I returned to Minnesota a few years later, a healthy, vibrant, wise young woman. I immediately sought out resources for continuing my spiritual education. I was thrilled to find that bookstores now carried a huge section of New Age books. I discovered online pagan communities to tap into. There were shops, periodicals, and local groups all devoted to the Goddess, and Her initiates. I attended a few rituals with local covens. But I was searching for something deeper, something more akin to the real training of the priestesses of old. I had been a solitary practitioner for years at that point, and was really craving the tutelage and camaraderie of a group experience.
In my quest to find such a group, I came upon an organization based in Madison, WI ~ the Women's Thealogical Institute. I contacted them, and received exciting information about a priestess-training program they offered, called "Cella." The program was divided into three cycles, which would span across six years. To be ordained, one would then complete a more intense seventh year, with specialized priestess work, similar to writing a thesis to obtain a degree. The curriculum was divided into various "paths" an initiate would choose for herself: Creatrix, Scholar/Teacher, Healer, Organizer, Ritualist or Earthwalker. The program was self-paced, working on your activities at home, and then meeting with your designated group for intensive weekends twice each year. I was beyond excited, more than thrilled ~ I had found the training I had been seeking since I'd first heard of the Goddess, many years before.
I immediately enrolled, and was placed in a new group that was just starting up in Madison. I knew that there would be other novices just starting out, like me, as well as women who were well on their path and already several years into the program. I had no idea what to expect, but I was so open to the experience - whatever it would be!
The five-hour road trip to Madison was invigorating. I was driving with a purpose. My body shivered with a feeling of "right-ness:" for I was embarking on a journey my spirit had long been craving. I took particular joy in the smooth road, the music I was singing too, and the birds popping into my line of sight: Hawk, the Messenger, and Turkey, the Give-Away. I was alert, and full of energy. I was ready for anything.
I will never forget when I arrived at our host's home for the first time. I was a little nervous, but entered the kitchen confidently enough, smile beaming, and said "Hello! I'm Emily!" There was a look of confusion on many of the faces I saw there - I was definitely the youngest woman present, and maybe a little more... "glam," comparatively. I heard someone towards the back mutter, "Who's the cheerleader?" But I dismissed it, as I made my one-on-one introductions all around.
The weekend proceeded as many workshops do: different women presented lectures and activities on our main subject, we had time for independent study, and time to meet with our advisor, a high priestess who would oversee our work in the program. We ate together, made rituals, and downtime to talk, knit, read, etc. I soaked it all in, and despite moments of feeling inexperienced or unintelligible, I thoroughly enjoyed the entire weekend, and all the women I was sharing the experience with. The high priestess and I determined I would walk a double path of Scholar/Teacher and Creatrix, and I couldn't wait to get home and delve into my studies!
On the very last day, a woman came to me and said, "I want to apologize to you. When you first came in on Friday night, I judged you without knowing you, which wasn't right for me to do. After spending the weekend getting to know you, I think you're a really amazing and powerful goddess, and I'm very happy you're in our group." I was beaming :-)
Over the next couple years, I would attend a few more weekends, in Madison, as well as with a group that started up in Minnesota, close to home. I was very disciplined with my studies: reading books, writing papers, creating projects. I explored different kinds of meditation, raising power, becoming more earth-friendly and conscious. I was "working the program," and it was working for me in my life: despite some other life choices I had made in that time, which might have been seen as taboo or subversive, this priestess training helped keep me balanced, grounded, and strong in my self and my spirit.
Then, as life will always have it, things changed. My focus changed. Everything was changing around me: my relationship, my work, my home. I was in my late-20s, the Saturn Return years, and as it happens for many people, my life was turned upside down. I was distracted from my studies, put them on a shelf, as I spiraled downwards into a deep depression that would afflict me on and off for years to come. I was self-medicating with marijuana, which robbed me of any and all energy to make positive changes in my life. I was surrounded by people that were mistreating me and using me. I was as far off my path, and separated from my true spirit as I could be.
