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"I have recently and reluctantly
come to the conclusion that I am lost. Not just unsure that this is the
right trail, but off any trail whatsoever. I find myself, figuratively,
looking for footprints, broken twigs, any sign that someone has been over
this ground ahead of me." |
The Four Shields
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As we grow, we undertake appropriate initiations. The Four Shield Initiations are Rites of Passage that immerse you in nature in order to effect a reciprocal healing process. As you surrender to the natural dynamic, you take it on more fully and nature fulfills its process in you. These initiations are undertaken through a period of preparation that readies the person to relinquish that which they have outgrown and move into the new wholeness that they are.
There are therapeutic modalities that are specific to each season and act as Rites of Passage through the initiatory requirements of that season.
The Spring Shield The Summer Shield The Fall Shield The Winter Shield
"The adult is frozen into
the roles, poses, attitudes, values, and myths of adulthood, and rarely
shows any other face. He/she is overworked, absorbed in the role of
mother, father, unmoved by sex, unable to play, overly rational, lost
in thought, caught up in dogma, formality, abstraction, cynicism, and
duty cold as an icicle. Work or relationship related stress is
held in like steam in a pressure cooker. A façade of respectability,
responsibility, untouchability, and capability, is coldly maintained.
The self avoids the dark shield by turning feeling into mental processes,
profession or routine. The little boy or little girl of the summer shield
is undernourished, unacknowledged and unseen. "
--Steven Foster
Unless your burden of responsibility is relinquished, your spirit can not be regenerated. The rules and regulations of the adult world can not indefinitely freeze over the child that newness of spirit longing to run free and flow unbounded. There must come a time when you are ready to undergo the initiations of spring when you are ready to let the ice melt and feel again, laugh and play again, and touch the deepest place of the sacred within you.
In spring your heart, mind, body and soul hear the stirrings of rebirth. Are you ready to step away from your adult world and immerse yourself in your Spring Shield initiation?
The Spring Shield Rites of Passage initiate you into the deeply sacred. They "trick" winter into dying so that rebirth can come forth within you. The spring initiations are meant to break the hold of winter so that death can come because without death there can be no rebirth.
If you are stuck in the Winter Shield, you are a mature adult - trapped by maturity and the responsibility of adulthood. The absolutely necessary task of caring for others and yourself has burdened you with trying to do what is the right thing. Those who are ready to loosen the grip of the Winter Shield and undergo the Rites of Spring will undergo the initiations of being reborn, enlightened, entering the spirit world, merging with their life purpose and coming to know themselves to be of nature. Only in this state can symbolic death come to the adult and the mantle of the child the new be taken up.
The Spring Shield initiations separate you from the orderly realms of the rational and from daily interactions with others. Each of the rites takes place in a solitary natural place where the symbolic death passage is encountered. During these encounters, the descending Fall Shield and the rising Spring Shield come into balance. This allows the center of gravity to shift towards the spring as gradually the outlines of the birth are illumined.
The Spring Shield initiations are:
The rite of coming forth from death 1-4 days and nights in nature moving through a symbolic death
Rites of prayer 1-3 days and nights in nature in prayer; you will pray for something or for nothing without ceasing and without questioning
Rites of healing 1-3 days and nights in nature where you seek to do that which will effect the healing of someone or something under your care
Rites of spirit 1- 3 days and nights in nature where you seek to make contact with the spirits of various orders and learn your own ways of opening these channels of communication
Rites of art 1-3 days and nights where you engage in the creative and dedicate your spirit to nature
Rites of Medicine power 4 7 days and nights in nature where your sole intent is to confirm the reality of your medicine helper
Each spring, you can undertake one or more of these Rites of Passage. Each is designed to evoke the Spring Shield process. The Spring Initiations include a period of preparation that readies you to relinquish the physical and move into the psychological and the spiritual, the Threshold Rite, and are concluded by a period of incorporation with a Council of Elders.
You would benefit from a Spring Shield Rite of Passage if-
"All is sweetness and light.
