Goddess Meditations was published in 1998 and taken out of print in 2002 because it wasn’t selling as well as Llewellyn’s “teen witch” books. When I wrote Goddess Meditations, I was holding several intentions. First, I knew that no one had written a book composed solely and entirely of meditations to goddesses before. (There have been several since 1998.) As a spiritual feminist, I wanted to create such a book. Second, I had been leading guided meditations in rituals, small and large, private and public, for about a decade. People had liked them and kept urging me to write a book. And, third, I wanted to deal with a number of issues in my own life. So I wrote the book. And rewrote it and rewrote it and rewrote it. All that writing led me through my own issues and gave me some important healing.
I still receive emails from people who find copies of the book and actually do the guided meditations. They love them. I’ve made friends with a few of these people, and one told me that the “dark work” meditations helped her through her divorce.
As I was writing the book, I kept thinking of two of my friends. One had recently died (stomach cancer) and another was dying (lung cancer). I wanted to honor the love and support these two women had given me through all the years of our friendships. That’s why I wrote a meditation on death. Another woman, a former friend who is now deceased, had done something extremely hurtful to me. That’s when I wrote this meditation on compassion, which I still like a decade later. It really works.
Compassion
Whether you are a pagan monotheist who believes in The Goddess and She’s All There Is, or you’re a pantheist who sees the face (and breasts and vulva and arms and legs) of the Goddess in nature, or you’re a polytheist who acknowledges all ten thousand goddesses by name and loves and respects them all—whoever you are, this is a book that can speak to all of us. It is my gift to you. I believe that compassion is needed in our world today more than ever. The goddesses invoked in this meditation are Tara, Kuan Yin, and Mary. Speak to the One who holds your heart in Her gentle hands.
A wise man once told me that the divine manifests in us, though us, and as us. Our task is to manifest compassion for someone who hurt us. This is not, however, altogether altruistic, for we all know that “what goes around comes back around.” Isn’t it better for compassion to be what comes back around?
Close your eyes, take a few deep, easy breaths, and bring to your mind’s eye the image of the person who hurt you. You can visualize what this person really looks like or see a generalized image, but avoid cartoons or stereotypes, for our intention is not ridicule but compassion.
(Pause)
If that person’s hurtful words or actions come with the image, observe them. Observe them from a distance this time. Don’t take it personally anymore. Consciously separate yourself from the hurt and know that its power is puny beside the power of compassion. Let it be.
Now visualize the symbol of eternity, a figure 8 on its side. Enlarge the symbol until it is big enough to contain you in one of its loops. Visualize the eternity symbol as pink, then as pink light, then as flowing pink energy. Watch this pink energy for as long as you want to, feeling its warmth. Feel it caressing you as it bathes your body, emotions, mind, and spirit.
Suddenly the person who once hurt you appears in the other loop. See that person standing in the eternity symbol, beside you but separated from you by the cross in the center of the figure 8. What this means is that while you do not have to be close to this person, it is important to understand that he or she is nevertheless just as warmed and loved as you are.
(Pause)
Know that the person is part of the same compassionate energy you’re part of, that he or she is feeling the same love, the same compassion, the same blessing that you’re feeling. Let the energy flow around you both, equally and without judgment or favoritism, for as long as you want to.
(Pause)
Now another element comes into your vision. There you see Her—balanced on the very point where the two loops cross. There She is—dancing or standing upon the very center of eternity. Tara. Kuan Yin. Mary. She stands, as She has forever stood, upon the cross of compassionate energy. Soon you can see the source of all that flowing energy. It is She, of course. It flows from Her, from Her hands, from Her feet, from Her eyes, from Her heart, from Her womb.
As you watch, you can finally understand how the compassionate Goddess consciously sends Her loving energy out into a world that surely and sorely needs that love. She has vowed to love us, and Her compassion will come to use whenever we call Her. Forever.
Let it be.
This book must still be available in used-book stores because I keep receiving fan letters from people who found it, read it, and enjoyed it. Holy cow–I just found it on Amazon. BUY THIS BOOK if you want to work with the chakra goddesses or do what I call light work or dark work. My literary agent is trying to sell it to a new publisher. If she does, I’ll be rewriting most of it. Send me a note and tell me what you think should stay the same.