Reading the Tarot’s Wisdom: My window on society, women and peace.
The new year always brings up thoughts about the future. What’s going to happen this year? Is this the much feared end of the world? Or is it just an other year where we need to get realistic, not fearful.
I enjoy the deep mystery of the tarot cards. I celebrate the fact that somehow from the other side, the cards are used as a language of wisdom to communicate with us mere mortals. It makes me feel that we are not alone.
The 78 cards are like an alphabet. If you recall their meaning, their position in the lay out, synthesize all that with the rest, and a story emerges. There is a clear story every time.
It feels like somebody else is creating the lay outs, I am just a conductor of this magical happening. I lend my hands, then I lend my words.
The main point is still communicating wisdom. Wisdom is always meaningful work. Its always self examination, self blessings, rituals to open the deep mind and allow the new to flow in.
In my woes of financial insecurity, I had applied and gotten hired by an English firm to read cards on the phone. This was a very new way to read for people, mostly women. English women. And this psychic hot line was busy.
Sometimes women and men just want me to soothe their hurts, they want me to promise them a better future. This is not what I do unless this is what’s indicated in the cards.
As a friend of mine now long passed, Janet Mc Cloud, a native American leader said: ”If you just want to feel better, take a couple of Valiums and masturbate.”
Spiritual consciousness is keeping the deep mind awake and at task. The deep mind doesn’t need sleep. It can be trusted with sorting things out, making things clearer.
Its not always a happy joy moment. Growing into your wisdom is hard work, requires a commitment as all meaningful change in our life’s. But have you gotten anything better to do then advance your own wisdom??
I actually pay attention to the wisdom communicated to us. And the wisdom of the TAROT is as its name suggest, “rota”… rotation. The Wheel of Life always turns. The good and the bad are both temporary. But the life we live can be also “stuck” when it reaches one of the fateful points in life, like the pivoting points of 21, 28, 31, 45, 51, 52,59, 62, 69,etc. It’s up to us to help the changes occur smoothly by embracing them.
These are times when life is coming at us, we don’t have to do anything except to CHANGE within. The outside world changes along with the inner changes. We only have power over our inner life.
This is a skill which I teach my clients. I share with them simple spells, Self esteem rituals, anything to have them accept the Fates decree, all must change, not just the number of our years. Not all women want to change within.
Many women run old tapes, over and over again, stuck on one unreachable goal or an other. Years can be wasted with these useless goals.
Heterosexual women have a old promise made to them, since childhood fairy tales, and they still believe in this promise. Patriarchy promised good girls that a Prince will come and deliver them into society. Only a prince can make them part of the happiness all humans deserve. Until then they have to behave, stay home,serve,work, go to church, and don’t be selfish whatever they do. Because if you are selfish God won’t send that prince, besides the princes are in short supply anyway. Most of them have pot bellies, and love their beer buddies more than women.
This plays out tragically. Often women simply push their years after each other, not living their lives, because there is no man in it. When I ask them what did they do before they were told that a man is needed for their happiness, they cannot even remember. When I mention that what they mean probably is that they crave love, as all humans do, they repeat their question over and over again.
“Won’t you look again, will I meet a somebody soon?”
I talked to a woman 57 years old, who had never had a date with a man, never fell in love, never even left town. She was always a very very good girl.
I suggested she leave town for the weekend, and expose herself more to life in England. Sent her to submerge in the healing waters of Bath.
But deep down what I should have suggested to her was, have you thought about the possibilities that you may be gay?
How far can I go with my intuition? The English had many rules, this I wasn’t sure of, but to shake up a lady somewhere far away with the news that she is gay. Well, I didn’t do it.
On the day I was to be fired, I fired myself. This was no longer what I loved about the Tarot; total freedom, telling like it is, giving advise, stand in my integrity.
This kind of online reading, one after an other, many many of them, started to sound very much alike.
Will I meet somebody? Will I meet somebody? Will I meet somebody? Will I… etc.
The men on the other hand wanted to know about co-workers, can they be trusted? About investments, will it tank or make them more money? Jobs, do I have a chance ? Will I be fired? Will I find a new job?
To the men the answers were variable, normal answers yes or no, satisfied them. One actually asked about a girl, if she was interested in him at all, the answer was however also no. I told him approach her with flowers and tender talk, and see where it leads.
What broke my heart that these women were simply not interested in themselves. How about a karmic change? How about a new interest? How about a new passion? How about caring about the Earth? Bird watching? Ocean? Anything?? No.
These ladies had professions and working credit cards. They demanded the psychic service of soothing words, and a string of little white lies.
