When we are open, life pulls us toward what we need to know.
Recently, I have found myself becoming an advocate for the pelvis, and the female pelvis in particular.
It started three years ago when I attended a mystery school for women called Priestess Path, under the guidance of Alisa Starkweather in Western Massachusetts.
I was questioning the purpose of the deep confusion and turmoil in this world, and had a desire to understand the mystery around me.
I had a notion that the sacred feminine was missing.
Priestess Path introduced me to a whole new culture of women delving into the divine feminine. It is an enchanting, heartfelt journey of truth, sharing, courage, loving kindness, joy, confrontation, community, deepening and ceremony.
It is a rite of passage that connects a group of 28 women to the sacred feminine within themselves and one another and restores balance in our world.
Priestess Path initiates a great healing journey that is not singular, but rather encompasses the whole of all that is—it seeks to restore a genuine feminine presence that has been discarded, discredited and suppressed for thousands of years.
When I speak of the feminine and the masculine, I mean that each of us has feminine and masculine aspects within us, along a spectrum. When a person resonates in their balance, there is wholeness.
As a culture, we have downplayed the presence of the feminine, passing down an inaccurate portrayal of its role for so many generations now that for the most part we are alien to what a feminine way of being actually is, what it feels like and what it offers us.
But, we can sense its disappearance—though it is never absent. It can be shy, with only our vigilant presence to summon it.
Two years ago, I completed the training of Priestess Path and began the work ahead.
I now experience within me a greater sense of direction—an innate, deepening presence—and I listen.
It feels restorative. I’ve gained reverence for the Earth and her guidance. Steadily, courage and commitment have called me to join in the awakening of the feminine spirit, whether or not I feel qualified.
For me, it means engaging the feminine within Rolfing—a transformative, mystical practice.
The body is a microcosmic reflection of the great Earth herself. Each of us inhabits a pristine landscape worthy of attention, respect and care.
I see the Earth as a beautiful living, breathing, sensual body, constantly responding to the gestures of life around her—some replenishing; most depleting. She is constantly communicating and offering ways to harmony if we care enough, slow down enough, come to stillness enough to surrender, listen and see.
As a Rolfer, I practice sensing the body and its ability to organize itself. I have come to trust that the pelvis is a vessel of wisdom that can show us how to restore the balance between the masculine (intellectual) and the feminine (sensing) strengths within each of us.
If we can come to embody, or inhabit, our pelvises, I believe we can feel whole.
The pelvis is the place we come from when we perceive sensation, presence, creation and connection. If we practice drawing our energy down to this area from the head, we can awaken a sense of existence—not through logic or a need to know, but through gut feeling and being.
When we embody our feminine felt-sense, we recognize that we are the Earth.
During Rolfing sessions, or Rolf Movement classes, I help people feel how their physical structure is designed to instinctively receive support from both the force of gravity, grounding with the very center of the Earth, and the heliotropic force of light, orienting with the Sun.
When people feel and respond to balance as it is, they discover stability, flow, presence, ease and joy in a constantly moving world.
Often, we may feel that we are losing support physically, emotionally or spiritually, and in those moments, we may grasp, contract and lose our balance.
We become disoriented.
Remembering to return to our felt-self, we discover that we have an innate capacity for the never-ending dance of falling, finding support, reorienting and responding anew to each moment, again and again.
We can always be open and attuned to what else is happening—always responding and resonating.
Phillip Sheppard describes engaging with the feminine way of being like this:
“[When] you reclaim your embodied wholeness, [you] attune as it is to the mindful present, attune to the frail, robust, transient beauty of life, it will also attune you to an understanding of justice that lies beyond dogma or self-interest. This is not about asserting control, but about achieving harmony; not about substituting a new set of ideas for an old, but about living the wordless truth of the moment; not about getting ahead, but about embracing your life, in all its mystery and urgency and love…”
As I gain more understanding of the pelvis, I learn that there is a rich relationship between the feet that feel the Earth below and the vitality of the pelvic floor—a resilient bowl suspended above; an elastic springboard. When feet and pelvis find attunement, we can experience grounding and flow through the core of the body, from ground to sky.
Such attunement further serves to release strains and adhesions that pull on the sacrum, uterus and bladder in order to resolve pelvic and back issues.
Most importantly, by releasing structural issues connected to the pelvis, women can access their inherent strengths.
This may take some time, but it is possible to return your pelvis to a state free of restraint and therefore experience it as a beautiful, mystical and dynamic bowl of creation…as it is meant to be.
Connect to your pelvis, the Earth and the sacred feminine, and you will discover that they are one and the same.
Relephant:
5 Steps to Embody Divine Feminine Energy.
~
Author: Liesje Smith
Apprentice Editor: Brandie Smith/Editor: Travis May
Photo: Tanveer Iqbal/Flickr
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