This working intercepted my working on “Opening to Rapture” in the book the The Magick of the Iron Pentacle by Jane Meredith and Gede Parma. I started a ritual bath consisting of herbs and crystals, and as I stripped to enter the bath, I looked at myself in the mirror and was saddened by what I saw – how overweight I’ve become since getting sober again last year. My intuition chimed in and suggested doing the “Acknowledging Shame” exercise from the Iron Pentacle book I just mentioned. So I did.

I grabbed my body paint and began the exercise. “I’m fat,” I said into the reflection in the mirror. I reflected on it. What crossed my mind was the laziness, lacking of willingness, and taking comfort in food and hiding from my feelings in that. That hiding transpired to even hiding from the gym. Feeling defeated from my setbacks with meth and gaining all this weight resulted in a feeling of disgust with self which showed up in hiding from the gym – not facing or accepting this reality. Naturally, everything I have been doing this past year crept in as well – therapy, step work, iron-pentacle work, finding myself, even the distractions such as psychic development and magickal practices. Although those practices are important to me have bore fruit in being tools for looking into my life and connecting me with spirit, they have demanded energy from me nonetheless. What I notice in all this, standing before the mirror, is movement; a strive for betterment and meaning. I’ve been here before. I’ve done a lot to be proud of, and I’m strong enough to endure and move forward. It’s funny how the body keeps score, regardless of what I’m hiding in – meth, food, or avoidance, the changes in my body are remarkable and as if it has a mind of its own, demanding to be seen – whether sickly and skinny from meth or over-weight in the comfort and stress eating I participate in. A new respect for my body slowly emerges and I chant to the mirror “your body is your own, beautiful and sacred,” which soon turns into “my body is my own, beautiful and sacred.” I paint an equal armed cross in yellow over my belly to represent sacrifice, a blue heart over my left chest for healing and compassion, a red Aesculapius staff over my right chest for power in healing, and a purple dot over my third eye for seeing this. I then got into the bath.

The bath – first I cleansed, consecrated, and charged all the elements with the intentions I desired. Epson salt (cleansing), black salt (protection), pure dragon’s blood oil for Mother Morrigan, Brigid oil for my patroness; herbs of lavender (purification), mugwort (shamanic work), wormwood for spirit contact, rose petals (self love). I cleansed and consecrated the bath water, and added the salt first. After that, I threw in the rest of the ingredients (herbs in a giant tea bag). I added gemstone totem animals from my altar that represent my inner child, my ego, and higher self along with rhodochrosite for self-love. I used amber soap for sentimental value in amber’s correspondence to Brigid.

In the bath, a dialogue began between me and my higher self. I was reflecting on another ritual I was going to do where I chant “I’ve been with you from the beginning,” which is from the “Opening to Rapture” ritual in the chapter on Sex from the Magic of the Iron Pentacle. I suddenly asked God/dess, “If you were there the whole time, why all the tragedy, trauma, and shame?” This question comes from the wounded self. The answer came in as I gazed at the water, “Free will, and conjunction with that, I kept you as safe as I could.” A pause while I was sitting there, and suddenly, “What does your light matter that touches others without your darkness? What credence do you have to help others, what worth or power is your word to inspire, heal, and triumph without knowing despair, pain, and loss? Who would that ‘perfect Matt’ be without those things?” This brought immense comfort and validation; and thus I silently scream-cried it out onto the bath water. A new sense of being centered resulted. The beauty in experiencing tragedy from those with the free will to be terrible people is the ability to heal those that have suffered. Empathy and the evolving word through transmutation of despair into meaning and purpose allows the light in others to emerge from their own darkness. There is a reverence to particle theory here as well, where the degree to which particles move is determined by the amount of energy they have and their relationship to other particles. Changing or adding new meaning and purpose to something changes their effects. Darkness/shadow shapes the light in human beings. I washed it all away down the tub, showered, and left the bathroom refreshed and maybe with a new grain of enlightenment as I journey my life forward.

Further contemplation, a conversation with Higher Self – “Although you hid in your secrets and fears growing up, the drugs and alcohol that followed that, it didn’t make you present or whole, fully connect, or secure you. Running from your darkness disconnected you from your light. In fact all that running, fighting, and hiding added so much more shadow to that darkness. But the journey through and back b/c of the Light….that process bears much more value, meaning, and purpose than if you hadn’t experienced any of it along with the bad at all. It has the capacity to touch more lives that are stuck in their own darkness (whatever forms they be) because in some form, you’ve been there. All that war your inner child waged and raged gave you more shit to feel, and thus more empathy to inspire others in marching their journey out of shame. On a side note – You were a very strong individual to endure what you had the way you had, but strength and freedom are not mutually inclusive.”

My perception on what dialogue with Higher Self is – aha moments. As the saying goes – the teacher emerges when the student is ready, aha moments appear when I’m ready and willing to receive them. The conversations with Higher Self appear more so as introspection. The sources of the voices in our heads depends on the tone – emotional = inner child; judgment whether good or bad = ego; new understanding and positive direction = Higher Self. I think the stream of conversation and use of words is like a radio wave and/or filter that takes place in the conscious mind.