The earth is always smothered in wildflowers. The sun is always coming
up and never going down. The butterfly flirts from flower to flower,
sky dancing, reviewing past lives, astrally projecting, channeling,
altering consciousness, shamanic journeying, consulting crystal balls,
swept up in pie in the sky dreaming. The feet dangle inches above terra
firma. Who cares for the things of this world when the riches of the
invisible world call like sirens? The opposite west shield, the dark
soul undernourished. The exaggerated spring shield is protecting itself
from the dark, which hurts its far-seeing eyes. The innocent summer
shield, the child, has been drawn into a fascinating alliance with angelic
beings and refuses to learn or grow up. The adult shield, its rationality
sublimed away by the light, lacks self-control or real work to do. Healing
must take place in the opposite fall shield. The illumined one must
face the darkness behind the light."
--Steven Foster
The Summer Shield Initiations ask that the spirit becomes a child and live in the experience of the reality and murkiness of the body and the physical world. Only by touching down firmly on the earth and engaging the monsters and fears of childhood can one obtain true sight. "What has become god-conscious must become self-conscious." Your spirit must be willing to ascend into the body and embrace all of the emotions, survival instincts, erotic instincts and physical materialism of childhood.
In our zest towards illumination, we may attempt to by-pass traumas, hurts and fears of childhood. In order to survive the messiness of the physical world we may have invented various means, just as children do, of avoiding the hurt and difficulties of our here and now physical world. In order to see in the darkness of our times, we must take on the reality of our physical bodies. The road from illumination to true sight must pass through the world of instinct and sensation. The spirit must endure the cold winds and harsh reality of the body.
Grand visions and lofty ideals must be tested and anchored in the tedious details and physicality of our mortality. The truth must be found amongst the sordid details. The secret lies in turning your back on the sacred mountains and returning to your everyday life of the mundane. The spirit must move through the body in order to come to know its own darkness and shadows. The Summer Shield returns us to the innate physicality of our materialistic and animal nature.
The Summer Initiations involve a series of Rites of Passage that are designed to initiate you into the intensely physical experience of life. If you are stuck or overdeveloped in the Spring Shield, you may know the awe of illumination but be of little use to the world until the spirit moves fully into the body. The Summer Initiations ask that you come down from the lofty world of spirit, grand ideas and visions and plant your feet firmly on the ground while beginning your worldly tasks.
Many people have visions but few actually bring them into the world. The Summer Initiations ask simply that you chose and begin to take action in this physical world. You are called to depend less on spirit and more on yourself. To live fully on this earth you must remember your own physical mortality and rejoin your physical body with all of its sensations, feelings, fears, and darkness. The Summer Initiations invite you to meet the darkness and all of your monsters for only through these meetings can you come to fully know yourself.
Summer Wisdom knows that if you stay forever on the precipice preparing, deciding, and waiting for the truth - that you will die with a life unfulfilled. The time has come for you to begin to live visions or not and undergo the initiations of the body.
The Summer Shield initiations are:
The Rites of Primal Emotion Enter into your own world of shadows. Your body - with its animal urges, sensations, feelings and emotions - will take you far into your consciousness and darkness. All the messiness of your life will come clear to you as you sort through the urgent messages from yourself.
The Rites of Sensuality Go alone into nature to experience and merge with your hunger, the touch, smell, sight and sound of your physical world. You make love with the sun, the trees and the dirt. You come to feel your existence again.
Rites of the Body - Go alone into nature and you celebrate your body. You give your body over to the natural world and in your vulnerability and nakedness you come to self-acceptance. Through your body you find a deep reverence for all vulnerabilities.
The Rites of Karma The Great Ballcourt Choose to fully accept the consequences of your actions. It is time to stop blaming your body and others. It is time to stop letting your body slowly fade away because you are too busy to spend time with it. Go into nature with your teacher a ball. Where ever you go the ball goes propelled by any part of your body except your hands. You commit to being a full player on the ballcourt and your ball becomes your teacher taking you on whatever journey you send it on. No way out of this one you have forced yourself to live with all the consequences of your kick of the ball.
Each summer, you can undertake one or more of these Rites of Passage. The Summer Initiations yank you from your place of enlightenment and push you to jump into the muck and yuck of life. No longer can you teeter on the precipice saying, "In any moment I will jump into my life". You will be called to just get started - and fears or not - test your "life myths" against the realities of this physical world.
