At a time when the collective issues are so stressful, I imagine that many healing professionals are seeing more and more clients who are exhibiting symptoms that are from the collective trauma field. I've found in my work with the ancestors that these collective trauma fields often activate ancestral wounds. Ancestral wounds also often show up as the kind of polarization we witness in the world today.

To address this, I'm offering an introductory talk specifically for healing professionals on ancestral lineage healing. More info below!

FOR HEALING PROFESSIONALS
June 16th, 6pm PT - Ancestral lineage healing: An exploration for healing professionals 
Our lives are reverberations of family inheritances, of patterns of being passed on to us through spirit, blood, and bone. In many cultures there are active practices for tending to those who have passed on with the recognition that they are an extension of the living. In today’s modern world many people have lost these practices, sometimes for thousands of years, sometimes leaving the ancestral field in disrepair. In this introductory talk for healing professionals you will:

• Learn about ways to recognize ancestrally influenced problems in clients
• Explore the concept of supporting boundaries, connection to well ancestors, and approaching the trouble in ritually safe ways
• Learn more about ancestral lineage healing and how it may be supportive for your clients.

This talk is led by Summer Starr, a student practitioner of Ancestral Medicine’s lineage repair work. She comes to this work from a perspective of the interweaving of human history with earth history and how by reclaiming our roots in our ancestry we are also reclaiming our right relationship to the earth who birthed us and the cosmic forces that shape all life while tending the cultural wounds that affect all humans today. You can learn more about her work at www.makingkin.com

Not a healing professional? Contact me and I'll keep you posted on future similar talks for the general public.

Register: https://us06web.zoom.us/meeting/register/tZIqd-irpjorEtXUm2JhVNbYT_8Z_QxBPXGY 


Share on Facebook: https://fb.me/e/1Qmwx3OMe

I went through a huge process of growth when I was living in India. It changed me at a core and foundational level. But this inner work was not easy for me to integrate. Some aspects of what my soul had opened up to left me with so many more questions than answers that I spun out into a state of non-coherence. I had trouble finding my inner compass again.

Some of this confusion and lack of coherence was part of the transformation process... we often have to go into the wilderness of our being to find a truer sense of self. But part of this experience was also due to trauma I had experienced and I needed to re-orient towards the goodness and wholeness in me.

I fortunately had the gift of meeting a mentor, Jennifer Johnson, who trained me in a healing modality called Resonance Repatterning. The method uses muscle checking to guide a session where we identify and shift negative patterns in ourselves that we resonate with and positive patterns that we do not. Then we use simple energetic techniques to shift these resonances. We also identify positive actions that one can take to support the shifts in the longer term.

I use this work regularly as a "tune up" when I realize that I am spiraling into negative thought or behavior patterns. I find the work especially supportive for people who are going through big transitions or are doing such deep healing that they feel a bit unmoored. It helps find that inner compass again, so the navigation through challenging times gets a bit clearer.

I have also used this work to support deeper healing. There are ways to bring in intergenerational patterns into the work. I have also had things come in from past lives where I have been able to do some soul tending of patterns that have been with me over many lifetimes.

If you are interested in exploring this work with me, visit my "Offerings" page!

I recently did some thematic harmonizing work with my female lineages. I came to the work feeling at a bit of a discord between myself and other women in my life. There has been a common theme throughout my life around not feeling in harmony with other women and I have been curious about the ancestral roots of this phenomenon. So I took it to my ancestors and they recommended that we do a harmonization process between my mother’s mothers, my mother’s father’s mothers, my father’s mothers and my father’s father’s mothers. All 4 of these lineages are in good health, each bringing a unique strength. In my process I started with my mother’s people and then worked with my father’s people and then with all 4 together. 

From the stories passed down from my mom, I had a sense that her two lineages did not get along. When I brought them together there was a great sense of each needing to be seen in its strength by the other. When that recognition took place, there was a feeling of great mutual respect that flowed from them into me. It was a sense of an ability to be with the greatness of the other without giving up any of your greatness. 

This hit home with some of my feelings with other women. I have felt like I have to become smaller to make them feel comfortable or have felt small in relationship to their greatness. To experience the greatness of my lineages stand in their fullness and recognize each other in that fullness gave me an imprint for how this can look and feel in an embodied way. I feel their coming together as a salve for a deep wound I have been playing out with other women.

My father’s lineages were a bit more in harmony from the start. It feels like the women in the two lineages are kindred spirits, each with their own strengths and insights, but with a common heart for the earth and the cosmos.

