Struggling with my Third Chakra: Murkiness of Power

A few weeks ago I went to paint my third chakra: power, will, ego.  I thought I was set.  I did quite a bit of work prior to going: reading and listening to Anodea Judith’s stuff on the third chakra, writing in my journal exploring myself in relation to my power.  As it turns out, this stirred stuff up and I ended up battling my painting until I came to a moment, a glimpse, a breathe of closure for the night -- a long late night.

My painting began as an expression of the third chakra -- what I wanted it to look like, what, if it was whole and open and flowing, it would look like.  It was gorgeous.  I loved it.  A large yellow circle began in the middle of the paper.  Then I began to pull down the upper chakras, green, blue, purple; and spiraled them into the yellow center.  I pulled up the lower two, red and orange and spiraled them into the yellow center.  I worked at adding different shades, blending them together, allowing them to mesh, mix, intertwine, and be distinct.  It was enjoyable and I was having a blast!

(I’m sorry that I didn’t take a picture of the painting before I ‘ruined it’.  However, I was playing on my iPad Sketching Ap and created the gist of it.  This image is not as cool as the painted one, but it will give you an idea of the flow, the spiral, the center of yellow bringing together all the chakras in order to ignite and manifest my power in the world.)

When I was done bringing together, blending, spiraling the energies into my 3rd chakra, I wanted to explode that center out across my painting.  I struggled with how to do that.  I landed, after attempting a few different things, on ripping up paper, covering it with yellow, and placing it over the painting shining out from the center like the rays of the sun.  I had a great time.  I love ripping and tearing paper; the sound it makes; the feel and release that come with the tearing movement.  I totally got into it.  I used all the different shades of yellow.  Dumped glitter on them.  Smiling.  Emanating the rays out.

Then all hell broke loose.  Really.  I stepped back (my first mistake) to take in the painting.  Tears rose.  The wound that I thought I had painted out appeared, there in the rays.  Some were solid rays stretching the entire length of the paper. Others were shorter with breaks between them as they reached for the edge of the paper.  When I looked I saw what my chakra looked like, what had happened to my power as I have moved through adulthood, how wounded it has become.  It brought me to my metaphorical knees.

That wound, the one that came forth in my goddess painting, right across my voice, heart and power chakras.  That wound that I had painted out with ash creating a wound on that canvas. That wound that caused me to experience myself split in two, working hard to integrate my dreams and visions back together into one authentic expression.

That wound arose again.  I thought it was gone.  I thought I had painted it out finally when I finished the ash painting.  It felt like it.  That day I was on my knees, tears flowing, clearing, cleaning my soul, cleaning the wound.  But it seems that was only another layer of it.  My teacher shared that she continues to paint out wounds she thought were gone years ago, surprising her again and again.  I found comfort and courage in that.  Comfort that this was normal, for the wound to bubble up again and again a little more each time.  My teacher reminded me that "It only gives you as much as you can deal with in the moment." Courage to face it, to engage it, to have a paint-filled conversation with it.  And that is what I did.  And that is what the next two hours of tough, struggle were all about as I worked and reacted and struggled through the muck of power and woundedness.

I had this deep need to try to bring the rays together back whole solid again.  I attempted a few different things and it was not working.  I so want my power to be whole.  I want my energy to be full of vitality.  I want my will to be strong.  I want to live full of compassion, using my power to transform the world around me. But I learned that will not happen until I wade into the muck of what it means to engage your power as a woman in this culture so steeped in power-over, in silencing women’s voices.  So I began. 

I invited the purple to flow, to teach me, show me, guide me in how to bring it all together.  I flowed it, spiraled it down around the the yellow to the bottom corner.  I pulled the red from the yellow and spiraled it around.  I pulled the green and blue and spiraled it down and around.  

I took a deep breathe and waded deeper in putting a large yellow circle in the top corner.  It came out green.  I added more yellow but it wanted to remain green.  So I let it. Ugh!  

I put a blue circle in the bottom corner.  That one took.  It  came out blue.