They welcomed my narrative about the spirit world, and how they are protected by them. I do believe that our ancestors are looking out for us, but who? Are they into matchmaking, or just save you from a car crash?
This was not TAROT. I started thinking about a new deck. Just for this service, the “psychic” readings. Very few cards. Or just hunches.
At my age, I am at the peak of my game. This is not the time to water me down, make me into a people-pleaser and not a priestess advisor. Wisdom is sometimes tough love. Truth is my duty.
Our lives are not just to be endured, but lived fully.
The Tarot calls our attention to the myriad of miraculous ways to be. This is the treasure from the ancient wisdom, our lives don’t revolve about men, or even sex.
Our lives evolve and revolve around the journey of our souls. The exciting coming to consciousness and perceiving the miracle of life and our role in it, makes a woman proud.
After our pride in being women, we need to rise to the idea that the world deserves humanity to be in concert with it, not against it.
Women have these values, peace, don’t hurt your brother or sister, eat your dinner, be grateful for your good health.
So far so good.
But women also want peace. Many women find love and meaning in working for peace.
Patriarchy can loose power over us in peace. Peace is only good for babies and civilizations and women and love.
Peace is the ground we can build our futures on.
The trouble with Peace is that it doesn’t make huge profits for only a few men. Peace is making good dividends for life’s quality and spiritual evolvement for all.
Peace is commerce, but fair. Peace is work. Peace is women’s value. Peace is good for children. Peace is great to build civilizations, invent new things, flourish the arts. Peace is entertainment with meaning.
Peace does not glorify violence. In peace manhood must be reinvented. Womanhood must be to the forefront of leadership.
Everything else has been done.
The 40th Anniversary of the birth of the Susan B. Anthony Coven Number One and the Dianic Tradition.
They had a throne for me to sit on. I didn’t want to. I am not a feudal lord, but I understood that this ritual was about the honoring me and themselves. About honoring the four decades of worshipping the Goddess; teaching new women and girls the Dianic Tradition. It is quite an achievement.
When we started the Susan B. Anthony Coven Number One in Hollywood there were only six of us present. It was Winter Solstice. We were all staffers from the LA Women’s Center. A very diverse group; Dixie a taxi driver union organizer, Joan my feminist mentor (we were in her apartment upstairs), Janet my first beloved, Susan and Joni, the married ladies who were lovers, Susan brought the Transylvanian goulash for our feast ALL the way from Marine. There was Barbara who was getting her Phd at UCLA in Shamanism and Possessions.
On this first Sabbath we had no culture yet. Who knew what witches do on a winter’s solstice? But we had me. Somehow in my genes there was a very strong strain of witchcraft passed down from my mother, who made a living by creating popular altars for the Magyar people; Madonna triple goddess altars, simple and long revered images with her special modern sensibilities. She was a temple raiser. So am I, but in the living temple way. My temple is built with the mothers and sisters, and now their girls.
On our 25th anniversary we had almost all the original members flown in to celebrate with us. This time it was only me from the original group present; at nearly 72 years old.
The Circle of Aradia put out a lot of effort to make this large gathering a success. There was a white altar in the middle with Diana of Ephesus statue with the many breasts, and the Fates, crystals and flowers.
White sage hung in the air.
All the women dressed in their finest celebratory fashions, we ranged from Greek classical shitans to silk shirts and pants, necklaces of every gem and pearls; and the crowns! I love seeing women crown themselves. Rabbit wore money necklaces and money earrings. (for prosperity).
Seven conga drums sounded the rhythms, and the ritual took off with energetic chaotic invocations to the four corners of the universe, and I invoked the center.
Oh Goddess of the ten thousand names come in to this circle of your sisters and bless us for 40 more years!
You know I had double hip replacements, and sometimes I limp from overexertion, but never when I am serving at the altars. I felt my body become the light youthful energetic body of the Goddess, no pain disrupted me.
At the candle lighting, as women took their light from my candle and the lights flickered all over the huge big hall. It seemed like stars were moving into our space, each woman a star, each woman a fate, each woman a light that will light many others.
Then I went around again, touching flames to flames. “Be strong!” I whispered to them, “Be strong!”
The women continued this theme, encountering each others flame to flame. “To Sisterhood!” We whispered.
Time usually gets suspended in a good ritual. Two ordinations followed performed by my first daughter Ruth Barrett H.P.
Lady Cerridwen was ordained to lead the Circle of Aradia in L.A. I had known this priestess since the mid-seventies, she is devoted and certainly will not miss the celebrations of the women’s community.
She will serve with a full heart and total devotion.
