Exorcism (from Late Latin exorcism, from Greek exorkizein – to abjure) is the practice of evicting demons or other evil spiritual entities from a person or place, which they are believed to have possessed.

All those who were said to be the messengers or mediators of the gods practiced exorcism in many cultures throughout history.  The majority of religious pathways have exorcism practices and those who perform the exorcism are known as Priests, Rabbis, Shamans, Medicine men and Brahmans etc.

They would exorcise the demon or entity from the person who was thought to be possessed.  It was only practiced by those who were seen as having knowledge in this field. They needed a strong constitution and faith in order to rid the person of a powerful dark demonic force. (The origins of the word Demon originated from the Greek word ‘Daemon’ which is a word for spirit, which did not have any malevolent indications)

That mantle usually went to the one in the village that was blessed with, took the orders of a holy man or inherited this ability to understand the workings of the spirit world. Others however tended to use this ritual as a means to gain power and instill fear in the community.

Shamans particularly experience this rite of passage themselves in contrast to Priests or Rabbis. They encounter their own entity invasion, which frequently lead to periods of madness, physical illness, depression and great suffering. Often taking on the pain and imbalances of the village and the land around them.

Recovering from this rite of passage the Shaman would be held in high esteem for their survival with the ability to re-emerge stronger from such an ordeal.  They would then be of service to the community members that asked and needed spiritual guidance and healing. The shaman understood the state of possession, madness and all the elements that attributed to the persons state of torment.  Without walking the path oneself, one is unable understand and navigate the worlds both in reality and non- ordinary reality.

It has been well researched that those who have been possessed by unwelcome energies have a belief in the possibility of being possessed. So if someone were an atheist, he or she would not be seeking this kind of help.

Parapsychologist and Author Jeffrey Mishlove PHD points out that beneath the attack of entity attachment will be found something within the person which has allowed for the possession to occur [Auerbach, 1993].

In my experience there is always an open vulnerability in the person who feels beset by entities. There is a sensitive predisposition that makes that person susceptible to feeling hosted or equally it could be an awakening or trauma that leaves one open to this kind of experience.

Exorcism was commonplace before the advent of psychiatry took the reigns and with that the belief in spirit possession was shunned and kept to a minimum through the church or temple. Those that practiced the exorcism would not go ahead with the practice until a psychiatrist had seen the person first.

Possession was replaced by the logic of  ‘mental illness’ a disease of the brain. ‘No you are not possessed, you have a mental illness and what you experiencing and seeing are called delusions and hallucinations’.

Throughout history both the church and the psychiatric body have gone to extremes to justify their beliefs. Far too many people were burnt, hung, and tortured and in the not so recent times, murdered in the name of cleansing the devil from someone’s soul. And even today there are reports in Africa that children are being exorcised in a harmful and hurtful way to cleanse them of evil.

Interesting to note that the Catholic Church did revise the rite of exorcism in 1999

In January 1999, the Vatican issued a revised Catholic rite of exorcism for the first time since 1614, reaffirming the existence of Satan and revamping his image for the millennium. Officials stressed that the church was not revising scriptural references to the Devil or suggesting that people should cease believing in the Evil One. But priests who conduct exorcism’s should now deal with evil as a force lurking within all individuals, rather than one that threatens people from without. 

However, flipping to the other side which is chock full of medication. People are afraid to talk about spiritual encounters of any kind, as it constitutes various conditions related to mental illness. The Hearing Voices Network is doing much to debunk this theory. As you can have experiences of hearing voices and altered states of non -ordinary reality and still find your way to a state of balance without a label to go with it.

The mental health world is bent on telling people that this experience is a disease of the brain. If it is a disease, why then do people recover?

Look at John Nash (The film ‘A Beautiful Mind ‘was based on his story) he went through great suffering and was medicated for a long time and then withdrew slowly and learnt to deal with his own otherworldly experiences in his own way. Or take a look at the website of www.successfulschizophrenia.com there is a great resource of success stories that the mental health industry does not want to be to widely known.

A statement that many hear:

‘You will have this disease for the rest of your life and you will NOT be able to manage without being medicated for the rest of your life regardless of the side (direct) effects of the medication.’

This statement is a death sentence for many and I see it in the eyes of those who contemplate suicide after being caught in the mental health system and being unable to find a way out of what they see as a life long prison sentence with no reprieve. In the last two years I have been to the memorials of two beautiful brothers who took their own lives a year apart for this very reason.

The mental health world condones giving any attention to what is happening on a spirit level as they say it just exacerbates the imbalance. But ignoring, suppressing and referring to anything that sniffs of that world as a delusion or hallucination is clearly not helping, and to now drug children as young as two years old for their behavior being inappropriate is just way to extreme!

I understand for those of you who perceive from the left side of the brain how possession seems ridiculous. But this does not mean we should negate the broader subject of spirit attachment or imbalance and throw the baby out with the bath water.

Demonic possession is not a valid diagnosis and is not present in the DSM-IV manual. It is now identified as: hysteria, mania, psychosis, epilepsy and schizophrenia.  Those that say they are possessed are viewed by many psychiatrists, psyche nurses and mental health workers as someone’s way of getting attention who suffers from low self esteem or who are narcissists.

Here are a few interesting points from a paper written by Marc Bancroft MA which shows you that this concept of spirit attachment is not uncommon even in the halls of psychiatric and psychological understanding.

 

• British psychiatrist novelist and author, Arthur Guirdham M.D., who wrote on ESP and reincarnation has concluded after 40 years of practice that every severe mental illness can be caused by spirit interference [Fiore, 1987].

 

• In Thirty Years Among the Dead Dr Carl Wickland writes, ‘Humanity is surrounded by the thought influence of millions of discarnate beings. A recognition of this fact accounts for a great portion of unbidden thoughts, emotions, strange forebodings, gloomy moods, irritabilities, unreasonable impulses, irrational outbursts of temper, uncontrollable infatuations and countless other mental vagaries’. [p.17, 1974].”

 

• Dr. Edith Fiore published a book on spirit attachment and its effects on mental and physical health.  Her book, The Unquiet Dead, generated new interest in the possibility of spirit attachment from therapists and the public alike.  Spirit attachment is the term used to describe the presence of entities “attached” to a living person who affect the person’s thoughts, actions, emotions or behaviors to some degree. Fiore’s work on spirit attachment came as a result from her work in past-life regression therapy.  Discrepancies in past life repressions revealed that many of her client’s past lives were really the past lives of discarnate entities attached to the client.  Out of 30,000 cases Fiore estimates that 70% of all clients have at least one spirit attached to them [Guiley, 1991].

 

• Some investigators in the field claim that between 70-100% of the population are affected by entities at some time in their lives.

 

• An exorcist seeking to dialogue with possessing spirits is far less likely to encounter the traditional demonic behaviors of hissing, convulsions, foaming at the mouth, and the screaming of obscenities, as is the exorcist who believes he is “doing battle with the forces of hell”.

 

•  William James, a psychologist and philosopher who was found to be the 14th most eminent psychologist of the 20th Century, also believed that if there were entities they would have to enter through a cracked or fragmented self. He was one of the strongest proponents of the school of functionalism in psychology and of pragmatism in philosophy. He was a founder of the American Society for Psychical Research, as well as a champion of alternative approaches to healing. He challenged his professional colleagues not to let a narrow mindset prevent an honest appraisal of those phenomena. In an empirical study by Haggbloom using six criteria such as citations and recognition, psychological factors are discussed which inadvertently bring the notions of spirit possession and psychological explanations much closer together.  Baldwin’s observation that “most attached spirits do not make their presence known to the host [Baldwin, 1991]” is indicative of how the subconscious mind typically operates.  The author goes on to elaborate that entities “seem to function at the level of the subconscious [Baldwin, 1991].

