Crucible

Greetings everyone,

This week has been something.  What exactly it is I'm not sure yet.  There was certainly quite a lot of stress and challenges.  The crazy makers were in rare form as well.  However it ultimately may be a blessing.  I keep coming back to a deeper understanding of how much I depend on others.  This is not a judgment just an awareness.  It is this interweaving of connections, needs, and exchanges,  that fuel our world at large and in our private lives with friends and family.

It's been a week since I offered my Transmuting Shame download.  I had been told by spirit that this one would have an enormous impact.  Life would change in a way it hadn't before.  I immediately felt my heart open wider than it had been in many years.  The challenge has been to keep it open.  My body  in an attempt to follow suit with the energetic template also shifted.  I had an aching in my chest, arms and shoulders as my anatomy shifted around.  Muscles that have long held tension around my physical heart began to let go sparking protest to all the connecting tissues.

This is happening at the same time as major changes in my work life are taking place, and corresponding to family events.  This is not what you would think of as the ideal time.  I found myself getting short with others, feeling angry and pessimistic.  I wanted space to process, and I got the opposite.  After the dust from my upset had settled though I came to realize how much I had to be grateful for.  (No doubt helped by a day out at my favorite art fair and a little retail therapy).  In the space of a day I opened to the beauty around me.  I felt like I was filling my soul with it.  My life was the crucible the place of purifying fire where the substance of value is distilled from the raw grit.  All the stresses or rather my thoughts about them were the materials poured into the crucible that is my being.  In the Crowley Thoth tarot deck the 14th card of the major arcana is called Art.  In other decks it is referred to as Temperance, but in this deck it refers to the art of alchemy.  The transmutation and ultimate transformation of the base materials of life into the gold of the soul.  Often times when this card appears it can mean that all the materials we need for the solution are already present, it is up to us to use them in an inventive way, hence the art of alchemy.

So how does this apply to you?  What are you taking for granted?  Can the challenges you are facing open you to a deeper space of gratitude and love?  Were you hoping for a time of peace to get yourself together only to find a whirlwind of chaos?  What if the whirlwind is the mix you need to find the gold hidden within you?  What if all the difficulties are the materials and your life is the crucible to forge you into something more than the sum of your parts? Now I'm not suggesting you don't get upset and feel bad about the things that trouble you, but once you have felt them perhaps seeing them as ingredients might help to free you from fate.  We say we want to transmute, transcend, ascend, or embody, but that is a process not a hall pass from deep work.  Take inventory of your life, list the ingredients, and then make something magical with them.

Peace and Blessings,
Thomas Mooneagle