From the Shen Archive: Gifts to You from the Spirit Journal

This article was originally published April 10 2013. The Spirit Journal Intensive runs from April 7-11 2016. 

By Ellery Littleton

The two following pieces were written by participants in a recent Spirit Journal writing program, in response to an exercise entitled “My Gift To You.” They are reproduced here with permission.

A Celebration of My Life – by Marion B.

My gifts to you I lay out in the sacred circle of my life. In the North, I offer my strong hands making give-away mandala rugs, holding babies, stirring soup. I offer hard-won knowledge – the how-to’s of everyday life. I offer celebration of our humanhood, our spirits and the grandmothers and grandfathers and all the ancestors who went before us. I light a green candle. I surround it with the blossoms of my garden and a stone from my path.

In the East, I give my far-ranging mind, bright insights and the flickering Northern Lights of my dreams and visions. I give you my intuition, my own sacred song, my hopefulness for change that can blow away long-held darkness. I light a yellow candle. I lay an eagle feather alongside, reminding me again of times I have achieved true lightness of being.

In the South, I offer you my passion. I offer my big-hipped Earth Mamma body with no apologies. I will dance with or around you – join if you choose. I offer my anger against injustice – if your flame has dwindled, I will encourage you to rise up, reclaim your fire god or goddess. I light a red candle. I place a smiling, ageless, rounded goddess form beside it.

In the West I offer you the sea – my joy of waves, my own tears, my wisdom of the cycles of joy and sorrow. I have almost been around the Great Wheel. I will not draw back from your pain. I light a blue candle. I place beside it a shell with perfect spiral leading inwards and outwards. If you listen to it you can hear your own heart.

In the Center I give you myself – where it connects with you and with All That Is and The Powers That Be. I remind you that we stand in the sacred moment – a center of the universe. I give my magic, my priestess keeping-of-the-flame. I light a floating candle which shifts and spins in the Waters of the World – the recycled seas and storms that is our living water.

I invite you to see yourself and me within this circle and to carry your own flame on your own journey.
Blessed Be.

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Let Me – by Alana C.

Let me give you my friendship
For I am a worthy friend
Supportive of your endeavors
Honest in my affection
Compassionate with my time and money.

Let me cheer you with my laughter
Which comes rolling up from my belly
Boisterous and lusty
Overspilling the banks of my heart
In mirthful appreciation
When you have me as your audience.
Let me share with you my courage
For I love being alive and marvel
At what life has to offer.
Let me show you how to taste this
Try that, put this on, take that off
Dive in the deep end and come up
Swimming, tail and fins flashing.

Let me teach you about learning
When the road is tough and steep
And the yoke of life bends you
To the point of breaking
Let me point out the lessons
In the pebbles and boulders on the path
That will enlighten your aching spirit.

Let me offer you my intelligence
For I am quick to see through things
To penetrate life’s symbols and metaphors
To brew an essence and offer it up in wisdom
To distill the gleanings of my experience as an elixir
Blessed with crone energy and understanding.

And here is the gift of my strength
For I have fallen and risen many times
I wear the cloth of endurance
Look closely, for in it you will see
The sun and the moon and the stars
And the line of the distant horizon.