“This is not the time to have spiritual conversations. This is the time to DO the work.”

– Rebecca Campbell

The Tsunami is coming!

If you knew a tsunami was coming and no one else did – what would you do?

If it was coming…soon! Like, today…!

What would your reaction be? How would you feel? Fear, certainly. A tsunami is coming! Responsibility? Maybe you’d think you should do whatever it takes to tell people so they could prepare.

 But after having that thought, what would you think next…

“They’d think I was crazy.”

“They’d question how I knew. What was my authority?”

“If I went around knocking on doors to warn them – maybe I’d get shot. Or at the very least, have the door slammed in my face!”

That was the question my coach, Jake Ballentine asked me when I became clear that my calling, back in 2019 was to teach about the Heroine’s Journey and make sure women knew they were on that journey every time they answered their own call to make a change in their lives. I wanted to teach about how important it was that every woman hear her call and respond to it! (Listen to my recent podcast interview with Jake here).

(Note that I’m talking about all kinds of calls here – the calls that spring from within, from your unique self: to open a shop; to write a book; to paint; to teach; to write poetry; to hike; to be in nature…to quit your job and do something much more suited to who you are.)

Jake wanted to know how committed I was to my message and my mission.

“If you think you have an important message then why aren’t you spreading it? Why wouldn’t you want to shout it from the rooftops?”

Who, me?

My reaction to those challenging questions was my lifelong typical reaction, “Who me? I’m not qualified. There are so many other people out there who are sharing their message. What do I know compared to them?”

You might relate to this reaction – it’s a pretty typical human reaction.

Who am I to do this? Isn’t there someone infinitely more qualified to talk about this stuff?

And yes, there’s always the fear reaction – fear about putting myself out there. How would I be viewed? What would people think? (That last one is so deadly.)

And then the corollary to the fear reaction – the playing it-safe response. I have always been good at that one. Move to the back; don’t say anything; just nod.

“But you’re the Comfort Zone Challenge person, Susanna.” You might be exclaiming, dear Reader.

I know! I am. I am because I need as much practice as the next person to leave my comfort zone and get out there and make the most of my brief stay on this planet.

It’s time.

As much as it pains me. As much as my comfort zone pulls me back. As much as my Threshold Guardian voices say:

Who do you think you are?

You’re not qualified.

They will laugh at you.

Etc.

Here I am knocking on your door with my message.

Consider this shouting from the rooftops.  

Feminine voices need to be heard! 

Back in 2012 when I started writing my book my aim was to write about the Heroine’s Journey and to support women on that Journey – to give them tools and encouragement. And that’s what I’ve been doing – my online course, my in-person workshops, and gatherings, my blog, podcast, and youtube videos…are all designed to inspire women to be their big selves, their Heroine-selves. 

What’s exciting to me now, in 2023, is that I see that what was calling to me back in 2012 was part of a much larger movement that encompasses many women wanting to do the same. Women are rising. I’m sure this is why I was compelled to learn more about the Sacred Feminine. It’s something stirring inside of us – the need to bring balance back to our small, precious planet.

It manifests in a multitude of different ways, unique to the person who feels called to express it. Some are taking up causes – for the environment, for social justice,  - some are entering politics – some are quitting their corporate jobs and doing what they’ve always wanted to do. We need the freedom to express whatever is within us and we’re finding our way to do it.

For me, it’s continuing to teach and encourage. The Heroine’s Journey offers a map and milestones, a way to bring out what’s stirring in you and not let it be impeded. And now I understand that the Sacred Feminine wants me to give you the means to tell your story. It wants me to help you acknowledge your worth and contribution. The more we affirm every woman’s journey, the more women tell their stories, and the stronger the feminine will be in the world.

Whatever you have brewing in you, wanting to be birthed… needs to be birthed. Stop thinking of it as “less than” and “not that important” and comparing. You wouldn’t be feeling what you’re feeling about it if it wasn’t meant to come out through you. It needs to be nurtured and brought into the light of day.

This is what I’ve gleaned from my exploration of the meaning of the Sacred Feminine (or Eternal Feminine). (If you’ve been reading my blog starting in January, you’ll know I’ve been writing about this a lot.) What’s rising now in so many women is part of a universal raising of consciousness that what women have to offer is important and must be released into the world - now.

