Feathers, Stones, Shells and Sticks
One of the important things for me right now is creating space. Creating space in my home in the cupboards, wardrobes, drawers, the office and its files, papers, and my art studio. Bit by bit I’m going through each nook and cranny and having a clear out. That includes a digital detox of technology and systems so I can create a healthy ground for moving forward into my next and this next phase of the year. With us now being in the start of Autumn it’s not surprising the need for release feels so important. Just as nature around us allows her ripe fruits to fall, as change beckons with colours changing and leaves falling, I feel the same.
It is amazing how much accumulates and how quickly in life. Just through the daily act of living. Consciously creating space is a must for me to keep my mind clear and healthy, to keep my sense of space feeling supportive and nourishing. When I am in the studio, I may well get messy while I am in the creative act but at the end of the day everything gets cleaned and put away so I can start fresh the next day. I just love a fresh space.
One of the things I’m preparing at home is my office space. I am changing the structure of my working day and creating space where I can get up early in the morning and write, answer emails, work on my website, marketing and all the entrepreneurial things it takes to be a self-employed artist and run a creative business. I can then go to the studio to paint, post out orders and have gallery viewings knowing I have tended my ground. So creating a beautiful home office environment to be in is so important to me – I just don’t flourish in chaos. I want a space I can write creatively in, cosy up and dream through autumn/winter and tend the daily needs of my art business.
During my clear out and reorganising of the office I realised just how many feathers, stones, shells and sticks I had collected on my pilgrimages over the last few years! Spending some time with them, feeling them, listening, I realised how I had collected all of these since the start of menopause began several years ago. Over this time, I had become a collector of natural things that I found or spoke to me on my journeys deeper into the land and ancient holy places. It seems to me that I have been gathering in the bare bones of life. Connecting with the spirit medicine of feathers that came on my path - swan, pheasant, crow, magpie, duck and raven. Marvelling at shells as the safe houses they had provided for their occupants with their grooved markings of spirals, lines and shades of tones and colours. Holding the stones and feeling their weight, the ground, the earth, and the wisdom of the ancients whispered through a natural material that reflects eternity. And sticks. Sticks of fallen yews, twigs gathered from the ground at holy places that exude the power of the yew as otherworldly talking sticks and for creating ritual tools in gratitude for the gifting.
They reflect my journey from the start of menopause and my journey deeply into this life changing rites of passage for a woman. How I have been gathering in the wisdom of my life, of the land, of the ancients in a modern-day world that doesn’t honour the sacredness of this time of life. Where the loss of youth and fear of the process of ageing gives rise to menopause being treated as a medical condition rather than a profound rite of passage. Now I find myself entering a new phase, a new place as a new woman. One born from the gathering in of the bare bones of her life, initiated by fire, flames fanned by the wind, polished by tides of the sea, planted deep in the earth and opened to a portal of another level of womanhood. And the power of the Feminine as She reveals Her power of shape shifting change as She calls you to harness the wisdom of your life and return back into Her body of manifest feminine intelligence.
These gathered feathers, stones, shells, and sticks speak my story. My story of initiation, transformation, and call of growth into the woman I am yet to fully become. Sitting and being with them I wanted them to have a designated place, a display of the in-gathering. This potent time of life speaking to me through feathers, stones, shells, and sticks needed to be gathered into one place. It dropped in to create in my office a wall space with shelving so they could be seen, honoured, and displayed in a way that speaks to my heart. I feel like they hold a space of my gathering in of the bones of my life into this next phase. As the fire and tides turned into a deep ocean of calm and peace, now I feel the new, making itself known as the uncharted depths of my soul fire forged in this alchemical meeting are making their presence known. Making the calling known. So, I prepare for the new. I am setting the right conditions to support me, and I am creating that space for the new and the next unfolding phase of life.
