also seemed to mark the entrance to an area that pulled us into a desire to explore, and so after paying our regards with the knowing we would return, we ventured off the beaten path.

I immediately had the sensation of entering into what felt like the body of the dragon. Dimension began to slip away, and the mind softened as the inner sight opened. I knew my companions were feeling the opening too, but I would not know until we rejoined how similar our experiences were.

As I walked, past dreams and visions started to knit together, as worlds folded into each other. As strange it all seemed, it also made sense. At least to the degree I was meant to understand that day. I soon discovered the land here holds its secrets tightly guarded and a trust must be earned to enter into their mysteries.

An other-worldly presence was undeniably evident, it turns out, to all of us. The face in the pyramid stone that had appeared during my trip in July, along with the large stone head at the beginning of our walk that day, could no longer be claimed as mere coincidences. I am a skeptic by nature, but I could not deny what I was seeing once Deb and Sophia revealed that they, in fact, had seen the same.

Yet it wouldn’t be until later, after I had some time to digest the experience, that I would begin to connect the dots and wonder how lives past and present were weaving together for a purpose just beginning to be defined. “Ammon Ra!” I was nowhere near Egypt, but the pyramids were everywhere, dimensions had collapsed the stars into Earth, and one tiny messenger was about to lead us to a mysterious eye.

I believe it was Deb who first spotted the tiny brown bird flirting among the shadows of the trees. It flew just beyond our reach, and difficult to detect. Were it not for its voice, we may have lost it. Yet despite its illusive nature, the bird seemed to beckon us to follow, and so we did. It was, in my mind, without a doubt, another messenger. Perhaps our most important one.

“I think we need to go there. In fact I know we need to go there,” I announced as I pulled my companions into the undergrowth of a path that wasn’t marked by human footsteps. The energy of the beacon had an undeniable force, yet there was a point when I knew we must stop.

Surrounding us were guardians staring out from the trunks of trees, peering through the visages of moss covered stones, and leering up at us through darkened holes. I was beginning to feel rather like I was in some Tolkien novel and the words, “Thou shalt not pass,” echoed through my mind.

We gathered between the grumpiest “troll” and the wooden head of a dragon guardian, forming a makeshift triangle on the uneven earth after we placed offerings of herbs and corn near the watchful eyes.

This wooden dragon brought back memories of a recent dream

On one side of us was the alpine forest, on the other, an immense white stone. If I had any doubts it housed the treasure being guarded, they soon disappeared.

Soon after our eyes closed in meditation, the serpent appeared. Its body emerged from the white boulder just over the head of Sophia and quickly wrapped the crown of our trinity. There it held us until we were finished.

“She’s standing in wait,” I whispered, eyes still closed and fixed upon the pillar of white energy waiting by the pyramid stone. Who she was, I still cannot say for sure, but she knew we were coming, and I was pretty certain I had seen her before. I recalled the “white goddess” who appeared in England at the foot of my bed years before, pulling the bedclothes back, urging me to surrender to the fey queen’s bidding. I thought also of Sophia, who had pulled the card for Isis before we had left. Was this her serpent energy that wrapped us tight?

It was after we rose from our mediation that I really looked at the white rock we stood beneath. “It’s the eye,” I don’t know how I knew it, but I was certain of my words.

A rock not meant to be climbed

Sophia, drawn to the curious markings that crisscrossed its surface, tried to get closer. The soft earth of the lid pulled her back and she lost her footing. “I don’t think we’re meant to go any nearer,” Deb and I both declared.

It was difficult to over-look the markings…

After a taking a few photographs, it was clear the “eye” had given has all of its gifts for the day. It was time to complete the mission of our journey and return to the pyramid stone and offer up the white pillar from Mystery Hill.

To Be Continued…

The Path of the Pyramids: Keeping a Promise to a Dragon and a Stone Part 2 #VThikes #dragonlines #pyramidstones #sacredsites

On By Alethea KehasIn Animal Messengers, Gaia & Elementals, Memoir, the labyrinth, Travel Adventures, Warriors of Light9 Comments
A little pyramidal cave in the rocks

There were at least as many pyramids as there were hearts along the journey that led us to one particular stone pyramid at the crown of the dragon. Too many to count, and probably a lot that were missed by our eyes. It seemed, though, like the hearts, more than a coincidence… Pyramids carved into the faces of stones, stones opening to their portals such as the one above, and rocks that had somehow fallen from Earth’s openings into perfect pyramidal shapes.