You would benefit from a Summer Shield Rite of Passage if-
"Summers child (of
any age) was hurt or never quite grew up and has turned away from the
fall passage of inwardness and feeling. The winter shield is undernourished
and the other shields are also affected. The child is given over to
tantrums, anxiety, fear, hypertension, hysteria, jealousy, violence,
sexuality, cheap thrills, greed, game-playing, attention seeking, manipulation,
parasitism, gluttony, irresponsibility, materialism, etc. self and self-serving
have become all important. Without modern conveniences of the technological
age and the goods and services on which she is dependent, she is at
the mercy of the environment, and incapable of acting appropriately
or self-reliantly in the face of crisis."
- Steven Foster
The Fall Shield Initiations take the child into adulthood and through the dark journey of puberty. The Fall Shield asks the initiate to sever from her childish ways and bring herself through the journey of herself to herself as an adult in her own power. The child of any age must leave her life as she knows it her work or daily routine, attachments to her parents or her husband and children, or other outward authority - and forge her own new authority to take their place. As the child, she is called to risk the darkness of herself to focus on evoking the growth that calls forth her inward aspects of childhood helplessness, vulnerability, apathy, loneliness, fear, solitude.
As she severs from her childhood aspects she completes the journey of her darkness and the uncertainty of her self and readies herself to step into her own meaning of maturity her Winter Shield.
The Fall Initiations involve a series of Rites of Passage that are designed to severe the initiate from her childhood and bring her to her own individuation. Fear blocks her passageway. The Fall Initiations ask that each initiate risk her own darkness and ally herself with her fear. For it is only through fear that the gateway to her adulthood will be open. The initiate of the Fall Shield must be committed to voluntarily emerging herself in this risk of darkness this journey through the fear of death- for this is what calls forth the powers of her inner guidance that leads to her maturity.
The Fall Shield asks the little girl to go inside herself and begin the journey to identify herself as her own spirit. The Fall Shield invites the little girl to "come to terms with herself" and to explore and experiment with all of her personalities and aspects. She will be asked to expose herself and test herself - to create her own real life story of herself. She will romance her animus (and find she needs the man within herself as much as she needs the woman within herself). She will undergo experiences that grate against her past and push her to redeem and accept her animus. She may render herself vulnerable and explore her own inner mansions learning how to "alchemize darkness into light".
The initiatory shadow of the Fall Shield enables the girl to connect deeply and experiencially with her own wildness and acquire a depth of soul whereby she is now able to impart oneness with the natural world to her own offspring. As she undertakes the Fall Initiations as she embraces her time of inwardness - her healing is intensified and by her act she attains the station of the mature life that can not be undone.
As she emerges through the initiations of the Fall Shield she will have been through the fires of her own personal experience and readied to assume her station as an adult woman. She will know herself as the individual she is with the tools needed to serve her well throughout the rest of her journey. She will bring herself into full womanhood taking her place beside her mother, grandmother and her lineage of women elders who will confirm her attainment of her mature insight.
The Fall Shield Initiations are:
The Rites of the Day: The Day Walk Walk alone from dawn to dusk in the natural world. Take your intention with you and allow it to guide your steps forming an intuitive path. Walk in an attractive place that calls to you. This is not a test of danger and reckless feats. Dream, nap, sleep, question. Let the earth open you and sensitize all of your natural senses. Talk to the wind. At dusk your journey is over and it is time to return to the Council of Elders and weave your story.
The Rites of the Night: The Night Walk Walk and sit throughout the night by yourself in a place of natural darkness. Surround yourself with the shadows of the night and let the darkness in. Listen, wait, dream, explode your power. The night will work its magic on you bestowing you with a deepness of soul.
The Rites of Walking: The Walkabout Go into the wilderness for at least 3 days and nights with appropriate back up and walk a predetermined route and length of miles. Let your course lead you into your adventure of self-reliance, communication with the natural world and your commitment. Camp each night at a new site and each day set out again on your road to maturity.
The Rites of Internment: Alone in the Earth Enter a dark and secluded place in the Earth (a cave, a lodge) and stay there for 24 hours. Take with you your guardian who will be your gatekeeper during your interment. Bring with you the spirit or memory of one who has wronged you or whom you have wronged. Be with that person during your internment. Watch what you feel, see, hear, dream. Purify yourself and bless the dark presences that may appear.
The Rites of Dreaming Go alone to a natural place and dream. Stay there for 24-48 hours by yourself. Let your dreams rework your spirit. Give yourself over to the elements of your dreams that have come to help you understand your journey.