There they sat opposite, far apart.  Both wounded.  Both connected by this deep tearing in my soul.  My voice, my ability to express myself in this world wounded as my power and heart were wounded.  It hurt deep down inside to put these two circles up there, apart, alone.  It was right.  It was necessary.  For now that is what my third chakra looks like, that is what my power is like.  It is torn in many pieces, spread out, silenced, working hard to voice itself, to manifest my hopes, my wants, my future, this re-awakening I am in the midst of.  Both needed to show up on their own, standing as beacons of hope, resurrection and wholeness.

And that is when the flames began to pop up, flame up from the bottom of the painting.  As I gave way to the wounds and accepted them, welcomed them, allowed the hope for wholeness to come, I felt it ignite inside myself.  I felt the fire begin to burn once again with a burst of energy.  I painted those flames.  I got into pulling them up.  Allowing them to take over as much of the painting as they wanted.  Reaching right up to that yellowish green circle -- right up through my 3rd chakra to my heart.  I allowed that connection, that integration to begin. 

I breathed deep as the movement subsided.  I breathed deep in a moment of closure.  I breathed deep in a moment of acceptance.  I breathed deep in a moment of true deep tough agonizing healing.  I breathed deep thankful for the courage to engage...

Flowing with the Energy of the Paint

I came to this painting differently than I have with others.  I wanted to continue my conversation with the paint that I am having around integrating my multiple dreams in life.  This time, I decided to set my intention in a different way by asking the painting a question; literally.  I began the painting by painting words with my fingers on the paper; words that represented the dreams that I am seeking to incorporate into my life.  I used the color themes from the previous paintings  -- purple, green and red -- to ask the question.  Then I rubbed the questions, the words, into the paper, into the painting, setting my intention; asking my question.

As I painted the words on the paper, I received an invitation to continue to paint with just my hands.  This changed the painting experience for me.  It became more physical.  There was nothing between me and the paint.  There was no space between the energy of the paint and my energy.  I experienced this painting.  My body had to be fully engaged in the painting for it to happen.  And that was a powerful experience that really brought to life the flow of my energy in my body.

I began by forming circles on the paper.  Purple circles.  Green circles. Red circles.  Then I started moving, blending the paint; pulling the paint up and down, left to right;  allowing the paint to flow however it wanted to.  I added more paint, different colors where I felt the invitation.  I rubbed them together flowing, curving according to how my body wanted to flow with the paint.  Some times I slapped the paint on, large quantities of paint.  Other times, I used one or two fingers to add various amounts of paint and rub them in.  And yet, at other times, I gently added tinted white to bring out the flow of the paint, to allow the colors to do what they wanted. 

I found at times I worked vigorously, really working the paint, the colors and paper together.  At other times, I worked gently enhancing, adding details to the flow.  

For much of the time, I left the bottom right corner empty.  I put a circle there.  First purple.  That wasn’t right.  Then lighter purple.  Not right.  Then white.  Definitely not right.  And finally yellow.  Yes, yellow felt right.  I added different tones of yellow allowing them to come together and become the yellow they wanted to be.

Between changes of the color of the circle, I returned to the flow.  I flowed around that circle awaiting the moment of YES!  And when it came, something broke free; something released inside me.  Something invited me deeper and deeper into the flow of my energy, into how it was flowing, where it was not flowing.  I ran out of time.  The “ah ha” moment came at the right time; awakening me to the work that needs to be done; to the call to go deeper into my chakras, into my energy, into what the Holy is inviting me to do and be in the world.

I have been doing just that for the past few weeks.  I have started writing morning pages (a spiritual discipline suggested by the Artists Way).  I have explored those monsters in my life; those people and experiences that have squashed my energy, my power, my will.  I have written them out realizing that the theme is about my voice in the world.  And that makes sense to me.  

Blue is the color of the throat chakra, the voice, the place from which I communicate my truths and express my thoughts, beliefs, opinions in the world.  Blue is a color I have longed stayed away from in painting.  In my personal supply I don’t have any.  I covered the blue ray in my goddess paint with clouds and the spiral journey.   Blue is the color I chose for those tears on my second chakra painting.  Blue was the hardest color to add to this flowing painting.  (I glossed over the blue time and time when I went to pick a new color.)  Blue is my block; where my energy gets caught; where I have experienced deep spiritual violence.

