— “Why not become fire?” (c) Cat Charissage, 2015

Dear Friends,

In the early Christian church, men and women went out into the deserts of Egypt and Sinai, fleeing the materialism and secularism of the cities.  This was in the 4th, 5th, and 6th centuries.  We have many stories of them, and this is one:

“Abba Lot came to Abba Joseph and said:  Father, according as I am able, I keep my little rule, and my little fast, my prayer, meditations and contemplative silence; and according as I am able, I strive to cleanse my heart of thoughts; now what more should I do?  The elder rose up in reply and stretched out his hands to heaven, and his fingers became like ten lamps of fire.  He said:  Why not become fire?”

Why not become fired, indeed?  The intention for this painting is “Show me my Tree of Life, burning but unconsumed.”  The story of Moses seeing the bush burning, but not being consumed, is deeply meaningful for me, because if we had the eyes to see, I believe that we could see all of the world that way.

As quantum physics is to classical physics, the imaginal realm is to material reality.  The regular rules just don’t apply anymore, and everything is filled with wonder and paradox. What we observe seems to be impossible, yet here it is.  Although not ordinary, this, too, is a legitimate way to view reality.  Truly, everything is so much more than what we see at first glance.  Everyone is so much more than who we know at first meeting.

Let’s just start with the fact that there is something rather than nothing.  Awe-full enough!  Then there are Black Holes and Einstein’s “spooky action at a distance,” Schroedinger’s cat, rainbows in every raindrop, and love.  I want to know this reality in every moment, and let go of the overintellectualization and oversophistication of the cynical.  I want to let the lamps of my fingers, the light of who I am,  illumine what is invisible and dream of what might be possible.

May my mantra become, as Jacob exclaimed about the place where he had his dream of angels moving up and down the staircase to heaven, “How filled with awe is this place, and I, I did not know it!”

I leave tomorrow for my fifth year of training at Dr. Clarissa Pinkola Estes’ Mysterium.  It will be a few days of travel, and five very full days illuminating what is usually invisible.  Dr. E. is a poet and curandera, as well as a Jungian psychotherapist.  She speaks in metaphor and story,  more clearly than anyone else I’ve learned from.  There is music in her language, imaging up incantations and prayers of old women.   I call the Mysterium my yearly pilgrimage, because I always come home deeper and more open to wonder and possibility.   I will carry all of you, my friends, with me in my heart.

Why not become fire?

With love,

Cat

Stella Muse,  acrylic on canvas, Cat Charissage (c) 2015

Hello dear friends,

I’m immersed in a couple of new, big (BIG!!) projects that have taken so much of my attention.  For a couple of years now, I’ve been painting using the method of Intentional Creativity as taught by Shiloh Sophia McCloud.  The instruction has been through her demonstrating how to prepare for and then how to execute a painting based on a particular theme.  I’ve been so impressed by how the whole process has helped me to access my inner symbolism and then to get it out onto the canvas to reflect back to me whatever wisdom my inner life is interested in at the moment.  Also, and of no little importance, when I’m engaged in the whole process, my pain level decreases to the point of not even being there — and that’s a miracle in my books!

The painting has given me another language in which to express some of what I’ve pondered throughout my life.  I’ve always read voraciously, most of it in the wisdom traditions of the world.  I’ve had the opportunity to both teach and to work individually with my beloveds (as I call the people I work with), but have wanted to write more about these things.  Lots of times words don’t come easily, oftentimes because I don’t want to unnecessarily challenge or offend some of my friends who may articulate their beliefs differently.  (I know, the coward’s way of “not” writing —– but also a woman’s way of wanting to include rather than to define prematurely and thereby exclude.)

And then I found this kind of painting, and I’m off!  So this year I enrolled in Shiloh’s in-depth training called Color of Woman, which is a 9 month vision quest wherein she teaches about 40 women how to teach in her style of Intentional Creativity.  This style or method includes coming to the canvas with an intention, it includes visioning and meditation, and it demands that we be willing to be surprised by what we end up wanting to express onto the canvas. The training can be done all online (which is the option I’ve chosen), though there are several 4-day weekend gatherings that the participants can attend in-person or online through Livestreaming.  There are at least 5 major paintings to create (Stella Muse, above, is the one expressing our Muse archetype), accompanied by extensive writings, some business coaching, and mentoring in conducting both short and weekend-long workshops.

The training started on April 1st, and it’s been a roller-coaster ride already — but a ride I’m excited to be on!  No motion sickness, just the wildness!

I’ll save telling you about my other adventures for another day.

I’m drowning in assignments that in total ask for about 20 hours per week.  Well, I could get by with less time devoted to it, but I’m determined to mine these treasures for all that they have to offer.  I’m also remembering just how blessed I am to be able to do this, and I’m loving every minute of it.  I’ll be sure to share!

