Defined - accountability

In no way was my poem yesterday meant to be a victim poem, more of a mirror to look at as I progress on the evolution I seek.  I do believe I am an empowered woman, I am not feeling weak or lost like I was a month or so ago.  I am realizing may things about myself, the lies I buy into, the hypocrascy I have embraced disguised in my dianic path.  I do believe that part of my mistrust has been a survival instinct to protect from repeating past decisions, however, I am guilty of steroeotyping men into a lump catagory that is just as unfair and unjust what I am working to combat as a woman.  I am asking questions in this blog, not to make myself a victim of my circumstance, but more to hold myself to a higher accountability than where I have held myself before.

And women, as a gender are just as guilty of stereotyping ourselves in the words we say, the looks we give, our own judgements of others actions.  How often have you heard of a sexual assault, or harrasment happening and the words are said, well if she wouldn't have dressed like that, if she wasn't such a flirt, if she wasn't such a lush.  We look at other women and deem them slut, whore, bitch because of things other people have said, a preconception because of underlying insecurities and jealousy.

It is said we make the examples for our children.  Wow, my oldest is now in 7th grade, and already girls in her class are being labeled as slut, easy, and whore.  Many of these girls I know and the label is far from the truth, yet sad because if one person says it, they all jump on.  I have had to have the discussion with my children, about being careful of labels, because unfortunately, who you hang around with, will label you for your whole high school years.  I know the stories of these girls, I know they are not what they are labeled, I know why people are labeling them, and I tying to protect my own daughters being labeled, yet trying to teach them not to label.  Yet I as I talk to them, I recall my own labeling of women in the past, of calling them a slut and whore, annd then remembered the feelings of being called those words myself.

I have heard myself answer my daughters when they question the behavior of the boys their age with comments like, " well, they are boys and boys are stupid,"  " men are dogs", "well that is a man for you."  How can I teach my chidren not to prejudge when I have already prejudge someone based on gender or perception.

I wrote in my poem, DEFINED, how I alllowed words to define me, but in reading that I have to ask, how am I defining my daughters?

Mind Purge by Poetry

Defined

I am an empowered woman

Or so I have told myself,

But how empowered can I be if

I allow the actions of others define

Who I trust?

I was told as a child the man was head of the household,

He was to provide and protect the family he created,

And the man who chose to be my father,

Who was a mirror image of God on Sunday

And lied and cheated on my mother on Monday

Left when I was 9 to create a new family that fit his need better.

This was the example of what a man was supposed to be?

The man child who took in my broken mother

After her knight in shining armorer abandoned her,

More my age than hers, threw tantrums like a child

With the strength of a man, and the lust of a teenager

Who tried to turn his attentions towards me when she

Could no longer fulfill them, but ran like the child he was

When I protected myself with magic and blade,

Another example of what a man was supposed to be?

For mates I chose the abusive manipulative men,

Talking, breathing replicas of my fathers

Whose faces I associate with the words and wounds

Burned into my memory like a branded piece of property

No longer owner of my own identity, defined by

Their voices as they rewrote my character with adjectives of

Worthless, stupid, weak, bitch, idiot, useless, mindless,

Lazy, dumb, disrespectful, disobedient, whore……

And the more I tried to become who they wanted

The more I disappointed because no change was ever enough

For the man who was supposed to love me.

I contorted and twisted trying to conform into the vision presented

Of the perfection of the puppet mate they sought,

An actress compromising for the starring role,

Only to find my heart yanked out of my chest,

Causing a pain so deep that my emotions went numb

With departing words like, “My life sucks because you breathe air,”

Or the tender kiss goodbye with promises of tomorrow,

As he knowingly walked into the arms of another,

While I sat in confused bewilderment…what about me?

I found myself in Goddess, in fellowship with women

Who were just as lost and broken as I,

Proclaiming our injustices at the hands of man,

Blaming God and church, preacher and Father

For taking our identity away, defiling our womanhood,

Hating them for hating us,

Claiming we were accountable for ourselves

But using “men” as the bane of our existence.

Finding comfort in loveless sex singing,

“all acts of love and pleasure are her ritual”

Looking for love but sabotaging our own efforts,

Forgiving them in words but harboring hatred in our hearts

Because we, I , could not trust myself to trust a man.

I am an empowered woman?

How can I claim a Priestesshood in Her name,

If I place her creation, man, lower than myself by not trusting,

but prejudging because of gender?

How empowered can I be, if I continue

To allow the words of the past to define my present?

Silver Wind Woman

11.12.11

Sparkyisfourty@yahoo.com???

I have known that this year that when that this time of inward travel was going to be deep and difficult.  This whole past year I have been lost and confused.  I no longer felt comfortable in Of the Goddess Sisterhood, I have felt like it was not my place, the path of the Dianic Witch seemed foreign and unwelcoming.  I did not know why.  I decided that it was okay to not understand for awhile, it was okay to be uncomfortable and it was okay to walk away.  I felt the need to explore a different way of thinking, a need to find balance and in my deepest knowing I new I had to bring the God aspect into my life.  So in this period of not understanding the wall I felt in OGST, I began to read and research the Gods of different pantheons.

In September I decided that the only Gods I was drawn to were the Norse ones.  Uncomfortable to change from Dianic to Heathen but feeling right at the same time.  I spent the next month and a half studying Odin, Thor, Ulhr and Tyr.   Tyr was the one that called.  Mid October comes and I go to COVA, Colorado Organization of Victim Assistance.  Sat through classes on death notifications and Sexual Assault Psychology, Protective Orders all interesting, seemingly irrelavent to my spiritual path.  It was a great experience.