And that makes sense to me.  I am stuck in the awakening of my dreams and visions.  I am stuck in bringing them to fruition.  I am at the place where I need to use my voice to begin to express and develop these dreams in myself and in the world.   I am at the gathering place -- the place of gathering those who will help me discern and ignite these visions in the world. This requires my voice...

The journey toward integration continues....

A continuation of painting my sacral chakra...

My teacher’s comment regarding painting green and purple on my sacral chakra painting -- “It is there.  Deal with it. (what I heard not so much her exact words)”  has been echoing in my head.  I decided to take this one step further.  I  decided to paint another painting with the question of integrating these two dreams together in my head.  Are they complimentary dreams?  or Are they conflicting?

Images had been coming to me in my dreams, images expressing a merging and yet a distinguishing of these two dreams.  It was almost like they are distinct and yet not.  I don’t know how to explain it.  That was the feeling inside myself that I needed to see on paper and explore through paint and brush.

So I got out my paint and brushes and sponges and paper.  I set up my table for painting.  I set out on this journey to paint out this vision that had been haunting my dreams -- awake and asleep.

I began by painting a figure (myself) standing in the “Bring it on” yoga pose (as a friend of mine has named it), with my arms stretching up to heaven and my feet rooted solidly on the ground.  It feels like a cross between bring it on and praise of the Holy.  I split the figure in half; half green, half purple.  The head reddish-orange.  I worked at melding the purple and green together and it sort of worked, but not really.  I added some white and began to work it into the purple and green.  That was better.  It made it look like the figure was clothed in a multi-colored robe. The head became a sun.  Yellow shining forth from it flowing across the painting.

Then I moved further into the image of my dreams.  The figure in my dreams became a tree that integrated both dreams together.  I added branches flowing from the arms, flowing outward.  The branches curved again into spirals.  That I did not expect, but I should have.  This integration is a journey, an exploration.  It is rooted deep in my spirit and soul, deep in my grounded self.  So I brought the branches down to the ground, bringing the brown into the green and purple and white of the robe.

I picked up the sponge.  I began to add the leaves.  Purple.  Then green.  Then another shade of purple.  Then another shade of green.  I layered them one on top of the other.  I let them come together however they wanted.  

And this is when the journey of this painting become most interesting.  The leaves, the branches, the tree really brought to the forefront the head of this figure.  It seemed to stick out, not right -- at least to my gut.  Orange red did not work.  It did not bring together the two dreams.  So, I left it.  I walked away for a bit to give myself some time away, to allow the work that was done to settle in my spirit and soul.  I took the pup for a walk.

When I came back, I looked at it again.  It was definitely not right.  It needed to be a different color.  I attempted to lighten it with yellow, but that did not work.  Then I had this idea...what if these dreams were like a yin/yang in my life?  So I picked up the brush and sponge and created a yin/yang symbol where the head was.  When I was done, I looked at the painting.  This change, changed the entire painting; the feel of the entire painting; the expression of integration -- and not in a good way.  It felt split.  I could see distinctly the green and purple and how they were not melting together.  And I felt somewhat defeated.  It felt again like that reaction to my sacral chakra when I first put the purple and green together.  Wrong!

“Deal with it.”  Echoing again in my head.  

Deal with it.

Ok.  Breathe.

I went back to the spiral, to the motif of journey and process.  I painted a spiral of the opposing color coming down the side of the trunk and spiraling out at its root.  It pulled the painting further apart, segregating more and more the two colors, the two dreams.  

This yin/yang was not working for me.  It was not helping me express integration.  It was helping me clarify what these dreams were not about.  But how they went together, not so much.  I left it on there though.  I continued the journey to explore the spiral roots of this tree.  I painted a garden on one spiral, combining the colors green and purple.  The purple garden growing out of the green spiral, blossoming out of the center of the spiral.  I liked that.

