You are already what you Seek - Medicine Doll as Mirror

"I wanted a doll that would remind him of who he really is, and oh my goodnes, I could not have orchestrated it more perfectly myself! When Lachlan saw his doll he was beside himself with excitement. He then started connecting with the doll and looked at me and said... "Hey Mum, this doll is ME. It is a wizard, just like me. It has a dinosaur tooth, and I love dinosaurs. It has nature, and I like nature. It has green, and green is my favourite colour, and it was made in Sherbrooke forest, and we love Sherbrooke forest!"

Wizard medicine doll made for Lachlan's 9th birthday

Over the weekend I received this beautiful message and it couldn't have come at a better time. To know that a doll has made a child feel this way is all the confirmation and praise I need. Thank you so much Lachlan and Nat - these words make my heart explode with happiness!

At the moment I am writing about the magic of the medicine doll to help me to prepare for Spirit Weavers Gathering in 2 weeks. It's a hard one to put into words. People often ask me how to 'use' a medicine doll and I have come to understand that a doll is always personal, there are no rules. They are holders and vessels for love, for healing and for your intentions. They can be powerful links to ancestors, especially when adorned with sacred family treasures. A medicine doll can help you to access the child within, help you face your deepest fears and when placed beside your bed they can have a strong presence in your dreaming.

And the medicine doll can become a mirror or a bridge to a powerful part of yourself that you might not always be able to express or feel - but you're getting there! Essentially I feel like a medicine doll is a friend and the more time you spend with this friend the more you love them. Perhaps you begin to tell the doll the secrets that you hold in your heart and cannot share with others. Here is a doll that helped me overcome my own fear. The doll lives with you daily - through good times and bad - the doll is always accepting. And then a funny thing happens - you realise that this friend is also a part of you, perhaps the most deepest and honest part of yourself. And this little vessel has become a being that knows you so well and accepts you completely. Then, that love that you have for this little doll begins to flow back to yourself. You see that you are also a beautiful, magical and creative being. You heal yourself.

Thank you Nadia Turner for this drawing of Fox and I dreaming in a doll together - I think it captures perfectly the essence of enchantment around a medicine doll.

I feel like I am at the very beginning of a long apprenticeship in the craft of dollmaker. I'm grateful to the lineage of ancestral doll makers of the past and for the opportunities to pass this craft on to future dollmakers. And while I am still trying to find the words to describe the ancient connection that humans have always felt for the doll, I have been looking at vintage photographs of children and their beloved dolls on Pinterest.  It might just be me, but I am starting to see that all dolls are medicine.

Turning Off, Tuning In - listening to the still, quiet voice within

I don't know about you but I'm changing - a lot. There are so many behaviours and beliefs I held in the past that I just can't relate to any more. And the great part of being where I am now - making dolls in the forest every day - is that I'm not worrying about it. Now THAT'S the strange part. In the past when I've gone through times like this I've almost worked myself into a panic trying to find or name the next 'stage' or 'path'. But for the first time in my life, I am accepting this strange period of change and a kind of nothingness. Why? Because the Lyrebird told me this time would be coming - if I let myself get there.

Three weeks ago I found myself in an environment with lots and lots of people. It was a confused environment and I was aware that there was a huge part of myself just not enjoying it but there was an old side of me that thought I should push myself out there amongst it, to step out of the hermit cave and find out what's going on in different circles, how things are being done differently by others. But I just found the whole experience hard work! I kept missing Tony, Fox, the forest and craved to be making a new doll.

On the second night I had a dream of standing looking at a huge messy freeway system that was looped and tied around itself like 10 different snakes. Cars and people were speeding along madly. It was very frenetic. And then I saw the lyrebird standing in the middle of what could only be described as a traffic island. He was standing in a small circle of grass in the middle of it all. The lyrebird pulled out one of his two beautiful tiger-striped lyre feathers and placed it in the circle and told me he was leaving it there for me but I had to come and get it soon because it would not be there for long and it definitely wouldn't be there forever.

