Peer Priestessing

©Connie Peters Gulick 2015

It's still tender to talk about...

I flounder with words. With explanation. With wanting to express all this has meant to me and feeling like I'm coming up short.

I had just booked flights for my eldest sons to travel to the east coast, to spend time with my parents, my sister, goddaughter and extended kin. We had NEVER done anything like THIS before! And as I coordinated the details, I noticed a seam within my heart begin to unravel, revealing lost hurts and beliefs I didn't know I'd sewn up so tight.

A gate suddenly loosened from these locked-down confines that were holding distrust of my past and lineage, and of the place where I came from. A new layer of my heart exposed itself, and I began to ask, "What do I most want NOW!?"

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©Connie Peters Gulick 2015

My heart swelled to bursting as I felt the inner promptings to be amongst my sacred lineage... in the forest, in pure initiation, with my sisters, with Her. I cradled it.

And I beckoned women, ones who'd walked with me many times before, through the land of Her initiation, into Feminine Wisdom, Leadership, Co-Creation and our Heart's Calling. And I welcomed those who had stood beside me from the inception of my work into Heart-Womb creation, living and mothering.

And I remembered a conversation from years ago with one of my soul sisters. She had tenderly asked if I would initiate her.

At the time I'd been honored... and horrified!! I LONGED to do this for her, and was petrified I couldn't give what I didn't believe I had. So I dug deep. And it took awhile.

And it got dark. REALLY dark. The pitch black no-other-color-exists dark.

During this passage of my life, I let myself cry so deeply because I had wanted a Wise SOMEONE to initiate me into the land of my lineage, wisdom and legacy... into the soul calling I'd carried since birth. I had carried this untameable fire my whole life. It set me ablaze, searching for pure intimacy with the Feminine, with the Sacred Mother. And in the process I denied the love that was burning bright within me, that was the only TRUE and PURE initiator of myself.

I had denied the love of my own all-consuming heart.

And BECAUSE of it...

I had longed
and sought
and ached
and created
and wanted HER... and only Her
to show me the way.

And I learned a LOT on this passage.

I grew humble. I became bold. I discovered She was within. And I was safe, sooo safe in the arms of Life and with others.

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"And the day came when the risk to remain tight in a bud was more painful than the risk it took to blossom." ~ Anaïs Nin

©Connie Peters Gulick 2015

This summer as I released myself from the wound of over responsibility as a mother, I celebrated what I've learned through Her initiation. And my sisters joined me, arriving with blessed water, food and drums. With passionate poems, sage and songs. And with hearts that knew the wild path of the Feminine. We'd been walking it uniquely and together our whole lives.

As we entered the forest, we sang. We walked in silence. We paused and gave our regrets and shame to my teacher, a tree known as the Mother of the Woods.

We wept for ourselves. We cried for one another. And we remembered the pain of mothering, being mothered, not having been mothered... and how we wanted to tend our pure wild hearts simply as sisters, friends and beloved kin.

And there was dancing amongst the trees! And gifts bestowed upon the earth. And laughter.... soooo much laughter. And a heck of a lot of lovin'!

I had asked that we join together in the Call of our Hearts...

And my sisters showed up because they KNEW how to give and live, fully... and it was time, YES, it was time, to RECEIVE all that we are.

And the heart of my work and this eternal journey, found it's bedrock and home.

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Our hearts have been calling for an eternity. We've each responded in-kind, through every step of our days. Let us stand in the deepest self-honoring for the monumental work we've done, as we allow utmost celebration and Her initiation.

Come in your raw self, we will see your beauty. Come in your uncertainty and fear, we will witness your true power. Come in your unknowing, wonder and longing, we will stand together in Her grace.

We come together for renunciation, reunification, illumination, initiation, trepidation, celebration. We come together for we are, and have always been, made for these times. We come together to be known to ourselves in such completeness.

~my invitation to my sisters

That day amongst my sisters and wisdom teachers, I was deeply initiated. And I chose to see it, believe it, taste it and allow it to be REAL.

Afterwards, as women were departing my home, a beloved sister came to me, water glistening in her eyes, and tenderly said, "You are our teacher, Sharon." I breathed that in, and let the tears purely flow.

We receive our most holy initiation as we allow ourselves to be seen in our innocent self. Like when we were born, we stand naked before those we love and are loved by, letting them welcome us into a world that has longed for us exactly as we are. And this is our most priceless gift to life.

©Connie Peters Gulick 2015