Lady Medea was ordained from Michigan, many of her coven members flown in to support her. This is the first time a priestess have taken my witch name Medea, it means medicine woman. I told her, “Wear that name well.”
After these important ordinations we have chanted the Isis, Astarte, Diana, Demeter chant, until we blended into a new chant. “Woman energy, Goddess energy, Good woman energy, Goddess energy!” This tune is easy to dance to and soon the women took off in an impromptu swirling. I started a little folk dance motive with everybody going around arms linked together dancing. Watching me my wife said, there was “not even a hint of a limp! Who are you and what have you done with my Z?”
NEW OLD RULE:
Tithing which was an ancient way to support the Goddess Clergy must come back. We are the only tradition who doesn’t support our Clergy with funds.
Here I was, documenting this herstorical Dianic event, participating in it at my age, and the Women’s Spirituality Forum Non-profit that I established for this purpose has never received any funds from this group. The Women’s Spirituality Forum Non-profit is ground zero for all Women’s Mysteries, ground zero for the return of the Goddess. Now we are everywhere. This has to be discussed right here and now.
So the NEW OLD RULE is:
If you have received any soul benefits from the goddess, read my books that opened your eyes, if your life has been changed by her, if you have gained happiness, hope, good luck, fertility, or any gifts, life changing dreams from the goddess when you called on her, please pledge continued funds to support this work into the future.
Four times a year, gift the Women’s Spirituality Forum a donation minimum ten percent of what you made. More if you can. I don’t believe that all women are dirt poor. We control trillions of dollars, wealthy women must make sure that their wealth is not isolating them from the unfolding herstory. Don’t let your handlers be in the power of your money.
Tithing money is to honor yourself and energize the Goddess work around the world. The planet needs women to spread the Goddess consciousness to all humanity. Survival alone is NOT enough. Occupy your own religion! We are worthy of your help, the work has been brilliant and selflessly donated already.
Bringing back the Goddess to women is to make us strong and our planet healthy again. The values of the Goddess is peace, culture and devotion. The planet needs these values. The planet needs women get serious about bringing back the Goddess with our hard earned funds to make our Clergy and especially Clergy Elders well supported and strong enough to teach.
And join the Dianic Tradition and the Susan B. Anthony Coven #1, established for exploration of women’s mysteries and the Goddess through our website: www.susanbanthonycoven.com.
I leave you now with this video on why you should support women!
I thought I’d drop in on this Thanksgiving and personally give you a huge thank you for this year. Of course I loved other years as well, but this year has brought so many changes in consciousness and health, and learning curves… that I have to take the time and tell you how grateful I am to the Fates.
Not all was fun, nevertheless I think you have outdone yourself if that is possible.
The year started with a big loss, Merlin Stone passed away in January. This was a shock because most of us didn’t even know where she lived, she has dropped off our radar many years ago. In a way it was good to find out that she was with us all this time, but also that she was very ill and in pain. Her passing however painful was a blessing. I don’t wish long life on anybody who is in horrific pain as she was.
Bobbie, my wife, and I have decided that we take the Goddess flag from this strong and important spirit, and carry on her memory and Goddess message.
Right after this loss, my little black Puli girl one day just refused to eat. For a Puli dog, this means the end. She was 12 years old, a respectable age for dogs her size. I put her down when it seemed like that’s what she wanted. They tell you in so many ways. My heart is broken ever since, I am huge animal/dog lover, and the walks we have taken together in the cemetery park became very lonely without her. I felt her spirit for a while when we started up the car to the park, I felt her behind me. I even talked to her, sometimes I could have sworn she rubbed against my feet .But now her presence had faded, and I think she has moved on. That hurts double .
We made plans to collect as many interviews from other Goddess feminists about Merlin Stone as we humanly could. We started in the spring, with Susan Weed, on her farm where I am teaching now almost annually.
On the other side of the Catskill Mountains we found my other long time friend Carol Clement, artist, now full time organic farmer. She was looking good, living her beliefs, earth-centered work, growing food and animals, selling humanly treated food, running her restaurant. She also has a nice husband, but he wasn’t around that trip. Farming requires a lot of errands. I miss Carol, or as we called her in L.A. “CC”.
We recalled some of our adventures, how we hooked up back in 1974. She just arrived in the city, she told me, and she was looking to something to do. There was a witch trial going on in L.A. She thought she could get a job as a court artist. She attended my trial, where I lost big time, but won nine years after many appeals. Later we met and had a book project together, SELENE the World most Famous Bull Leaper, which is now back in print via Amazon. There was nothing out back then for young girls to relate to, to be strong, and victorious.
