Initiate Yourself: Recipes for Personal Evolution in March 2020
As part of our personal practice, a co-priestess and I have created a set of practice methods for continuing to deepen our relationships to our sensuality and our essential selves. We invite you to start wherever you are on your path.
These are games for your intuition. If you're not having fun, stop and go do something fun. You will find ease in accessing intuition, so if it isn't easy, it isn't intuition. If you don't believe in intuition, use your imagination.
Theme for 2020 – Act Like You Live in the Future—Because You Do
We live in a world of abundant technologies: touchscreen refrigerators, smart watches, AI assistants, and instant global communication. Wake up, world; this is the sci-fi future you’ve been waiting for. What might have been rare or expensive last year might now be readily accessible. Keep yourself open to the possibilities of progress. Allow yourself to accept what used to be impossible. Decide the trends for the 2020s by wearing everything you want to be.
Theme for March – Discovery & Divinity
One of my clients recently told me, “efficiency is a type of divinity.” While the universe seems to be asking a lot of everyone these days, we continue to receive messaging that leveling up is the way to thrive. Fortunately, with the confluence of spring (at least in the Northern Hemisphere) and the end of Mercury Retrograde, the season has a hand at our backs as we reemerge from yet another chrysalis. It’s time to put those new wings to work and get your feelers in the soil.
Experiments for March
1. Mantras as Spells & Prayer – Think of a difficult situation you’re in right now and set a timeline for when you expect it to resolve. Take some time to write down what you hope to learn from the experience. Write a blessing to what your ideal resolution would look like. Read these affirmations out loud, optionally in front of a mirror. How much do the words resonate out loud compared to within your mind? Return to these words until the situation resolves. When you are out of the situation, burn the mantra.
Challenge Mode: Create mantras for three situations you encounter regularly (e.g., relationship conflicts, moments of overexcitement, triggers) and read them out loud whenever you find yourself uncertain or afraid in any of those categories. Transfer the mantras to a grimoire or notebook so you can keep them and access them regularly. Allow new meanings to unfold as you say the words.
2. Movement & Balance Are Superpowers – Every movement you make is a small miracle as energy transfers from skin to fascia, fascia to muscle, muscle to bone. Can you sense into and transfer energy between each of your connective points as you move? Can you feel the earthquake of emotion as it erupts through these membranes? Take some time this month to press your fingertips, hands, feet, body up against a surface such as a wall, table, or floor. Engage with the surface as though it is another body. How small do your movements become? How large?
Challenge Mode: Explore partnered yoga with a significant other or friend. Rather than researching poses, experiment with the ways you can both stretch at the same time. If you’re feeling especially adventurous, perform a stacked plank (one person one direction, the other person the opposite direction on top of each other) using your shared balance and strength.
3. Invite Evolution – We all exist in overlapping realities, each of us with a different perspective, bias, and method of editing out experiences. What realities might you not be seeing right now? How can talking to others clear up the discrepancies in your reality? If you steer away from confrontation, this is the time to encourage yourself and others to face interpersonal fears. Consider making a new friend or reading back through your journals this month to broaden the scope of your perspectives.
Challenge Mode: Find a group on Meetup.com or event in your local newspaper that resonates with your interest but is a little outside your comfort zone. How does engaging in that space change your opinions of yourself? How does it change your opinions of others?
4. Remix Your Story – It’s time to tell a new narrative about the ways you exist in the world. In fewer than 500 words, write your journey on the road to your passion without using trauma or pain as mile markers. Name what calls you and follow it through your life. Name the people who influenced you, the media that encouraged your growth, the privilege you were born with or inherited. Write this story as though looking back from six months in the future.
Challenge Mode: As you remix the story of yourself, consider writing shorter stories (100-200 words) about your journey in your current relationships. How does this help you speak clearly about your relationship agreements? How does this inform how you interact with the other person?
5. Integrate & Renew – As you move through the other experiments, take time to absorb what you are discovering, learning, and teasing apart. Find ways to cleanse yourself so you can move without guilt, shame, regret, or residue in your future interactions. Understand that “body” is a process, not a single action. What practices rinse you free of the past and prepare you for the future? How regularly do you need them?
Feel free to document and share any of your experiences as you move through these offerings at r/highpriestesses! We’d love to hear how these are working for you.
Recap of February’s Experiments
The offerings for February included exploring abundance in the themes of belief, time alone, finances, and hardship.
While I did not make a manifesto of my beliefs, I started making miniature poems, sayings, and pieces of personal wisdom into memes and sharing them on my new Instagram account, @playgroundpriestess. This has been a great way to look at the themes present in my daily life and analyze the current beliefs I am operating under.
This month, I travelled to Colorado Springs during Valentine’s Day and spent most of that day alone. I really enjoyed taking myself out to a leisurely lunch and doing self-care. I also spent time thinking about when and why I want space and time alone. In thinking about the simulations my brain runs, many of them occur in relationships, and right now a lot of my energy is tied up in imagining the way out of an unpleasant situation with my roommate. I’m looking forward to what my brainspace looks like once that resolves.
In thinking about finances as a type of energetic exchange, I allowed myself to accept trades for my services and made sure to write down any additional “perks” that came with a session or service I provided. For example, my girlfriend played a role in one of my recent sessions, which made it so much easier to hold space. Even though I was not getting paid any more than usual, the energy required was much lower and made the experience far more enjoyable. I also traded a cuddle session for an excellent professional in-home massage, and I would 100 percent do that again. Yay for nourishing trades!
I’ve been spending most of the beginning of this year thinking about what it means to choose hardship, and even though I am in the middle of some very difficult and complex interpersonal issues, I can see that choosing these difficulties will give me more clarity and confidence about navigating situations like these in the future, situations I encounter on the regular. Additional energy expenditure now is going to pay off in the long term.
Thanks for reading! Enjoy this month’s experiments!