With love,

Cat

detail from Sovereignty, Cat Charissage (c) 2015

Dear Friends,

Since the last time I wrote, I’ve lost a dear friend to a recurrence of cancer.  We all thought she had more time, and she committed herself to “living every day that she was alive”, as she told me more than once.  Then she got weak, went into the hospital, and too soon we got the call that she had passed on the morning of April 10.

Though I was very sad, I didn’t cry until her funeral in the overflowing church where I heard over and over how much she had influenced so many people for the good in her 48 years.  She was a home-maker who home educated her now (barely) grown children, and close to 500 people were there at her celebration of life.

So I’ve been thinking a lot about what makes a good life, how to have a death that is as good as possible, if it’s possible to live without regrets, and, amusingly enough, how many people will come to my own funeral — hopefully in the far, far distant future!  Because I’ve moved many times in my adult life and have very little extended family, I’ve left many friends in cities far, far away.  I don’t want to move any more, or else my funeral will be attended by only a few new friends!

I’ve been thinking of how so many of us have such challenges and difficulties in our daily lives, how we worry, understandably, about our children and about our elders.  Daily life is filled with such maintenance and routine that I’m hardly ever doing all that I think I can to let people know I love them, to laugh enough with friends, and just hang out with family.

Yet in the midst of of this, the chickadees have returned this year to the caragana bush outside the window of my study.  Soon the growing green leaves will hide them, though I’ll still be able to hear them.  The warming days have brought me such joy;  I don’t think I’ve ever enjoyed a springtime quite as much as this year.  I don’t think I’ve ever noticed a springtime as much as this year.

I hope our April showers are over.  I hope you’ve had a good spring.  May we all create good summers.

Thank you for reading; thank you for your support.

With love,

Cat

Dear Friends,

I hope you enjoy my new painting and poem:

(c) Cat Charissage, 2015

Wise Woman of the Portal

Cat Charissage, April 2015

Dear one,

acquiesce with what you deeply want

and already know:

it is in silence that you meet,

that you become,

that you create

not only yourself,

but the deepest connections

among all that is.

Life is the invitation to the portal

where we transform our

coal into diamonds,

where we recognize

the truth of all symbols to

throw us back together

into ourselves

and our wisdom:

“This, too, I know.”

I am water

I am deer

Frog leaps in me

I leap in salmon.

Grandmother Spider weaves

red threads of connection.

The web vibrates

and I see, as owl.

I dance, I am

connection.

I circle round, I circle back.

Lightning brings heaven to earth,

earth rises to meet the divine.

This crossing, this meeting, is the

Crux of the matter, our matter,

where human meets divine meets all that is.

We tell our stories of this,

a thousand thousand stories,

stories of matter that matter.

They end as they began:

in silence.

Come in to the portal

of silence,

of wisdom,

of “This, too, is me,”

where we shall create.

And it will be good.

It already is.

WIP, Mater, Tree of Life, (c) Cat Charissage 2015

Dear Friends,

Life has been busy; my dear body has needed rest:  stubbed (broken?) toe, pulled back muscle, regular aches and pains, etc.  I haven’t been able to write much that is new lately.  I did just finish a month-long e-course called “Riding the Winds of Change: A Luscious Life as a Female Elder”, and sent the group a favorite quote of mine from Dr. Clarissa Pinkola Estes.  May it bless you today with visions of what really IS going on in your life, within and invisible!

“Listen Dearie:

“Never underestimate the endurance of the wise old woman.  Despite being torn or treated unfairly, she carries another self, a primary, radiant and incorruptible self beneath the beleaguered self — an illumined self that is ever whole.  The wise old woman is certain to have a twenty-foot wing span hidden under her coat, and a folded-up forest in her long pocket.  Certainly, seven-league gold lame slippers might be found under her bed.  And, through her spectacles, almost everything that can be seen, will be seen.  The little carpet before her fire may truly be a flying one.  Her shawl, when unfurled, likely has the capacity to either bring on the hounds of hell, or else to call up the starriest of starry nights.  She cackles as she sails across the heavens in the half-shell of her own broken heart.  Her feathers lift, for she is ever learning love.  She falls toward the breath of anything that sings and seeks to protect the soul of everything.  Songbirds tell her the hidden news; thus she has “the magic eye” that sees beyond and behind the present.  Like her human counterpart, she most likely lives near a cherished river . . or else, she herself, simply is one. . . ”

With love,

Cat

(c) Cat Charissage, “Eve” 2013

Dear Friends,

For the Friday prompt this week, I invite you to listen for and to acknowledge all of the knowledge and wisdom that is already within you.

