A Short, but Beautiful, Lesson

[redheart]

Originally published at Ekunyi's Embers. You can comment here or there.

Image of Hanny’s Voorwerp, the “Dancing Frog in the Sky,” from Dailymail.uk.

 

I sat in shrine and allowed the incense — a rich blend of tea leaves, sandalwood, clove, vanilla, and spices –to fill each breath. Having offered my daily prayer for the friend who continues her journey West, and sung my standard musical offering for each of my five, primary Names, the rest of ritual was open to whatever Netjer wished to make of it. Heqat and Hethert-Nut approached me as one, each taking a hand and pulling me over into a meditative state, swiftly but gently.

I floated amidst the stars, movement most easily accomplished if I treated the vast darkness as the great ocean and swam. As I righted myself, I became aware that I was some distance above the earth with my Beloved goddesses, their presences intersecting through the starry body of Nut that surrounded me. Hethert-Nut or Heqat-Nut, someOne in between, in that instant I could not tell them fully apart even though their voices remained distinct, comforting and encouraging as I adjusted my orientation to viewing the otherwise Unseen.

Why are we here, was my unasked question, known before I put it to speech.

“Look at the world, grandchild,” came Heqat’s quiet yet profoundly ancient voice.

I did, finding that in simply focusing on it, I could see, with no small amount of alarm, all the hurt and suffering, the wars and pains of the many people below. My mind “zoomed in” to a starving child, an explosion in the Middle East, a dying ebola patient. I had to retreat again to the stars after several more visions in this vein, and was immediately washed in a blanket of peace.

“You cannot stay here with us, not yet,” this was Hethert-Nut, Her presence a forceful wrap of comfort around my body.

Heqat murmured Her agreement, “No, some day, when your life has been lived. But child, you have only the one.”

Hethert-Nut’s agreement came with another emphasis of Her love of and pride in me, “Yes, and you can use it to balance these things you have seen.”

How? I wondered, still gripping to the security of these ladies of the night sky, holding to their unabating love and reassurance like the child in the darkness that I was.

“By living there, living there fully,” Hethert-Nut murmured, turning me back towards the earth which I saw now solely in the beauty of its turning surface, the incredible, mind-boggling majesty of its sheer existence.

Heqat became more tangibly Herself, “The earth is much like your body, my dear.”

I turned in Her direction, giving the glowing outline of woman and frog my attention now that there was a particular place to look.

“It has had its hurts, its hardships. Many challenges it has survived, despite the abuses its known. It is marvelously imperfect, and yet it is yours. Yours to live in, yours to inhabit, yours to claim and care for and love.”

I thought to a conversation I had with my partner earlier in the day, initially just sharing my frustrations with slight physical imperfections, but which later progressed to a traumatic experience that I had not spoken of in several years, nor ever fully dealt with. This had led to my hysterically crying as I drove us West across route 76, my subsequent embarrassment and horror, and finally my retreat into the power of my mind and my work, shifting my focus to to-do lists, planning, and mental games for the rest of our drive together.

Hethert-Nut held me closer as I put two and two together, “You cannot separate yourself from your body forever, child. It is a part of you, as much as the work, the challenges you set for yourself. You have to feel, you have to inhabit what was given to you, even if at times it is broken or hurting.”

“Live on your earth, little one. Live in your body. You have but one body, one life. Claim it, speak well of it, make what you can of it and you will do great things,” Heqat murmured, Her voice a thrum of words melding with the choir of frog song that She knows to be one of my greatest auditory comforts.

At their indication that it was time to go, I pulled myself back down into my body where I sat, kneeling, on the floor. I took a moment to inhabit that body, made myself aware of the sensation of my thighs pressing against my calves, where my hair fell on my neck, the nail that had torn the day prior, the dryness in my mouth. After settling into this state of mindfulness, this return to my physical body which I had been charged to inhabit more fully, I was greeted by another Name.

Aset-Hatmehyt, her crown shifting back and forth between the throne and the fish, approached on my left. She reminded me that part of my ongoing task was not only to inhabit my body, but to love it, and to treat it well. Fluidly joining me on the floor, she knelt and placed what appeared to be a small akhu star within my throat.

“A reminder,” She said, “that when you speak of yourself, you should speak kindly, with words that those who love you would approve of and agree.”

She then dissipated, leaving me alone with my many thoughts, and a profound sense of gratitude to all three Names who had shared this short, beautiful lesson with me.