As we pulled away in the car, I saw her face a little sad, she gave up her art for becoming a farmer. Love that CC. She is true blue! (thump on the heart with my hand.) She walks the walk. Her place is called Heatheridge Farm, she is getting very good write ups and you need a reservation to be there and eat.
I was grateful to feel her presence at this later time in our lives. I often go to her website just to see how the livestock is doing. There she is delivering little lambs, talking to her guard llamas who drive away intruders. Next time I make more time to hang with her.
My other long time friend Joan Nixon scooped up us and drove us around in NYC for the rest of the interviews. Then there was the relentless summer heat of the city. And each day had become hotter than the one before. We gasped for air, yearned for air conditioned spaces.
A highlight in our journey, we met and interviewed the legendary Gloria Steinem. I adore this woman, and I felt like a schoolgirl in her cool apartment. She lives in the upper east side, as she should, in a two story attended by soft spoken sari clad ladies from India .Gloria was not a religionist. I think she still isn’t, but after forty years she did see the importance of the Goddess Movement in feminism. Our paths have crossed several times in the past. She came though L.A. when she launched Ms Magazine. The fledgling Women’s Center called her up and complained that while she gets a hefty honorarium from the University to give a talk about feminism, the local women’s center, the practice of feminism is struggling to make the rent each month. Our sister Gloria generously said to send somebody to talk about the center. We can have the podium after she has finished, and she will donate to the Women’s Center $5oo dollars. That was a sum enough for two months rent!
I was dispatched to give my first public speech at the University (I have forgotten which one), and then fork over the money to the Center as promised.
Gloria and Ms. Sloan finished their magnificent speech, big applause followed and the audience started to leave. I wasn’t introduced. I took a deep breath and took the stage. All I remember is the back of the people as they started filing out.
I have introduced myself, and must have said something funny because there was a smidgen of laughing, then the audience turned around back, and slowly took their seats again.
I don’t know what I said, probably discussed the immediate issues at the center, personal stuff, like Inez a homeless woman who made phone calls to the Vatican, demanded to speak to the Pope, and we need the money to pay our phone bill. True story. In short, I found my voice as a speaker and found my inborn humor; and talent to be intimate with an audience without fear. It was an awesome gift this opportunity and it has launched me as a feminist speaker. I still have the zeroxed copy of the check Gloria handed me after it. I meant to show it to her to celebrate her awesome blessing on my life, but I didn’t bring it along. I’ll show it to her some other day.
Anyway dearest Goddess, I thank you for letting me finally be part of the greater Feminist Movement, not just a fringe element without the blessing of the legendary Gloria. Now we are official.
And I thank Merlin Stone. Because it was her who unearthed from the libraries of the world the remnants of our Goddess past. We all met “over her” as it were. She gave us back our past, she gave us a global heritage, not owned by any one group, but all women from around the world.
The journey was fast and we have collected more than 30 interviews from different women, some who knew Merlin, some who just felt her influence.
And in the middle of it all we put up our house for sale.
This blog is to be continued. Enough said for now, gratitude for the rest as well.
This year I have devoted myself to honor the memory of one of our greatest foremothers, Merlin Stone. We have collected interviews from about 30 contemporaries; she has brought us all together for the first time. East coast and west coast and the middle, all has given us rich material to celebrate and be proud of Merlin. The fragile sister who could. All of this work will be coming out in DVD when Bobbie gets to create it early next year.
In the meantime we are moving. I sold my home. Too many stairs, too steep. I could not even carry my own groceries in. We bought a smaller, but still cute home two hours south from Oakland.
My advice to many of my clients “learn to tolerate ambiguity” is now my own lesson. Ambiguity is hard to tolerate. Waiting for a loan to come through, nerve breaking. Dealing with paperwork, serious boredom and fear.
Diana Paxson and I have been working on Goddess in the Office rewrite and enhancement. Some say do not use the word “office” anymore, say “own” work; the future will have less workers in the office and more online elsewhere. What do you think?
My autobiography was held up too. Diana Paxson and I got a strong beginning, but I have not really dealt with the reflections and examination of my mission in life; when and how did I fall into this Goddess mission. I have however written up a lot of Forest Gump moments, all the funnies. But the meat of a good Ab is the reflections, the curve, the hindsight of how this life evolved. What were the forces that drove it. For some reason I couldn’t quite face it. But now I can.
When I visited in Budapest this summer, I looked at the house where I was born, the bunkers dark musty entrance to a life underneath the ground during the mass carpet bombings. I sobbed my eyes out for the little girl who was so brave and had her childhood ruined by the WWII.