I painted a forrest growing at the base of the purple spiral, bringing together both the green and the red (from the head).  The leaves appeared unexpectedly, but really brought the spiral to life.  These I liked.  I liked seeing how each dream can bring the other to life.  How each separate dream can offer the grounding fertilizing soil through which the other dream will grow to its fullness.  That is cool!

But I was left with this yin/yang head that was just cutting at the core of the painting.  Look at it.  It really takes away the integration of the two dreams.  

I walked away again.  I gave myself a break from the work.  I was worried that I was running away from the challenge put in front of me.  But I had not clue was to do.  I had no clue where to go.  I sat quietly in the other room.  I played with the pup, because as soon as I sit quietly all pup toys end up at my feet.  What else can you do?

It was in the first game of tug -- real game of tug where the pup was working hard to win -- that it came to me.  The head, the center, the sun (so to speak) of this painting had to meld the two colors together into a color spectrum from purple to green and then smudge into the rest of the painting.  So I went back (to the chagrin of the pup) to the painting.  I picked up the purple and green and covered the yin/yang.  I used the sponge to bring the colors together, to meld them so that you could not tell where one begins and the other ends.  I added yellow to the edges and rubbed it in, pulling the color outward and integrating the edging into the painting.  Then I stood back and looked.  That was better. 

I added more yellow coming from the center, from the sun and shining outward over the entire painting, over the leaves, over the trunk, over the meadow of flowers, over the forrest.  And I left the painting, not sure if it is done.  But I left it with my teacher’s question echoing in my head, “Tell me three more things you can do to this painting...”

It does not feel done yet, just like my sacral chakra does not feel done yet.  It feels like I have made good progress in this processing.  Every time I look at it, I ask myself what three more things can I do to this painting.  One answer comes again and again:  Make the sun rise over a mountain where the peak is a light purple and the shade changes to a deep green by the base.  Yet fear rises within me -- fear of ruining the painting; fear of covering over what it there; fear that is causing resistance, resistance to go deeper and deeper and deeper. 

I need to just do it.  I need to take that deep breathe and paint that mountain and break through this wall of resistance....and yet I haven’t... I just keep staring at it wondering...  

Working at Integrating my dreams....My Sacral Chakra

I was not ready for what happened in this painting.  It had been an extremely busy week.  I had to get all my hours in before heading to PA to paint.  I wrote two sermons, prepared bulletins, prepared for Saturday’s confirmation, planned ahead in worship, and fulfilled the normal office-oriented stuff that comes up all in two days.  

The night before was Ash Wednesday.  I had to preach.  I set up the altar and displayed my paintings.  I preached.  I preached about rebirth and how we are born anew from the ashes of our lives.  Then I got in my car and drove to Philadelphia.

I painted my sacral chakra the next morning.  I did not feel ready for that.  I had not begun to transition from paying attention to root chakra to moving into my sacral chakra.  AND I brought my paintings to discuss and process with my teacher.  

So, it felt abrupt to move into this painting.  I taped together two pieces of paper and put it up on the wall.  And I stared at it.  I went and got orange paint.  I held it and stared at the paper.  I took a breath, put the brush in the paint and painted a line on the paper.  And I repeated it again and again.  Each stroke felt more and more wrong.  So I put down the brush and grabbed a sponge and covered the paper in orange -- completely.  That felt better, but not yet comfortable or centered.  And that is how I felt through this whole process -- off-kilter.

I stared at the orange paper and decided to implement the process I used to get into my root chakra to get myself into my sacral chakra.  I painted red up from the bottom.  I painted yellow down from the top.  And I came to the middle, the metaphorical place of my sacral chakra -- between my root and solar plexus.  All that I felt was tears.  Tears and more tears.  Stuck.

I attempted yellow right there coming out from the center brightening -- holy -- sacred.  But that was not right.  My teacher asked what was happening.  

I was stuck.  The last thing I did was so not right.  

She asked what I felt -- what color was there.  Green and purple.  

