The medicine walk: cholla cactus and golden braids

If you have been following this story of the medicine walk, you might The elusive inner masculinebe wondering what my longing for a loving relationship has to do with the intention I brought on the walk, and why I chose to ask the lizard that question. I can tell you two things about this. One is that the question arose spontaneously, as did the entire interaction with the lizard. And it is this spontaneous arising in nature that is part of the gift of the medicine walk, vision fast, and other work in nature. One never knows what is going to happen. And what happens is outside the realm of our usual experience. This is why we go to nature in the first place—to gain insight and understanding from a place that is different from our usual thought processes and ways of interacting in the world. As my story continues I will draw together all the pieces of the events on the medicine walk into a cohesive whole that makes sense.

The second piece about asking about my desire for a loving relationship is that this is part of the work with my inner man. I mentioned previously that I am claiming my inner father. Yet the inner masculine is also my inner lover. And the type of relationship I have with both these aspects of my inner masculine will affect the quality of relationships I have with men in my life, especially in the area of intimate, romantic relationships. Looked at one way, this means that the desire for a great romantic relationship is a strong motivation to do the inner work to have good relationships with the inner masculine aspects. But that’s kind of a backwards way of looking at it, as you may know if you are involved in inner work yourself. The gifts of looking within are the goal of the work, and the benefit this may have in our outer lives and relationships is secondary. (Or so the theory goes!) But the truth is, our relationship with ourself is the one constant that is there throughout our life, while outer relationships come and go.

So, to continue my story, I left off at the point where I was sitting near the golden cactus. I noticed it was prickly, to keep other creatures away (like me). And beautiful, to draw them close (like me). Suddenly I wanted to know what it would take. If only I could DO SOMETHING, like flog myself with the cactus, cutting my arms, or run across the desert for miles and miles, to make it happen. I felt my powerlessness. Do I have to move to California or New York to improve my chances of meeting the kind of man with whom I want to have a relationship, who is as deeply committed as I am to the inner journey? Does he have to be on the same spiritual path, or can it be someone like Larry, who runs and meditates and has a deep inner awareness, and holds the sacred ceremony of the vision fast? He can sense himself and his unfoldment, though his inner work has been on a different path than mine. And then there is that mysterious factor of strong physical attraction, which I would want to feel with my mate. When will I find all of this in one man, I wondered.

I felt into the sadness in my chest, and the longing to be seen, regarded as special, loved and cherished—from a lover man whom I felt passionate about. And I felt the helplessness and hopelessness about ever having that. I believed I don’t get to have it, won’t ever get to have it. The hopeless sad powerless longing felt like when I was a child. And cactus was saying don’t look outside for what you want, just do your inner work. (And I remembered Larry saying what we all want is on the inside.) That felt frustrating and unsatisfying too, but I also noticed the feeling tone of feeling powerless to ever have what I want, and hopeless, felt like when I was a little girl, wanting mom and dad’s love and attention and for them to think I was special.

Unbraiding her true natureI remembered being about four, having these feelings. Longing for love, closeness, attention. Feeling ugly and unloveable. The hurt of it all. So I started talking to little Karen, telling her I could feel her hurt, and I was there for her, loved her, thought she is beautiful and precious, and that I cared about how she felt. I asked if she could hear me, but she seemed pretty absorbed in her hurt and sadness. She didn’t seem to be aware of me. With my eyes closed, I imagined drawing her near to me, and I unbraided her two braids. I touched her hair, telling her that her hair was beautiful, soft and wavy from the braids, and that she is special. I could see her uniqueness and the qualities in her that are different from most little girls. This showed in her face as a seriousness and strength.

I held her close, telling her she is special, and felt a very full, loving feeling, deep pink, in my heart. The pink fullness was also between us and through us, a unified field of it. Then I saw her as free to be who she was—happy and light, a tremendous force of nature, running through the landscape.