It’s like my eyes have been opened, and I can look back and not be afraid.
In Glastonbury, I gave a speech about politics and spirituality. Yes, and the British gave me a standing ovation! I don’t remember getting a standing ovation for a long time.
My life was driven by politics, the Hungarian Revolution that opened up the boarders and I could escape. The help the Goddess Boldogasszony gave me, how her touch was all over my story. Now can be told.
But most of all I think the collective story of everlasting wars, the patriarchs depend on for their power is the main driving force of many lives. Wars waged over my house, the total loss of everything we had, the deaths of all grandparents, the starvation which all wars bring. And then the commies with their lies.
Many of these features are back again. This time here in the USA.
The political enviromement is very bad now for women everywhere, especially the young. Young women cannot stay stupid and let nature take its course because Nature is impersonal, she cares about making babies even when you don’t. She gave you brains. It’s up to your smarts to know your body, have some wisdom determining when you could or want to bear a child. No matter what the GOP is doing to abortion rights, girls, you always have herbs. You can have a quickening with many of the herbs free, but you cannot wait until it’s to late. Pennyroyal, Rue, just to name a few. A cup of tea at the time when you’re due and your period will return. No abortion clinics needed. No doctors if you are smart. If you ever look at a Mexican community, right in font of a home, a woman would plant a Ruta (Rue) plant, for good luck. Yeah right.
But the war now, this economic war, is directed against USA kids. The police are back serving the powerful. So is the Media. They are as mean and as lawless they were in the sixties. And no matter how dreadful they behave, they will never go to jail because they are trained to be mean. You are lucky if they don’t water-board you.
The media? We lost the media in the middle of the Information Age. You can only get what’s going on via the Internet on the uTube.
Regular media didn’t even cover the Wall Street confrontations, but you did mercifully dear MSNBC and Current TV.
Back in the sixties at least the battle made the cover of Time Magazine, when the hard hats attacked the long haired hippies. This too happened on Wall Street way back. Brilliant choice of targeting… Wall Street.
Not a word was on CNN, instead it was all about poor Michael Jackson and how he died poor lonely soul. Goddess bless and rest him, but this trial is not Situation Room news! The situation was the Wall Street police brutality once more against the young and their supporters. The young deserves a future. They are demonstrating because they are smart, figured it out, money is the only god in the USA. All the biblical blah blah is meaningless; the same Xian politicians send the police to beat up our kids for practicing their rights as citizens.
Wall Street where millionaires are still “working” shuffling other peoples money around, themselves do not produce anything at all. These are our “middle class” that’s not working, and doesn’t want to. They invest.
And they don’t care about the working people. Nobody ever got rich for working for wages for others.
American workers, goddess bless them, are a diminishing breed.
Their jobs have been outsourced by greedy corporations. We are sinking into the third world status fast. Our infrastructure is crumbling, and there is nowhere to run anymore. I cannot become a refugee again.
There are folk who worship share holders and CEOs. None of them are in the Bible; politicians however worship them for they need money to get those government jobs, with the lifelong benefits. Senators, Congress people, all need the millionaires largess to create their commercials, and sell their story to the voters who don’t have time to research their records.
I have an idea. I am sure you heard it before.
Let’s give each viable candidate an hour free airtime (it’s the people’s air), do with it what they want. Commercials. Debates. The works.
After that time no more exposure. You can make your case just before elections, not for years preceding it.
The GOP candidates looked to me like lined up like fancy beggars, with no helpful ideas, all having the same script to mouth from. Even their buzzwords are the same. It’s one campaign with many boring pale faces. Mr. Green even appears white to me.
The winners are the freeloading billionaires. They pay no taxes, what’s that all about???
GOP are faithful servants of the Koch brothers. They swear oaths to them, sign their names to pledges. Lick their boots and their fat asses.
It’s treason.
After all didn’t they take a more sacred oath to the people as they have taken their seats?
Love to you. And thank you Oakland for giving me a good life and happy memories.
Women from all walks of life come together with High Priestess Zsuzsanna Budapest, in a flowing woman-only Dianic circle celebrating our expanding global sisterhood. Beginning with the sacred Dianic purification we enter the circle, commune with our ancestors and our divine selves, lift up a joyous dedication to the Goddess Sedna of the Deep, as we bless all waters inside and outside. Chanting, dancing and strengthening our bonds of sisterhood. We are the flow, we are the ebb. When the women are healed the whole world is healed. Drummers, musical instruments, voices welcome. Dress comfortably. Come garlanded with something in season, greens or flowers.