What shape.  No idea.  

Put green and purple on the paper and see what happens.  Paint it out....

I did.  I put green and purple on that painting and had such a strong hatred-oriented reaction to that movement.  I wanted with all my being to scrape it off.  

My teacher said no.  

I wanted to rip the painting apart to get rid of it.  

No. It is on there and deal with it.  

Ugh!!!  

What’s there?  Tears. 

Paint it!  

So I did.  I decided the way to paint tears was to throw blue paint onto the painting over the green and purple. It seems to be a theme in my painting... to get out the obstacles, to get the energy flowing, throw paint.  Throw it hard.  Throw it til that feeling goes away.  Then breathe....

When I breathed I saw it.  This Re-awakening that I am experiencing awakened numerous dormant dreams.  In this case green and purple.  These dreams that were re-awakened feel like now is the time for both to come to fulfillment.  But can they?  Do they go hand in hand?  Will they compliment each other?  Or do I have to give one up for the other?  Ah, the tears....

I found myself working hard to integrate these two dreams, these two colors, these two shapes together.  That is what I did with the rest of my painting time.  I worked and worked at it.  

I began with painting an upward flow switching the colors ending in spirals.  This is about the journey of integration.  I swirled the opposite color into each other spiraling again.  Hmmm another theme.  

But they were not coming together.  They were still quite distinct, quite separate; just flowing next to each other.

It did not matter what I tried.  That feeling did not go away.  I painted and painted.  It still felt split, torn.  I added brightness.  That exemplified the split in my soul; in my dreams; in my re-awakening.  

I think now that is where I am at.  I’m working at bringing both dreams to fulfillment at the same time.  They are different, drastically different.  And yet, they could be complimentary in time. 

This painting.  It does not feel done.  I have not signed it.  It sits and I stare at it.  I am waiting for the moment when it feels complete.  I think that it is point of this painting.  I am staring at the struggle to Re-Awaken, to weave together those dormant dreams, to explore all the pathways and allow the Energy of the Holy to illuminate which one when, then to mourn (if needed) the leaving of one or the other for a time; not forever, just for a time.

And so for now, I am waiting.  I am working.  I am following these separate, complimentary paths to dreams that I hope can and will integrate in time. I am keeping all the balls in the air... 

Bursting into Life....the journey of Lent

Tomorrow is Ash Wednesday and the start of Lent.  For me, it is the completion of a painting journey I have been on for the last month -- a journey to explore how we are reborn out of the “ash” of our lives; how reflecting upon this ash can rewaken our souls.  

Why? Because ash is the first symbol for the Christian Lenten Season.  My favorite artist and theologian, Jan Richardson, blogs in The Painted Prayerbook, “Ashes can be a thing of wonder, of rebirthing, of renewal. This day in the Christian year (Ash Wednesday), this day of ashes, tells us that ashes—dust, dirt, earth—are the stuff from which we have been made, and to which we will return. It seeks to ground us, to make us mindful of the humus, the humility, the earthiness of which our bones and flesh are made. And yet, in the midst of this, the season calls us to open ourselves to the God who brings life from ashes, who works wonders amid destruction, who cries out and grieves in the presence of devastation and terror, and who breathes God’s own spirit into the rubble.”

As I am preaching tomorrow evening, I wanted to know what that looks like.  What does it look like when life is reborn from ash, when the Holy breathes Her own spirit into the rubble of our lives to bring it to life anew; to bring wholeness, fullness, Energy?  I learned two important things on this painting journey.

Being reborn from ash is not a slow process where the Energy of the Holy slowly creeps in and covers the darkness of our lives, like Clifford Still’s paintings where color slowly creeps its way across the black bringing new life into the painting.  I thought that when I began this journey.  But as I allowed the creative process to teach me the truth of this Holy Energy, I have come to understand that is not the case.  Rather, the Holy bursts forth from within us; bursts out of the box we have worked to contain Her in like a supernova exploding in space; like a flame of fire bursting up from a pile of ash and wood.  