The Witches Ball comes, I go with my sister Sarajane and we talked about various things including my journey of the year.  We talked about the Goddesses I worked with and Ishtar was brought up.  She who called me, claimed me as her own.  I told Sarajane how nothing I had planned on doing this past year had happened, and Sarajane tells me how she could see Ishtar stepping back allowing me seach my God, because she new I could not grow until I understood the male side of my path, that Divine God Energy. 

We went to the ball, I left early.  On the way home, the veil opened and realization after realization hit me.  Last February I invited a friend of mine into OTGS, a friend who was experienced in Drawing Down.  She did a Drawing Down for the circle, many of the women on OTGS are solitary, do not do the public rituals and had never experienced a Drawing Down before.  The night progressed, I went last.  The first part of the message was a divine message, I still remember the words, but somewhere in the midst of this message the energy shifted, the Divine Energy left and the message became personal.  It was a message of this friends love for me and how much she loved me, how my daughters needed to be aroud her.  I let her talk and kept a straight face for the rest of the women in OTGS.  Inwardly I was pissed, totally livid.  After that incident, my daily communion with Goddess ceased, I stopped going to Circle, I aligned myself with other people.  I began to question the Dianic path, how so many Dianic circles are "man haters."  I don't hate men, I am not a lesbian, I am not a Femi Nazi.  The exclusion of men in Goddess worship, even in Wicca, though it is supposedly about balance it is Goddess heavy, the Gods are sexual and fluffy.  The is unbalance in a supposedly balanced path.  I found myself questioning more than I was finding answers. 

  Remembering this incident reminded me of an exercise we did in one of my COVA Classes.  It was an exercise that basically allowed us a glimpse of what a rape victim goes through.  And I realized that in my mind, this friend had violated the sacred space I held dear, it was no longer my safe place, thus I shut myself away from it, and removed myself from the circle. I made a vow right then to reclaim my sacred space and to reclaim my spiritual path.

So I set up new altars, began daily moments remembering Goddess and the vow of Service I claimed when I recieved my 3rd Degree.  I also began working with Tyr, in the way I knew as I read and research daily more traditional ways to work with Tyr.

The veil is still thin, there are spirits still wondering and close, I can feel it in the air.  Yesterday I sit down to sign into Facebook and Bill's email address pops up on the screen.  It made me feel weird and I had to think about it.  I asked last night before I went to sleep for insight.  The insight did not come in a dream, it first began to become clear in an email I recieved from an old friend of mine who asked:
 "Question..
Are you in a relationship at this time? When was the last time you were in a serious, real give and take, healthy relationship with a man?
Yes, there is a reason for the question. heehee..no trickery here."

Bills email address, these questions...I realized how much resentment I have harbored silently inside towards Bill.  Everytime the girls have a breakdown, act out because they miss their dad.  When they have Dads Week at school, and they don't have a dad to go with them.   How much I resent the the financial situation I have left because of him and people promising to help pay the bills but never actually helping. 

I begin to realize, I am drawn to work with Tyr to learn healthy interaction with men. Why Tyr, because he is just, fair, sacrificing, and wise.    I have to really analyse my resentments towards Bill and get rid of them. If I am to have a healthy relationship with men, I have to learn to trust myself in trusting men.  If I cannot trust, how will my girls ever learn to trust. 

Then I get an email from my friend who sent me the question.  I won't go into the email other than something she wrote, " We got to talking about men and how as a Dianic I've been accused of "man hating". The strangest thing happened was that I was explaining to her that I didn't hate men at all. In no way shape or form but I don't know...she said what do you mean you dont' know ...I said you know, it's not so much I hate them but rather I'm like you know, terrified of them. "

Which is exactly part of the realization that came to me this morning.  I do believe that working with Tyr in the spiritual, and seeking being around a Kindred, are steps necessary for me to heal, to get rid of resentments and to no longer be terrified of men, but to live with them in harmony and balance.  This is a harmony and balance I need to find within myself, and find in the physical world I live. 

The Bank of God

In 2004 when I had reached an absolute bottom in my life, I sought comfort in the one thing I thought could count on, back to church to find God.  So I went to a church, they happened to be having  a revival.  There were preachers there I had grown up with, Rod Parsley, Creflo Dollar and I was excited to hear them.  The first day, the sermon was about giving to the church and God would bless me.  The next night the sermon was about giving a double tithe to receive double back.  Third night I heard about how if I would give in faith all my needs would be met.  Well I was not in need of money, I was quite capable of working and taking care of myself what I needed was to know the broken heart and soul was loved and could recover from the ordeal that had caused the problem.  I walked out of the church and swore I would never go again, because if all those preachers wanted was money then the God I new was no longer in the church.

The other morning I woke up after falling asleep with the TV on to catch a paid for Church show that happened to be Rod Parsley's church.  And again, the sermon was about giving to the church to get back, this preacher (not Rod Parsley) even went so far to say that if people would give in the next specified amount of time, that God would give them back a 1000 fold return.  Really, 1000 times the investment is a pretty big promise of a mortal man to guarantee an Omnipresent being like God is promising. 

At first this show made me mad, I thought of Jesus and the money changers in front of the temple and how he got mad and destroyed thier tables.  I thought of how the church becoming secular was not a place of worship and fellowship like our anscestors wanted so long ago.  It has become The Bank of God, where people deposit their money based on empty promises by the preachers who would rather live off of the money of the people than to teach about love and compassion.  These religion brokers push greed, hypocrisy and hate.

But instead of being mad, this whole thing just makes me sad.  What about all the people who believe in God who are good honest Christians who are descent to other people.  Their God has made into something he was not.  Then I began to think about our country, Occupy Wall Street, and the correlation between The Corporations and The Church.  In both people are disposable, just faces with no names.  I think when we put "In God we Trust" on our money back in the 50's, a self fulfilling prophecy was started, but the God of money replaced the God of the people.