Z Budapest is the founder of the Dianic (Feminist) Tradition of Wicca in the USA, initiating the world’s most famous coven, the Susan B. Anthony Coven Number One, which continues to thrive and brings women’s spirituality into mainstream consciousness (SusanBAnthonyCoven.com).
Z has led rituals, lectured, taught classes, given workshops, written articles tirelessly, and published in hundreds of women’s newspapers across the country. She has powerfully influenced many of the future teachers and writers about the Goddess. She is the director of the Women’s Spirituality Forum, a nonprofit organization and Z founded and sponsors the Dianic University’s Goddess College (GoddessCollege.com). Her books include the Holy Book of Women’s Mysteries, Grandmother of Time, Grandmother Moon (http://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/1460911407). See www.ZBudapest.com.
Venue: The Goddess Hall Time: 10.00am-4.00pm Fee: £50/$85/€65
Last May I stood in the home of Susan B. Anthony, in her attic that had been converted into workspace. Where she and her apprentices worked tirelessly in preservation of Women’s history. Clearly Susan B. knew to ask the question… Will you be there? Will you remember? Be remembered?
Will you be there sister, when we gather as sacred sisters to mourn and celebrate the life and works of our sister Merlin Stone? Of the others who have also passed. Those women who deserve our remembrance.
Will you have your picture taken? Standing shoulder to shoulder with your sisters? Your words witnessed and recorded for posterity.
Will you be the one who helps maintain the sacred scrolls, the published and unpublished thoughts of the others?
No one will remember us sisters unless we hold ourselves more dearly.
Our numbers were once in the millions. The Second Wave they called us; after the Suffragists, the First Wave.
We embraced the heritage of our foremothers. We were all there, creating even more for the next generations. Yes, we sent our daughters to universities. They are now endowed with diplomas and confidence, if not quite the equal opportunities.
We were all there.
You were there when you saw the shadows of the long fight, still ongoing. You knew we might not witness all the changes we brought forth; doesn’t fit into one lifetime.
Many of our sisters have left this life; passed on.
Many sisters aged and ill. We don’t even know how many. Who were all alone at death’s door? Who died unexpectedly?
There is no honoring for us from some lofty entity. There’s only you… and me.
There are no Academy Awards for moving history ahead. There are no Oscars for naming the ills we had to overcome.
The monetary awards for Feminists are like a thin vein in the back of the patriarchal vigilance. Some gets through.
There is not even a centralized email list where we can reach all of us at once. The right wingers, enemy of our gender have computerized themselves already in the seventies. We didn’t bother to coalesce. We fought our fights alone, a familiar situation.
Sisterhood escapes for lack of true flow of information. Lack of honoring. Lack of visibility. Dispersed, like seeds in the wind.
Who is left?
Honoring each other is honoring ourselves.
We are worthy. Can we rise as a female gender to this noble cause?
Like we once did? Will you be there?
Stand alongside me. Stand alongside your sisters. This time… be there.
Once upon a time back before modern times, way, way before television and social media, people had a way to get answers from a loving and caring spirit world. When a war was about to be fought, the kings sent an envoy to the oracular centers of the old world, places like Eleusis or Delphi to inquire of the Fates, via their priestesses, if the war would go their way or not. It was a wiser time, when men knew still that wars no matter how well they were fought could backfire or earn the wrath of the Fates. In a way it was social etiquette to inquire humbly at the shrines of the Goddess, what to do about matters of state, marriages, and children about to marry.
In order to receive this counsel, the people brought gifts to the temple, live stock, salt, spices, and of course gold and silver coins if they had any.
The priestess would then prepare herself through many rituals to center her mind, climb onto her tripod, and listen to the questions from the people… deepen about it. And when she was deeply entranced, she uttered the answers. Most of the time, the people were the only ones who asked the question and understood what the answers were. And that is how oracular messages were received. Oracular means to hear, to understand.
I have spent a considerable amount of time preparing myself to be an oracular priestess. In modern times, it’s mostly about the study of ancient symbols, and their ever nuanced meaning. I spent three years solid studying the Tarot. And, I have practiced other methods of oracular activity, which I gleaned from the great Merlin Stone (goddess kiss her soul).
One thing I know for sure, you cannot just jump into oracular prophesies without a deepening first. The priestess and audience must undergo some centering rituals, some high quality incense must help relax the modern mind. The modern mind is not in tune with these old ways.
The modern mind wants answers, yes, but it wants it in modern terms, not in symbols and metaphors. This is why we have to make the modern brain step aside.
