Sacred Space

 

“Your sacred space is where you can find yourself over and over again.” – Joseph Campbell, American Mythologist

 I just returned from a weekend spiritual retreat taught by my wonderful teacher, Cybele. I don’t normally write in public forums about my Earth-based, feminist spirituality. But this weekend showed me how much I fear what I call “getting in to trouble.”

So, here goes. Despite the fear I feel that someone reading this either won’t like it or will think I’m an idiot, I’ve decided to write this post anyway.

There were five of us taking the plunge, including our intrepid teacher. We played with the energy of stones and crystals. We did sitting and walking meditations. We walked a beautiful labyrinth at sundown. We swam, talked, ate together, and during these three days, created our own community of spiritual women.

As I was slowly walking the labyrinth, I realized how quickly I speed through life. I walk as if someone was chasing me. In the labyrinth, at each turning point, I realized it was me. I was chasing myself. I want to slow down. To ponder, to wonder, to take the time to enjoy this life which is speeding by. As I walked the labyrinth, the knowledge that I was in sacred space filled me. I stopped in the center, and looking in my teacher’s eyes, I saw love and acceptance. I picked Smoky Quartz to be my companion for this year’s journey. A stone of grounding and meditation, I am wearing it to center myself as life flows around me.

Since this workshop, I am taking five minutes every morning and evening to stop, breathe, and look around. This is my version of creating sacred space. For to me, sacred space is the present, the now, my fingers on the keyboard.

If I attune myself to this, then the fear of “getting in to trouble” fades. The memories of bullying in grade school and high school fades. I am back in the present, in the now.

For this ability to center in myself and re-remember who I am, I thank my teacher Cybele, those wondrous women I shared this weekend with, and the Reclaiming Community. For that’s where this journey started many years ago.

But that’s another blog post for another time.

 May all beings be well and happy!

Happily writing – Georgie