When I went along to Claire's creativity group earlier in the year, I found a force to play with that was not what I was expecting.
At the time I was feeling unsettled and stressed and overwhelmed looking for a new home. Claire read a Krishna story which contained a potentially very positive poison, though not obvious.
In the story the sea is churning and Gods and Demons are fighting, and the Goddess of Misfortune, Jyestha arises from some black, putrid oil and tries to mess things up for the Gods. Well in my rather heavy state, something started to wake up and wonder who I should be in this scene. A goodie? NO! I want to be The Goddess of Misfortune! Is that a bad idea? Is there something deeply black in me? I felt rising excitement and mischief at the thought.
When I put on my funny black outfit and black hairpiece and hit my wooden sticks together, I felt a freedom rising up which was young, naughty, and natural and wanted to dance and bounce. Suddenly I felt more myself and in our ‘scene' I interfered, manipulated, teased and at times barged my way to a result. Confidence did not seem to be an issue. But the main thing was I did not feel bad, nor did I upset anybody. I just felt alive and good.
The next week we had a slightly different story – but I could not help being the GOM again. Then I started to look forward to being the GOM. She seemed to become part of the family and her energy kept revealing more and more to me. I found she was sexy too. More than anything her spirit was somehow clean and direct, although playful. I felt unhampered.
The GOM showed me something about being amoral. ‘Bad' revealed itself to be a word which had sneakily tainted my view of myself. And I always thought I was quite ‘loose'. ‘Good' seemed like it could be fierce, not cosy. I often came away from sessions feeling fresh and relaxed. Assumed concepts seemed to unravel in me. Self-judgement moved over, though I could see where it had been.
Since that time I have started to discover more of what I want and be honest about my gut feelings. There have been creative stirrings in new directions. There's also a connection to my spiritual life which has been opening up and tapping into a certain peace and awareness. I'm not so prepared to put up with dissatisfactions in my creative and work life and have said ‘no' more. I think GOM's medicine led to something really quite healing and certainly freeing.
Nana
Published in Making Moves Newsletter Summer 2005