When I brought all 4 lineages together there was a sense of the feminine really coming home. Each lineage holds a piece of the larger tapestry of the feminine in a way that, when combined, they form a powerful expression of the larger feminine mythos that I can see play out in tangible ways in my life, but also in a larger cosmic scale. Some of the traits of this combined energy are deep earth relationship in ways that can predict and manage resources, as well as relationship with the celestial cycles, and additionally a tending of the feminine wounding by the patriarchy in a way that brings profound wisdom and healing to broken places.

I am a small part of a much larger work happening on this planet and in the larger universe (and multiverse). By coming into alignment with the wisdom of my ancestors, I can step into my part to play in a fuller way.

One of the gifts of my lineages is a wisdom around timing. We are part of a much larger cycle of learning and growing happening on the planet and part of what we are learning is how we create connection and work in harmony with each other. I don’t expect my lineage work to immediately alter all of the female relationships I have, but I do see how it adds a positive perspective and energy to those relationships, which moves all of us towards a larger direction of healing. I look forward to witnessing the patient unfolding this work is a part of.

If you are interested in exploring the wisdom of your ancestors and assisting in the healing of your lineages and the larger collective, you can learn more here!

I’ve been asked by the nature spirits I work with to start to co-create essences (energetic medicine) for each of the zodiac signs over a year-long process. This month I started this work with Aries, the sign that begins what is traditionally thought of as the new cycle of the yearly circumnavigation around the zodiac. In my work with the essence I am making I have come to know Aries in a different way, in a way that brings what we traditionally think of a very independent sign back into relationship, which makes it more reflective of its opposite sign, Libra. 

This full moon in Libra reflecting an Aries sun allows us to explore these paradigms of individuation and interconnection in a way that can be nourishing to the soul.

One of the lessons of my work with Aries has been that while it holds the energy of hope, courage, perseverance, and individuation, in its highest form it does so with a deep sense of interconnection, of connection to and partnership with the larger forces of creation. In some ways we are all portals for the forces of creation to act through us. In my cosmology there is a primal essence, which I associate with the void, which all emerges from and returns to, that speaks through all of creation. I associate this with the Tao or the Buddhist sense of the emptiness that is the true nature of all things. In this way the Aries sense of becoming “me” is rooted in a profound sense of my connection with the source that is all things. There is no final individuation, only a sense of becoming more of my part of the whole.

I’ve come to understand that when we start to entrain with the forces of nature, like the rotation of the earth around the sun and the seasonal patterns that are expressed through that rotation, then we start to come back into more intimate relationship with the primal force that speaks through all things. It is a way to “remember” in a world of forgetting.

Aries can often play into the “forgetting” with its wild individualism and Libra brings us back into a sense of relationship. 

As someone who often feels outside of social norms, Libra can be challenging for me. She asks me to see the primal forces of creation in the people around me. I can see this more readily in the non-human people I interact with, especially in the nature realms, but to see this in humans or in society in general is trickier for me. My feeling is that we have lost our entrainment to these primal forces in a way that has encouraged rampant individualism at the expense of interconnection.

So in some ways this full moon in Libra is an opportunity to come back into alignment in a way that is needed both on an individual and a collective level.

May you feel the primal forces working in you and your life during this particular passage of time and may this ripple out in larger ways in your life and those around you!

Meditation

Breathe in and out in a relaxed way, noticing the way the in breath and the out breath bring balance to your body and mind. This is the balancing nature of airy Libra. The inner and the outer are intimately in tune with each other through the breath. As you breathe in, you are intimately connected with the air around you and all the plants and animals who have breathed this air. And as you breathe out, you contribute some essence of yourself to this larger web. Take a moment to be in silence with this breath of interconnection.

Now notice the inner fire that enlivens your being. The warmth of your body. This is the fire of Aries. Take a moment to feel the liveliness of your heartbeat. As it beats, inwardly whisper the phrase, “this is my heart”. Bring a sense of gratitude to the expression of heart that you uniquely bring to the world. What does your heart dream? What does your heart love? How does your heart love? And feel into those toughened places in your heart that life may have caused to constrict and bring some compassion to how even these places are a unique expression of the whole that is you. 

And also bring attention to how your heart is formed from strands of DNA passed on from generations of lives, made of building blocks that are found in wild nature as well as the stars above. There is a way in which you are uniquely you, but you are also interwoven from all of creation. Take a moment of appreciation for your unique expression of life and its interconnection with the past, present and future of all things.