 

• Carl Jung said: The chief danger is that of succumbing to the fascinating influence of the archetypes, and this is most likely to happen when the archetypal images are not made conscious. It may even happen that the archetypal figures, which are endowed with a certain autonomy anyway on account of their numinosity, will escape from conscious control altogether and become completely independent, thus producing the phenomenon of possession

 

Carl Jung was a man who moved through his own states of madness. Seen as a Shaman of his time, he found his own truth in working with archetypes.  He said  ‘these images need to be made conscious’. I heartily agree with that. Whether on not the client feels that it is a spirit possession, archetype, disowned self, thought form or even the psychiatric term dissociation. The purpose is to bring the truth of the story and the players to the surface, to expose the wound in safety as something that may seem separate from you but as you work with the lesson it brings you to a deeper understanding, including your part in it as well as working on clearing the entity and embracing that aspect of the disowned self.

 

Professor Jeffrey Remain who served as devil’s advocate for the 1991 televised exorcism seen on 20/20 proclaimed, ‘It (exorcism) means that we don’t have to take responsibility for the conditions in our society that breeds crime and violence and other forms of evil. We can blame that on the devil as well. So I think it’s a counsel for irresponsibility’. [Exorcism, ABC Nightline, 1991]. ‘ Exorcism can easily be perceived as a quick fix for genuine physical, emotional, and psychological problems.

In today’s society it’s imperative that we do all we can to take our own power back. We have moved into a ‘fix it’ society where if there is not a tablet for everything one will be found.

The quick fix isn’t the answer to taking self responsibility, nor is it leaving it up to a psychic healer, Iman, Rabbi, Priest or Shaman that you found in the yellow pages to exorcise your attachments so you don’t have to face you own unconscious prodding’s.

‘It is not for us to judge who is and who is not really ‘possessed’. If someone is in his own cultural milieu, generally considered to be in a state of spirit possession, then he (or she) is possessed’. [Lewis, I., p.46, 1971].    

The work of the Contemporary Shaman is the path of learning how to clear the emotional body of its debris and working within the astral plane, as that’s where these unbalanced energies take form.  Taking responsibility for all that you have attracted (that doesn’t mean becoming a victim) is vital along this learning path.

That’s not to say that you can’t be supported on your journey, held, guided and given a good clearing of the energies surrounding you initially. In the long term however you can’t just expect someone to regularly give you an exorcism when you are playing the victim to what ever attaches itself to you. When you can empower yourself to challenge any visiting energies and learn tools of how to master and communicate with these vibrations of imbalance, you will be able to empower yourself in spirit, mind and body.

The energies/entities are coming to you or through you for a reason; there is availability within your emotional/astral body that they are attracted to. You are the most significant person in moving these energies into the light, as their relationship is with YOU.

Still, like most things being educated in how to stay safe and how to develop insight and skills can take time to learn.  I am not talking so much about intellectual based education, it is more developing emotional and spiritual intelligence. The key is to realize that in giving your fear and your power over to these energies of possession or harassment, you continue to stay the victim of their games.

The Contemporary Shaman after teaching you ways to use healthy grounding tools can guide you in how to embrace and remove these energies. They can guide you in how to work with the spirit world and empower yourself, but the true responsibility lies within you and you are the one that needs to learn how to be the master of your own spirit body rather than the entities, thought forms, archetypes or daemons that appear to possess you.

People are at their wit’s end in regard to getting help from the various mental health systems around the world and know that medication is not enough. So those with a strong conviction in the laws of good verse evil or those that have lapsed in their beliefs are heading back to the traditional Saturn based pathways of monotheist religions and the like.

Religion is coming back big time, as the world gets more chaotic. In some ways people are going back to traditional beliefs for a sense of familiarity and belonging. There are also New Age groups that are incorporating similar laws familiar to more traditional religious groups.

I find it interesting that there is little found documentation on priests themselves getting exorcised, but I had to laugh to discover that Mother Teresa was exorcised in her latter years, because she had trouble sleeping and was somewhat grumpy. Obviously it had nothing to do with old age and serving people all her life!

I am curious to know if the priests who have been charged with child abuse said it was the devil that made them do it?

Again, this belief that something or someone has more power over you is giving yourself over to something outside yourself. Rather than looking within to connect to your own divinity which is part of the greater whole.

I am not saying religion is to be shunned for those that have a deep connection, but it has brought so much shame, guilt, and judgment with it and lets face it behind every war there is a strong religious backbone.

I honor those that walk the path of compassion whatever path they belong to and do not argue your right to believe in a God, Goddess, Jesus, Allah, etc. Everyone has the right to believe in what they want. But why do we have to be so black and white about everything?  E.g.: this is the only way and those that do not join us will go to hell, stay sinners, be forever lost on the path, not ascend, be left behind, be given no mercy etc.

Today we have a healthy model called Spirit Releasment Therapy, which is akin to the Contemporary Shamanic work that I mentioned before. It assists in making contact with the interfering energy, identifying its attraction to being attached and to assist it to move on and for the client to integrate the learning experience so as to feel more whole.

This fast paced world that we are adjusting to throws us back upon ourselves to be our own healers. It is one of self-responsibility, self-empowerment and that is the path we need to take in dealing with this type of experience.

I can understand the need to clear the person of the surrounding entities as an initial starting point, but there is a relationship of sorts happening and just getting them moved off for a moment will not solve the issue.

Known actor Stephen Fry did a documentary and interviewed people who suffered from what is termed Bi polar (who experience many similar otherworldly experiences when in the elevated stage as those suffering from those labeled with schizophrenia) found that when pushed to answer the question: ‘If you had a choice to press a button and eliminate all the otherworldly experiences and encounters, would you?’ Majority answered that they definitely wouldn’t want to press the button, as it was a gift as well as a curse for them and they enjoyed much of their otherworldly experiences.

Years back I had attended an exorcism as a witness for a man who was deeply religious and believed in the devil.  The born again Christians asked him to ask Christ forgiveness for him being molested as a child (I nearly lost it with anger at that point, but promised I would just be a witness) The voices returned to him within 24 hours because his mind was still fearful and he still felt shame and guilt from the wounds that pervaded his life, which of course were never addressed. I was doing journeywork with a woman in my training days who felt she was possessed by another being and when all was released she felt better but said ‘ what will I be without him?’ Within a short time of her going back to her old ways and NOT practicing what she had be guided to practice the entity was back. There is always some kind of unconscious relationship underlying the continual harassment that the energies bring.

I also went to a workshop that a friend insisted on. At this workshop much was referred to regarding   the subject of Ascension. A woman did what was perceived as a healing on me (I had a little alert button go off but did nothing) and I was getting a cold that day and felt a little weak. I did not relate to many things said and many people in the room were totally enamored of the teacher.

That night and for the next night I felt well, possessed by an energy that was not my own. It was heavy, depressing dark and malevolent. I struggled for a day or two thinking it was just my stuff, as I just didn’t pick up on what was occurring. On the third night I felt like I was spiraling into a chronic state of melancholy and feeling rather spooked and high strung at the same time. A huge storm was blowing, blasting lightening and thunder. Something inside prompted me to get up put my raincoat on and go up onto the hill close to my home.

As I stood on the hillock with all the skies raging around me, I felt to purge whatever this was and the only way that I could do it was scream all the feeling of ‘bile’ out of me. So I went with whatever my intuition motioned me to do. I spat, screamed, screeched, flailed my arms about, moved my body in strange positions and completely let it out.   I did not resist the feelings that I felt and expressed them fully without judgment…I just wanted it out!

To any one watching (fortunately not) I looked like a mad woman possessed doing some evil spell and ready to be locked up. I thought it better to dive right into it and out the otherside of whatever was taking hold.

After it finished (of its own accord) I felt spent and somewhat limp. Walking back to the house another message came though my intuitive self. ‘The stones you took with you to the workshop, bury them in your garden for three days and nights’. I did this as soon as I came in the door, burnt sage in my room with strong intent of sending anything off that did not belong and sat down to meditate. The channel was clear. I felt back in my body and connected. I receive that this ‘Ascension New Age model’ is definitely not my path and that for me it has a great deal of unbalanced energy mixed with it. I am not criticizing the concept of ascension re moving to a higher vibration of consciousness, I am talking about the ascension movement and its cultish pseudo Christian vibration.