The next morning I packed up early and came home. As I walked down the pathway to our house I looked out at the forest and it was as if the leaves and trees were glittering, shimmering... I felt the forest was happy to see me! And I was definitely happy to see the forest. I sat with the whole experience and especially the dream and I began to understand that I had changed and that there was nothing wrong with that or me - I just had to start making some new choices. I have slowed down so much, honing everything down to the singular practice of dollmaking and now it is very hard for me to feel grounded in very chaotic environments. I interpreted the fast moving freeways as other 'movements' perhaps movements that I had felt the need to be a part of before or just trying to 'keep up' with the outside world and the way others are choosing to be. The Lyrebird was giving me permission to just step out of it all and come and receive the gift of sanctuary.

Turning, Tuning Tarot Spread

It's interesting to have a look at what we need vs what we crave - it's a good place to start if it feels like there are too many 'voices' in you head haha! Let's turn off all of the voices and opinions coming at us from every direction from the outside world and listen to the quiet voice within.

This is a simple Tarot spread that I created in the dark moon this week to help me listen to all aspects of myself: body, heart, mind and spirit. Take a moment and breathe deeply as you shuffle your cards and simply pull one card for Need and one card for Crave and sit them beside each other. Are they similar in their focus or at odds with each other? If you need to, you might want to pull a third card to act as a 'bridge' in the middle to show you a way of creating a balance between the two or a step to take to towards honouring your needs more than your craving.

Now that you know what you Need. Place this card as the central card of your reading. Put the Craving card back into the deck (pay special attention if this card turns up again in any other position).

1. Central card: What you Need

2. Bottom left card : Voice of the Body

3. Top left card: Voice of the Heart

4. Bottom right card: Voice of the Mind

5. Top right card: Voice of the Spirit (Still quiet voice within)

Dollmaker Julia INglis

Autumn's Children - Inspiration for Medicine Dolls

amanita muscaria by Sacred Familiar

Look who's back in the forest?! Beautiful amanita muscaria mushrooms are popping up everywhere at the moment. We were also blessed with a meeting with Pip an orphaned 7 week old swamp wallaby who is living with our friend Anne, a local wildlife carer. Isn't she beautiful? Her eyes are so dreamy and she has a gentle, inquisitive nature.

I'm also sharing a photo sent to me by our friend Carolyn, who is a local librarian - look at the little early morning reader she recently discovered - I love the expression on his face.

I always feel inspired in this season and it's been very productive. Wherever you are I hope you are getting to meet the local creatures and finding some time to smell the mushrooms too.

amanita by sacred familiar

mushroom path by Sacred Familiar

Pip the Wallaby

pip wallaby by sacred familiar

poss in books

baby sunflower

acorns sacred familiar

Koala Warriors - Colleen Wood and Southern Ash Wildlife Shelter

These are some of the beautiful rescued koalas being cared for by Colleen Wood and her team of volunteers at the Southern Ash Wildlife Shelter here in Victoria. It's been a long time between visits but last Saturday Tony and I were thrilled to visit Colleen and her sister Jenni and have the honour of meeting the koalas in their care. Colleen has been a huge inspiration to us over the years. She has dedicated her life to the plight of the koala in Australia, she is a leading expert in koala care and education and told me that it didn't matter what was going on in her life, her mission to help and protect them is always her priority.

Colleen inspires me so much because she is not an extrovert or a natural leader, she is in fact a quiet person and even a shy person. But the call of her work gives her the strength to go out into the world over and over again to speak on behalf of the koalas who are facing so many dangers to their health and habitat. She educates wildlife carers, zoo workers and also people working for corporations involved in logging because she was does not want to attack - she is a warrior of love for the koalas and knows that the more people that know and understand this sacred and ancient animal, the more they will be compelled to act with care.

This year, after 20 years of service to the koalas, Colleen was finally recognised by the Australian government and she was awarded an Environment Achievement award on Australia Day. Her wish is that finally the plight of the koala and their habitat becomes more known so that we can act now to preserve them and their homes in the future.

This work is not easy. Colleen and her staff see so much tragedy. The work of the wildlife carer is linked as much to death as it is to life - they are right there on the frontline with the animals they love so much. I am awed by Colleen's determination to never stop helping and it made me think about ways that I can help more. We are not all able to do the same work and shouldn't judge or compare ourselves to others which usually results in feeling less worthy or courageous and that doesn't help anything. Instead, we can find ways to assist and do more in our own way. For me this was offering to hold a healing ceremony on the land of the shelter to honour the spirits of the koalas that have not survived and with love release the huge weight of grief that Colleen and her carers have been carrying. It is hard enough to do this work without carrying grief of the past. Once we hold our ceremony of release we will create a medicine dollmaking circle so that each carer can create a doll to hold hope and vision for them in the future. In difficult times in the future this doll will be a beacon of light to remind them of their strength and courage.  She will be a bright reminder of their own love.