As a Tarot devotee, this is the single hardest part of getting into the souls wisdom… stepping aside with the modern brain’s opinions, and attitudes, and impatience. You have to steady this part of your mind. Lull it to escape somewhere else, but keep the right brain alert, the magical brain, which is the one who plugs you into your own intuitive self.
There was a lot of literature about how the priestesses who sat on the tripods inhaled some fumes coming from the earth herself. At Delphi, this old knowledge was scientifically explained. It seems the temple sits on top of two fault lines coming together right at the place of the temple. So, methane could have leaked from those schisms.
It does get you woozy, but not high. I prefer the story about the slabs of hash burning gently below the tripods, and inhaling the fumes of that does make you high.
The priestess usually sat with the question awhile, and then when she “heard” the answer she uttered it. The people hung on her every word, and usually got what they wanted… an otherworldly point of view on their very earthy problems.
I also practiced an instant prophesy version. After some centering, one woman I covered with a black or blue scarf, making her the oracle. Then, another woman in the circle would stand up and request an answer to her question. The woman under the scarf had a chance to listen deeply to her spirit, and answer it if she could. Women were amazed how accurate they could be almost right away. Such experiences strengthen the belief that we are not alone. We don’t live in only a visible world, but an invisible world as well. Just like the universe we live in, some objects reflect light, others don’t. What we see is only what reflects light; hence our eyes were made for that. But our souls can see beyond, hear beyond the grave. It’s exciting.
My mother was one of those oracular beings, who didn’t need much to KNOW. When she looked at you she also heard your story. She knew where you came from and what bothers you. She was a medium, an artist, an oracular priestess. She was a Piscean and I am an Aquarian. For this kind of oracular work her sign was better suited, but all signs can and have become oracular.
The best place to practice this kind of reclaiming is in nature. In nature you can engage the entire environment in helping you sort things out. First you make an agreement with yourself, and nature.
When I ask my question, if I see a bird fly off from the east it means yes, if the bird flies from the west it’s a no. All other directions you can assign a meaning as well. Then sit and wait. It won’t be long when the birds begin their answers. After you have received your clear answer leave some foods for the birds, bread crumbs, or buy some seeds from the pet store and leave it out for the wild life.
Oracular conciseness is a fine skill. But you must not allow it to take over every decision you have to make. If you abuse the spiritual powers, or insult it with over repetitions, not getting it, forcing it over and over again, the entire hot line to the oracular forces will be cut off. So be careful and respect the lines that can be plugged in to the infinite wisdom of nature.
—————————- Zsuzsanna “Z” Budapest, D.Min (h.c.), is the founding mother of the Women’s Spirituality Movement. Z founded the Goddess College, an online school for the Dianic tradition and Goddess studies for women. She authored nine books embracing spirituality; including The Holy Book of Women’s Mysteries, Grandmother Moon,Celestial Wisdom and Summoning the Fates. She has appeared on several TV shows and documentaries, as well as hosting her own show, 13th Heaven. Through her non-profit organization, Women’s Spirituality Forum, Z’s vision for the future is that of peace and abundance, expressed in female values, to dominate the world’s consciousness.
Neptune comes around every 40 years, bringing with it a kind of rerun of history. When I was young, last time Neptune came around we fought for Women’s Liberation, the right to have rock and roll and fun, women’s rights to orgasms, equal pay for equal work which still is not realized. We fought for all people’s rights to freedom. Just like today the Arab countries finally have their revolution, first time ever. May they succeed.
In 1973, we won the right to our own bodies, abortion rights. We won the right to be paid for work earlier in the century with the suffragists. They have also won for us all the right to vote. Yes, it has not been to long since these achievements happened.
The billionaire Koch brothers, decided they want to call the shots in politics. It must be to boring to be so rich. Nothing to do, but count your money. They have inherited their wealth, but now they have inspirations to destroy all that Neptune gave us the imagination and energy to create. All it takes is unlimited budget to take us down, and they can rally the groups against women any time.
Vote in the political pretenders, under false pretenses.
Once they got into power the true colors came out. The Koch brothers lapdogs are not serving the country, but their keepers … the billionaires.
Amongst Republicans there are many eager takers. Their voter base hates women, and our rights to our bodies. They hate gays who are suspected to have more fun then their opponents. They hate giving equal rights with straights, and just on the whole they think and believe they actually own God. Yes the big guy. Yes. Up above.
The Koch brothers think they bought God already years ago; no problem.
So the program unfolds quickly.