In my early days of madness I had to clear the entities from myself and learn about why they had come to hassle me. It’s about empowering yourself to stand up and meet the imbalance head on. There is great liberation in doing this rather than relying on someone to do it for you.

Don’t get me wrong I am all for guides, teachers, path pioneers, and guru’s if that is your path. But these teachers could and should be guiding you back to empower yourself.

Exorcism/ spirit release without dogma is fine if it is part of a longer-term guidance to enable you to clear for yourself. You do not have to bring in the words of religion to be of help if that is not your path and entities tend to get mighty agro when priests say ‘ go back from whence you came’ or an Iman says to the jiin if it doesn’t get out it will be tortured and burnt by the flames of Allah

Whatever the attachment they/it, are lost in a state of imbalance and need guidance in the astral world to freedom.

The best defense is listening and learning what the message is for you. To know where to focus your attention in that area to bring true emotional healing and to strengthen yourself.  Your wound is your gift, bring it into the sunlight embrace it, give it a voice, validate its role in your life and then let it go.

Carry a good bullshit detector, find a good guide in this field, develop an open and compassionate heart, hold onto the sword of truth (not judgment) and you will gain a stronger sense of self and clarity of spirit

Exorcism can be a dangerous ritual to play around with. Wisdom comes from building your own inner grounded truth and shining your light.

Do all you can to balance your world. Nurture yourself with healthy grounded spiritual practices and if you feel you are in need of clearance, make sure whatever you do is totally safe and will not exacerbate your issue more. If you are on medication, jumping off is dangerous.  Good psychiatrists will work with you to lower your dosage as you gain a stronger grounding.

Blessings

© Odette Nightsky

 

 

 

 

 

Knowledge is power, however knowledge without experience it is just information. Growth comes from experience and the most challenging experiences can offer us the biggest soul stretch if we see it as an opportunity rather than a setback.

Its not the circumstances we get thrown that define us, its our belief about them.

Depth of character comes from diving deeper and you will not be able to really understand the depths without the experience or at least a taste of actually being there. You can read many books and hear others personal stories but until you are there, in the experience…its just a story, someone else’s story.

It is often thought via the clients themselves that the better therapists are those that have walked in the shoes similar to what their clients have. That’s not to say someone who has good skills but no experience can’t be of quality guidance but the ‘life experience’ that is added to that knowledge makes the person not only skilled, but also good at relating to where that person is at. And that can be incredibly valuable to those in the midst of struggle seeking support.

Recently someone very close to me fell off the boat, so to speak

(A persona I am unable to be a therapist for as they are too close).

They had been cruising and surfing the waves the majority of their life and had little understanding of what those that struggled in deep waters actually felt. This person is a born fixer, a doer, a positive action controller and an impatient optimist who in reality had little time or empathy for others who were struggling. Not because he is heartless and un caring, more because he had never emotionally struggled much before or if he had it was only a bit of a surface gurgle before all his programs of controlled survival kicked in.

When he fell off the boat and struggled against falling deeper and deeper into the dark recesses of the ocean (his unconscious) his fear increased. No life vest, no compass, no sign of a lighthouse or land in sight. He used his old programmes to try to sort himself out but none of his old tricks worked. He was falling deeper and deeper down to the the dark realms of the ocean floor and he could do nothing to prevent it, no matter how hard his mind willed him to get back up to the surface. Night sweats, anxiety attacks arising out of the blue, and the wet black dog heavy on his chest 24/7. Being the fixer he rushed out and grabbed at anything he could find to remedy the situation. Paid so much for what he thought was expert advice and found himself impatient, frustrated and more and more desperate. Why didn’t anyone have an instant solution? Why didn’t anyone know how to ‘fix’ him? He tried several costly psychologists ($180 Aus a pop!) but they didn’t ‘fix’ anything and as a working man, who’s work was suffering he needed a solution quick smart! He tried hypnosis and a few others options like a touch of cognitive behaviour therapy and mindfulness, but was left disillusioned and felt as if he was plummeting deeper and deeper. Some psychologists wanted to scrap back into his childhood and blame his upbringing. But he didn’t want to trawl through all that and go all Freudian for umpteen sessions. He just wanted to sort out what was in front of him right now.  He also found that many of these so-called experts were much younger than him and lacked the experience of life that he could relate to even thought there slick advertising shone like a beacon of instant hope.

In fear and desperation, he grabbed on to the recommended western model of medication to try to at least help him stabilize enough to find out the what the hell was really happening.

I am not one to judge another’s choices in this regard. (Nor should anyone) regardless of what you think you know is a better path or solution.

The gift in inside the pain.

Along the journey which he is still in, he has become a more philosophical deeper being, a more insightful caring compassionate person. A door has opened within him.  It has rocked him to his core and truth be told he a better man for it. He see’s things differently now. He is amazed at how others survive such terrors from within and has not been struggling for that long in comparison but it hit him like a bolder and knocked him flat on his face and in my opinion for the better.

He has now walked in the shoes of many others who struggle within the deep recesses of the unconscious proddings. He GETS IT! He has shown incredible gratitude to those that have held support space for him. He gets that ‘fixing’ things isn’t as valuable as experiencing things that make you a better more insightful person. Of course he still wants it all to go away, but he also sees that the medication is just a holding space for him to really work on what got him to fall off the boat in the first place. And he is determined to get to the bottom of that once he finds the formula that works for him personally.

He has said to me several times ‘You are so lucky you have your spiritual life; I don’t know how you survived what you did!’

Which has made me reflect that everything I have been thrown in my life I have looked on it as a soul growth experience. I am a spiritual being experiencing all these life challenges, and in experiencing them, I have living knowledge of what it feels like to be there.

The other aspect is that in being a sensitive absorber and empath I tend to merge with others vibrations naturally. I tend to energetically step into their shoes, and feel what it must be like to be where they are for a time. I have spent many years learning how to cleanse and transform what I do absorb and that at times that in itself has been very challenging, but I wouldn’t have it any other way.

Each deep challenge that one experiences offers a hidden gift. The bigger the lesson, the bigger the stretch, the bigger the opportunity for growth. Its not a competition of who gets there first! Stuff that! Remember the tortoise and the hare? Slow and steady is good.

Walking in another shoes is an experience. And experience that can change you and humble you. Until you have been there, beware of assuming you know where someone is really at.

If you don’t know, try asking them what it feels like from their perspective. Something that many people avoid doing as they are either afraid of making the person uncomfortable or more likely, that they feel helpless and uncomfortable at not being able to fix it.

You don’t have to fix anything. Simply listen attentively, inquire without judgement and show compassion not only in your words but in your actions. That in it self is priceless.

LISTEN WITH YOUR HEART

Take your awareness down from your ‘fixing’ head into your heart

HOLD SPACE FOR THE PERSON STRUGGLING

Be energetically present in a relaxed attentive manner

ALLOW THEM TO SHARE WITHOUT YOUR PITY OR YOUR JUDGEMENT.

They already feel like they are failing, don’t add to the sorrows

CALL THEM REGULARLY AND TOUCH BASE TO SHOW THAT YOU CARE.

This is accepting them as a whole being rather than just when they are happy

DO NOT WAIT FOR THEM TO CALL YOU.

When one is struggling they often do not want to be a burden so you calling shows that you really do care.

IF THEY DON’T PICK UP. LEAVE A MESSAGE TO LET THEM KNOW YOU CARE.

Do not assume they will call you back or take offence if they don’t return your call. They are the ones struggling. Reach out to them regardless. Let them know that they have someone in their corner. Offer to drive them somewhere to get groceries or leave a nice meal for them as a loving gesture or something similar that is thoughtful

In these times we all need to be supported where we are at.

Blessings on your journey within and without

Odette

It has been recorded that during times of crisis in history people in general did not suffer from depression. Of course then I think “well who was interviewing these people at this time and when you are facing the threat of death of you or your loved ones or your community, who is going to have the time to question how they feel?