When I returned home I created a doll call FireVoice inspired by people like Colleen who despite their own quiet natures, stand up and speak out for the vulnerable. This doll will be auctioned at the upcoming Friday 13th StarTribes Dollmarket to be held online as a Facebook event next week and the funds raised will go to the koalas at the Southern Ash shelter.

You can also sponsor a koala at the Southern Ash Wildlife Shelter for as little as $40 as well as give a donation of what ever amount you can afford. Southern Ash is the most amazing shelter we have ever visited, they receive no government assistance and everyone who works there does so as a volunteer - every cent you give goes straight to the koalas.

Thank you Colleen and Jenni! We look forward to our medicine dollmaking circle with you and your koala tribe!

Hawai'ian Ancestor Doll - why we cannot wait to be perfect

Recently I was asked by a friend who is also a maker and artist if it is a good thing to create something for someone else when we ourselves are feeling down or unwell. I understand this question, I used to worry about the same thing and very strictly only created when in my utmost health. But one day I created a doll for a woman in great need of assistance, she was suffering panic attacks and I wanted to make her a doll right then when she needed it most. On that weekend I was in a state of grieving for someone in my own life but as I sat with the soft wool in my hands with all that colour around me - my favourite part of dollmaking is playing with colour - I realised that I began to feel a lot brighter and happier. What I discovered at the end of the creation process was that not only had I made a very beautiful and joyful doll, I was feeling so much better. I have found this to be one of the significant benefits of creating a healing doll for someone else - we receive that healing too. We heal ourselves through the practice of creating and I feel especially that in the act of sending good wishes and intentions to another, we receive the same blessing. A blessing doubled.

Last week, particularly around the Full Moon in Cancer, a Wolf Moon and first full moon of the year, the intensity of energy was enormous. Two astrological posts that I found very helpful to understand the energy at the moment were by Hare in the Moon Astrology and Mystic Mamma. Recently I have been dealing with an old back injury that I used to get when I was much younger. I have come to understand it is emotional and caused from 'holding on' and 'holding back'.  Just before the full moon I felt whatever was lurking down there in the depths for too long suddenly and terrifyingly rise to the surface - it was as if a sleeping volcano had suddenly awoken. At the same time, I was weaving a doll for a beautiful Hawai'ian sister, Wai'ala. I asked myself: can I make this doll when I am feeling so much of my own fear? Hesitantly I began preparing the medicine bundle to go inside her doll. As I did, I kept hearing the word 'orchid' and getting the message to include this flower for her. I knew I had 2 orchids grown with love by Tony's mother but for the life of me I couldn't find them. Finally I gave up and began to close up the bundle. But I kept hearing a woman's voice very firmly telling me to keep looking! She was not one to be argued with and so I looked again and finally found the orchids - in the last package of course! I placed them inside the bundle and I could feel right away the doll was happy.

When I shared the message with the Wai'ala about being told to find the orchid, she wrote:

'It's local folklore that our Hawai'ian goddess Pele loves and treasures orchids and it's been said she moves her lava flow around certain ones to save them and consumes everything else around them; preserving them alive in a surrounding sea of lava. I have great joy that the medicine doll requested one'.

On the night before the full moon I dreamt of an elderly man coming forward with a carefully wrapped box. Inside the box he said was an ancient crustacean. I felt very honoured but also scared to be it's keeper as if it was too precious and I was not worthy. I was also unsure how to keep it. I was then shown through a series of lessons on how to care for myself more and how to honour and protect the precious animal and mineral medicine gifts that I receive. I was also shown how to release what I had been holding on to. When I awoke from the dream it was as if I was still living in it, it was full moon and I was aware that I had work to do and instructions to follow from the dream.

