Tuesday 8 November 2011

Get on yer bike! The cycles of life and how you can't ignore them......

Hello!
Well readers, I have no one but myself to blame- after all I wrote the book. And when I say "I wrote the book," I DON'T mean it in the rhetorical sense I mean I actually wrote the book.
TEN YEARS AGO
In 2002 , after four years of research and inclusive of everything I had learned and experienced in my 38 years, with the best of intentions my first book "Moon Rites- Ritual Myth and Magic For The Modern Moon Goddess" was published. My plan for the book was that it be used as a tool and a resource for those women who wanted to rediscover the power and beauty of female stories, ritual, and the 'wise ways' that women have been using for thousands of years  in different cultures to care for themselves in all the different stages of their lives, to help busy modern women get in touch and reconnect with their inner selves and draw soul food from the wellspring of female  power inside.
It was a breathtakingly wonderful experience to see all this work come together in a book, my offering to the world, and my daughters.
At the time- my daughters were 11  and 9 respectively. We lived near Byron Bay in a lovely timber house with a big productive garden and I was cleaning houses and writing freelance articles as my job . It was creative, beautiful time where I was able to enjoy the natural energy all around me and live a lifestyle where there was always a moment to breathe and reconnect with my soul.

Well! FIVE YEARS LATER..
Luckily for me, when the original publishers decided to jump ship the wonderful Shekhinah Morgan, creator of the yearly "Moon Diary" and publisher of "books celebrating Her" took the work and improved it. In 2005  "Moon Rites was re- published as "Moon Rites- a feminine path to personal power" which is exactly what it is.
 Ok- Ok I know you're saying- get to the point woman! Sorry for the long set-up but you won't fully appreciate the delicious irony if you don't have the backstory.

ANOTHER FIVE YEARS LATER.....
The punchline my friends is this. I have become that very same woman I wrote the book for. For the past nine years I've lived in a busy regional city. I now run an office. I still write, but not regular freelance, I write books,when I've had the time to squeeze it in, between raising teenage girls, work, husband, dogs, cat, guinea pigs, et. al. I know, right? Cosmic Joke! Quelle ironique! Quantum freakiness!
 This year the cycle has come around to full. My youngest daughter has left home, and after a suitable period of  greiving for my former identity I've realised that it's now time to do the very thing I wrote the book about, namely to Renew, Rediscover and Reclaim my inner woman. In addition I was officially given the 'peri menopause' label in June - a new adventure, a chance to actually LIVE something I only knew from writing about and the stories that other women shared with me ten years ago.

So here's my plan- I'M going to use Moon Rites in the way it was intended. There are 13' month' or moon chapters in the book, each one talks about a different goddess, a different aspect of  looking after ourselves and a simple ritual and has blank pages to journal one's thoughts, experiences and feelings for that month. Over thirteen months, I am going to read the entries, do the rituals and note my journey in the journal, and here in this blog. If it's as transformative an experience as I'm hoping, other women might gain from peeking in on my experiences.

What I'd dearly love to do is have  others come on the journey with me. Yes, it'll be all about ME. And YOU. And US!  If you want to comment, find out more about these ideas, share the laughs, the groans, the whole damn thing please feel free to let me know you're out there! If you'd like to find out more about Moon Rites- click HERE.