This rebirth is an explosion within our souls that unleashes a tremendous Energy to propel us forward onto a path that we otherwise would not have had the energy or willpower to take -- a path that will lead us, if we follow it, to a Re-Awakening of our Soul!  

It is a tremendous gift, that Holy shove out the door of our cocoons of safety.  And yet is it also a scary gift to loose the safety of that shell so quickly and, sometimes without preparation or warning.  It seems to me that this is the way the Holy works.  We get too comfortable, too lazy.  We accept our lives the way they are.  It works for us.  I may not feel passionate about what I’m doing.  I may feel stuck.  I may feel boxed in.  I may feel contained.  But, that is okay because I’m comfortable and I can live with that.  I’m nesting, settling....

In my life, that is when the Holy comes and bursts out of Her box cracking the shell of my cocoon and leaving me bare to the world around me.  Sometimes it does not feel like a gift.  This time, it feels like a gift.  This time, although I was not ready, the explosion gave me enough momentum to continue down this new and inviting path of Re-Awakening and Re-Visioning.

And that leads me to the second thing I learning.  This Re-Awakening and Re-Birth that starts with an explosion continues as a journey.  It is all about the journey.  We need that first huge burst of Holy Energy to get us started; to propels us forward out of the quicksand that has bogged us down; to give us momentum to continue down this wonderfully exciting and fearful path.

This is what Life is about:  the invitation to journey as close to the Holy as we can; whatever the Holy means you.  This Great Cosmic Energy in the World is inviting us to tap into Her Unending Reserve to Re-Awaken our Soul and in the process bring about justice and peace and shalom. 

Know and believe that what the Holy creates and graces and blesses may be beset and broken but will not destroyed. “Life finds its way: ancient memory takes hold, follows the path of the ash, inscribes itself anew, beauty blazing from the wreck and ruin” Re-Awakening our Soul. (Jan Richardson, The Painted Prayerbook)  Trust that this invitation from the Holy to set out on a journey that allows the ashes of our lives to be transformed and born anew, that invites us to tap into the Unending Energy Reserve of the Holy will Awaken our FULL selves.  It is an invitation to live LARGE in the world.  Unashamed.  Whole.  Strong.  Joy-filled.  Centered.   

It starts with that cosmic bursting within our Souls that propels us forward; that invites us to explore where our passion is; where our hearts are most alive; where are Spirits are least contained.  It beckons us to put one foot in front of the other as we follow the journey of considering what is most basic, what is elemental, what survives after all that is extraneous is burned away.  It is a journey to work through the chaos stripping away layer upon layer that threatens to dulls us to the presence of the Holy, and insulates us from that Energy that can bring us to a place of full Awakening.  

My advice:  allow that Cosmic Energy to burst forth from your soul and follow it.  It will take you to places you never dreamed of.  It is worth it!!

Ashes to Paint...

I pastor a very small church.  There are usually about 25 people in worship on a Sunday morning, choir included.  It is probably the smallest church in town, although there are two other small Protestant churches.  We have begun doing things together, worshipping together for specific occasions, such as Christmas Sunday and New Year’s Sunday.  So, we will worship again together, us and the Reformed, on Ash Wednesday, exploring what the Holy is inviting us to reflection up during this Lenten Season.  The Reformed are hosting, which I love because that means I can just show up and worship, maybe read, but not have to preach.  Well, not this time.  

Clyfford Still Painting

The Reformed pastor invited me to preach Ash Wednesday.  My head said no.  My gut said, “wait a moment”.  My creative spirit thought, “you could express Ash Wednesday through ash and paint, through art and preach from that.”  I liked that.  So before I could say no, I answered that I would preach and committed myself to this creative process and expression.  Then I walked in and painted my root chakra.  (Yes everything gets all intertwined in my life.)