I woke up and began to finish the medicine doll and as I wove the colours into her dress I saw that she would be holding a crystal skull to represent her ancestors and adorned with fossils of ancient oceans. As I placed the fossils into her dress I realised that the elder in my dream was one of Wai'ala's ancestors. In the weaving of the doll for his granddaughter I had created a space where he could enter my dream and assist me. On completion, the doll told me her name was FireOrchid Flowing Water Woman. At first I thought that her name was too long, I tried to shorten it to just FireOrchid but the doll was adamant again, she was also FlowingWater. I placed her in a large medicine circle with all of the medicine dolls, my personal dolls too and also all of the animal, plant and mineral medicines that go into the creation of each doll. I held a ceremony at the full moon singing gratitude to every creature, every being, my ancestors, Pachamama, my animals guides and all that help me to create the medicine dolls.

The next morning I awoke to read a new message from Wai'ala:

'I am so greatly honored, and full of bliss that while bringing her into creation my ancestors visited you and helped heal you and grow your natural talents. Their gift of the crustacean is so beautiful and inspiring. I've been seeking a stronger or more open connection with them, and felt a medicine doll would facilitate that amongst many other things, but I think that facilitation alone maybe most healing. It sounds like that connection was forged in many many ways. I have so many blisssful comments on all the details and beautiful work....but I'll only ask; Did I ever tell you what my name Wai'ala means?? It's my grandmothers Hawai'ian name and it translates to English as, fragrant flowing water; flower water, or commonly known as Flowing Water.'

I was blown away by this - I had no idea of the meaning of Wai'ala's Hawai'ian name or that this doll was intended to open the pathways of ancestral medicine. To receive this message was the just one part of the huge healing I received from Wai'ala and her ancestors - another was meeting this little tawny frogmouth. They have been walking with me this whole week and they are strong teachers! I am happy to say that I am practicing more gratitude and discipline around my medicine practices and have even released my hold on certain medicines that I was informed were not for me. It has left me with a sense of trust in what I'm doing and deep honour of the animal world, even the ancient creatures who are no longer existing in the same way on our earth but are still here in other forms.

I think sometimes we wait to be perfect to make something beautiful. If we do this, perhaps we will never create anything at all, thinking that we aren't there yet or aren't worthy. I feel that would be very sad for all of us and especially Mother Earth. Each creation is a ripple of love, a teaching from the mother in birthing with love. In these changing times there is so much healing and assistance available to us, especially when we create with the intention of helping another. We are all a little broken at times, we are flawed and a little ragged. We are all human and we are all in this together. Our shadow helps us to keep connected to compassion and empathy and when someone comes to us and they are facing their own dark night of the soul, we may know exactly what is needed. Because we have have been through it ourselves, we can give them hope to keep moving forward.  A tarot spread that really helped me to face my fears during this moon time was a shadow reading I call 'shining a light on the scary'.

My deepest gratitude goes to Wai'ala! I look forward to hugging you in person under the Redwoods at Spirit Weavers Gathering! And my deepest gratitude to your ancestors. I am honoured to share their message:

'Let go of what is not needed, protect what is sacred, remember the living ancients and trust in yourself.'

Thank you FireOrchid Flowing Water Woman.

Tawny Frogmouth Animal Message

Tawny Frogmouth by Sacred Familiar

Look who I met this week! This is Oscar, a nine week old orphaned tawny frogmouth a nightjar that is closely related to the kingfisher family. I met him just after the full moon when I finally got to take a big walk in the forest after my back healed. After my walk I visited my friend Anne. It's always a thrill to see her because she is a wildlife rescuer & you never know who else you might meet. His eyes were mesmerising and he had a little black curtain that he would disappear behind when he felt he had had enough of human interaction. Could be a message there for us all?!

Tawny Frogmouth by Sacred Familiar

Tawny Frogmouth by Sacred Familiar

Tawny Frogmouth by Sacred Familiar

Tarot Spread for Animal Messages and Transition in 2015

caterpillar photo by Sacred Familiar

Hello, how are you feeling in these early days of 2015? I'm not one for making New Year's resolutions but I'm very interested in contemplation and reviewing the lessons and messages that appear at the close of a year. I usually use January as a time to review the past year and gain clarity about the possibilities for the year to come. I always feel that I tune into the Chinese New Year much more - at the New Moon in February this year - I can physically feel the year birthing at this time. So I love to spend the month of January contemplating, releasing and dreaming - tilling the soil before planting new seeds.