March's full moon is in Virgo. I honestly have a hard time with Virgo. She triggers the perfectionist in me. As I connect with her more elementally (earth) and also look to her ruling planet (mercury) there is a way in which she takes ideas and visions and translates them into physical reality. She can often be at the cutting edge of making new ideas happen. She can also get caught up in the perfect idea that never quite translates into the perfect reality when brought into the physical plane. She is also known for being the archetype of the healer, which to me is characteristic of her connection between the mind (mercury) and the body (earth). Working with her energy feels like a good opportunity to address the perfectionist in ourselves and become more fluid with our ideas of how things should be versus the reality of how things turn out. It is also an opportunity to tidy up the mind/body connection and perhaps discover some healing in the process.


The Virgo full moon is reflecting the Pisces sun, so we are also in the watery realm of the unconscious. This makes Virgo's healing properties even more potent. Pisces is the place of gestation, the watery womb where the new is formed. Whatever was planted in February during imbolc is starting to form, but it might be on a really unconscious level. For those of you who are tapped into the unconscious, it might feel more conscious or it might be rolling through your dreams, but the idea is that something new is forming, but is not birthed yet. I see Pisces as a creator who is weaving something in the depths of the unconscious from the energy of all possibilities... like there is an infinite palette to choose from and there is a selection of one strand and then another, pure creativity allowing all to be as it is without judgement. With Neptune as its ruler, Pisces has an energy of illusion to its creativity. It is forming what is new through the dreaming of the deepest parts of our being. It is weaving the new form of maya, illusion, that we are dancing with in our yearly creative lifecycle. This is a very different energy than Virgo where it is all about conscious ideas taking final form. Pisces is the unconscious primordial waters where the not-yet manifest is just beginning to form.


There is a way in which with this full moon I want to sink into Pisces' waters and allow the depths to inform the Virgo-ian energies of translating thought into form. I want to dream new realities not based on ideas of perfection, but rooted in the wisdom of my subconscious. And I want to tap into the manifesting powers of Virgo to start to make those dreams real and in alignment with my soul's healing path.

Meditation
Take a moment to breathe in stillness and come to the center of your being. Just a few breaths, allowing yourself to sink into your body. From this place of centeredness, I invite you to bring forward an idea or two that you might have for the future or how you might like your current life to be. What needs to come into form? What needs some tending or healing to come into right alignment with your ideals? Start to hold these thoughts in your body. Where do you feel them in relationship to your body? Is there something that needs to shift or open to come into alignment with these thoughts? Just take a moment to feel into the body relationship with these thoughts.

This is the energy of Virgo - of mind/body connection… of thoughts and their counterpart in form. Invite in a moment of extra awareness to the earthiness of your body, the element of Virgo. Send out an intention of goodness to your body and to the earth that surrounds us. May our human thoughts be transformed into goodness for our bodies and for the earth.

Now take a minute to connect with your kidneys, feel them in the backside of your body below your ribs. This is the place where the waters of your body get filtered and it is also the connection to the energetic waters of your ancestors. Allow this place to be a connection point to your watery subconscious, maybe expanding your awareness to your back body, the quiet unconscious parts of you. Allow your awareness to sink into your sacral area and the watery creative wisdom held there. 

This is the energy of the Pisces sun that is being reflected by the moon. Take a moment to receive any wisdom it might have to offer you. Invite in a moment of extra awareness to the waters of your body. Send out an intention of goodness to your personal waters and to the waters in the world around us. May we listen to the unconscious, emotional, deep places in ourselves as we move through our days.

​

The wild world around us is cyclical in nature. Our earth orbits the sun and this shifts the light and heat on our planet in what we call seasons. These seasons are alchemical processes of change, each initiating a process of life- or death-giving states. There are times of germination, of birthing and growing, of harvesting, of death and of returning to stillness in preparation of the next cycle of growth. Historically humans have looked at the movement of the moon and the stars to help predict these cycles. They noticed patterns of where the sun was placed in the constellations during certain seasons and started to associate earthly natural rhythms and the alchemy found at certain times of the year to these constellations. 

We like to think that our psyches are separate from the world and even the galaxy around us, but like the ocean tides moving to the pull of the moon, we feel the pull of the celestial forces around us.

I've been fascinated by astrology for some time, but my connection to nature spirits has increased this. As more subtle beings, they are even more in tune with the subtle changes in the celestial realm. I believe this is why the Celtics and even Maori and Aborigine art feature spirals. There is a way in which nature is a series of spirals. The earth around sun. The earth around its axis. The moon around the earth. The planets around the sun. Everything in the heavens is spiraling and in correlation all of creation here on earth, including consciousness, is spiraling too.