Although this experience wasn’t the union with the masculine that I longed for, it was very satisfying, and seemed to be a piece of the puzzle of healing so that I am ready for a relationship. Reparenting my inner child, releasing her pain, allowing her to be free to be herself. With this work done, I no longer needed to seek someone on the outside to give her the love and attention she had been longing for. To honour and mark what had occurred, I did a small ceremony. Earlier, when I crossed the threshold, I had a nose bleed. I buried the kleenex with my blood on it at the base of the cactus, as a gift of thanks from my body to the earth, and a symbol of letting go of the suffering from the past. I marked the tiny grave with a black stone, and placed a piece of the cactus that had broken off on the flat black stone, together with a tiny red stone.

This concluded the second part of my medicine walk, which I thought of as being related to the west side of the wheel. The inner masculine work is the work of the west. But clearly the work with the inner child is the work of the south. Ruth reflected this back to me later on when I told the story to her and Larry. And she made the beautiful piece of art pictured here, showing the hands loosening the braid.

The work with the little girl seemed like a possible completion of my medicine walk. It was so wonderful to have cared for her in such a way that her suffering was relieved and she was freed to be her true, magnificent self in the world. As often happens when fasting, my thoughts turned to food and I wondered if I should call it a day and go back to base camp to eat! But I had it in my mind to do some further ceremony for the north and the east…

The medicine walk: cell phones and lizards

Golden chollaAfter the ritual of the south I felt it was time to move. I couldn’t get comfortable in this place. It was too hot in the sun, too cool in the shade. All the rocks felt rough and uncomfortable to lean against. So I gathered up my things and headed down the wash.

I saw a spot with red rocks, which I had noticed on the way up. It was at the mouth of another wash that led to a plateau high above the valley floor. I continued down the wash a little further until I came to a beautiful big golden prickly cactus. I took its picture, remembering another faster who had taken a picture of the same type of cactus.

I wanted to check the messages on my cell phone. (Not a very ancient ritual, I’m afraid!) Leaving my pack and extra clothes near the cactus, I took my cell phone and climbed up to the top of the red rock wash. I looked around and saw a faster below, in another canyon. I retreated below the ridge line to turn my phone on, got a minimal signal, and stood up on the ridge line again to check voice mail, but it didn’t go through. Aha. So this is what the spirits of the place had to say about modern communications!

I climbed back down to where I’d left my pack, and noticed a flash of movement. I’d startled a lizard, who had darted under a little plant. I looked at him and noticed he was a collared lizard with two black stripes around his neck and orange in between. The rest of his body was coloured a softer orange with a grey pattern. He was quite big, and had a long, slender, flexible tail.

Collared lizardI really wanted to give him some water, so I poured some into the lid of a water bottle and sat very still, waiting to see if he’d drink it. I was facing down the wash, with a wonderful view across the basin floor to the mountains on the other side. I tried to be patient and just wait. It seemed quite a while, and I could see the lizard under the plant, absolutely still, with one eye facing me. Eventually I saw his tail moving, flicking slightly back and forth, and then he turned fully towards me.

He came a little closer, looking right at me, only about 18 inches away. He flicked his tongue at me, tasting and sensing me. I looked at him too, and then he went over to the water in the bottle cap. He looked at it but didn’t drink it. Then he scampered over my pile of black jackets, pausing and continuing until he was right up close to me. He looked at me again, straight on. Then he jumped off the pile and ran away, off to my left.

While we had this contact I had been asking the lizard what it would take to have someone love me the way I want to be loved. He seemed to be showing me something about curiousity, getting to know someone, check out what’s offered, and then decide whether it was what I wanted. In the case of the water, it wasn’t what he wanted. And then he took off, after his curiousity was satisfied.

To me, lizard is the creative masculine of the east. But exploring my desire for a loving relationship with a man seems very west. Hmm! This is one of the mysteries of the wheel, how the two opposite poles are related to each other.

I didn’t feel fully satisfied with the lizard’s answer about finding love, so I decided to continue the exploration by having a conversation with the golden cactus. To be continued…