A “portal” pyramid in the boulders

Guides continued to appear as we ascended the mountain. Soon after the chipmunk, a call rang through the canopy above. “It sounds like an eagle,” Sophia remarked, “I was told an eagle would be here today.”

We did not see the eagle, but days before I had seen an eagle twice in my travels. Three times in total this summer.

Followed by the eagle, was a yellow butterfly spotted by Deb. It was becoming a little uncanny. Not only were these common guides in my personal life, the eagle and butterfly are two of the totems in my Warriors of Light series. And it would get stranger from there…

This beautiful wolf-like dog appeared at an uncanny moment for us. His name was Ari, the eagle-boy in my book series, yet he resembled Lupe, the wolf-boy.

Worlds started to collapse as the mountain watched us walk its body. So many watchers, I would later remark that I was grateful I did not take this journey alone.

So many guardians in the trees

After that rather shocking encounter with the rock face that looked like the head of a galactic being, we were constantly aware of being observed. Ents appeared in the taller trees and trolls below them. Some seemed happier than others about our presence and it was clear we were walking in a land that did not really belong to humans.

Dragon wing?

A land, we would feel every-increasingly, that was guarded with a purpose. And, was alive with forces that, well, seemed other-worldly. Unlike in many of the places I have visited in England, where the magic of the land was enhanced by an ancient sophisticated society that moved and placed stones with deliberation, here mighty stones formed uncanny alignments by the forces of Earth.

We couldn’t help but feel the body of the dragon as we neared the summit

Yet there were so many similarities. The feeling of dimensions collapsing and realms mixing. The feeling of forces dormant and waiting to be reawakened…it was more than obvious a dragon lines ran through this land, and the three of us could not help feeling and seeing that the stars also had a special alignment with this serpent mountain.

Although this may not be the best depiction, there are curious carvings in the rocks of this mountain that made each of us think of the stars.

And, even though we had not chosen to walk the path of the water lines, the feeling of the element was present. It was held in the body of the stones with whale beings seemingly embedded into the body of the dragon. Fire and water. Alchemy. I couldn’t help but think of how the magical hexagram was here. And I could only hope that the lines were still alive here, even though there were obvious disruptions. Most notably, the towers of metal we could not bring ourselves to linger near for too long (much less photograph) that several feet (thankfully) away from the crown.

One of the whale stones we encountered

Memory and intuition brought us to the crown even though we were walking an unfamiliar path to get there. The increasing pulse, pulling us to our destination to place our offerings and heed the land’s calling, whatever it may be. And if it were not for the wren, we may never have seen the eye…

To be continued…

Thoughts of Fathers and Daughters with the Loss of Ruth Bader Ginsberg #RBG #sexism #parenting

On By Alethea KehasIn Reflections9 Comments

Photo Credit: Pixabay

I don’t watch the news much these days so I am often late finding out about world events. This morning, I learned of the loss of Ruth Bader Ginsberg on Facebook. In a world that seems to be spiraling into an ever-darker abyss, this is one more crushing blow to all that is good. But, this will not be a post filled with all the good that RBG brought to the world. I have no doubt these are being spread far and wide at the moment, as they should be. Instead, this is a post about fathers and daughters.

At this time, I cannot help but think about fathers and their daughters, and here is an example why. Where I live in rural NH, there is a house that is positioned near the entrance to our small town. It is on the corner of three bisecting roads and just off a main highway that connects the state to its neighbors. Inside the house lives father who is in the military, his wife, and their two daughters. Their vast yard is punctuated across its perimeter with more signs for the POTUS than I care to count. Including one so large it could easily fill the side of a school bus.

They are a white family, privileged by the world’s standards, raising two strong girls, from what I hear. I don’t know them personally. But each time I pass the house, I am reminded of all the privileged white men with daughters in the world who are asserting their support of another privileged white man, who happens to also be deeply misogynistic, a likely rapist multiple times over, and an individual who is doing his best to strip away women’s rights. Including their daughters’.

Each time I pass this house, I think about all the progress women like RBG, and many others of both sexes, who have worked tirelessly to ensure that all lives matter equally. I keep thinking about what a father is telling to his daughters when he stakes his over-large sign on their yard to assert that, in essence, their lives don’t really matter. And, I am deeply, deeply, troubled by the notion that there are so many who are pushing their daughters into the shadows to assert their power as privileged white men.

