Theme of the month – THE DIVINE FEMININE – by Hannah Peskett

Each month at FYS we have a theme that us teachers use to thread and weave some philosophy, mantra and inspiration into our classes. Going forward each month, we will all be taking it in turns to write a blog about the theme of the month to get our students involved too. Please feel free to comment and share!

“In India, great rivers are named after the goddesses, the ocean and the earth are considered the Mother, the Trees her arms, the mountains her breasts, the plants her nourishment, the Sky her lover. Usas, Kali, Lakshmi, Kamala, Parvati, Aditi, Saraswati, Devi, Gayatri, Shakti – all names of Mother as God. There is a goddess of the sun, the goddess of the dawn, and another of starlit nights. There is a goddess of wealth and beauty, a goddess of wisdom and aging, a goddess of learning and speech. There is a goddess of destruction and a goddess of all-devouring time. They are all the Mother.” – Taken from The Path of the Mother by Savitri L. Bess

July is the month of MA! The mother, in all her forms. A vast subject with various aspects and many layers. It’s a small word, with a massive meaning. “Ma” Is the Sanskrit word for Mother. In some schools of thought it can mean, to make, produce or create. Ma is Mother earth. Nature and everything in it. It’s your mother, my mother, the divine mother. It’s a presence, a cosmic feminine energy that surrounds us, residing in even the smallest cracks and crevices of the earth. She is the very earth that holds us our entire lives, supporting our every move, nurturing us as we grow. She feeds us, hydrates us, she lives in us every day, and we live because of her.

I’ve been reading a lot about the goddess and shakti recently. So, I was excited when this month’s theme for the studio was announced. There are so many delicious layers to the goddess’. So many empowering stories. We can tap into the energies of all the different goddess’ by invoking them through things like chanting, mediation, visualisation, intention. There are so many ways to access shakti.

My classes so far, this month have been about the hips and the heart. Opening the hips with the intention of creating space and releasing any blockages that may be preventing the liberation of stagnant baggage. Whilst shining light on the heart space to bring the cracks to the surface, not to try and stitch them up (metaphorically speaking of course) but instead, to let shakti in. The goddess and all her psyche’s.

After the first full week into July, I felt depleted. I was grumpy, sad and lonely. I gave myself a tough time, trying to figure out why I was acting this way. Was it my hormones? Was it the full moon? As I sat and asked myself these questions, a lightbulb went off in my brain. (That week I had taught 5 classes focusing on the hips, practiced that very sequence over and over, and chanted to the goddess most days.) The intention I had when I was planning this class, was working its magic on me. OF COURSE! It was naive of me to think that the classes I teach are for my students only.

I stopped trying to fight the powerful shakti and surrendered. I cried for a few hours. Suddenly, everything fell into place and started to make sense, I was grumpy because the plans I had made for the weekend went awry and didn’t happen. My first lesson from the goddess was don’t get attached. Aparigrapha sprung to mind. I was sad, because the things I was storing, came into light. Lesson two, practice what you preach. I was lonely because I was trying so hard to find her, to feel the essence of the goddess in some way shape or form, desperate to have something to write about, desperate to have some sort of shakti awakening. Lesson three, some things must happen naturally. You can’t force nature! Once I let go of these egotistical imbalances, I felt her. I felt Calm, I felt supported and nurtured.

I am a very independent person, I like to think I’m hard as nails and I can handle anything the universe should throw at me. But that night, I was so thankful to have my girlfriends there with me, we sat under the full moon (the goddess in ALL her glory, shining brighter than even the sun!) we ate food, talked for hours around a fire. We wrote down things that we wanted to leave behind us and watched them as they turned to dust in the dancing flames. My fourth and final lesson for the week, was that it’s okay to need people. I am lucky enough to have an incredible support network of amazing woman, and when we get together, I for one, instantly feel rebooted, empowered and so very blessed.

You see, Ma, or the goddess, or shakti or whatever term you want to use, is EVERYWHERE. She is all around us, she is the sacred geometry spiral of baby ferns emerging from the earth. She is the air that we breath every single day. She is in every single being that lives on this planet, big and small. All you need to do is stop searching and just open yourself up to her, let her in. You will be surprised how much her presence begins to pop up.

“The earth is your mother she holds you. The sky is your father he protects you. We are together always, we are together always. There was never a time when this was not so.” Navajo lullaby.

“The shakti of the goddess, even in her fierceness, is both adorable and adoring. The more you honour her, the more you’ll relish her paradoxes. Adore her for her sweetness, and be grateful for the sharp edges of her sword. Open to her nurturing love and trust her ruthless dispassion. As you do, you’ll realise how intensely the shakti of the universe adores you. Those who know the goddess come to realize that every particle of this world is pregnant with her essence.” – Sally Kempton (awakening shakti)

Thanks for reading, Hannah xxx