What wasn't clear to me until recently is that we can view the entire human lifespan as one larger spiral... I see it as an orbit around our evolving soul/heart. And during that cycle we go through the same stages of alchemy that we find in a calendar year... germination, birth, maturation and death. These cycles happen multiple times in a life, but what nature has shared with me is that each human has an overarching unique rhythm to this cycle that is based on their birth chart. 

In my life cycle astrology readings I take people through their life map to explore themes in their creative rhythms. We look at ways to entrain to the alchemical forces at work during this moment in your life and unpack some of the experiences you may have had previously in your life during other alchemical stages as well as look at what is to come.

What is powerful for me in these readings is that it deconstructs the idea that at every stage of our life we must be living into full productivity. On contrary, there are times where the prevailing energy is asking us to rest, go within, reform ourselves at our deepest levels. Giving this consciousness and giving ourselves permission to be as nature is intending us to be is liberating.

If you would like to explore your personal alchemical process and where you are in your creative lifecycle, do reach out to me!

This month we welcome a fiery full moon in Leo. Moons in fire signs can be a little ungrounding as they are reflecting the sun in an air sign, in this case Aquarius, so bringing this energy into the body is helpful in navigating the essence of this moon. We will definitely do some body tending in this circle!

The moon in Leo brings a maturing sense of fire, this is fire in a more adult form, energy moving to the crown chakra and our sense of spiritual connection or knowing. Leo is a flashy energy that demands attention, but also can be very connective, illuminating the beauty in all that beholds its fire.

The moon reflecting the Aquarius sun is bringing us the energy of something more than air, it is the energy of ether. Ether is the vibration of electrons flitting in and out of quantum reality. It is the quick exchange of information as knowingness flits between realities. We are living in what is called by some the Aquarian age and this describes the way that we are connected to each other and ideas through the electronics that weave through our lives. Aquarius energy lives at the root chakra and is the place of quantum activation of the new cycle of creation. It is like the fertilization of the egg of possibility takes place under this sun and the moon in Leo is reflecting a hint of what the eventual adult form of the offspring will potentially look like.

So this is a great time to plant intentions for what you want to grow in the new year. What are you looking to harvest later in the year? Or simply tune into the silent impressions of what is starting to form beneath the surface of your life, seeing what it needs to nurture its growth.

At this full moon I encourage you to tune into the fire of your metabolic processes and your heart fire as a way to bless this element in you through attunement. Also acknowledge the quantum or ethereal aspect of your being with by paying attention to something that feels like it is coming to you from beyond the veil or in other words from a more collective reality (as opposed to your personal experience) either through dream, intuition, vision or just a “feeling into” your life. A news article, instagram or facebook meme that you are drawn to is also a more modern form of collective information gathering, but one that perhaps offers some playfulness into the mix. The electronic and information sharing aspect of our lives can sometimes feel overwhelming or ungrounding, so this is an opportunity to explore how we relate to this in a healthy way.



Meditation for this full moon:

Breathe into your heart. Let your breath drop into your belly. Allow your body settle, following gravity to the earth. This is your center. Just be here, now, in this moment. Allow everything else drop away and bring all the parts of you to this time and place. This breath.

Let the warmth of your body remind you of the molecular fire that permeates your body. These are your own personal suns, shining on a  microscopic level. Allow this to connect you to the Leo moon that now shines in the sky.
​
Through time and space, we are connected through intention, through thought, through consciousness to each other and the world around us. Take a moment to recognize this connection, both people and non-people. Trees, the rushing water out beyond us. All have a spirit and we are connected in spirit. This is the Aquarian energy of ether, the spiritual weaver of social reality, relatedness in all its forms.

I invite you to stand and  with your eyes closed, if that feels right, explore movement of this embodied sense of your inner fire and the interconnection with all of reality around you. How does it feel to weave between your inner sovereignty, your liveliness, and your connection to all things? Allow breath and sound to come in whatever way it wishes.  Take a few minutes in silence to explore this experience.

Cancer is being shown to me these days as the ruler of the salty waters. The sea water, but also our blood, sweat, and tears. It also governs the alchemical process of solutio, the dissolving of old patterns through emotions of love, grief, gratitude, etc. Anytime we have strong watery emotions that support a process of change, this is a solutio process. So we will have space to honor this process in our sharing. I invite you to bless something that represents these salty waters, something that can be returned to the earth after your ritual.

