Welcome to Week 4: Anchoring your Experience
Rooting into the offering through your heart into your body, your life, your family, your work and your community
Small and Slow solutions: The power of tiny changes
Join Shannon Thompson and original Shakti staff, herbalist and horsewoman Jordan Stanton for a conversation about the power of one of Shakti's classic practices to bring transformation into your daily life: tiny changes. (See more of Jordan's work here: https://www.jshorsewomanship.com/ )
Meditation: Rooting In, Branching Out
Shakti Rising founder Shannon Thompson invites you to sink your roots deep with this guided meditation in support of bringing all that you've learned here into the many branches of your life.
Week 4 Reflections & Recipes
Week 4 Recipe: Dee's Delicious Vegan Bowls
Plant-based chef extraordinaire, yoga teacher and Shakti sister, Dee Schaub, shares some of her favorite DIY vegan bowls. Enjoy!
(See more of Dee's work here: www.deidraschaub.com )
Sustenance for the Soul
Our Favorite Resources for Staying Awake & Aligned
Book Recommendation for this week
Foxfire, Wolfskin and other Stories of Shapeshifting Women; by Sharon Blackie
Drawing on myth and fairy tales found across Europe - from Croatia to Sweden, Ireland to Russia - Sharon Blackie brings to life women's remarkable ability to transform themselves in the face of seemingly impossible circumstances. These stories are about coming to terms with our animal natures, exploring the ways in which we might renegotiate our fractured relationship with the natural world, and uncovering the wildness - and wilderness - within. Beautifully illustrated by Helen Nicholson, Foxfire, Wolfskin and Other Stories of Shapeshifting Women is Blackie's first collection of short stories.
Yoga & Mindfulness practices for moving from Anxiety to Calm Presence
Djuna Mascall
This handout includes a number of simple, effective, body-based practices for grounding, resourcing and becoming mindful during an experience of anxiety, from a Buddhist perspective. (See more of Djuna's work here.)
Calling the Spirit Back from Wandering the Earth on its Human Feet
Put down that bag of potato chips, that white bread, that bottle of pop.
Turn off that cellphone, computer, and remote control.
Open the door, then close it behind you.
Take a breath offered by friendly winds. They travel the Earth gathering essences of plants to clean.
Give it back with gratitude.
If you sing it will give your spirit lift to fly to the stars’ ears and back.
Acknowledge this Earth who has cared for you since you were a dream planting itself precisely within your parents’ desire.
Let your moccasin feet take you to the encampment of the guardians who have known you before time, who will be there after time. They sit before the fire that has been there without time.
Let the Earth stabilize your postcolonial insecure jitters.
Be respectful of the small insects, birds, and animal people who accompany you.
Ask their forgiveness for the harm we humans have brought down upon them.
Don’t worry.
The heart knows the way though there may be high-rises, interstates, checkpoints, armed soldiers, massacres, wars, and those who will despise you because they despise themselves.
The journey might take you a few hours, a day, a year, a few years, a hundred, a thousand, or even more.
Watch your mind. Without training it might run away and leave your heart for the immense human feast set by the thieves of time.
Do not hold regrets.
When you find your way to the circle, to the fire kept burning by the keepers of your soul, you will be welcomed.
You must clean yourself with cedar, sage, or other healing plant.
Cut the ties you have to failure and shame.
Let go the pain you are holding in your mind, your shoulders, your heart, all the way to your feet. Let go the pain of your ancestors to make way for those who are heading in our direction.
Ask for forgiveness.
Call upon the help of those who love you. These helpers take many forms: animal, element, bird, angel, saint, stone, or ancestor.
Call your spirit back. It may be caught in corners and creases of shame, judgement, and human abuse.
You must call in a way that your spirit will want to return. Speak to it as you would to a beloved child.
Welcome your spirit back from its wandering. It may return in pieces, in tatters. Gather them together. They will be happy to be found after being lost for so long.
Your spirit will need to sleep awhile after it is bathed and given clean clothes.
Now you can have a party. Invite everyone you know who loves and supports you. Keep room for those who have no place else to go.
Make a giveaway, and remember, keep the speeches short.
Then, you must do this: help the next person find their way through the dark.