Melancholia must be commonplace in such challenging times. Fear, worry and plain old survival would be the priority and looking into your emotions, much more a luxury. During times when disaster strikes people tend to join up, help each other, lean on each other, tend more to be of SERVICE to each other and find MEANING in the moments of reprieve, along with laughter, and a sense of common connectedness.

In my life when I faced the so called black dog of depression (As Winston Churchill phrased it) It arose in several areas that soon joined into a mangled clump. One was around grief and loss (which can be referred to as natural situational depression) and the others occurred due to not wanting to face profound changes that needed action to be taken on or finding myself at a place where there was a deep sense of ‘de-pression’ due to lack of meaning in life.

People who suffer depression (in general) seem to have lost a sense of true meaning in regards to their place in the world and their relationship to it and themselves.

Please not that I am not referring to people who suffer from clinical depression.

A possible dialogue of a sufferer of depression

I get a picture of many of those suffering being awake at night after all the so called ‘well adjusted’ people have gone to bed.  The dark time is when supposedly the world has stopped for 8 hours. You wont be getting calls from a worried relative, or being harassed by the credit card company or hoping no-one knocks at the door. The dark time of night is when the depressed person usually feels ‘ok’ to be awake. No one is judging, no-one is watching to see how you are not what you think you should be.

So the night is yours undisturbed. You can watch what you want, do what you want, without any guilt. Then in the wee small hours you fall into a deep sleep and awaken to a telephone call which you try desperately to hide from. You pull the blanket further over your head and nuzzle deeper into the pillow. The phone finally goes silent and you let out a sigh of relief but at the same time a heavy de-pressing feeling weighs your body down knowing its daytime and you are meant to be a participant in it. You pull deeper into the darkness of the blanket and weep a little or rage at yourself a little or a lot. You just don’t have the strength the meet the day. You feel too insignificant anyway. No one will notice if you are not there. Darkness becomes more of a comforting companion and the fear of the light tends to push the person deeper into their own shadow.

The world is chaos and chaos is rampant. The extremes between the poor and the rich are widening and justice, well that has become somewhat of a farce even in the courts of law.  “What’s the point?” The melancholic person says. ‘Its all shit anyway’.

A well known term used by depressed people is ‘But’.  The word “but” is a deep resistance to the changes that are taking place within them.

One thing they do have going for them is an incredible sense of RESISTANCE. It’s like a child standing with its arms crossed over its chest saying ‘I don’t want to, you can’t make me!’ This is will power turned inward.

Let’s look at depression now from a spirit based perspective.

We all have life force (otherwise termed as energy) This life force assists in keeping our body alive and functioning even when we are asleep.

When one is in a state of depression, the life force is compromised, blocked and pushed down and inward. Much like trying to shove too many clothes into a small suitcase.

This life force is symbolically covered with a thick grey and heavy wet blanket.

If anyone were to get up and function with a big wet heavy blanket covering  you day in and day out, you would be struggling like those in depression are.

Depression is a heavy energetic weight that is carried around within the psyche and aura. It dulls the mind, the senses, the passion, and life force in general.

No-one likes being in that place and fight it like a dog gnawing off its leg. Which does the dog no good and just increases the suffering. They don’t accept that this big blanket that has been thrown over them will not go away by struggle or self loathing or blaming others. They may try going to a therapist for what they want as a ‘fix me’ solution and for a moment throw off the blanket feeling the placebo vibe take effect but soon the blanket returns and they moan of the waste of money and why didn’t it ‘fix’ them. The therapist is then put on their judgement list or they judge themselves to be a hopeless case. Most commonly, both.

The blanket, as much as one may not like to hear it, is owned by the person who is de-pressed. It does not belong to anyone else. It may well have been triggered by someone else or got wetter and heavier due to outside circumstances but the blankets owner is the one who is under it.

The blanket is a teacher.

Like the influence of the planet Saturn, it restricts you for a purpose and this purpose has a teaching within it. It is offering you to look deeper within to see where along the line you stopped and became stuck and rather than changing tack you stagnated.

• It may be due to fragmenting at a difficult time and never retrieving that part of you that you lost.
• It may well be due to not letting go or forgiving yourself for something that you really wanted but couldn’t have. Like the dream of a relationship that had to die.
• It may be that at that moment you had to step up to the changes you needed to make you just couldn’t let go enough to do it.

One needs to move to the time before you became depressed when you were ok. Move slowly along the time line of memories and see where it changed. That moment is like a key to a lock. That is the moment where you need to give your attention to.  It’s in that moment that you may have lost a part of your sense of life force and from then on the blanket just got more sodden and heavy. A huge part of your consciousness may well be stuck there.

Are you able to forgive yourself in that moment? If not, why not? Is it worth holding onto? What is the payoff for keeping the blanket close?

People that are depressed have very low motivation because of the heavy vibration.

So you need to wake that vibration with a few things like

• Rock or sea salt scrubs (make sure you do the crown of your head, the belly and the at the top of your back before the neck)
• Lemon in water with a spring of rosemary
• Warm lemon foot baths
• Sage burnt regularly esp. around places where you ponder too much
• Investigating when the blanket first appeared and finding the moment where you lost yourself.
• Talk to your inner child about why they are so angry and really listen and validate them
• Recapitulate regularly
• Alkaline foods.
• Drum and lie back on the earth and let her take your pain.

There is great power in resistance.

I mean look for example at the French Resistance!

The resistance when in a state of De-pression is turned inward with anger.  Start by pushing the resistance outwards instead of inwards mindfully with the breath so you have some space. I don’t mean push your anger outward. I mean use the ‘but’ and the ‘no’ productively and give it a better job than blocking everything.

People suffering from depression are in general very unkind towards themselves. This is a big learning curve and the hidden message within de-pression. So give yourself a little grace, go talk to your inner child and ask them what they need from you.

Learn how to be accepting and gentle with your inner child and in turn you will benefit.

Blessings and gentleness to those in need. May these few tips offered be of service to your growth.

Odette

 

 

The senses of touch, taste, sight and smell were present before our ability to speak came along. As a babies in the womb we were already developing our sense of touch and at birth our sense of smell and taste kicked in and then hearing and sight developed within the first months. Each of these natural senses offers a different gift. Not all of us were born with all senses intact however. For example, the person born without sight or hearing may experience the expanded increase of other senses.

I was born with my left eyeball turned inward and shaking. This meant that my visual sight would be challenged, so I was operated on and the cord behind my left eyeball was severed. I vaguely remember my glasses with the patch over it and unconsciously loosing them wherever I went. Not unlike now with my reading glasses and the camouflage of batik that drives me potty when I am in search for them. Needless to say I survived with one good eye but I do wonder how I viewed the world to begin with having a so-called normal eye and one that was turned inward and shaking. It does make me wonder if that’s often why I see the shadow and wounds in people straight up. I also tend to put my hand over my left eye when scrying for someone in a journey. So even though I came in with what was perceived as damaged sight. There was a hidden gift.

Now back to the senses. It has been proven through mindfulness and cognitive behavior therapy that being connected and in touch with the senses is helpful both for anxiety and PTSD. It makes total sense when viewing it from a more spirit-based perspective. When we are majorly stressed, anxious or traumatized we naturally do the flight or fight thing.

I was born a natural flyer and rarely fight unless protecting others. My automatic go to action was to fly. I am very fond of the thought of flight (loved jumping tandem from a plane at 40,000 feet on my 50th birthday. Highly reccomended) and levitation, so it feels more natural than going into battle. However I had to learn how to stay landed in my body enough to function here on earth.

I have been always much more cerebral and esoteric so my body has just taken a back seat really. It has always told me the truth far more than my mind could ever do, which I am most grateful for.

I know now when I am partially or mostly out of my body as well as when I am really in it. Just that knowing is a really important step. “Hey I am outside my body. Why? Where did I go? And of course ‘How do I get myself back?’ So I have spoken and written about how to bring yourself back home in all sorts of ways, from Recapitulation to Soul Retrieval and much more.