And have I had time to contemplate this year -  on new years day I went for a walk for the first time in a week after being completely bedridden and unable to walk after putting my back out just after Christmas. Like most of us, I really wanted to be joyously greeting the new energies of the year to come. Instead I was living with the consequences of burning myself out at the end of the year, not stopping work even on Christmas Day. Because I love to make art, especially for others, I thought it was ok to just keep on going. Sometimes it's hard to believe that art is work too. But I had to have a good look at my work practices in that long week in bed - why did my feelings of worth come from being productive? Why do I pride myself on my working hard? And why had I forgotten how much I love to read for hours in bed?!!

Needless to say, I had a lot of time for reflection and one thing that stood out for me was how many animals had crossed my path over the last month. Tony and I had been lucky enough to meet a snake, echidna, caterpillar and lots of bees who are now visiting our home many times during the day to drink from a bird bath that we have filled with water gathered at a local natural spring. I realised that I hadn't spent a lot of time with the messages from these animal teachers and that perhaps they had been trying to give me hints about the burnout that was coming but I was too busy to notice.

Echidna photo by Sacred Familiar

Photograph by Sacred Familiar

Last night I created a tarot spread to understand these messages. I wrote down 4 animals that had crossed my path in the last month and then I shuffled the 4 Aces from each different element or suit of the tarot. Each element relates to a suit and to 4 quarters of the wheel:

Ace of Earth : Physical world (body, finances, work)

Ace of Water: Emotional world (love, healing, creativity)

Ace of Air: Mental world (ideas, worries, teaching, communication)

Ace of Fire: Spirit world (passion, dreams, magic, willpower)

I wanted to see what part of my life or element each animal had come to teach me about. I shuffled the Aces (the gifts or blessings of each suit) and placed them beneath medicine representing each animal. For this you can also just write the name of the animal on a piece of paper. I then thought of an animal that has been a big part of my journey this year or perhaps my whole life, a totem and for this animal I chose a Major Arcana card to represent the soul message and also a Minor Arcana card to represent the practical advice from this animal messenger. And finally at the bottom of the spread I began to tap into the tiniest, whispers of promise and opportunity available to me in the beginning month of 2015.

All I can say is I wish I'd done this spread before Christmas! I truly believe that after reading it I would have let myself rest. There were so many messages about slowing down and receiving pleasure, playing more and loving each moment for what it is not what I wanted or hoped it to be. My wish is that this spread helps you to understand the spirit of the last month and the gifts that came to you through your animal visitors (and they can be any animals at all - perhaps you read about a particular animal or watched a documentary that stayed with you for a long time. And of course they can be your own animals that live with you, our wise familiars).

 Animal Elements for Transition Tarot Spread

Animal transition tarot by Sacred Familiar

First separate the Minor & Major Arcana cards and the 4 Aces.

Positions:

1 - 4: Choose 4 different animals & write their names on paper - place in these positions.

5 - 8: Take out the 4 Aces of each element & shuffle. Place them in these positions. The element will tell you what part of your life this animal has come to assist.

9 - 12: Shuffle the Minor Arcana and choose 4 - place here. These cards represent advice on how to create balance and transition in these areas.

13. Think of a significant animal messenger that has been appearing in 2014 or throughout your life and write the name of this animal and place it here.

14. Shuffle the Major arcana and choose a card for the Soul Message from this totem to you in regards to the best way to transition from 2014 to the energy and spirit of 2015.

15. Shuffle the Minor Arcana and choose a card for Practical Advice on how to integrate the Soul Message and apply it in a practical way to create a smooth transition.

16. Major Arcana: Opportunity for growth and blessings in the early part of 2015.

17. Minor Arcana: Opportunity for growth and blessings in the early part of 2015.

Lyrebird Medicine - Your Spirit has a Voice Beyond Time

Recently I was given the gift of a Lyrebird feather. I was deeply honoured to receive it not only because the feathers of these totem birds of Sherbrooke Forest are so very rare and hard to find but also because they are medicine from these sonic record keepers, the ancestral sound recorders. Lyrebirds have a prehistoric memory recall of the sounds of animals that no longer exist on the earth.  These ancient creatures have a lot to teach us about ancestral voices and once when I was listening to a lyrebird in the forest, I felt a line of energy or space open up through my sinuses and mouth – it felt like an activation of some kind and it was created by a frequency of sound made by this bird that is actually way too hard to describe in words. Sonic is the only word that comes close to it.

