Wild Goddesses & Mystics of Mercy by Mirabai Starr

You begin by taking refuge in stillness. Just as the desert looks barren at first glance and then reveals the life teeming just beyond the edges of your gaze, so too does a silent sitting practice become a space of extravagant wonder.

When you show up for what is, with curiosity and courage, you carry that presence into your daily life, rendering everything sacred. The Shekinah, the indwelling feminine presence of the Divine in the Jewish tradition, and Teresa of Avila in the Christian tradition, illuminate a radiant path to the center of your own being and show you the way to carry that light into the shadowed world.

In this module, you’ll:

• Discover the unconventional and intriguing life of St.Teresa of Avila and find out how she can serve as a vital and relevant companion on your own inner journey
• Connect with the imminence of the Shekinah as a guide to full embodiment
• Develop the courage necessary to speak for the voiceless, even when it’s neither convenient nor socially acceptable
• Become familiar with different modes of contemplative practice and make a commitment to some form of regular meditation
• Expand your conception of what it means to be of service
• Commit to a regular Sabbath practice

Miriam followed her baby brother’s basket as it flowed down the Nile to safety, and then finagled to get the Pharaoh’s daughter to adopt him and hire his own mother as wet nurse. Mother Mary agreed to be the vessel for the incarnation of the Divine and then to bear loving witness to his execution.

Mary Magdalene risked everything to stand beside her beloved and speak the voice of feminine power and wisdom. In this session, you’ll look at each of these three great prophets through the lens of peaceful resistance and compassion in action.

In this module, you’ll:

• Learn about Mary in the Bible and the Qur’an
• Reclaim Mary Magdalene to her rightful place in the mythos of the Christ
• Uncover your own story in stories of Miriam
• Engage in a guided meditation to deepen your connection to the Divine Feminine
• Find your unique prophetic voice

Kwan Yin, the Chinese bodhisattva of compassion, is known as “She Who Hears the Cries of the World.” She pours mercy from the palms of her hands onto your broken heart and offers sanctuary.

The medieval English mystic, Julian of Norwich, promised that, “All will be well and all will be well and every kind of thing shall be well.” For Julian, God is an unconditionally loving mother who adores you exactly as you are. During these times of intensifying polarization and rampant “otherizing,” these wisdom beings generate a space of safety, forgiveness, and deep rest.

In this module, you’ll:

• Discover Julian’s vision of Christ the Mother
• Listen to passages from the Showings where Julian reveals why God could not possibly blame us for our transgressions
• Contemplate the story of how Kwan Yin became a divine being
• Discern between charity dispensed to those perceived as having (or being) less, and compassion based on the realization of our essential unity with those who suffer
• Find refuge, comfort, and support in the embrace of the feminine

In light of the popularity of nondual teachings, you may have felt pressured to reject the yearning that burns in your heart for union with the Divine. The great secret of the mystical journey is that devotion is the catalyst for connection, and the duality of lover and Beloved melts into an undifferentiated experience of pure love.

The poetry of the mystics not only describes this ecstatic love dance with the Divine; it evokes it. Union with the Beloved is your birthright. Reclaim love-longing.

In this module, you’ll:

• Learn how the young Mirabai fell in love with Krishna and overcame unimaginable odds, including numerous attempts on her life, to devote herself wholeheartedly to Krishna
• Explore the poetry of mystics from multiple traditions who express the transformational power of love-longing
• Learn to integrate your spiritual passion with your life, allowing that sublime love to permeate every aspect of what you do and who you are
• Explore the mythologies of lover and Beloved and why they most closely mirror the connection between the individual soul and her divine source

The Earth is both our nurturing Mother and our traumatized sister. You can let yourself down into her arms, feel the roots that extend from the soles of your own feet and entwine with hers, and rest in the safety and connection she offers. You must also lean close to listen to her moans of pain, and activate to protect and care for her.

As Indigenous wisdom has long proclaimed, the Gaia Theory postulates that everything is interconnected and mutually dependent. The Earth is a living being, and what touches one part affects the entire system. Ix Chel, the fertility goddess of the ancient Maya, is an artist who weaves the world into being. She heals and protects all of life with creativity and beauty. This is our task, too. Art is medicine.

In this module, you’ll:

• Reclaim the wild holiness and unshakable wisdom of your own body
• Identify a particular issue of personal concern regarding the plight of the planet and make a commitment to action on behalf of the Earth
• Develop a personal relationship with Earth as Mother, and address her as a cherished relative
• Recommit to spending regular time connecting with nature as part of your spiritual practice
• Commit to some form of creative practice as a form of healing prayer

In different ways, both women and men are conditioned to fear our anger. Religions reinforce our mistrust by judging anger as a spiritually inferior state to equanimity, and evidence of moral corruption. The earth is in peril. The water and the air are poisoned. Governments collude for profits at the expense of those on the margins, who grow increasingly more vulnerable. Anger is the appropriate response to these widespread abuses.

Like the Hindu goddess, Kali, and the courageous Beguine, Marguerite Porete, you’re called now to transmute the lead of your outrage to the gold of sacred rage, to raise your voice together with a roar of resistance and sing the song of love loud enough to be heard above the deafening silence of complacency.

In this module, you’ll:

• Expand your conception of what it means to be of service
• Find a healthy balance between personal spiritual practice and caring for others
• Develop the courage necessary to speak for the voiceless, even when it’s neither convenient nor socially acceptable
• Find yourself in the web of interbeing so you may respond to crisis from a space of connection, clarity, and love

True transformation requires some degree of annihilation. You do not choose the difficult things that happen to you, but if you show up for them and yield to the shamanic descent into the dark mystery, your soul is remade and you carry both the fruits and the scars back into your life where they empower you to be of service to other suffering beings.

When Demeter’s beloved daughter Persephone was abducted by Hades, she made the journey to the Underworld to negotiate her release, changing not only her own life and the life of her child, but of the Earth herself.

Machig Labdrön, the 11th century Tibetan Buddhist master and wise dakini, initiated the powerful practice of Chöd in which the seeker of truth visualizes demons consuming her body and liberating her from the illusion of separation. By surrendering to the transforming fires of the human experience, you become more fully human and available to step up as an instrument of peace.

In this module, you’ll:

• Understand the difference between “becoming nothing” and “being unworthy”
• Embrace the fire and allow it to transfigure you
• Explore the connection between missing loved ones and spiritual longing
• Develop deeper compassion and more vibrant resilience in the face of difficulties

More information about Self Help:

Self-help or self-improvement is a self-guided improvement—economically, intellectually, or emotionally—often with a substantial psychological basis.
Many different self-help group programs exist, each with its own focus, techniques, associated beliefs, proponents and in some cases, leaders.
Concepts and terms originating in self-help culture and Twelve-Step culture, such as recovery, dysfunctional families, and codependency have become firmly integrated in mainstream language.

Self-help often utilizes publicly available information or support groups, on the Internet as well as in person, where people in similar situations join together.
From early examples in self-driven legal practice and home-spun advice, the connotations of the word have spread and often apply particularly to education, business,
psychology and psychotherapy, commonly distributed through the popular genre of self-help books.
According to the APA Dictionary of Psychology, potential benefits of self-help groups that professionals may not be able to provide include friendship,
emotional support, experiential knowledge, identity, meaningful roles, and a sense of belonging.