In this post I would like to honor the sense liberators that can assist you to be here with more presence and consciousness.

The Sacred Senses Landing Tips

Sight: Three quarter close your eyes till you feel them light shielded by your eyelashes. Put your attention ‘inward’ towards your third eye. This improves what is referred to as inner sight. It is also calming for those who’s mind run around too much when they are fully closed. If you look at most pictures of Buddha the eyes are three quarter closed.  This assists in turning your sight inward to the ‘seer within’. Sight is not just about what your eyes can see when they are open.

Sound: Hearing is more than just what our ears pick up on. It’s often the vibration that comes with the sound or our own triggers that disturbs more so than the sound itself. For this I suggest just being present to the sounds around you. The white noise, tinitus, the bird out on the branch, the wind in the tree’s………zero in on the sound and be mindfully present of your ears.

Smell: Smell and memory and tightly connected. Some folk really resonate with the smell of baking as it brings them into their body with a memory of home or comfort. For others like me it’s not baking but rather something like White Sage. I smell it and instantly I feel more present and at ease. One time when I was in sweat lodge I had my face so close to the earth due to the heat and the sage I had in my hand to sniff was a lifesaver. It kept me present and when I smell it now it brings me back to my body instantly.

Taste: Have you ever chosen to eat a meal with absolute awareness? It’s like an active meditation where you are totally present with what enters your mouth. You may like to shut your eyes and ‘be the flavour’ and experience the taste consciously.

Touch: Touch can be included in the above as you are aware of your hand holding the fork and the awareness of its movement as it moves. Or touch your beloved animal with mindful kindess. Being really present in the sensation of touching/petting them with tenderness and love.

Now I am going to throw ‘Feel’ into this sense tribe.

Feel: For no less than five minutes either with eyes closed, open or three quarters  SMILE. Whatever you are looking at, whatever your mind is doing…..keep smiling. Be aware of the FEELING that smiling brings to each thought, memory or experience. Be aware of your face, your cheeks, the impact the smile makes on you.

Senses are something you can tap into at any time and what they help to do is bring you into the moment more as the observer and the participant.

The body is the house where our spirit resides. Our earth suit is quite miraculous and marvelous and it has gifts that can help our spirit feel more present and grounded.

Take an adventure with your senses. Remember to be mindfull of your breathe while you do it. Take my tips and expand on them and find ways of really getting to know your senses more deeply and what natural gifts they have to offer. What is your strongest sense? What is the one that needs more mindful attention?

Let your senses be your guide.

Blessings

Odette

As a child I felt I had dropped down from some foreign place to a landscape I had no relationship to and people I had little in common with.

Instead of sitting confidently in who I thought I was, I did my utmost to lose myself and ‘fit in. I tried desperately to fashion my earth suit to accommodate what I thought was my style. Unfortunately I was a kid of the early sixties so fashion was not at its most complimentary to a teen in Bogan Australia trying to find their own place in the matrix of beer and meat pie and football. My soul much to my dismay did no choose to be born to a couple of free thinking bohemian Woodstock parents and wearing paisley print skirts with cheese cloth tops and long straight hair that went down my back.

I choose a conservative army base mentality to land in. So conservative that it saluted back to me. My mother kept my curly hair short, which I hated, and the clothes; I had no relationship to them at all. Only when I dressed up in theatre costumes did I feel I could expand, experience, stretch who I was or wanted to be. Otherwise I was a playful curious being trying with great determination to adhere to the culture and customs of a strange land.

I did however choose to be born into a home of care and respect and that was an important backbone to the journey I would take. I was well loved and funnily enough in the land of the military conservative middle class, I was left to explore religion, belief and my own future without restriction. Something I am be eternally grateful for. My parents although culturally conservative, had no mind for certain types of indoctrination, which many others of my peers did. So they were liberated in that sense which was a huge bonus for me. Safe to explore

Home was to me a safe place where I felt included as loved member. My mother and father were not helicopter parents in any way and I felt the freedom to investigate anything that took my interest without someone judging me or needing results or bulletins of my progress. Many other kids waylaid going home but not me. It was the safe place away from school – the hard turf where I learned the hard way.

So I had a gauge of what safe felt like when I was a kid. Sure it drove me mad that my mother would walk into my room without knocking, or say I was way too sensitive, or my brothers would tease me in front of their mates cause they were bored or I felt I had to rabbit on or shout to be heard being the smallest. But I did feel safe to come home and to go to sleep at night no matter what part of the world we were living in or if it was a house or a hotel or on a plane.

That is until the night started to become more than just the shadows in the room or down the hallway on the way to the loo. They seemed to vibrate with my fear and then my mind would imagine what it didn’t want to imagine and my back would feel as if someone was sliding and invisible finger down it.

Inside my mind, inside my being everything became unsafe.

Darkness was the messenger and I did not want to listen.

The inside was no longer safe and I didn’t know how to make it safe.

I remember having a horrid nightmare and mum or dad flying into the room. For that time they were my safety but I needed to find the safety within me. Nobody talked about those kinds of things then and the Internet hadn’t even kicked in yet. So no Google for me to go on a search to investigate with.

This would take me on a long and bumpy road to where I needed to go. When I look back at the path I have walked it has all been worthwhile. Every step, every fall upon it, every detour. They have all been part of finding my way to my inner safe home.

I am just reflecting on the multiple situations I put myself in that showed me what was not safe. What was I thinking? I deliberately put myself (unconsciously of course like a moth to a flame without any knowledge of the consequences) in situations where I would be in unsafe situations.

The real drama or danger was always one person removed from me. I would be there but not at the center of it so to speak. But I would be deeply affected by the experience being the spongy empath with little sense of energetic boundaries.

I would regularly freak and fly out of my body. I was a flyer more than a fighter unless children were involved. I split myself up into so many shredded fragments in order to be a witness to these experiences not really knowing why.

I would at times wonder to myself ‘What the hell am I doing here?’ There was some element of wanting to be needed or be the rescuer for sure, but the other side of it was that I was unconsciously experiencing all the situations and what happens on the energetic front that pulls people out of themselves, what make people split off, fragment, leave their body in flight or fright?

Unconscious research for my future work of service.

Damn lucky I have Jupiter on my Ascendant!

From the moment that I experienced my first Soul Retrieval (this is different to the Sandra Ingerman version as the guide/practitioner walks alongside the journey with the client and guides them as they reclaim their lost fragments and brings them home) I have returned to it time and time again. I have studied and trained in other things to compliment my work but I always, always come back to Soul Retrieval. I have been at my wits end at the bottom of an abyss where other techniques have fallen to the ground and after all is spent, there will be an inward nudge arising like a golden sun and there it is yet again. The question.  ‘Where did you fragement?’.  I will say ‘Of course! How could I have forgotten?’  Soul Retrieval! Its important to move through all these trials of the ego and spirit to return back to what that naturally brings me back home when all that needs to be learned has been learned.

When I am fragmented I don’t feel at home with myself. I don’t feel safe. I am either searching outside for stimulation, craving things I don’t really want, I don’t have much trust in my self, feel insecure, self critical, confused and displaced and at times quite melancholic and self protective.

When I am home and feeling safe I feel resonant with my purpose. I am in a state of trust and my inner home feels like what I will take with me when I leave my earth suit. A sense of conscious connection within my inner sanctuary, animal kin, inner kin, inner child and soul self. My heart emanates more love. I feel a sense of meaning and purpose within my self devoid of what impact I may or not make on the world.

Safe and home to me are two words that melt into one. The home inside me needs to be a place of safety.

I used to be so protective of my inner world that I was in terror of letting anyone too close. Not because they would trash it or steal something I deemed precious, more because I thought I would harm it through my own neglect by giving parts of myself away to another and not putting myself first in the realm of caring for self first so you can care well for others. This changes the more you acknowledge and clear trauma from the parts of you that are wounded and or feel rejected or abandoned.