Why?

We have to bring the masculine/feminine balance back to Mother Earth. Both aspects are important but we all know it’s been a masculine energy that has presided over the planet for the past 4000 years.

Why “back”? Did there used to be a balance? Here’s how Rebecca Campbell, author of Rise, Sister, Rise writes about it:

“We each have within us both masculine and feminine energies. While your sex indicates what energies you chose to focus on in this life, we still embody both. As we are coming out of 5,000 years of patriarchy, where the unbalanced masculine has been the focus.”

I’ve learned in my studies of ancient history about how we went from an agricultural world to a world occupied by herding people. It was the farming people around 7000 BC who worshipped and revered the Goddess, a Mother God. Then women were in places of power in their culture.   They were considered equal to men if not more elevated because of the magic their bodies possessed.  They gave birth to life! Their cycle was the same as the moon. 

But there was a huge change, and Joseph Campbell, the author, and mythologist, describes it this way in the book about his PBS series of interviews with Bill Moyers, The Power of Myth:

“As I’ve said in many of my books, from the north and south, in the fourth millennium B.C., came the invasions of herding people.  They hunted; were nomads and worshipped warrior gods, like Zeus.  The mother-goddess mythology (nurturing, creativity…love for all her offspring) flourished in the great river valleys – the Nile, the Tigris-Euphrates, the Indus, and later the Ganges was overtaken.  The world of the Goddess was replaced by a dominant male-oriented myth and the man became the creator.”

He goes on to say that there was goddess worship for a while. She did continue to be revered in some communities…

“…(The Goddess) was a very potent figure in Hellenistic times in the Mediterranean, and she came back with the Virgin in the Roman Catholic tradition.  You don’t have a tradition with the Goddess celebrated any more beautifully and marvelously than in the twelfth- and thirteenth-century French cathedrals, every one of which is called Notre Dame.”

We know that the feminine, goddess culture was very much in tune with nature.  Everything was considered sacred – plants, animals, the earth, itself. Without blame (because we only know what we know at the time) we know that the predominantly masculine culture sought to conquer nature. The Bronze and Iron Ages saw the nomadic tribes devoted to the arts of war – and they conquered many of the Mother God-worshipping cultures. Women were enslaved by these people, raped, and forced to marry. The shift was profound. Our environment and its great imbalance are reflective of this shift. Nature is something to be tamed and used, not considered sacred. 

So, what do we do about it? 

One of the most crucial ways women will help with the rebalance is to respond to their inner voice, the voice that’s telling them where to focus, and where to put their precious energy. We have to stop burying our passion, our “bliss” as Campbell named it, - our calling.

Women have been putting their true desires on the back burner for too long. They’re finding they can’t keep it down anymore. The more women answer their call, the more all women will feel the pull to do the same. I think the pandemic has positively influenced this. We had to curtail our busyness. We weren’t able to run around so much during the pandemic. We quieted down and were able to hear what our inner voice was guiding us to do.

Women are following their intuition and creating a myriad of new and exciting endeavors. I run a school for Real-Life Heroines. I get to see many women go through the process of hearing their calls, clarifying them, and responding. I see women working together to encourage and inspire each other to do what their hearts are urging them to do. I am seeing such an upswelling of new confidence, creativity, hope – and real joy as women are aligning their lives with who they really are.

Your job is to keep your channel open, my dear Heroine. Let your passion, what gives you joy, shine through – it’s the emergence, in all of us, of the Sacred Feminine – which so long has been missing and is deeply needed now. Let’s join together to honor it.

This quote of Martha Graham’s is so applicable to this moment.:

“There is a vitality, a life force, a quickening that is translated through you into action, and there is only one of you in all time, this expression is unique, and if you block it, it will never exist through any other medium; and be lost. The world will not have it. It is not your business to determine how good it is, not how it compares with other expressions. It is your business to keep it yours clearly and directly, to keep the channel open. You do not even have to believe in yourself or your work. You have to keep open and aware directly of the urges that motivate you. Keep the channel open. No artist is pleased. There is no satisfaction whatever at any time. There is only a queer, divine dissatisfaction, a blessed unrest that keeps us marching and makes us more alive than the others.”

― Martha Graham