Clyfford Still Painting

I began to have images and thoughts about the paintings.  I must take an aside and tell you that one of my favorite artists is Clyfford Still.  Clyfford Still’s art is mainly one color, black, textured with other colors creeping in.  My favorite is an all black painting with the hint of red on the edge.  It hung in the Art Institute in Chicago on one end of an open room.  If you turned around, another hung opposite it.  That one was mostly black with more color invading the black.  It felt like by turning around I moved from death to life, from woundedness to healing and wholeness.  I could feel a spiritual movement in my soul as I went from one painting to another.  I love those paintings and when I lived in Chicago visited them often.  They have stuck with me.  Now, with this invitation to preach, I felt an invitation to play with ash exploring through this style of painting how we are reborn out of the “ash” of our lives; how reflecting upon our past experiences can inform our future vision and growth.

Luckily for me, I was staying with friends who have a fireplace and use it!  Before leaving, we filled two bags with ash.  One from the bottom of his fireplace.  In it was not only ash but pieces of wood and kindling that had not quite burned completely.  The other from the basement where the extra ash falls.

Then once home, I went to the art supplies store and bought paint and medium, canvas and paper, paint brushes and sponges.  Medium to turn the ash into paint.  I brought it all home and it has sat for that last week or so.  I have busied myself with other things: painting doors and walls with rollers, cleaning, writing sermons, working, walking puppy, laundry, TV -- all along ignoring that invitation to create.....until last night.

I took out all my supplies.  I covered the table with the plastic and drop clothes I dug out to paint the doors and walls.  I pulled out the paper and canvas and set it on the table. I opened the ash and began to mix it with the medium.  And I painted....

It was like painting with mortar, thick and rough.  I thinned it with water and covered the canvas.  The color was different than I thought it would be.  The texture was nice, interesting. It really would allow me to express woundedness quite well.  I began to layer it, creating texture, creating the wound.  

Then as I was mixing another batch of ash paint I came across those pieces of not-completely-burned wood and chunks of ash.  I took them and placed them in different places on the wound.  I sprinkled ash over it.  I then took more of the paint and began to work it all together, adding layers and clumps and texture where it felt right to do so.  I grabbed the large unbroken black chunks of ash and broke them apart allowing them to sprinkle on top of the wound.  Then I left it to dry, to harden...

I came back and added some red.  The red was too powerful.  It overpowered the painting and took away from the wound.  I tried to hid it with more ash, but that didn’t work.  I scrapped it off.  It left a hint of red stain on the canvas and I covered it with more ash paint.  The effect was cool.  That seemed right.  I did the same around the edges of the wound, integrating the red so that only hints of red appear.  And I walked away to allow it to dry.

I went and ran errands for a few hours getting all the business of the day done.  I got back and the painting completely changed between wet and dry.  The ash changed color.  The red stain became like clay hughed.  

I stared at it.  I took the pup for a walk.  I stared at it some more.  It seemed complete.  I had thoughts of wanting to add more color but my gut said, “no this is the wound.  Nothing else should distract from this wound.  It is a powerful wound, one that echoes the wounds of Christianity with ash and wood.  It is complete.”  I signed it.

I feel like I finally got that wound that resided deep down in my soul out.  It started with painting the Inner Goddess; with ripping the paper and creating that wound; adding color and flowers and working at expressing both woundedness and healing.  This time, I just expressed woundedness.  I allowed for that wound to show up on that canvas.  I poured into it the tearing that oppression and discrimination and abuse and violence does to our souls, especially when it is steeped in Christian doctrine; when its goal is to tear at the Holy residing in our soul, to take God away.   That’s why the red didn’t go.  This is Good Friday:  the darkening of the sky; the crucifixion; the tearing of the curtains on the Holy of Holies.  Then and now.  For Christ, for God, for me, for you.

What is My Root?

What is My Root?

As I wrote in a previous blog, I prepared for the painting of my root chakra.  I read all about the root chakra and what it governs.  I learned the foods and color and exercise that you could do to open your root chakra.  I wore red.  I ate root veggies.  I found amazing lavender chocolate.  And I walked and walked and walked putting my feet on the ground, feeling the energy of the earth under me. 

And I dreamed in red.  I dreamed images of yoga poses.  I dreamed of red rivers flowing forth from the Holy.  I dreamed of Paradise.  I was curious heading toward this painting experience to see what would happen when the brush touched that paper.