These days I do not need to do much in journey work in this regard. Its like there is an inner automatic pilot that as soon as I acknowledge there has been a fragmentation my wise self goes and gets what has split off and then on a multidimensional level everything falls into place in a way that I feel this sense of incredibly safety, openness and meaning within. I am in alignment with my whole being beyond and including my earth suit. My body is relaxed. My mind is at flow, my heart is smiling and my inner child is light.

The time spent feeling unsafe and not at home is valuable. It offers where your needs lie and how to find your way to nourishing them. Nothing in the journey of life is wasted if you see the reflected gift in it.

If you have come from a home where you were not safe look to your inner child for the direction so you can create what is. They know instantly what makes them feel safe. And this is the compass that you can use to help you. Another can help you feel safe to a degree but this is not about getting another to make you feel safe as much as its finding your own sense of safety within. When that other person is not there, you need your own sense of safety. This is your present and your soul line to yourself.

If you are wondering where is your place in the world?

It’s within you beaming out.

Blessings

Odette

(c) Odette Nightsky 2017

 

 

It can be very difficult at times to define your core truth in the midst of the search for it.

There are many pathways in the world of alternative modalities and just as many pot holes. A new type of healing is advertised and you head that way. You meet a friend that comes back from a wonderful retreat (that suited them) and you head that way. Someone advertises themselves as a ‘master’ and a ‘Healer. And you get pulled in that direction thinking ‘will someone just fix me please!!’

When one calls himself or herself a ‘master’ or a ‘healer’ they better have proof to back it up! I have rarely if ever met someone I would give that title to. I have met incredibly wise beings, teachers, and those that can help to move your trauma out of the way so you’re being can naturally heal itself, yes. But the former is incredibly rare.

The want to heal is deep and it can take a person to a place of desperation and some to a place of giving over their core truth in the hope of being saved. This is what happens to people who are drawn into fanatical cults. There is a slow eroding of the inner self to the point that the so called ‘Master Healer’ has you harnessed by the spirit and you look to them for ‘their’ knowledge and truth.

You know ‘your’ truth better than anyone no matter how stormy or fragmented it looks. The core of your being knows the truth that resonates with you the best. Of course that core can feel damaged, split, torn. But it’s usually the thoughts, behaviors and beliefs that have manifested due to trauma that makes it seem hard to source.

In all that I have learned and encountered over the years. I tend to dive into thing fully and as I swim through it I feel a nudge from within that is my core self calling me to listen. What I have learned adds to my ways and expands my mind but my core stays stable. Not blocked. Not stubborn. Not rigid. Stable and grounded with flexibility.

A little practice in getting to know your core truth.

1. What if anything brings me a sense of calm? (Feel free to use your imagination.)
2. When I sense this little moment of calm, where in my body do I feel it?
3. Now put your hand on that place, take your breath into that spot on your body and that feeling of calm and add the picture of calm to it.
4. Now ask yourself ‘ If I go in this direction how does my soul feel?’
5. What happens to your sensation? What happens to your breath? What happens to your feeling of calm?

Your core truth has a sense of feeling like a settled place when something fits like a glove and your body is at ease and your mind is quiet. Sure it can also feel excited and passionate too, but underneath all that there is a calm surety about it.

You are the best healer you know. You are the best inner teacher you know. Sure there is guidance out there to help you find your way and there are lots of detours on the journey so its great to have a guide.

Much like you’re in a country you have never been to and don’t speak the language and a guide is very handy so if you do get lost it’s more like an adventure! (I like to think of myself much like one of those types of guides)

So please don’t let anyone rob you of your core truth even if you are still trying to find it. A good warning sign is :If they harm or manipulation or make you feel small, or shame you, they are not a good guide. They may be talented, gifted etc. but that doesn’t mean they are a good guide for your wellbeing. Healthy guidance comes with love. Sure it can be tough love in times when something needs to be gotten to the bottom of, but it is always done in a compassionate way and not with any personal agenda or harm intended.

Your core truth is who you are beyond the trauma’s, beyond the patterning, beyond the dysfunctional behavior, beyond the undermining, and beyond your low self worth.

 

Ask to speak to your inner child.

Ask to speak to your wise self.

 

Your wise self is not arrogant and your inner child will tell you what you need via what he/she needs.

In connecting with them both on a regular basis your core truth will become more visible and you will enjoy the journey much, much more.

Blessings

Odette Nightsky

 

 

© Nightsky March 2017

 

 

We all originate from the same source (whatever you choose to name it) and in my view, far beyond the rights and wrongs of duality.

In my understanding we all chose to come here, maybe not knowing how things would play out exactly, what experiences and challenges we were in for, but on a deeper level a part of us said yes to another adventure on this earth called Gaia.

 

An adventure in what I refer to as our ‘Earth Suits.’

Our spirit began to incarnate at a certain time during our earth suit development. In some tribes they believe that the spirit of the child does not come in till a certain age, where as others would challenge that and say it is as soon as the spark of fertilization engaged that the soul came in.

Regardless of when the soul actually incarnated inside the earth suit, the baby arrives into this world after being housed in a womb.

Watch an infant as it adjusts to being here in its earth suit. It ‘generally’ sleeps a lot in its first months because the birthing process is usually exhausting and it needs nourishment and growth time to fine-tune inhabiting the vessel it’s in.

In time it begins to wriggle, use its eyes more, makes noises with its mouth, sucks what part of the body it can, using its mouth to identify things, moves its hands trying to use them, juts out its little legs every which way, bends its back to adjust to the use of its spine etc.

I am always in awe of babies as I view them as souls incarnating into a little body in which it often feels way too big for.

“How on earth do I fit into this thing? Why is it so limiting?”

As the earth suit and the relationship to it develops, the frustration of trying to grab things, learning to crawl, pushing itself to stand, and walk without tumbling soon turns into a thrill when they accomplish what is perceived as a simple task for adults.

The soul is getting a handle on its earth suit and how it works.

Earth suits come in all sorts of shapes and sizes. Some function better than others. Regardless of what earth suit we have we need to make the best of what we are given, what we have incarnated into.

When the earth suit is not all one hoped it would be.

One of my best friends, who left his body to the world of spirit, entered the earth’s atmosphere this time round with a paralyzed body and only a few fingers working on one hand. His diagnosis was Cerebral Palsy. He was put into an institution at an early age as his parents struggled to care for him. He suffered institutional abuse, needed a wheelchair to get him around, sounded as if he was a bit drunk when he spoke and his earth suit seemed to have a jerking life of its own.

However…and this is a big however. When I met him as an adult I met the cheekiest, wittiest, most caring, pioneer in disabilities that one could ever meet. His humorous timing was quick as a whip and he was as smart as they come.

His earth suit was not like everyone else, and didn’t function as well but his heart was huge and what he did for others with disAbilities and in advocacy was inspiring and ground breaking. He achieved well in academia, specializing in his area as well as circumnavigating Australia in an electronic wheelchair!

He admitted there were a few mutinies along the way! As it was a hard journey to fund (Australia is huge and at that time any one with a disability was shunned and or locked up) and he was rather bull headed at times. A determined Taurus to the max! Ha! Through the searing heat and long hours in the wheelchair his earth suit kept hanging in there right to the end.

This was all to promote the cause and understanding of people with ‘disAbilities’. Jacob was never resentful about the earth suit that he incarnated into. Ever. He saw it as a gift. He experienced several sensual loving meaningful relationships and perpetually saw the glass full and life an adventurous opportunity.

A few images I will always remember: His partner clambering into his lap and kissing him affectionately. And the time I was dancing with him on the dance floor while he twirled the handle on his electronic wheelchair with his one good hand and moved his defiant earth suit to the beat. He had wonderful rhythm.

Jacob saw the potential in what he was given and made the most out of it.

I must say that before he passed away he was quite angry at his earth suit for not keeping up with his feisty pioneering soul. Yet he finally found a sense of peace before he left his body and am sure he came back as fast as possible knowing him.