Wisconsin Governor wants to kill the unions. He has aspirations to be the first and calls to his newly minted GOPHERs to follow suit. Killing the unions would mean an end to the fair pay they receive now. Taking away their right to negotiate would mean more wealth to the billionaires. (May they choke on their ill gotten money and drop dead in their golden gilded baths.)
But Neptune is here again. We get to re-imagine everything.
Women are in huge numbers now, with jobs, and more of us are coming out of the universities, collages, and they are young and strong. We won’t go back to pregnant and barefoot. We use our votes more wisely next time. We have to turn out in the great numbers that we have. Gender solidarity got us this far, now we need to close ranks with unions, and stay awake when the lull sets in after we won abortion rights, most women activists simply went home.
The lull always comes with a price tag.
When there’s a slow drum roll against women’s rights, do not ignore it. A group of republican women engaged in career building instead of serving the public, protest them, march on them, don’t hold back just because they are women. Women are more dangerous to other women because they act like men with lipstick on. And we still want to play sisterhood with them. Give that up as an illusion.
It’s going to be a hard ride!
Billionaires with their corrupt, paid officials want to undo America. They want more wealth. How many billions is enough?
It’s time to take this opportunity and Neptune’s vibrations, and create a new America.
My solution: Tax the rich and tax the church. Now we have fixed the money problem.
Legalize pot and treat all drugs like legal alcohol. Collect taxes from that. Now we have surplus.
Upgrade our schools. Free education for all. Medicare for all. Paid for by the new taxes. Join the 21st century. Happy women and children everywhere.
To do this takes spiritual common sense, trying out something new.
Life is to short. Why not? Everything else had been done.
We are a good halfway into the Age of Aquarius, started in 1962 and will go a hefty 179 years long, when all new things are possible; new inventions will turn our culture around. The question is, do you enjoy your lives more?
What I see is that indeed the Aquarian age has come and made us all pay attention to other humans. Not made up humans, but reality show kind of humans, even better, reality itself with the real humans in it.
We are so interested in what humans do, we don’t care if they are shown to us peeing in the bathroom, passing gas, or take a dump. These images were normally considered off color, but in this intense “reality curiosity”, we do get the bottom line.
Reality TV has pushed out the normal fare of sitcoms. Hollywood settled into a comfortable rerun of the most ancient shows, to avoid making new shows … they run Leave it Beaver and Car 54 where are you? … I Love Lucy; but Lucy is immortal.
The most spectacular money saving show they rerun again is the sugary Lawrence Welk Show. Lawrence Welk shows are on all day somewhere in the world. I mention the Lawrence Welk show because this was the very first TV show I had ever seen back when I was seventeen living in Austria.
My girlfriend and I took two streetcars to get to the friends home with a TV. There we watched with baited breath the polkas and the bouncy skirts on the dancers. I thought, my god, this is America! They seem so happy! It’s all about bubbles and singing sweetly. I want to be part of that.
Today we have revenge shows, all the CSI serials … Dick Wolf is running his shows against himself on parallel stations.
All of them are about the crime solving. They all say to women, don’t worry, they may rape and kill you but when you are dead, we treat you real nice, clean you up, talk to you softly, weigh your heart, your liver, and discuss your mode of death with each other for an hour. Then find somebody we can punish for your death. That’s right … don’t worry women. We get revenge; justice for you.
The problem for me is that revenge doesn’t stop criminals killing innocents. Women still disappear; little girls vanish from playgrounds or from their own homes. There is always another Amber alert.
Murdering women is now normative. Religions didn’t make a dent into this at all. In fact some religions, Whahabists, advise the males to hit the women, to make them obey. If they are tired of this free servant, get a younger one. Males pay each other off with women as if we were objects to trade. Debts are paid this way; promotions are bought with little girls lives.
This is on my mind because I have just signed a petition to stop “Corrective rapes” in South Africa, where they rape lesbians to ”show them” a good time; to flip them. After the brutal rape they will now like men? No. It’s just another excuse to violate a woman.
The other problem is that there is no prevention, no thought is wasted on the root of the rapist culture, and why beautiful accomplished women get killed by jealous inferior often mentally ill males because they can. Other males sell women to each other, little girls for sex slavery, because pedophiles somehow have a lot of money. They can pay for it.
So peace on Earth and good will towards women, that would be nice.
Peace on earth, everybody go home and stay there. No more invasions of other countries. No more barrelful of taxes money uncounted, rolled out of secret vaults, men distributing it amongst themselves for war. No more blood money.
No more resenting women who gave life to god.
As Sojourner Truth said, Where does your god come from? Where does your Christ come from? From God and a woman, men had nothing to do with it.
Recent Comments