if you dream of Her...
you are obliged to work for Her for the rest of your life."
Inez Talamantes
I was on the road to Houston, January 7, 1989, at 12:40 pm, when the Goddess appeared to me. Words in a paragraph cannot convey the brilliant, living quality of the white light or the sudden sense of spiritual humility in Her presence that, along with Her sheer beauty and power, made tears pour from my eyes.
On a familiar drive on a mild winter day in Central Texas, I admired a parade of thick, cumulus clouds moving slowly over dense woods west of me. One cloud began to change shape, and when I saw in it the double image of an angel and a mermaid, I pulled off the road and got out of my truck to get a better look. The cloud grew, filling my eyes. It changed shapes several times -- to a Willendorf, then a strong Amazon, to a being of great mystery, and finally to a woman whose belly grew enormous with pregnancy. She rotated slowly to display Her sacred yoni to me, legs spread wide.
I waited, but She delivered no divine child, though a small dark cloud-puff hovered nearby. After some time, the goddess and darkling cloud merged with the other clouds, continuing their slow march to the Gulf of Mexico over the Coastal Plain. The sketch on the right, the earliest recorded version of the Sanskrit Om, is quite like one of the manifestations of my cloud goddess.
Quite some time before the 1989 trip to Houston, I had a somewhat strange experience -- I woke myself up in the middle of the night speaking unfamiliar syllables: ka-li-ma. Later, when I came upon Joseph Campbell's The Power of Myth and after that, Barbara Walker's The Woman's Encyclopedia of Myths and Secrets, I understood that the Hindu Great Goddess, Kali Ma, had come to me in my dreams. As I meditated on and experienced Mother Kali, I made the final leg on a journey of recovery from childhood abuse. Kali taught me to see the nurturing aspects of my mother's parenting, to make a more whole and meaningful picture of the experiences my siblings and I had experienced as abusive and emotionally neglectful.
My Kali work connected the emotional/psychological/physical healing I had done with the spiritual realm, giving me a holistic, transpersonal framework for comprehending my reality. She and other goddesses have come to me since then in my dreamlife, to guide, chide, instruct, initiate and mystify me: Kali Ma, Neith, Gea, Sequana, Tara, Isis, Hera, Lachesis and the White Mare are among my dream visitors.
you are obliged to work for Her for the rest of your life...
The Inez Talamantes quote above describes how this visionary experience has affected and directed my life. Within two years of the vision, the Goddess movement was birthing in Central Texas, and I was a weaver of that web. I connected with Goddess women, co-founded the Texas Cella group in 1992, and dedicated myself to the priestess path. I have since moved on, co-founding other circles, seeking visions of my Goddess work, rolling up my sleeves, and doing many things in Her service.
My dedication to Goddess, to serve Her and Her women, has been a coming home experience. As a young girl, I had been aware that I was called to a spiritual life. At 18, half a year before high school graduation, I explored missionary work as vocation at an annual conference for young Christians interested in a missionary ministry. I learned at the conference that the pathway to missionary work was not really open to me as a single woman. Clearly, if I married a young man entering missionary work, I could minister to him and to his congregation. This might have been fulfilling work, but it was not a close match with my Sagittarian vocational ideals.
In the early 1970s, non-Catholic mainstream religion offered no vocation for women in North America. Goddess studies, Goddess community and Her guidance have shown me the pathway to spiritual service in Her name.
To Know. To Will. To Dare.
These first three "powers of the Magus" came into neopaganism from Ceremonial Magick traditions. They describe a potent magick formula and provide clues to seekers exploring mystic pathways.To Know. Spiritual seekers need to be grounded in a spiritual tradition and to know themselves, mind-body-ego-spirit. The Cella Training Program has provided a framework on which I have created and carried out my self-directed studies of Goddess religion and feminist spirituality. I have continued my lifelong habit of personal growth and conscious self-knowing through the program's Personal Growth activities.
To Will. Mystical seekers be advised: a spiritual journey is not all sweetness and light. With promptings from Goddess, including three direct suggestions from Jade River, my first Cella Advisor, I chose to move to Madison, Wisconsin, at the end of my first cycle of studies. I abandoned plans for mainstream doctoral studies in psychology and dedicated myself to the priestess path. In Wisconsin, I've developed meaningful peer relationships with priestesses and others, found my life partner, liberated my scholar self, embraced the mystic within, and manifested my visions of contemplative, scholarly and creative work and play in service of the Goddess. I've also experienced shunning and betrayal in feminist community, become physically disabled, seen the extent to which empowered women fear women's power, and come to understand the ways in which we women work both for and against each other personally and organizationally.
To Dare. In the difficult years, compassionate friends asked why I persevered. "Because it is my path," I responded. I dream of and work for a change in the world -- within and without -- and the birth of woman-positive, inclusive, earth- and spirit-friendly ways of being. I dare to live and speak my truth, trusting Goddess to make of it what She will.