Friends, soul writers, mystics, and lovers of prayer,

If 2022 is the year we “learn to listen to love,” then in this 9th week we really have to dig deep to find ears that can hear love in chaos.

Right now, it’s hard to see or hear love, isn’t it?

Instead, we see and hear the crash of bombs and the crush of tanks pounding the ground in Ukraine. Is this what September 1, 1938 felt like--the day Nazi Germany invaded Poland?

The news of Russia’s invasion of a sovereign country sends my heart to weeping.

And yet, at the exact same time, President Biden announced his choice for the United States Supreme Court, Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson. Jackson is a brilliant Black woman with impeccable credentials. She has more judicial experience than Thomas, Roberts, Kagan, and Barrett had at nomination—combined! And—this so warms my heart—she began her legal career as a public defender.

The news of Judge Jackson’s nomination sends my heart soaring.

How can one heart, one body hold such contrasting emotions?

On one hand, an old abusive patriarchal hand, an avaricious plutocrat marches into a foreign country to steal land and wealth that belongs to the people who live on that land.

Does that ring any bells? Sound slightly familiar? It should.

Last Sunday, in Reckonings Pluto Returns: Part 1 The Myth of America, Rabbi Tirzah guided us into a profound meditation to meet the “daemon of America” and ask the Grail question: “What ails thee?”

(Reckonings was recorded and is now available on-demand.)

Everyone’s experience was unique, but for many of us there was a theme of theft. The daemon, the spirit of America, that showed up for me was quite literally a thief, complete with black mask. Pus was oozing from a four-century-old wound—a wound he labeled “unatoned theft.”

There has been so much theft in this country—and in all plutocracies around the world. Theft of the land. Theft of the resources in the land. Theft of the labor of people forced to work the land. Theft of dignity. Theft of culture. Theft of languages. Theft of freedom. Theft of self-determination.

So much unatoned theft. And it continues today.

Don’t you find it interesting that the term for a government in which wealthy people use wealth to rule, is “plutocracy”—Pluto’s stamp of darkness. Pluto, who is calling us now to a reckoning with our history.

Next, Tirzah said to ask the daemon: “What medicine do you need to return to your soul?”  Before I could finish writing the question, the thief began to cry. “Pray for me” he said, “grant me another chance. See me as good.”

“See me as good.”

His request swirled around my heart kicking up sand and dirt. Could I do that? Could I?

Instantly, I knew I could. I could because I’ve had three great teachers.

1. My first teacher was the man who stole my money, my house, and the far greater injury of stealing any sense of safety and confidence I once had. My ex-husband. I prayed for him every day during and after the divorce.

   As he was dying, our son and I stood by his bed in ICU and I surprised myself by promising to remember only the good.

   When he died three days later on Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement, he began to atone. He became a master of atonement. A king of atonement. And he has continued to atone for 18 years. And I have kept my word; I see him as good. Because he has proven that he is good. So very very good.

2. My second teacher was Rabbi Zalman Schachter-Shalomi. In a prayer intensive on the Tree of Life in 2020, Rabbi Tirzah shared Rebbe Zalman’s radical and difficult teaching that if we focus on one good thing in another, no matter how small, that one good thing starts to grow.
3. When Tirzah said this, I recognized it as true because I’d heard the same thing from a mystical source I treasure and trust, the masters and teachers of the Akashic Record.

   When my son was unexpectedly released from federal prison by the judge who had sent him to prison to coerce him to name other activists, I asked the masters and teachers if my prayers and the prayers of 100 others who joined me in showering the prison with unconditional love had made a difference.

Listen very carefully to their profound teaching:

“In each individual, in each soul, there is a king. Speak to the king and the king will come forward.”

• So, that holy and wise “king” was somewhere in the angry judge and prayer brought the king forward.
• That “king” was absolutely inside my ex-husband and prayer absolutely activated his king-ness.
• And that “king” is somewhere inside the daemon thief of America. When Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson takes her seat on the highest court that will be one step in his path of atonement.

But what about Russia? Putin? Is there a good king in there somewhere? Can prayer touch that deeply buried king?

It will help if I begin by changing king to Queen.

This is hard. I know it’s hard. And I don’t know how it’s going to work, but I am determined to pray each day that the Queen—the Queen of goodness, kindness, equality, justice, and sovereignty—the Queen hidden somewhere in the chaos, will make Herself known.

And we will see that She is good. Very very good.

to the deep knowing that prayer changes the field, activates the good, and opens the door to sacred and necessary atonement, 

Janet

Promised links:

Reckonings discounted and on-demand:

Reckonings: Pluto Returns!
Part 1 The Myth of America

If you don't want to wait for Monday's newsletter, here's the link to The Introvert Writer Summit, opening March 1:

The Introvert Writer Summit

More goodies:

You can read and share all my Notes from the Field from the blog section on my website.

Come hear me read Notes from the Field on YouTube. I love speaking directly to you and Hyldemoer loves chiming in.

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