And the sound of our words spoken aloud or in song can be just as powerful. We are being called now to speak for the Earth and for her animals, her trees, her water. Reclaiming our words and the unique sound of our own voice and then speaking with intent can be life-changing. I believe that some of us are being called to re-enchant the earth and her people with our voices. To sing up the earth, to sing alive our bodies. When we are speaking from the depths of our heart it can build an etheric bridge to the voice of the spirit. Our timeless spirit may speak in a voice unrecognisable to the conscious self. I have spoken to singers who tell me they are often surprised with what comes out when they open their mouths to sing. This voice may be strange to your ears, it may not carry your accent from your current lifetime. It may be beyond accent, beyond the linguistic heritage of family and country.

Often in medicine sessions, I hear this strange and queer voice, sometimes whispering, sometimes deep and loud. The more I hear Her the more I have come to love and trust this voice that does not obey my mind. A voice that is not always pretty and sometimes beyond words – pure sound. Don’t let shyness or the risk of sounding ‘silly’ block the ancestral voice. Your spirit is ageless and unique and your voice is an instrument to communicate it’s message.

Imagine if any one of these incredible singers had held back in any way…we would be the poorer for not receiving the full expression of their gift.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LpiFmZLICgM

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CrCQbrFCQ1I

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MKsSbI6cRx0

GrandMother Crow and Past Life Beliefs

Lately I have been finding crow feathers on every walk in the forest. This is a photo of a GrandMother messenger that I met on Williamstown Beach many moons ago - one of the biggest teachings I've ever received. She said to me 'you are beholden to no-one' and began to show me visions of past lives where I'd taken sacred vows of silence, poverty, chastity and the healer's oath - beautiful & honourable vows in their time but promises that had become binding and heavy to my spirit now. Soon after this meeting with Crow I began to travel around Australia for the next 3 years with the medicine that became known as Swan Blessing - a release from old karmic contracts and sacred vows.

I'm happy to say that after resting this medicine over the last 6 months I will be opening space to hold these medicine sessions again in 2015 in person here in Sherbrooke Forest & by Skype. Blessings on your path friends, you are free.

Kristan's Swan Blessing Story of The Outcast

In her past life, Kristan belonged to a tribe that could not accept the powerful medicine that she carried. In her tribe this medicine was seen as taboo for woman to hold. She was asked to obey or to leave. She chose to say NO to the tribe so that she could say YES to her spirit. Many of us have experienced similar stories in past lives and in our present lives. We have felt that to truly be ourselves, we must journey alone. Or we have put up with behaviour that hurts us just to stay a part of the tribe whether that tribe is family, society, peers. In this time of the rise of the Divine Feminine we are being called out of the shadows to embrace all of our natural gifts and to release the fear of being rejected and cast out by those who do not understand or accept us. Saying NO when it is right for us is a practice of honouring ourselves. When we release the belief that there was ever anything ‘wrong’ with us we remember that we are all creatures of the earth – as individual as every animal and plant and an integral part in the wheel of life.

Looking into the waters of the crystal ball of consciousness, I stared and I waited and I imagined I would not see anything. And I saw nothing for what felt like such a long, long time, I was beginning to feel I would not see, that my mind was too strong to allow my soul to show me what I needed and wanted to see

I stayed with prayer, asking and pleading at one moment to see, please let me see  . . .  and then the mists began to clear and I could see a clearing in the mountains, green pine all around, the smell of freshness and soil, and a teepee

And horses, many horses And then I saw HER, myself in another time By the teepee, the wild life of the mountains surrounding HER  Ah, she was alone, living an isolated life, no tribe, a sadness surrounded herI could also sense an understanding, acceptance of her situation as the best possible outcome for her at that time and place We saw each other, she smiledI could see her deer skin clothing, her turquoise choker with red beads HER long, long braids of dark black hair I could feel HER and I felt a relief that we had met, that the veils had parted and that we could meet I began to track why she was alone in the woods, her only communication with the forest life; the birds, woodland creatures, trees, the natural world who heard her and loved her

A new vision appeared I found myself within a tribe of teepees A fire A Father, a Chief at the door of his teepeeAnd a Mother and more children (my siblings) sitting at the door of her teepee I stood by my Father, the Chief as he asked me again if I would do what was expected of me and again, the 12 year old HER (me) said NO I would NOT