Keeping a Promise to a Dragon and a Stone: Part 1 #VThikes #sacredsites #dragonlines #dragonstones #leylines

On By Alethea KehasIn A New Earth, Animal Messengers, Gaia & Elementals, Memoir, Reflections, Travel Adventures10 Comments

We left at 9:30am. Three women, piling into my little blue car to fulfill a promise I had made with a dragon. And a stone. We had everything we needed, or so I hoped. To be honest, I wasn’t wholly sure what we needed, or what at all to expect. All I knew was where I needed to go and what I needed to leave behind.

My offering was wrapped in gold satin at the bottom of my backpack. A gift unearthed six years before at in a place where it shouldn’t be by my daughter. I couldn’t deny I would miss it, just as I had the Raven’s Crystal but this too was not mine to keep.

Inside the pack, with the pillar of selenite, were my snacks and water, some tissues, bandaids, my wallet, windbreaker, and three bundles of sage and lavender from my garden. There had been no more dreams or visions, aside from the returning memory of a journey with my two companions to the Mystery Hill where my daughter had found the offering years before. They, in turn had brought their own offerings, which later we would realize were perfect. Being led, like me, with few clues but with a willingness to discover whatever awaited.

Photo taken by Deb. We saw hearts everywhere throughout the day.

The signs began to become obvious when we pulled the car into the base of the mountain. Although its electric charge was now at zero, the gas meter read 333 miles remaining in the tank. When I glanced at the sequence of 3s, then shared the number with my companions, it became obvious why we had formed a trinity for this journey. There had been a moment of guilt days before, followed by an extension of the invitation to others to join, but in the end we were left with the three I had envisioned. And, somehow we had settled, without knowing it, to embark on the day of a new moon, because it was simply the only day that worked.

Deb and I jumped out of the car to pay the park fee, get maps and make an inquiry.

“Can you tell us how to get to the Serpent Ridge trail,” Deb asked a dumbfounded attendant. I had an impulse to nudge her when I saw the look on the attendant’s face.

“There’s no trail by that name.”

“Yes there is,” Deb insisted, “readying her phone to pull up the evidence.

“Never mind,” I interjected.

I’m okay with not being considered “normal,” and perhaps a tad bit “crazy” by some people’s standards, but I saw no point in further alarming the poor woman behind the glass who seemed pretty close to making use of her own phone. To call the authorities.

“We saw it online,” I said. “It was probably just named that by some hiker, never mind.”

The car chugged up 2/3 of the mountain with some effort while Deb and I shared our experience at the gate with Sophia. Marking the beginning of a steady stream of jokes and much laughter that would carry us through to end of our day.

My faithful companions with just a hint of mischief in their visages.

The air was colder than I had anticipated, and the sky threatened a rain that never released from the clouds when we disembarked from the overheated car. Resting nicely in a near-empty lot, we left the vehicle behind to eat lunch.

“What time is it,” Sophia inquired.

“11:44”

The next time I would look at the clock on my phone it would be 12:44.

“Should we take the slut trail or the slab,” Sophia wondered as she studied the map.

“Slut?!”

“Slot, Alethea, Slot!” That was it, we were doomed. I could have blamed the wind for the tears, but it was pretty obvious that the three of us had reverted back to childhood. Laughter would turn out to be the balm we needed as we descended into the darkened forest.

Our first guide was a familiar one. “I was wondering if you’d be here,” I greeted the chipmunk as it scurried from stone to stone beside us.

“Do you remember the chipmunk at America’s Stonehenge,” I asked my companions. They recalled its uncanny hoping to the stones where our eyes needed to linger. This one, though, stayed with us for just a short time. There was another guide yet to make its appearance. A guide that would make me think of Sue.

I took it as a good omen we were in the right place, but I think the old man who passed by moments later thought I was as looney as the gatekeeper did Deb. More laughter, of course, ensued.

The next being we encountered stopped us in our tracks. Nestled into the roots of two birches aside the path, it was impossible to miss.

“It looks like…”

“Yep.”

“I had the same thought.”

All three of us, apparently, saw the same image encased in stone. And what we saw foreshadowed what was yet to come.