Think of your dear body.  Draw a full page outline of your body (sure, she can be your ideal body if you want) and bring your attention to each part of yourself starting with your toes.  Scan slowly, and ask each part of your dear body if it has anything to say  to you.  Write down any insights you have as you think of your toes, then ankles, then calves.  Write it right on the outline, just a few words.  As you move your attention from each part of your body to the next, say a little thank you to that part for supporting you, for working properly — or add a bunch of compassion if it’s not working healthily.  Take your time with this, and consciously try to relax each section of your body as you move your attention to it.  Relax and listen.  Include your internal organs, too!

If that’s all you want to do right now, stop.  Have a glass of water and move on into the next part of your day.

If you have some more time, though, draw another outline and mark the energy centers, or chakras, with circles or spirals.  Red for your root (at the base of your perineum), orange for your sexual organs, yellow for your solar plexus, green for your heart, sky blue for your throat, indigo blue for your “third eye”, and purple for your crown, located just an inch or so above your head.  Now starting at your root, ask yourself what your survival self might have to say to you.  Do you have concerns about basic survival issues:  food, housing, feeling like you have the right to be here?  If so, or if you hear anything from your intuition about this aspect of your life, write it down.  Move through your energy centers, asking, listening, recording, honoring, thanking.  How is your sexual self?  How are you relating to sexual intimacy, whether partnered or by yourself?  What about sensuality?  At your solar plexus, ask about your sense of personal power.  At your heart, about love.  Do you feel loved in your life?  Are you sharing your own love with others?  At your throat center, clear your throat, then hum a little.  Are you expressing yourself as you would like to at this time of your life?  Are you aching to say something, but refrain?  Why? Now at your “third eye”, what do you see?  What do you see in certain people, in certain situations?  Let yourself see and know what you know.  At your crown, ask about your openness to transcendence, your spiritual connections.  Is there anything that this part of you wants you to put into words and write down?

Take a few deep breaths, have a glass of water.  Reflect on what you wrote.  Is there anything you felt that you haven’t yet recorded?  Even if you don’t quite have the words right now, try just a word or two, or even leave a space or draw an empty box in order to express your wordlessness.

On another day, go through other systems of organization that you know about, such as the four directions (or seven, or eight directions, depending on how you’ve learned about these symbolic systems).  Ask yourself what you know that you haven’t yet been acknowledging about these symbolic areas of life experience.

Metaphorically ask each part of yourself “How’s it going?  Anything new?  Do you need anything?”

Ask the different voices in your psyche the same questions.  We all have our “on the one hand”  and  “on the other hand” voices.  Too many of us have voices of other people within us who criticize us or demand too much.  Some of us are lucky enough to have the voices of those who have loved and encouraged us within ourselves.  Hopefully, all of us can hear the quiet voice within us of our True Self —- at least, if we listen for that voice.

Doing these kinds of scans regularly, whether every day, every week, every month, or every few years can be really helpful in owning whatever wisdom we’ve been accumulating through our life experience or through our conscious study.  It will help us pay attention to areas of our bodies or our lives that are needing help in some way.  It will help us to either balance out our lives, if that’s what’s needed, or else to acknowledge areas of particular concentration for a phase or for a season. It will also give us information about where we might most effectively direct our energy into the world around us. After all, “my” is “our”, ultimately.

Reaching for knowledge, and with love,

Cat

Dear Friends,

It’s my intention to offer journal prompts on most Fridays.  Many of us have a little bit more time on the weekends to play in our journals; many of us take a little time on Sundays for some Depth Dimension exploration; many of us take a Sabbath on either Saturdays or Sundays.  So I’d like to offer a question or suggestion to add to your reflections, something to help you explore life and create meaning from the raw material of every day.

This week’s question is related to my process in creating “Listening for the Red Thread”, both the painting and the poem:

What issue in your life do you have a push-pull relationship with?  What issue do you do a “on the one hand. . . . , but on the other hand. . . . ” with?  Is there something you’d like to do, but as soon as you think of it, another voice in your head warns you against going too far in that direction?  Is there an issue in your life that you know you need to find a balance in, but that balance has so far been very elusive?  Write out the issue as clearly as you can, then write a letter to yourself accessing the voice of your inner wise self to answer the dilemma.  Or, imagine that the Sacred, or a guide, teacher, or saint is responding to you, and write what they would tell you.

An example is the inquiry at the heart of this painting and poem.  In my inner world I’ve so often gone back and forth between “I need to rest and take care of myself; with chronic illness and pain, it’s the most responsible action to take.  Besides, my body is crying out for it,” and “You don’t need to get lazy about this, Cat.  Yes, be good to yourself, but you shouldn’t get selfish about your needs.  There is still so much that you can, and should, get done.  Keep working as hard as you can.”

The result of this push-pull is that I’m either working too hard or I’m feeling guilty about not working hard enough.  It’s not a pleasant state to be in, to put it mildly.  Now, rationally I can work it all out, but feelings-wise, well, it seems my feelings have a life of their own which do not care all that much about my well worked out rational conclusions.

