Good morning love 🖤

I was talking with a dear friend the other night who asked me to share more about the last year and this wild descent. About midlife, individuation and how I’ve been experiencing it. I didn’t know where to begin.

To attempt to articulate the layers and levels of animacy, synchronicity, archetypal forces, real life magic and deep alchemy that has gone down. Along with bottomless grief, unbearable pain I never wanted to face, a reality I wouldn’t have been able to fathom only a couple of years ago and so much death.

You’ve probably heard a gazillion teachers, teachings, posts, shares, scriptures that tell you that you will ultimately have to give up everything on the path. You’ll have heard about the fire of purification that burns all that is false. You might be familiar with the Dark Goddess, with Kālī Mā, Innana, Persephone, Hecate. As with all things, the map is not the territory.

I had danced on the edges of the forest. I’ve had many descents and ascents, many rebirths but not like this. I was afraid of the Underworld but then Hecate came to me and, with a great deal of reverence and a respectful approach, I formed a relationship with Her that taught me how to come into relationship with so much more life. I felt the eyes of Hades pulling me down and so off I went to meet Him. With a good slice of paradoxical knowing and naïveté.

So what did I Hades show me?
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That archetypes are not two dimensional concepts. They are real life entities and beings that you don’t fuck around with. That Psyche is alive and everywhere and that once Soul wakes up in you, the world wakes up with you. Which is to say that everything is animate. Everything is alive. Everything is speaking, if you know how to listen.
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I learned that I could be seen in my grief, my exhaustion, my shame. That I hadn’t had a place to grieve for the death of my Mother. I discovered Eros and that there were parts of me that were starving, voracious, hungry. I learned that these were the ones that needed my love the most. I learned what true love is from big women who were willing to bear witness and stand in a circle of love and protection around me while I got real messy.

I see that we use up an enormous amount of creative energy on suppressing, exiling, hiding, protecting, denying, starving parts of ourselves. Parts of Her. It’s all Shakti. And when you go into the Underworld, when you descend and meet all of that suppressed power, you get the chance to unlock it. To step into the wild magic of your artistry.

I am in deep gratitude to all the incredible beings who have lit the way and to Libby, my Ninshibur, who held me with so much compassion through Instructions for the Underworld. I showed up to the sessions and mostly just cried and slept. The good student in me had to die and the idealised teacher had already fallen.
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Lib showed me how to love the dark and all that waits for me there. And she continues to show me, hold me and see me in all my light and shade. What a gift to have teachers, guides, friends like these.

If you are feeling the gaze of Hades eyes, if you are shedding, transforming, metamorphosing, and sense that something more true and honest is pushing up beneath the surface then go to her free workshop tonight.

I will be sharing some poetry from my time in the Underworld on IG this week and also offering live meditations to support you, wherever you are in this wild karmic adventure of life.

Sending love to all the parts of your soul.

Col 🌹