Each fall, you can undertake one or more of these Rites of Passage. Each is designed to evoke the Fall Shield process. The Fall Initiations include a period of preparation that readies you to relinquish the physical and move into the psychological and the spiritual, the Threshold Rite, and are concluded by a period of incorporation with a Council of Elders.
You would benefit from a Fall Shield Rite of Passage if-
"The adolescent of any
age has fallen into the quicksand of feelings, and is depressed much
of the time, a helpless victim, deeply wounded by love, assailed by
doubt, addicted to guilt, narcissistic or suicidal, a rebel without
a cause, beset by troubling dreams and self-consciousness, unable
to kindle up a spark of creative insight, seemingly incapable of loving
herself, and probably having difficulties integrating the
animus. Repeated efforts to extricate
her from the black hole
for any length of time result in full or partial failure. The opposite
shield (spring) is undernourished and the adjacent shields (the adult
and the child) are sucked into a psychological maw where everything
is felt and nothing resolved."
--Steven Foster
The Winter Shield Initiations demand that the adolescent "get a grip" on herself. Before she can step into the illumined Shield of Spring, she must first pass through the dark underworld passage of winter. The bright light of spring illumination would hurt and burn her immature eyes. First she must ripen and become whole and mature. She must pass through the rites of winter and prove that she can survive the rigors of life and that she has the "right stuff" to connect and commit to herself and others. The adolescent girl must take on the mantel of the mature women self-discipline, the ability to work, study, and apply herself in an orderly self-controlled, self-reliant manner.
It is in winter that the adolescent girl completes her gestation and allows herself to be crystallized into purpose and direction. She must get hold of herself and in the deep darkness and chilling cold of the winter she must be brought out of herself into a fully human, responsible, contributing member of her community.
The Winter Initiations are designed to bring a woman through the rigors of survival. There are no short cuts to enlightenment. Life is not always at her disposal. If she can not attain what she desires, she is not given the freedom to dive deeper into her own sense of victim.
Immature narcissistic behavior not only drags upon her, it drags upon her family and her community. A woman sunken unto the depths of herself can not muster the willingness, cooperation and ability to work without reward that is required to survive the harshness of winter. She will perish and place those around her in peril if she escapes into the depressed, the guilty, and the wounded.
The Winter Shield asks the adolescent girl to give up her helplessness, to abandon her sense of despair and powerlessness, to walk away from self-destruction and feelings of unworthiness and frustration. She is taken through her trials and she is asked if she can be counted on to contribute to the well being not only of herself but to all others in the whole.
The Winter Initiations stand as the robust block to quick and easy enlightenment. They remind a woman that she will not see the light if she remains hidden inside negativity, depression, guilt, shame, loneliness, despair, trauma, and estrangement. The only way to the light is through control of herself and her mind.
The Winter Initiations will form her into a free woman with depth and breath. The harsh realities of survival anchor a woman in her self, make her self-contained and multi-facetted. Having undertaken her Winter Initiations she will be able to bring order, harmony and balance wherever she is, to work hard and to love and nurture herself and others around her.
As she emerges from the Initiations of the Winter Shield, she takes her place among mature women. She sees that the children are cared for, nourished, and protected from harm. She orders her life and that of her familys so that the community remains balanced, whole, and directed. She matures from self-love into love for others and develops her values, understanding, and wisdom to be of service not only to herself but also to others. She considers her actions and governs her body, spirit, and mind in a capable and appropriate manner. The Winter Initiations have tested her and now she undertakes projects, gets results and brings her desires to completion.
Few modern women attain the fullness of the Winter Shield. They get stuck in their development and fear the intensity of the Seasonal Rites of Passage. They armor themselves in routine and responsibility, in caring for others and ineffectual attempts to control their lives in an uncontrollable chaos.
The mind of the mature woman who has a fully attained Winter Shield keeps itself in harmony with the natural order and continues to pass season after season through the appropriate initiatory experiences. All the seasons of herself stay alive and active. She does not shirk from or fear her descent or ascent but continually circles adding depth and volume. She grows in wisdom and understanding, becomes a voice for the feminine mysteries, and acquires the kind of soul necessary to midwife other initiates into their new worlds.
