Purchase on Amazon http://goo.gl/1vuigc

 

 

I am one of those people: A catalyst.

What does it mean to be a catalyst? How does it work? You might take me to a lunch and introduce me to friends. After the introductions I will say something/anything. It will strike at the heart of their life.

I’ve never laid eyes on the person. I know nothing about them. I don’t know their secrets. I don’t know the pains of their past. I know nothing about their struggles in the present. And I’ve just used the key word that unlocks their past, sums up their struggle and opens the door on all the stuff they’ve been hiding from themselves.

Where did that word come from? How did I know the key to their unfinished business? Am I psychic? Am I a modern day gypsy fortune teller? Wait! Should I be getting paid for this curse? Uh, I mean gift.

No. There is a big difference between me and the gypsy. They know they hold the key and it’s going to cause problems. Maybe this is why in the movies the gypsy always insists on being paid up front?

I come away from the encounters feeling at best confused, but more often feeing ashamed, insensitive, wondering, “What just happened?”

Is there a trick to becoming like the gypsy? Is there a trick to resolving a curse?

Where are the tools I can find to outsmart a curse? A long time ago someone told me we cannot solve a problem on the level where it is conceived. This means I have to find a solution vibrating at a higher frequency than my gift and curse.

I’ll go walking in the forest to look for clues. No! I’m not talking about a metaphoric forest. I’ll walk in the forest two blocks from my house. Looking out my window today is powerfully windy. The tips of tall pines sway. The aspens lining our back porch bend. But in the forest at ground level it’s quiet. Feelings are spilling through me and I set a fast pace.

Remember I’m looking for clues. First I find a beautiful gold and black volcanic rock about the weight of a city telephone book. A belly rock I’ll lay across my midriff at night pulling me into harmony with the land, the forest, Mother Earth. I think it’s possible to find a cure for all curses in the greatest mama of all, Mother Earth. So I set the rock standing on its side to remind me to pick it up on my way out of the forest.

Next I find in the middle of the path a stick. As clues go it cannot get more obvious than lying in the middle of the path. When I pick it up I can see before its incarnation as a stick was a tree root about one inch wide. One side is black from being embedded in the dirt. The other side sun exposed is gold and weathered silver.

When you come across clues it’s best to take them literally. I found a stick that represents the root of my problem. (Yes, it’s true. Clues speak in puns.) Part of the stick was mired in black dirt. The other part of the stick silver and gold represents value and wealth. (Yes, more puns. The stick also represents how our gifts are curses and our curses are gifts.)

I can take the colors another step further and put them on the Medicine Wheel. Black and gold are the colors of death and birth. I picked the stick up, symbolic of the root of my problem and the need for a death and re-birth.

Tonight I’ll decorate the stick. I’ll write prayers. I’ll cover the prayers with drawings maybe flowers. I’ll tie my prayers to the stick. In ceremony I’ll plant my prayer stick in the ground and ask the wind and the rain, the sun and the moon, the stars to carry my prayers.

Will this offer the transcendence I require? Is beauty always the answer?


For more see The Way of The Fairy Godmother.