Completing the magical circle

Structure seems to have captured my attention lately. 

Last Saturday we explored Louise Nevelson's work with Artsy Fartsy kids. I took some of the leftover scraps and created my own piece. I loved playing with the the re-cyled pieces of wood, moving and arranging them until they suited me. At one point, it became so hot in the room and we needed more ventilation for the spray-painting booth, that I opened a studio window. As I did, I noticed a scraggly, weather-beaten and warped strip of plywood. Perfect, I thought for my scuplture. I removed the rusted screws and added it. 

And, then I left it for the weekend.

All week, I have been slowly gluing sections together and tweaking the design. After most of it was glued, I realized it wasn't gong to be a wall piece, but could stand on its own and was interesting from all angles. But, it needed something. I removed the one plastic piece, which no longer seemed to fit and shifted the warped plywood from across the front to the top. It's sort of Picasso meets Zen temple. I adore it and the process that bore it!

It is solid, aesthetically pleasing and gives me great pleasure.

At the same time, my brain has been developing some ideas around the skeletal structure and I suspect this process is entirely related to my creative building exercise.

A Thomas Kelly quote from a Sunday Quaker worship sparked my imagination. Something about lingering in "double-minded obedience." The night before, I'd remembered a dream snippet of recognizing to love myself from within. All of this moves me closer to deeply knowing that the seed of God is, indeed, within me. Focusing on this wisdom moves me away from double-mindedness and into deeper relationship with Spirit, wholeness, being, existence, Truth and the eternal.

I mulled this over in worship, primed by the Kelly quote and God's words to Moses from the burning bush: "I am that I am." They have haunted me for some time, though they are such a mystery and their definition, for me, is beyond words; more like an intuitive, bodily knowing.

As I sank deeper into the golden silence, a meditation came to me:

Bathe yourself in love
completely, unlike any
other time

[feel the love]
bubbling up from inside,

trust and go deep
into the Tree-of-Life roots
work your way up your spine;

the entrance is the place in
your sacrum I showed you

you already have deep roots
trust those

take my hand and we'll ascend
toward the nothingness of Love

leave everything else behind

I had an experience last year of journeying through the Tree of Life. This time, I understood the tree represented me, my body and journey. My body is the trunk. My faith is the roots and I am pushing the Christ Energy that I can feel, which is the seed of God, within me up and out the third eye toward this no-thing-ness of Love, void of emotion and thinking; a place of pure being.

A week later, again in worship, this tree-like skeletal system flashed in my mind and I began to identify other body parts:
• Feet – roots of faith
• Sacrum – where God resides (sacred space)
• Heart – where Jesus lives
• Reproductive organs – creativity
• Head – wisdom/Sophia
• Eyes – awareness
• Hands – compassion
• Ears – discernment and Truth
• Third eye – divine connection

I am grateful to tangibly know this sense of Spirit within my own body and to be able to taste it as I create an outer structure that has given me such joy.

• When has a tangible act sparked a spiritual Truth or epiphany?
• What was my emotional response?
• Where do I imagine Spirit? Outside or within?
• How has my vision of Spirit's placement or proximity changed?
• How can my body be a temple or vessel?


we crawled through
the tangle of roots
into the altar of the sacrum,
traveling up
higher and higher
as the branches grew thin
to the point of
nothingness

the place everything becomes love

we are birthed from this
nothingness and our life's
work is to make our
way back, completing
the magical circle,
our cycle and purpose

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