The Winter Shield initiations are:
The Rites of Self-Tracking During your preparation and severance phase you will fashion an object representing yourself. At the appropriate time, you will go alone into an unfamiliar natural place where there are no paths and you can not track your steps. You will leave the representation of your self on the Earth, turn, and walk away from it for an hour. You will then turn around, retrace your steps and find yourself.
Rites of Observation You will go alone into the wilderness for 48 hours to study a natural aspect and its relationship to the biosystem. Your task will be to study the ways of the natural world. You will scrutinize and observe a part of nature as thoroughly as you can, noting everything about it - propagation, nourishment, defense systems, how it developed and evolved its relationship with itself and others. You will observe and let it teach you how it is related to all the ways of yourself.
Self-Designated Rites Plan your own Rite of Passage in the natural world. What is the purpose of your ceremony? Why are you performing the ceremony? What do you want to accomplish from performing the ceremony? Does this ceremony mark a severance? Does this ceremony mark a passage? Does this ceremony confirm the attainment of a new state? Who will benefit from this ceremony? How will you mark each of the stages of a Rite of Passage in this ceremony? Who will be the witness of this ceremony?
Rites of Apprenticeship You choose to learn important work through apprenticing to a master. You watch your teacher and learn to do as they do. You give yourself in service and agree to learn from your experiences. You do the work required of you and are open to your teachers assessment of you. You sacrifice your own comfort to aid your teacher in the work. You live peacefully and non-judgmentally with the imperfections of your teacher and yourself. You do not become a burden demanding time and attention. You do not hang around when no longer needed. You trust and allow your skill to increase and as you do, your teacher passes onto you more responsibility in the work. In time, the apprenticeship is complete and you move beyond your teacher.
Rites of Confirmation You are moving from one stage of life to another. You are changing your world and leaving behind a part of yourself. You go alone into a natural place to confirm that this new change of worlds is taking place and to confirm that you are ready to take on your new lifes mantel. You sacrifice a part of your self or your world to make the confirmation meaningful. During your threshold experience, you perform a "death lodge" ceremony in which you are symbolically reborn into your new life. You will confirm that you have passed from your old world to your new world.
Rites of Relocation The time has come for you to move. You know that in this move there will be chaos and disorganization of all aspects of yourself. You seek to complete and sever from your old location. You seek to move into your new home, your new occupation, and your new course. You go alone into a natural place for three or four days and nights and complete your move.
Each winter, you can undertake one or more of these Rites of Passage. Each is designed to evoke the Winter Shield process. The Winter Initiations include a period of preparation that readies you to relinquish the physical and move into the psychological and the spiritual, the Threshold Rite, and are concluded by a period of incorporation with a Council of Elders.
You are ready to undertake a Winter Rite of Passage if-Are you ready to step away from your world and immerse yourself in your Four Shields initiation? Each of the Rites of Passage is set up as a 3 month process. One month is spent in preparation, one month in the threshold experience of the rite, and one month in incorporation.
The Four Shield Initiations are contemporized versions of traditional rites of passage and are designed to be accessible in todays modern world.
The Spring Shield initiations can begin in March, April, or early May.
The Summer Shield initiations can begin in June, July, or early August.
The Fall Shield initiations can begin in September, October, or early November.
The Winter Shield initiations can begin in December, January, or early February.
As your Shield midwife, I will act as your guide, guardian, and gatekeeper as you embark on your own personal journey through the Four Shields initiations. We will meet by phone twice a month in regularly scheduled sessions and I will be available to you throughout the month by phone and e-mail as you design and travel through your initiation. I will guide you through the unfolding of the initiations, anchoring you in traditional preparations, severance, threshold and incorporation rituals, and practices.
In addition, we will meet each month in one 45 minute Instructional Session to familiarize you with various aspects of rites of passage pertinent to your personal journey. These Instructional Sessions will include work in some of the following areas depending on your need, desire and journey:
Fee for each 3 month Four Shields initiation is $975.
Has one of the Four Shield initiations touched your soul and caught your attention? Contact me to talk about what this might mean for you and how you can take the journey into the most sacred parts of yourself.
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Energetic and Spiritual Growth and Evolution
Contemporized Rites of Passage for
Women
To register for a
Four Shields initiation
call me at 434-263-4996
or e-mail at maryann@evenstaronline.com
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