I was banished from my tribe

For being who I was For speaking who I was For saying NO to what was not true for me I caught the eye of my mother and she caught mine sadness but understanding i saw there and in my father too, not as cheif, but as my father a sadness and again an understanding And away SHE went, alone, to live a life of isolation, to be herself Again, I find myself back at HER teepee This time we connect, we stand in a pool of water, a water fall, falling behind us The vines from below come up, writhing and cover her, strangle her, snake like she is bound I connect with HER, I cut with my teeth the binding reedy vines I free HER She smiles at me, she becomes as of light and as a shooting star Returns

The wounding: I will be rejected, cast out, banished from my tribe if I am myself, authentic and truth speaking, if I say NO to what does not feel right I release this binding, this wounding as I bite and free the vines of that lifetime

The blessing: authentic, true and free, I express myself fully, I am my actualized self, accepted, loved and cherished by my tribe, now and for eternity

Thank you Kristan Read, for sharing your beauty, strength and truth. Kristan is a Shamanic Midwife, Teacher and crafting creatrix extraordinaire! You can experience Kristan’s inspiring medicine for yourself through her work at www.atmypractice.comand www.thecrafthive.com

Read more Swan Blessing stories

Spirit Dolls Made in our Workshop!

Spirit Doll made at Sacred Familiar workshop

One of my favourite things about teaching dollmaking is to see the photos of the dolls made during and after our gatherings. This month we held a full moon doll workshop in the forest and look at the results! How amazing are these dolls?!  

Their new dollmakers also received many messages and assistance for their own path even when they created dolls for their loved ones. That's the beauty of creating with intention to give to another - we receive the blessing too.  And I particularly love that the tradition is already being passed on to the families and children of the participants - weaving the new circle. Thank you to everyone who joined us in our dollmaking circle in the forest and thank you to Louise, Lee, Robyn and Eliene for sharing photographs and stories of your beautiful dolls and their healing stories. We will hold our next dollmaker circle early in the new year.

The dolls above and below were created by Louise. The doll above was made during our workshop:

'Meet Fireya resting in my beautiful elephants ear plant. She brings messages of courage and trust to all who walk their own path," Louise.

Medicine Doll made at Sacred Familiar workshop

Medicine Doll made at Sacred Familiar workshop

The dolls above and below were created by Lee. Lee created the doll above for her friend Betsy in our workshop:

'I feel her message is about making yourself a priority and from that all will flow. I loved learning with you, thank you again for sharing,' Lee.

And below are the dolls that Lee created with her youngest daughter Lilia. Lilia's doll is the one in blue - she's so wise and beautiful Lilia, thank you for sharing!

Medicine Doll made at Sacred Familiar workshop

Medicine Doll made at Sacred Familiar workshop

Meet Daisy and Monkey - medicine dolls created by Robyn. She made a doll for herself in the workshop and a doll for her husband Geoff when she got home and is looking forward to creating dolls for her children.

"Here is the start of our family. Meet Daisy again and Monkey. This is Geoff's doll. He's a lovely wizard that wears the earth as a coat. His coat bears ocean and earth, cloud, lightening and storms, yet underneath on his base there is a peace symbol to represent all the calmness. His heart is the sun which is full of love and radiates across the world. Geoff has always been my personal weather man. He has a magic citrine wand on a staff of sage  sticks and wears a Tibetan sanskrit writing pendant of hung meaning walk the talk. Inside there is a turquoise to help speak the truth with love and integrity, herbs for sleeping, bottlebrush for changes,purple peace symbol for inner peace and tolerance, skin herbs for healthy skin. Thanks again. Daisy is Strong and her medicine has been working with instant effect,' Robyn.

Medicine Doll made at Sacred Familiar workshop

And finally we share 2 potent medicine dolls created by Eliene. The doll above was created for her beloved, Catherine.

'Hi Julia, I loved the workshop... the doll I started at the workshop changed a lot over the next 24 hours. During this time she told me that was The Herbalist. She became rugged up (scarfs etc) and I knew she came from a very cold country... Catherine loves her. The one for myself didn't as for any more than rose leaves. Her spirit is strong. Thanks for the experience as I am enjoying connecting with my inner child...' Eliene.

Medicine Doll made at Sacred Familiar workshop