I started painting placing the image of my dreams on the paper.  I painted a red figure in tree pose in the center of the paper.  It seemed to me that energy radiated out from that figure and so I sponged color radiating out from the figure.  It was cool.  And that is when this experience got interesting...

My teacher came to me and asked if I was painting from my root chakra.  I thought so.  Wise as she is, she did not.  And, of course, she was right!  As I stared at the painting I was painting from my dreams, from my head, not my root. So I did the only thing that I could think of -- I painted down, down to my root chakra.  I took the brush and began to paint down turning the legs into a river --  echoing in my soul the images of first century Paradise. 

The invitation was to continue to paint down, down and wide.  So I added more paper and painted down widening out this river that was flowing from my soul.  As I filled the paper with red I began to realize that it was not a river but a meadow and the invitation was to inhabit that meadow, to bring to life all that is growing within the meadow of my spiritual foundation -- my root.

The problem  was that images of houses and boxes were coming into my head.  I knew in my gut that no box would ever appear on this painting.  I was not going to box or contain my spirit, my energy, my soul.    All that I have experienced over the past two weeks was about bursting out of boxes not being contained/housed in them!  I ignored those boxes, those houses, and turned to nature, to wonder, to exploring the image of the tree that was so powerful when I painted my Inner Goddess.  I began to paint trees and flowers and a river.  Then I put feet on the flowers.  I don’t know why.  It just seemed like that was the right thing to do.  It felt right.  It felt good.  So I did it.  I went back and painted feet on each flower.  And I smiled.  Something was opening up, moving, inviting me to move deeper toward the Holy inside of me.

That was when the figures appeared.  In yellow.  There but not there.  You can easily miss them when you look at the painting because they are so light.  Because they are LIGHT.  There in my soul, my spirit -- the Incarnation of the Holy.  In tree pose -- solid, rooted, spreading upward toward heaven, connecting heaven and earth.  In child pose, resting, stretching, being quietly.  In “bring it on” (as a friend calls it) inviting the universe to bring forth whatever it will, defiant, strong, ready to act in the world.  In seated namaste, mediating, listening, breathing in the Holy, centering myself.  There it is:  the balance between action and rest, between play and work, the Sabbath Center and how it is growing out of me.

I sat and pondered the painting, taking it in, waiting for the next invitation when  The Critic came.  This was not the invitation I wanted, yet one to struggle with.  It came and I felt unhappy with the painting.  I felt that the red of the meadow did not go with the red of the paper above.  So I attempted to blend it with a sponge.  Sponging the paint from the river above onto the meadow and back up, darkening the red of the meadow.  And that is when the Critic left, when the painting became physical and therapeutic and cathartic.  

Somehow when I painted with the sponge up a strong feeling said “Keep going.” So I did.  I kept sponging up.  And I saw it.  I saw the volcano of my soul ready to explode.  I sponged up and out in red covering all the purple, covering the initial figure, covering the paper with movement and explosion.  But it did not feel quite right.  It was not exploding.  It was emanating.  It needed to explode.

Ah, I could throw paint at the painting.  Yes.  That is it.!  I asked for help from my teacher who taught me the technique simply inviting me to just do it.  I did.  I flung paint at that painting.  I flung with all my might, all my frustrations, all my grief, all my loss, all my anger, all my energy.  It seemed too contained on one sheet.  It needed to explode more -- wider -- upward and outward.  So I added paper....

And I flung more paint.  Everything came up and out with that paint.  All the obstacles, all the blocks, all that which has contained me, boxed me, kept me from doing what I want to do.  All of it.  I threw it out of myself like a volcano that explodes.  I smiled and glowed.  This was fun.  It was powerful.  It was cool.  It was a crescendo, a finale.  

When I was done, done flinging paint, the painting was complete.  I sat down and looked at it.  It was complete.  There staring at me was a beautiful meadow nourishing my soul, allowing me to commune with the Holy, inviting me to allow this vision to explode forth into the world and follow it.