Becoming a Herbalist
by Susun S. Weed
www.susunweed.com
~ Part Nine ~
"You must learn to smile even if you don't feel it," she said, sternly but gently.
I certainly didn't feel like smiling, but I knew I had to do something different. I was in so much emotional pain I felt like I was drowning. I felt weighed down, heavy, victimized, ostracized, villanized, powerless, unhappy, bitter. I knew what herbs to use: motherwort tincture gave me a warm lap to snuggle into; skullcap tincture helped me lose my pain in sleep; comfrey infusions comforted me and eased my tears. But all the herbs in the world didn't seem enough to lighten my outlook.
"How can I smile when everything I loved and trusted, cared for and gave myself to has betrayed me and abandoned me," I complained.
"The Earth has betrayed you?" she softly mocked me. "The Goddess has abandoned you?"
"That's not what I mean." I said in a fresh flood of tears. "I mean the women I loved, the women who said they were committed to me and to our mutual dream of women's land."
"I know that persistence is a virtue," she chuckled, "but you must learn to give up. What you envisioned is yours, and yours alone. If they shared it with you, it was not to your benefit. No one else in the world can make your vision reality except you. Let go of wanting what you thought you had. Accept what is. And smile, darn it!"
I tried a wan, wet, unconvincing smile.
I called and asked her for help after a particularly vivid dream. In it, I saw my hurt and bitterness eating into me, taking over my insides like a strange cancer. Horrible! Frightening. But my grief seemed to have a life of its own and it wanted revenge on those who had hurt me. How could I smile? How could I give up? Wouldn't that prove them the righteous victors? Anyway, I knew it wouldn't work to give up. I had already tried it. I had meditated on forgiveness and letting go of the hurt. And when I did, everything seemed to get worse, as though my meditation created a psychic beacon visible to those who wanted to hurt me, giving them a path to me.
"Help me more," I begged. "What do you mean when you tell me to let go?"
"Good question," she replied, smiling broadly. "I mean you must let go of the ka which binds you to that which is hurting you. Ka is the word the ancient Egyptian shamans used to describe the filaments of energy that bind us to each other. You and those who now seek your destruction wove your energy fields closely together over many years and through many intimacies. Your ka and theirs are bound together in many places and many ways. You must left go of every strand."
Day after day she guided me in deep trances to enter each chakra and remove all the ka I found there. A few were easy to remove. I had only to think about them, or look at them, and they dissolved. Most were far more substantile--hooks, barbs, pins, buttons, zippers, ties--all the ways there are to fasten one thing to another. And some were incredibly frightening.
At my throat a filament of ka pulsed like a living thing. It was far thicker by far than the others I had seen, grotesquely so, in a bloated, turgid way. At first I was baffled, unable to see any way to remove this unwanted appendage. Then I flashed on the image of an umbilical cord being cut. No sooner said than done! I tied off the enormous ka in two places fairly close together. When the pulsing between the ties stopped and the ka grew flaccid, I took a knife and cut the ka.
The unattached end began to writhe and to reach out for me. It tried to grab my throat, my throat that it had been attached to for many years. Feeling more scared by the instant, I called my spirit guides, guardian angels, plant allies, animal totems, anyone! For three days that ka stalked me day and night, looking for a way back. I slept only because I knew my spirit helpers were guarding me. And every time I looked, it grew fainter and fainter, until, it finally faded from my psychic sight.
At last the ka was cut. I was free. "But it will easily come back," she warned. "Brood on the wrongs and the ka will reestablish itself. Long for the past and the ka will return. Plot your revenge and their ka will be more deeply woven into your life. Now that you have let go, you must be vigilant that you do not call the ka back, nor accept it when it is offered, as it definitely will be." We were drinking tall chilled glasses of oatstraw infusion, a welcome way to strengthen our psychic muscles and keep our nervous systems powerful for the tasks we had yet to do.
"Living well is the best revenge" she advised me. And as she did, I was flooded with memories from childhood, when I tried to hurt my parents by hurting myself. And memories of relationships in which I tried to appease my partner by making myself small. Could I do that too? Nourish myself? Love myself (in the midst of many telling me I was unlovable)? Become large? Dare to shine?
What to Do When Your Love's Left You
(or the universe has otherwise brought you grief)1. Honor your enemies.
It is they who make you strong and wise. (But see #4.)
2. Define your own reality.
Let no one tell you what to think, how to act, nor how you are supposed to feel.
3. The heart cannot be broken.
Only the barriers that protect the heart from the pain of life can be broken. Although never sought, heartache can be seen as a deep opening of the heart.
4. Do not be kind.
Honor the love you shared; be decent in all your actions, but recognize that in these circumstances, kindness is a lie.
5. Cut all energetic bonds between you.
They can be used to manipulate you and hurt you further. If there is to be reconciliation, let it be from new material, not the re-engagement of the previous energies.
6. Think of yourself first for one full year; beginning right now.
7. Let go. Give up. Die. (But don't really kill yourself, please!) The earth will recycle you. Lay down on her and pour your pain into her. Envision yourself as a dead body. Let yourself be eaten by the beetles and worms and excreted as manure for the plants which are eaten by people like you. It all goes round, so let go. Let go of blame. Let go of shame. Let go of guilt.
8. Smile. Even if you don't feel like it. Smiling--the actual tightening of the muscles involved in making a smile--causes the release of feel-good chemicals (endorphins) in the brain. When in pain, remember, smiling is more effective than drink or drugs.
September 27, 2012