Because of it, everything I tried failed. Every wall I tried to climb, I smashed into instead. All of my good intentions proved to be futile. I had learned the lesson early in life, in Mexico: by small daily affirmations of spirit, expressions of gratitude and taking tiny, positive actions in my environment, synchronicity would swirl, and when we walk the true path, we are rewarded with endless opportunities, divine assistance and magical blessings. I knew this, had already learned this and lived it... but knowledge does not make wisdom. The lesson was there for me to learn again, as lessons will often require. Some things are presented to us again and again and again, until they have taken hold in a way that finally influences our choices and actions. I wasn't there yet. I may not be even now!
Indeed, it would take many years, many journeys, other relationships, jobs, experiences, births and deaths before I would finally encounter the returning path to my spirit, and to my true self and destiny. After a particularly cruel (yet transformative) year, where I had been stripped of family, husband, home, career, and more, I was left only with one thing: me. Whatever skills, gifts and talents I had been given or had cultivated, would have to be enough to reconstruct not only my life, but (and more importantly) the person I intended to be.
After years and years of neglect to my spiritual discipline, I knew the best way to get back on track would be slow and steady progress. It was Winter Solstice of 2009, and I charted a plan for my life that would coincide with the Wheel of the Year. From winter to spring, I would begin to plant the seeds. I would rest, allow myself time to dream, create, envision, expand, and explore. I would carefully consider what elements would be necessary to live a most fulfilling life. From spring to summer, I would take action. I would investigate, seek out, invent opportunities that would fall in line with the goals I had established. From summer to autumn, I would get busier than I had ever been - push myself to network, meet new people, take advantage of every opportunity that came my way, and exhaust myself with activity and work. Finally, from autumn to winter, I would step back, assess what I had accomplished (or failed to) and make the plan for the next year to come.
This has been my current path, and here we are, in repose, looking back at all that I have manifested. For the most part, I truly have accomplished all I set out to do: I have surrounded myself with positive and inspiring people, have created work opportunities that best suit my talents, have focused on healing of mind and body, and feel incredibly strong in my person: I have re-met my true self in this process, and am firmly back on my true path ~ which, like in Mexico, is evident by the amazing synchronicity and support from God, Goddess and the Universe.
In my assessment of my progress, only one element was missing to complete the picture: the priestesshood I had left behind years before. I pulled out my old manuals and workbooks. I made a list of where I left off in my studies, and what work remained for me to complete the first Cycle. I contacted the high priestess in Madison, and told her the time had finally come, and I was ready to pick up Ariadne's thread again, and make my way into the labyrinth of the Goddess.
I received confirmation from her last week, that I am most welcomed to return to the Madison Cella group, and that I may pick up where I left off. The old familiar excitement swept through me. My spirit began to dance. I take joy in the wisdom that by incorporating this spiritual discipline back into my life, the energy which is already swirling so beautifully around me at this phase of my life will only intensify. This is the last step onto my destined road. The Goddess, who lives within me, is most certainly pleased.
Had I continued my Cella studies straight through, in all this time, I might have already been ordained as a priestess. But, that's not always how life works, nor our individual spiritual journeys. All of the experiences I endured in my hiatus - however tragic or terrible - were ones my soul needed to integrate the mysteries and knowledge I am gaining. That's how wisdom is born ~ as a product of knowledge and experience, which becomes our intuition. In the tarot, the High Priestess says this about intuition:
"Intuition is partially a function of prior experience. We can sometimes predict the outcome of a particular situation through intimate knowledge of the participants or through understanding a similar incident in the past. The wisdom of the High Priestess is a kind of knowledge we use to move forward every day when we anticipate the outcome of our actions."
I anticipate that by choosing right action in my life, incorporating positive and inspiring disciplines, aspiring to better myself each day, and staying true to the woman I know I am, the goals and successes I wish to attain shall be mine. Life will change, as it always does. We never know what each season or year shall bring. Yet, I have learned that when it feels like you're beating your head against a wall, or certain people or situations bring on agitated emotions, or doors you most wish would open remain closed... you are meant to go another way.
I have returned to the path that was destined for me, and me alone. I pick up the thread, to wind myself in to the heart of the labyrinth. She waits for me there. The Mother is calling Her daughter back home.
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