To Be Continued…

The Wild Soul Yearning to be Free #freesoul #dreams #dreamhealing #dreammessages #innerchildhealing

On By Alethea KehasIn Reflections6 Comments

She stood wrapped inside the wild wind and her wild thoughts. No, they were not her thoughts, but she felt them as if they were. So wild there was no language for them, only feeling. So wild they lifted her soul out of her body, which she dragged behind her in her wild search for meaning.

I woke this morning from a dream that seemed to be telling me my story but also everyone’s. Inside the walls of an ever-expansive house, I searched the crowded rooms, looking for an exit. I pulled at layered clothing too old to be anywhere close to new. I felt worn and tired, too weary to feel beloved until a ravishing touch awakened my pulse.

Before the dream was over, I listed what defined me. “Oh yeah, I whispered as an afterthought, I am also a writer.”

The list made me feel tired even though my body slumbered. It dulled me inside the confinement of the rooms I could not escape from. Endless chambers filled with the collection of things made to define lives hopelessly searching for the return to the wild soul.

As I put meaning to the dreamscape, I realized that perhaps this simple longing to return to the essence of the free soul is what is plaguing humanity right now. Radical factions breaking off from the “norm,” decrying conspiracy and even hatred in the search to be free. Masks defiantly not worn in the name of freedom…

My thoughts wandered to Nelson Mandela’s life. Twenty-seven years spent imprisoned in body, but not in soul. I can’t profess to understand how he endured those long years while keeping that light strong inside, but I do know the wild longing for freedom when there are no bars holding the physical body in restraints.

The mind is a master of erecting barriers that cannot be seen.

I thought of that day when I followed the wild thoughts that were not mine to a hill in England and looked with wild eyes that were not just my own through a history I felt acutely in my dancing cells. I had, it seemed, come to bear witness to the past stretched long into the present. To know, through the depths beyond reason, our collective history. As I wandered the ruins of a land that was once enchanted by the magic of the free soul, I felt the long moment of entrapment. The wings that would fly, clipped. Grounded into a darkness not my own, yet very much mine.

We are swirling, once again, into the darkness of the shadowlands. We blame the outside, crying out in the name of injustice and freedoms lost, inciting division and even anger and hatred as we rage against our would-be constraints. And in the process, we entrap ourselves and each other, further and further into the abyss that diminishes the light of the soul that knows that it, in truth, can never be confined.

Yet who can blame us? We are birthed to know confinement. The soul that knows only light, suddenly constrained by a dense body inside a dark, ever-confining womb, waits to be birthed into form. A form that it exists within, for a limited time, not just to understand life, but also death. The soul inside the body learns easily what it feels like to be restricted, while forgetting what it feels like to be boundless.

I am reminded of the suffocation of my dream. The feeling of rooms without exits, but also self-imposed labels that felt heavy and limiting. The voice that felt lost inside itself. I am reminded of the inner child who always searches for the chance to dance back into the light, naked and free. Not caring who is watching…Singing with abandon.

I am reminded of how much I have allowed myself to forget that she exists without bounds. That she need not be constrained without my will. I am reminded about how much I default, as I watch those around me doing the same, to the outside instead of the inside. Forgetting, in the process, that we are never not free. That the wild light is alive inside and is always best nurtured with love.

Serenity in Turbulent Times #serenity #writephoto #suevincent

On By Alethea KehasIn Reflections24 Comments
Photo Credit: Sue Vincent

These days serenity is borrowed. To avoid the turbulent waters that try to divide the heart’s landscape of love, I find myself seeking the pause. Stillness, where thoughts cannot ripple the surface. I walk into the rain to find beauty in the gray mist. The tucked heads of flowers pigmented like the sun. Their beauty muted because the eyes can stand only so much glory.

With my belly on the mossy lawn I watch hills of ants and find a sophistication of silent cooperation that is foreign to my language. For a moment, I’d like to be an ant crawling into dug caverns, deeper and deeper into the body of Earth until what remains on the surface disappears from the mind.

The cat studies with me. Delighted. Her purr barely perceptible, she is stingy with her love, but her curled lips betray her. She believes me to be a cohort in mischief and I think perhaps I am. Inside the house dust settles into corners and dishes wait in the sink, but I am stealing more time to listen to bird song and soft sigh of grass yielding to my body.

Here, level with the eyes of the cat, I search the understory of life and find pipes made of fungi pushing through last year’s leaves and I know the fey cannot be far away.

For Sue Vincent’s #writephoto prompt #serenity. Click here to participate in the challenge.