Week 30--in which we wonder if humans have ever lived in beauty, reverence, and peace

Beautiful Ones,

It’s hard to even start writing this Notes from the Field. Because the Field is splattered with so much blood. And tears. War and death continue and continue and continue. Children die. Infants starve. Mothers weep. While politicians shrug and pedophiles trade for their “Get out of jail free" cards. The crassness, the lies, the violence. The politicians who have traded their souls. For what?

For what? This is the question that will not go away for me. For what?

This question surfaced for the first time on February 2018 in a startling prayer experience. I was saying the Hawaiian shamanic prayer of restoration and forgiveness, Ho‘oponopono, as I had every morning since that prayer helped get my son released from prison.

If you don’t know the story, here’s a short version.

In 2013, my 24-year-old son Jerry was ordered to prison by an enraged federal judge in an attempt to coerce Jerry to offer up the names of his fellow activists in Occupy in exchange for his freedom. A trade my highly principled son would never ever agree to. A trade, however, that hundreds of people are making today as they cave in to the cruel demands of abusive power.

Jerry stayed silent for eight months. But at one point, unable to bear the pain, he crawled into his bunk and stopped eating. I was terrified he might not make it. So, following the guidance of the Masters and Teachers of the Akashic Record, I asked friends to join me in a daily prayer to shower the prison with love for five minutes. When the five minutes ended, I said Ho‘oponopono to transmute all the crud that our prayers had loosened.

Now you know the background for the beautiful Her Council of Love prayer that hundreds of you are praying right now.

In an interesting side note, that maybe isn’t a side note, Jerry was held in MCC, the same NYC prison where Jeffrey Epstein is said to have committed suicide. We can talk about what happened another day.

I loved the original Ho'oponopono so much, that I continued to say it every day for four years. On February 5, 2018, I started to pray and suddenly turned to Archangel Michael and said, “Show me the first person who silenced me.”

Instantly, I felt a presence. In the living room. And I knew, I just knew, who that presence was.

The first person to silence me three thousand years ago was my husband. A beloved husband.

Shattered, I said Ho‘oponopono for him. Because I knew that prayer has the power to cut ancient sticky god-forsaken patriarchal cords that perpetuate hate, misogyny, domination, and greed generation after generation.

The same horrors we are living in right now.

That night, I heard a relentless pop lyric and knew my ancient husband was trying to speak to me. The lyric was, “I don’t deserve this.” Over and over and over, “I don’t deserve this.”

The next morning, I told Archangel Michael, “He doesn’t believe us. He doesn’t believe he deserves to be freed from all the harm his decision three thousand years ago has done.”

So I got out of my chair, stood over the husband in the middle of the living room, and with tears streaming onto the floor, I shouted Ho‘oponopono for him while slicing the cords with my arms. Once. Twice. Three times.

Exhausted, I sank back into my writing chair, picked up a journal, and out came a profound prayer.

I thought this prayer was about me and my ancient husband. But it’s not. It’s a universal prayer. And a prayer that is begging to be heard right now, in this uber-patriarchal moment, when war and starvation and abuse are not only rampant, not only tolerated, but, by those who have sold their souls to power, actually applauded.

Now we must ask everyone looking with cold eyes into the cameras as they lie, “For what? For what?”

This prayer opens with me looking at my husband in horror three thousand years ago and asking:

If I Forgave You

© Janet Conner 2018

If I forgave you

for silencing my voice
ending the music
and closing the dance

If I forgave you

for shutting the temple
dispersing the women
and trampling the fire

If I forgave you

for bowing to power
crushing our love
and selling your soul—was it worth it, my dear, was it worth it

If I forgave you

for rattling your chains
betraying my trust
and trading your honor—for what, I wonder, for what

If I absolved your sins
If I wiped your face
If I unlocked the love songs buried in our hearts

Would you hear them again?
Would you lift your feet?
Would you fall to your knees?

Would you?
Could you?

If I cut the cords of betrayal that bound us then and bind us still, Would you feel a touch of freedom?
Would our children?
And their children, and their children, and all the children—because they are all our children.

If I forgave you
Would you be free?
After all these years, would you, would we,
would I, be free?

If I forgave you
Who would you be?
Who would you be?
Who would I be?

My 3000 year ago husband returned in August to help answer these two massive questions.

He began with his own litany, “If I honored you…” And then he did it. He did what none of the patriarchs in our world seem capable of doing.

He acknowledged all the sins he and the patriarchs have committed. Against women, against children, against devotion.

I watched as he slowly removed seven objects that represent patriarchal power, ownership, control, and abuse. His watch, wallet, belt, shoes, keys, tie, designer jacket.

Finally, standing barefoot in shirt and pants, he said,

If I rebuilt the fire,
opened the temple,
and atoned for my sins

If I fell to my knees,
asked for forgiveness,
bowed my head and began to pray

If I offered myself in service to love
If I offered myself as protection for love

Who would I be?
Who would I be?
Who would we be?

Well, I think I know the answer to that last question.

Who would we be?
We would be a family living in Crete.

I wasn’t aware of Crete when I received his prayer in 2019. But I am now. Because the very first place we are going to visit and remember in ART 6 on Reverence and Devotion is Crete.

Why Crete?

“Crete was the last, full flowering of matriarchal culture. We are taught that Western civilization begins with Greece, but in fact the imagination of the Greeks came from Crete. All Greek religious ritual, all Greek mythology, was of Cretan-Mycenaean origin. Rites performed at Eleusis in utter secrecy were, in earlier Crete, celebrated in sacred groves….

Cretan art and religion were a vivid celebration of life. The Goddess was joyously worshiped as the Lady of the Beasts….

The Cretans appear to have been gentle, joyous, sensuous, and peace-loving. From the evidence of ruins, they maintained at least one thousand years of culture unbroken by war.”

The Great Cosmic Mother: Rediscovering the Religion of the Earth, Monica Sjöö & Barbara Mor

Cathy Stevens Pratt painted this homage to Crete

I have been immersed for weeks in this delicious delightful world of Crete. A world I now realize I intuited back in 2018 when my ancient husband arrived begging to be forgiven.

Would you like to remember this way of living in joy, beauty, and the celebration of life?

Then, join us in ART 6 on Reverence and Devotion.

We open next Sunday so this is the perfect moment to get ready to jump back in time to remember how to live in a world without war.

ART 6 
The Memory of Reverence ∞ Devotion

Life is Fragile. Handle with Reverence.

Janet
PS: if you were not in ART 5, you will need your Sigils from the four Libraries of the sacred elements in order to open the locked vaults in ART 6.

You can get them by purchasing ART 5 On Demand, it’s only $205. With that purchase, you are entitled to a discount for ART 6, bringing the final cost of ART 5 to just $124. Quite the bargain.

When you order ART 5, I'll send an email on how to begin to gather your elemental sigils so you're ready for the deep adventures in ART 6.

ART 5 Divination

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