Human beings are story tellers. We gather with family and friends and tell stories about strangers, friends, family and, above all, about ourselves. We shape our lives around these stories of our lives. We live out our own myths – handed down to us by family, culture, religion, and then accepted and embellished by ourselves. Rarely do we question their veracity – even when they serve us badly.
The Heroine's Adventure begins when we no longer linger among other people's stories, when we escape from the stale, smothering, false myths we’ve for so long accepted, and create a fresh, new, true version of our own myth:
- What is my purpose in this life?
- Is there meaning behind my struggle and pain?
- Why does peace elude me?
- Whom do I love? Why?
- What curtails my freedom?
- What does it mean to experience the sacred?
- What are my core beliefs?
- How can I remain true these beliefs?
IN THE CIRCLE
We’ll all experience just such an adventure at The Guest House, a lovely retreat center in Chester, Connecticut. There we will meet in our circle, the most ancient of images for community and gatherings of women. Protected and supported by our circle, we will each write our own personal myth. Combining ritual, sharing, meditation, movement, color and other techniques, we’ll together enter into the mystery of the Inner Marriage. We will explore our unique feminine and masculine selves beyond the mind’s need to define the "appropriate" feminine and masculine roles in our lives. Finally, we will ask the Divine Matchmaker to do her work and, as we give back our hearts to ourselves, we will mark the circle of wholeness in a marriage ceremony in a swirl of colors, a final ritual created by the Circle.
HALLOWEEN AND THE NIGHT OF THE FULL MOON
Quite wonderfully, our marriage ceremony will be on Halloween, the night when the veils between the worlds are thin and ancestors are close. Hallowmas is also the celebration of the Dark Goddess, she who leads us from death to rebirth in her great, nurturing womb. This is a time to consciously let go of aspects of self that no longer serve you, and to embrace the you who is waiting to be born! Also, this year, Halloween is just one night past a full moon! How we will work this into our final evening will be a grand aspect of our creative imaginings.
This is a journey of deep creativity that neither judges nor evaluates. Creativity feels, it speaks in images and metaphors, it sings and dances and knows how to be soft and fierce. It understands the call of wholeness. It invites us into the marriage of feminine and masculine.