So I bring it to the canvas.  I write my intention on the canvas before creating my portal of the sacred heart, and as words came to me, or questions or images, I record them in my journal.  I include the words “compassion”, “rest”, “quiet”, and “contemplation” in the painting.  After I finish the painting I write out the words, questions and images that came up for me during the painting onto a new piece of paper, then just sit with them for awhile.  Slowly, the poem is created.  It was a surprise to me that it came out in the second person; I think it’s the voice of my loving observer self, my wise woman within.

I don’t expect that I’ll never feel the push-pull again, but I do know that something got worked out within my psyche.  I also have the physical evidence of having reflected deeply on this question, and receiving an answer from a very deep part of myself.  If the questions turn up again, I’ll ponder my painting and poem, and hopefully, know then what is best to do.

Now, your turn.  I would love it if you post your response in the comments, if it’s not too terribly personal.

The photos below are the different steps in my painting.

With love,

Cat

(c) Cat Charissage, 2015

Listening for the Red Thread

Rest into the quiet, dear one.

Listen for the Red Thread.

You want to respond to the aches around you,

to the pain so visible to your x-ray eyes.

You want to share the wisdom pieces you’ve saved

sweeping up after so many messes.

You see so much . . .

Yet you ache, too.

You’re tired, so tired, too.

Rest into the quiet, dear one.

Listen for the Red Thread.

Mysteries within have moved mountains of intentions,

changed plans again, and yet again.

You can’t do it all, dear one,

not even just what you really want to do

not even just what you think you’re called to do.

But you still move forward, slowly,

15 minutes now, then again, and yet again.

Rest into the quiet, dear one.

Listen for the Red Thread.

Don’t push, you’re not lazy;

no dynamite needed here.

Cherish self, your inner circle of all,

where you have most influence

even within mysteries of unexpecteds.

Enough sleep, good food, these can be chosen

today, and another today, and yet another today..

Rest into the quiet, dear one.

Listen for the Red Thread.

Remember the golden heart, dear one, where

Love protects your aliveness.

Follow the Red Thread to its center

and intuition will show what’s next.

Your x-ray eyes might see the Red Thread’s tangles

But only your piece is your piece to hold.

Your piece is your peace, in quiet,

in contemplation you’ll know the

compassion to cherish self,

your own center of it all.

Rest into the quiet, dear one.

Listen for the Red Thread.

Dear Friends,

Final call for registering for this coming Saturday’s workshop!

ENTERING THE LABYRINTH

You can’t get lost!

(c) Cat Charissage, 2015

Saturday, March 7, 2015, 1:30 – 4:00 p.m.

Registration or questions:  catcharissage@gmail.com

Will you enter the labyrinth to meet your Muse, the figure of your Inner Guidance?  Imagine what it would feel like to use Intentional Creativity as your tool for joyfully playing with image, color, and word to get to know this Muse within you!

What will happen when you allow both sides of your brain, the logical language side and the image filled, colorful side, to speak to yourself and to the world?  Explore the way of Intentional Creativity to access your inner wisdom of juicy color and possibility.

Join me in:

• Red Thread Circle
• Labyrinth teachings
• Labyrinth Creation and Meditation
• Writing a letter to your Muse, your Inner Guidance figure
• Written inquiry and invitation to write poetry
• Painting a first image of your Muse.

You will leave with images of 2 types of labyrinths, a prose poem, and an 11” x 15” outline painting full of luminous color.  No art experience necessary at all!

We will meet in the Red Thread Study in my home in Lethbridge.  All supplies are provided.  Since I work with microgroups (2-5 people) or individually, there will be plenty of time for individualized attention.

Your investment:  $150, or if two or more register at the same time, $99 each.

I am deeply committed to making this work accessible to those who want to participate; if finances are a barrier, contact me for work exchange or scholarship possibilities.

Contact me at catcharissage@gmail.com for registration or questions.

Sovereignty, (c) Cat Charissage, 2015

Sovereignty

— Cat Charissage, February 2015

I am mine own.

No one owns me, though dear body

remembers too many generations of domestic servitude,

captivity.

But now, HERE I AM:

Full, beautiful, whole, kind.

Mine own.

Bounded, but bounded with blessing:

This far, no further.  Go in peace.

I will choose

where to place my attention,

how to spend my time,

whom I will be with.

And I do choose.

I choose to share the treasure of

pen and brush and needle.

I choose to create beauty,

to nurture liberty — for you are your own, too.

I choose

to surrender to the greater Love,

to take my part in the greater Mystery.

Here

I

am.

Dear Friends,

When I have posted my paintings and poems before, some of you have been so interested in seeing photos of my painting while in process, so I’m including them here.

Many blessings to you this last week of February of 2015.

Cat