the STONE : i le va

In Samoan, i le va should mean "in-between" and this is how I felt most of the week. Basically, antevasin, which if you have followed me before, is Sanskrit for "at the border" : अन्तेवासिन्

If you read the previous entries, you know that I would write weekly, on a Saturday, but what happened during this week calls for an extra entry. And here it is:

I felt I needed to pull some other cards, on Sunday. And I felt drawn to A Yogic Path Deck, by Sahara Rose:

and these cards described perfectly how I was feeling, like if a door was shut and I was stuck, where all my plans were to fall apart. With me, not living in alignment, Kriya was all this and asked for meditation and a shift in direction towards clarity and Truth. Niyamas hinted at change and personal transformation as a life-long practice and it was asking me, directly, what my Divine Purpose was, my Dharma. It suggested I continue with meditation and especially Svādhyāya, or Self-Study, and to dedicate extra time to the celebration and contemplation of Spirit. Do I dedicate? Do I surrender? Or do I keep on trying to do things my own way?

Since well before this journey started - and, again, if you had read some of my previous entries you would know - I have been hinted to the Surrendering of the Ego, to give up myself, to dissolve. And maybe, maybe, this time I am ready to admit that all my efforts to reconcile my opposites lie in my surrendering and openness. Maybe this long and tiring journey which started with a very young girl who celebrated Mass in her bedroom, through all my studies, praying, hoping, reading, reciting, observing, exploring, testing, questioning, rebelling, searching, chanting, believing, ... maybe this journey can find an end here. Or at least a form of respite. A moment of peace. By surrendering, by opening, by admitting, by showing.

More than anything is the fear of losing what I have now. I feel that if I have to renounce who I have always "wanted to be" in favour of "who Dharma wants me to be", I have to give it all up, façade and all. I spent a couple of days making it lists of who I think I am and who I really am, like my two personalities (as in a very Jungian way, of Personality #1 and #2). The mathematical, logical, black and white, Italian, determined, a tad arrogant, assertive, rightful, opinionated, strong and masculine; and then on the other side it's the spiritual, colourful, alternative, not-caring but empathic, that woman who meditates and is spiritual, who believes in Kali and uses her heart over her head. On one side the ambitious, on the other the God-will-help. Admiring the cockiness of Liam Gallagher or crying myself to sleep.

It feels that I cannot be one without the other one, and they do not work together. It is exhausting. Pretending to be one thing and being strong and then letting go and falling apart. It is a cat chasing its own tail, over and over again. And feeling, feeling all the time...

I don't know which one is the one that is liked the most. I like them both; and I like none. And I cannot choose who to be.

During one of my reading, while looking to make sense of all this, I followed a thread which took me to Pluto, via Tzvi Freeman who said that God can only be found in paradoxes. Pluto was always present in my life: whether it was the earthquake, my father's death, my brain shutting down, my moving to this country, or losing everything, Pluto was always in a strong antagonistic position with either my Sun, my Moon, Uranus, and even Jupiter (the logical me created a magnificent excel spreadsheet with all the data...). And Pluto represents the need for safety. Pluto is the dread I have always felt, the anxiety, the friction. This unbearable pain of living I feel at times. My need for safety, as in any child with CPTSD, allowed me to create this schism in personalities. Pluto destroys the Ego because Pluto is Kali. Pluto is the God of the Underworld, the destroyer of the Ego. And guess what: one of his symbols is the horse (pls, see last week...). If Pluto is Kali, she has always been with me, in her destructive power but also in the transformation, in my growth, in me being safe, regardless of what was going on around me. Destroying my ego means accepting to Trust her, to Trust her within me; to let go of what I don't need, and who I don't need; to open up to the Real Me. And to follow my Dharma.

I ended up scared, frightened, locked in in a place I don't like that much. But I also ended up on YouTube where I found a video that was helpful and which contained a link to some suggestions re. a specific form of journalling and a Vedic Meditation (which is the basis for TM).

And you know what, that worked for me.

Moreover, because Kali never ceases to amaze me, when I sat down to meditate I was asked to think about a mantra to repeat: I tried the word "safe", but it didn't work. Then I tried the sound "bla": nothing. And then... the sound "ma" appeared. And "ma" is just perfect, for me. म ("ma" the 25th consonant in Sanskrit), as the name of Brahman, mother, abundance, Lakshmi. But also...