What type of earth suit he incarnated into again….hmmm I wonder? I’m looking forward to catching up with him again in some way.  Such a positive life affirming being was Jacob Baldwin. This is one of my favorite photos. I think it sums him up beautifully and I feel deep in my soul that he is more than happy for me to write about him in this way.

http://www.nma.gov.au/collections/highlights/jacob_baldwin_ability_collection

Whatever earth suit we get its up to us to utilize it as best we can. I am very grateful for mine that has worked so well for so long. It’s not to say that it hasn’t been challenged. I had an eye operation at three. A kidney removed at thirteen, and more confronting life tests to see if my earth suit could spring back… and I must say it’s done pretty damn well!

However.  I am not my earth suit. I am a being residing in this very functional wondrous human vessel. Sure I may not be the best eater or the best at exercise but I am in good health so far as I know and what does challenge me is up to me to overcome.

The best way I have overcome physical challenges is to look beyond the earth suit and see what else may be blocking its well-being. Then I look at it much like a case manager might. Like a pie chart, each section needs attention. My body, my mind (thoughts), my spirit and my heart (emotions). They all need to work together.

What is my body asking for that I have been ignoring?

What is my heart needing from me that I have been wanting from another?

What is my inner voice (my spirit) telling me to do that I have been ignoring?

The spiritual relationship one has with their body is so very important. It’s not about starving oneself on a lettuce leaf or going to a boot camp to torture yourself each day. (Hey if you really like boot camp go for it, I myself would end up running off in exhaustion or telling the instructor to….)

It’s about ‘caring’ for the self. It’s about respecting, nurturing, nourishing and listening to the needs of your earth suit, and then doing what is indicated a ‘little’ each day. I little loving goes a long long way. My body nudges me to things it needs. I know the difference between the craving (the wanting of sugar for example) and the needing of nourishment now. The nudge does not beg for anything it just gently leans towards what it requires. Like at the moment a few chopped bits of cold pineapple before breakfast (pineapple very good for moving bacteria through the intestines).

In the heat of the Australian summer, my body needs hydration. Not only by drinking plenty of clean filtered water but also by being immersed in it. So in the hotter days to come I am planning to head to a river to give it what it needs: A good deep emersion for a good long while, till I feel happily water-logged.

My earth suit and my spirit self loves to swim in fresh non-chlorinated water!

How about you? What does your earth suit need?

We are all spiritual beings residing in wondrous earth suits.

Nurture and nourish the wonderful vessel that you arrived in, no matter what shape or ability it may have. You can’t take it with you when you go, so make the most of it while you have it here and now.

Blessings

Odette

 (c) Odette Nightsky 2017

Ps. give it a hug or a nice caring caress daily or when you remember…it deserves it.

 

 

Dear Kin I have been asked to share what I do in sessions of service so I thought to take a few moments and offer some insight into my ways.

Before each session I clear space both on a practical level and an energetic level.

I then become quiet and invite spirit and my spirit kin to sit with me.

I ask Great Spirit-Earth Mother and all my inner kin (this includes guides and power animals that have chosen to be of service in my medicine practice) for assistance in helping me get out of my own way so I may be of service to whom I will be having a session with.

I then focus on the energies of the client to come. I drop in and receive both statements and images.

When a client has confirmed their booking via payment for a Skype session, I ask them to take some space beforehand to write down any questions or queries they may want clarity on. Often things don’t arise in the moment and its frustrating to come away thinking that they wished they would have asked something that they forgot. This can be anything from being unable to cope with grief, otherworldly experiences, blocks, mental health challenges, inner child healing, death, guilt, fear, child abuse, trauma, feeling possessed, issues with addiction and how to deal with it from a spirit point of view, entity attachment, feeling haunted navigating, learning safe practices in contemporary shamanism, how to be a more authentic practitioner….the list goes on.

When we begin the session I invite you to share with me your most prominent issues/questions and ask a little about your cultural background as its important to me that I don’t offend where you are coming from, nor what your beliefs are. In saying that if you have come to me to talk about sinners, condemning others or the relevance of the so called devil, I am not sure I can be much help unless those are beliefs you want to move away from.

In this sharing I listen within and feel you and what you vibrate. What you put out energetically can be quite different to what you say and I usually receive images of contemporary shamanic tools, images, other lives, blocks and more than anything, the primary wounding that lies underneath all that is shared.

At times spirit will stop me and want to speak (this is not any one spirit so much as a collective of those of the medicine way that have chosen to be of assistance). At these times I generally close my eyes and translate what comes into my consciousness. This does not happen all the time, as I am now able to work hand in hand with spirit, my own experience and intuition to bring things forward that need to be heard. But when spirit does want to send a strong message they keep nudging me until I go quiet. In one Skype session I could not stop coughing. This was spirit trying to come through and I needed to drop in and share, as it was a very powerful insight to the story that needed to be told of that person’s other life and the relevance to their current life. The coughing stopped instantly as soon as I moved over to let them through. These messages can come through with a strong vibration but always with a sense of loving compassion, which is totally beyond judgment.

I am not a healer or fixer as such. Primarily I have been asked to be of service as an educator in safe contemporary medicine practices and my natural talent of wound tracking with a gentle touch is what I am known for.

In face-to-face personal sessions I tend to move into doing much more shamanic journeywork. It’s like you have a midwife with you supporting and guiding and leading you in a state of deep relaxation as you move throughout it all. Knowing what to do when you get scared and offering your supportive strength to take the next step. There is no force here in any way. You will never be forced to do anything that does not feel right. Your being and your pace is to be respected at all times

With strong trauma I make it a priority to assist you in establishing a safe place within so you can access what safety actually feels like and be moved to create a state of sanctuary within you.

I do not see myself as someone to put on a pedestal nor would I ever want to. I was fortunate enough to come across ways to bring light and repair to the shadow wounds in our lives. To embrace, love and find understanding. The more I trusted in my own unique way of doing things which at times can seem somewhat eccentric the more spirit assists me.

Through my own trauma I sought out practical, yes practical ways to honor and embrace that which we run away, suppress and hide from. I am not a traditional shaman by any means. I am more akin to being a midwife and a wound tracker with a grounded shamanic approach.

My tools and knowing comes from many cultures that I have lived, experienced and studied through many lifetimes. They all have a shamanic flavor.

I am often called Witch. True translation a wise person by both adults and children yet my path of service is deeply based in shamanic practices. There are people who are very good gardeners with their hands, I am more of a soul gardener with my intuition, assisting you to pull out the weeds, and tend your inner garden so you can find the medicine that you need to nourish you on your own individual medicine path. (Re: weeds. They can be great as tonics once you have pulled them up!)

Depending on what your needs may be you might need more than one session. Trust and safety is often not built within one session but in saying that I have a reputation for supporting others to feel safe very quickly and my aim is to offer and teach you the tools so you no longer need me to guide you, or not as much as you initially did.

When I was first initiated into this work over more than 15 years ago now, the practice of Soul Retrieval was like a multidimensional door opening into what my spirit came her to really do. Soul Retrieval is a path of healing deep wounds. In the traditional way a shaman travels through non-ordinary reality to seek out lost fragments that split off due to trauma. I was trained to travel along with my client to where they have fragmented. My teacher offered impeccable guidance and held space so brilliantly that it was actually easy to do.

This pathway of learning was so empowering and self affirming. There has never been a client who I have guided in Soul Retrieval who has not willingly retrieved that which was lost. Which says a great deal about the way in which I was taught both by my teacher and by spirit.

I have also trained small groups of those in the path of service of Soul Retrieval and it is something that I totally love doing. Nothing gives my more joy than to offer the seeds of experience and knowledge that I have learned in this practice and other lifetimes, to others who want to be of service in alternative pathways.

Sessions with me are pretty grounded, practical, often times humorous but above all they are steeped in honoring and caring for those I am helping. It’s my calling to be of service on the path of assisting you in finding the best recipe of wellness for your unique path to balance.

My blog posts, my Facebook page post and my path of medicine service are a way of being of service to those in need. I do not do this alone. Spirit kin is behind me all the way with each person I encounter. And I am so very grateful to be able to be of some service to those in need especially in these challenging times than we have chosen to live through.