The full moon will be reflecting the Capricorn sun, so I also wish to honor the way that Capricorn holds the energy of metal/stone. This element is also our bones and teeth, the hard structures in our body. It governs the alchemical process of mortificacio, the death process. This season marks the beginning of winter with all life coming to its most inert stage. Death holds the key to new life. It is also the season where we feel closest to the sovereignty of the earth as she dances away from the influence of the sun, for without the sun the earth is barren death to life as we know it, but yet she is still a fertile host for the powers of the underworld (think stone and lava people). I invite you to bless something to bless that represents metal/stone/bone/teeth that can be returned to the earth after your ritual.

Ritual meditation for Cancer:
Take a few deep breaths and start to tune into the salty waters of your body. Your sweat, your tears, your blood. Really tune into your blood for a moment. Feel the way your blood circulates to every part of your body, bringing oxygen and nourishment and carrying away all that is ready to be eliminated. Connect into the history your blood holds, its link to your ancestors. Really deepen into your sense of connection to your blood and let it draw you deeper and deeper, like drawing you into the dark waters of the ocean. Let this sense merge with the ocean waters, feeling no distinction between the blood in your body and the great deep waters of the ocean. Imagine yourself sinking deeper and deeper into the dark vastness of the ocean, finding that you can easily breathe there no matter how deep you go. Feel the energy of the ocean around you, the movement of the currents. Let that energy penetrate your body and allow it to heal any blocks you might have energetically in your emotions or mind. Allow it to nourish and heal your physical body. Allow the swirl of the water around you, gently bring your system into deeper resonance to the deep waters of the ocean and the primordial life force there. Take some time to be with this, allowing the healing to unfold as it will. Notice how as the waters in your body come back into resonance with the primordial waters of the ocean, you are amplifying the health of the ocean and you are actually healing it as well. Imagine this amplification of healthy waters rippling out around you and reaching the far corners of the ocean. See it being evaporated into the air, raining and snowing down on the earth and flowing healing resonance back out to the ocean, creating a cycling loop of primordial health that supports all life on the planet.

As you start to come back into waking consciousness, think of a word or a phrase to speak to the water you have brought. Dr. Emoto has shown that water holds the resonance of the words spoken to it and so your word will imprint on this water and when you return it to the earth it will be a blessing, rippling out into the environment.

When you have your word or phrase, offer it to the water in gratitude for its support for life on this planet.

​

My psych meds kill my soul. They add a layer of toxicity to my energetic system that takes near constant alchemical work to transform. They distort my soul’s onboard navigation. So in order to remain centered and clear on my path, I have to work to listen to the world around me and to transform the negative effects. I will never be as clear as someone who is not on meds. But does that mean that I do not have a message to be heard or support to be offered? No. In fact with so many people around the world being put on psych meds, I think I hold a very important key to navigating this brave new world. And that key is my own experience with alchemical healing...of soul work. 

So why take meds at all? For those who have never navigated altered mental states it may seem like a poor decision. It is one that I definitely fought for years. And it is one that I may reverse some day. For now I know that my meds allow me to navigate the ordinary world in a way that I would not be able to without them. I wouldn’t be able to have a regular job, which means I wouldn't be able to support myself in a way that has allowed for my learning from many of the influential teachers on my path. Staying oriented to normal time and space continuum is challenging for me without meds. It is hard for me to even remember what is me and what is the rest of the world. Boundaries and protection are nonexistent. I walk with a permeability that is risky at best and a complete hazard to my own existence at worst. 

So the meds have their place. 

Why not work on boundaries and strengthen my system until it is strong enough to not be on meds? People with a higher level of spiritual mastery have often viewed me with pity or concern because I have not developed a strong energetic body. The meds deplete what is already depleted. However, I am one who does not force practices on myself. There was a time where I naturally had a daily yoga and meditation practice and it still didn’t prevent me from psychosis. I’ve come to accept that I have a certain “way” and that way is a bit more challenging and requires different kind of work to maintain. It is this respect of individual paths that I bring to my work with others. The trick is to find your way and walk it. 

So for me my way requires a LOT of internal processing of poisons. From my meds to all of the junk I absorb from the outside world, I am constantly working to remember my truth and my path in the sea of muck. The alchemical process of changing the lead in my system into gold has been critical for my health. And there are days where I am closer to the lead and days where I am closer to the gold. 

Perhaps some day I will obtain a higher level of mastery where I will get to lay down some of the struggle. Some level of alchemical work will always be there… otherwise one is at true homeostasis, which is death. Until then, I offer my insight into the struggle as my unique balm for the world. 

​