I am taking some time out from Skype sessions for the next six weeks or so to be in nature and offer some face-to-face personal sessions. I will be back in the new year, so if you wish to make a Skype booking in advance you can find me through my website or inquire about a group training or sharing’s in the basics, of building inner sanctuary, working with power animals, other lives, or soul retrieval and we shall see what we can co-ordinate.

Blessing

Be gentle with yourself.

You deserve it.

Odette

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

We are very fortunate in comparison to our ancestors in that we have access to many more tools to help us keep balance. There is so much available now to access ones particular needs in this regard. The challenge that we face in this era is the pace, the extremely fast pace of everything and the energetic overwhelm of the collective crisis that comes with it. Here are some tools of resilience that may assist you.

 

1. Fill a glass jar with rock salt or sea salt (not crap table salt) put it in the coolest spot in your bathroom. After a long day where you feel drained hop into the shower and lightly scrub your body with the salt. Rub it between your palms and move your hands over your crown chakra in a circular swirling motion. Make sure you rub salt on where your neck meets your back and on your belly. Rinse off and do some deep relaxing breathing in the shower as it washes away, then continue to do what ever you do cleansing wise. (This helps to clear your aura and clear dense build up energetically)

2. Recapitulation: (look to the blog post titled thus) Recapitulation helps in breathing your energy back and letting go of others energies you have absorbed.

3. Unplug: Turn off all media electronics from the wall. No Wi-Fi, No TV, No mobiles, Nada. If you can do this every night before you go to sleep you will find your energy more restored in the morning. Even do it for one night a week it will make a difference. Choose a day to be totally not in the electronic TV, Radio, Mobile field both for you and your family. Go out into nature or do other things like drum, rattle, sing, play games with each other, read books (not macabre murders or dark things) play musical instruments etc. Take your shoes off and put your feet on the earth. If that is too cold just stand out there for a while intentionally breathing the cold cleanse through you from your crown out through your feet. This helps to restore your natural vibration devoid of the grid. If you live in an apartment nowhere near nature, imagine a tree growing right through the center of your living room or bedroom. See it strong and sturdy and connect with the essence of its strength in non-ordinary reality.

4. Journal all your dreaming. When you journal you will find that realizations and insights occur more than they do by just remembering what happened. These times are powerful so look primarily at what the symbols of the dreaming has to do with your life. Look at them  from an archetypal viewpoint and even more importantly: What is your response and/ or reaction to what is happening? This will tell you where you are at on an unconscious deeper level.

5. Go within to your sanctuary. Ask for nourishment from your totems. Sit with them, play with them and invite your inner child to come closer to you if they are not already in your lap. Choose to be in your heart in this sacred place. Always give thanks to those that have helped you.

6. Use your medicine tools, your drum, your rattle, your voice, your feet, your body. As you are singing them up, close your eyes for a while. Then open them look out for a few moments and close them again. Do this three times or more. Moving from non ordinary reality to ordinary reality.

7. Take a moment of silence and mindfully pull your spirit into your body when you awaken before you get out of bed. This may mean you need to wake up a few minutes earlier just to literally join both your spirit and your body to align to take you into the day.

During these times its very important that we all show our gratitude to Mother Earth for all she has provided. Find loving ways to thank her. Even putting your hands on the earth or intentionally walking on the earth in gratitude and intent. Without her none of us would be here. Make sure you do all you can to protect and honor her sacred self be that in action, word and deed.

 

Blessings on your journey within and without

Remember that your beaming resonant heart is your greatest ally

We are in this together

Much love

Odette

 

When we arrive out of our cocoon and into the light of humanity, we experience what it is like to be ‘in’ the world. We get tugged in all sorts of directions via the need for nourishment and support both externally and internally. How this is responded to or reacted to defines much of the way we view and deal with life.

Of course there are other factors, like what we bring in with us on a biological cellular level, gene wise, other life wise etc. None the less what we are taught or influenced by when we are small impacts on how we manage things emotionally as we get older.

Women (in general) have a natural predisposition to care, serve and nurture others. Many have been taught both through society and parental expectations that it is a role that they must fulfill in some way. I remember not long ago talking to a Greek woman at a bus stop and her first question to me was ‘Do you have children? Are you married?’ In the media today, if a woman is single for too long or does not have children she is perceived as somehow faulty.

Many women have been told and taught that they should not be selfish. This has halted many towards nourishing within or really knowing how to go about starting that process. Just to be clear indulging is not the same as nourishing.

I have met women who have gone to multiple workshops,  many yoga classes, do all sorts of therapy etc.…but still there is a lack and an emptiness within because they are still somehow seeking the nourishing connection outside themselves within the workshop experience/participants or the in connection with the therapist or the group class or getting off on the high that these things bring initially. It’s not about the choice of courses or the chosen workshops or therapies it’s about the deeper motivation, the hunger and the longing for nourishment.

Men (in general) are taught to be strong, courageous and brave.  They are not taught to self nourish and this leads to many having a crippling sense of low self-esteem, shame and rejection. They are left feeling depressed, in a state of self loathing and don’t step up when they are needed to. They are weakended both emotionally and spiritually.  Men have never really known how to self nourish either. Instead they are locked inside an inner prison. Trapped inside a place where there negative thoughts swallow them up.

In today’s times we see more selfishness and more narcissism than ever before. The ‘somebodies’ have their boats, there huge mansions, their private jets, their label clothes, bling, shoes wardrobes etc.

This is what has been mistaken for inner nourishment. This is what the young see as THE way to be nourished. When I have asked young folk what they want in life, many answer….MONEY. That is what they see as the way to fulfillment. If they don’t have that they see themselves as failures.

On my Facebook page many of my posts refer to ways one can nourish the self from within because I see such a massive lack of it in people.

The ego is not the enemy as its part of us that helps us survive in all kind of ways, however it can be quite greedy.

It ‘wants’ things much like a child that you take to the shop and says ‘Can I have this?, I want this, can I have this? Or another example might be the child that has way too many presents every time their birthday or Christmas comes around and they rip the present open and then quickly move onto the next without hardly acknowledging it or those who gave it to them.

They have a bent  sense of meaning in what being nourished represents and their parents are just trying to keep up with the demands. The child becomes addicted to what they ‘want’ much like the rich reality lot that the media loves to shove down TV lover’s throats. This is what many of the youth today equate with what they want and what they MUST have in order to survive in society.

Sitting in a luxurious apartment with all the money in the world, all the bling you need and all the connections you need to make you socially acceptable, is a far cry from inner nourishment. It’s narcissistic JUNK FOOD!!

We do have a choice in what we want to feed and nourish on a regular basis.

The spiritual self and the child within, is in need of nourishment. It needs sustenance that won’t come in the shape of anything money can buy.

Feed the Ego or the Spirit.

I am not saying become all pure, righteous and mung bean about it. Balance your needs and wants but choose your spirit nourishment as a priority. That’s were the feeling of contentment, peace and compassionate self-love arises from.

A few steps towards Spiritual Nourishment.

• Journal your self talk each day for a few minutes. See how much you fill your thoughts with positive or negative statements. This is your daily intake of inner food. What are you feeding yourself? And how can you be happier if you are feeding yourself junk food filled with crap. Then be pro active and jump into some options to change your thinking eg. Mindfulness,  CBT, Voice Dialogue, EFT (tapping) to name a few.
• Work on building your inner sanctuary within through the shaman’s tree, to a place where you feel safe to be nourished. Where your totems, guides and kin can hold space and guide you. In that place of sanctuary, begin to invite your inner child to come forward. Listen to them, accept whatever mood they are in and be the one who nourishes them. (This automatically nourishes you from within)

Spend time in nature, away from others, take space to feel who you are away from other people’s energetic influences. Soften your mind, walk down to your heart and breathe the medicine of nature into your being.

You are worth nourishing. You are worth loving and caring for. It is not selfish. In doing this your ability to care, love, and connect increases.

If you feel you would like more guidance in how to self nourish and move beyond the blocks you can find me at my website.

Blessings

Be Gentle With Yourself

Odette