Honouring Shakti....

Honouring the Goddess within is a deep form of self-healing. When we honour the Goddess, we create self-respect, self-love and a healing that vibrates through every layer of our being, physical, emotional, mental, environmental and spiritual - we honour the universe around us and the universe within. We honour and heal the past, the present and the future…

The Goddess has many faces to reflect to us as we look in the mirror of our lives. Kali - Hecate - Sheila-Na-Gig - Coaxicatl - Sophia - Kuan Yin - Tara - Nepthys - Aphrodite - Yemaya - Isara - Cerridwen - Saraswati - Freya…. Goddesses span the globe with creation stories, affirmations of love, promises of prosperity and healing wisdom.

Put your feet firmly in the earth in any country around the world and there will be a pantheon of Gods and Goddesses to tell you the stories, rites and rituals that underpin their cultural heritage.

"The Goddess has a dreamlike, slippery quality," says Starhawk, Pagan author and ecologist. "One aspect slips into another: She is constantly changing form and changing face. Her images do not define or pin down a set of attributes; they spark inspiration, creation, fertility of mind and spirit."

Whether man or woman, honouring the Goddess within honours the bountifulness of the universe, celebrates our uniqueness and helps us rediscover ourselves.

The Goddess heals through movement, sound, dance, food, wisdom, meditation, sensuality… we can use Goddess energy to celebrate all aspects of our being and to highlight areas in our lives where we need healing.

It is about waking up to the Goddess energy within us all - male or female - acknowledging the divinity within us. The dance of shiva-shakti that makes us whole.

Coming back to Source, beyond the different faces in the mirror is Shakti. In India, life is danced into creation by Shiva and Shakti. Whereas Shiva is a God-form with many consorts - Parvati, Kali, Meenakshi… Shakti is the energy within. Shakti is pure energy, formless, fluid, action in motion, Shakti is the spark that fuels us and ignites the world…

"Shakti is the spirit of our primordial feminine energy within and its activity promotes the union of body, mind and spirit," says Sri Swamini Mayatitananda (formerly Maya Tiwari.)

"Goddess Shakti's rhythms move within every man, woman and child, and creature through shakti-prana or Mother's breath.  Shiva, having seen the truth of the universe, represents cosmic intelligence and Shakti creates the rhythm, the cosmic energy through which manifestation occurs." Shakti energy makes things happen.

We can use Shakti to heal ourselves through movement. She is pure energy so celebrate your body, let go into movement and really listen to yourself. When we move through yoga, dance, mindful walking we really start a conversation with our bodies and a dialogue with our souls.

So much of our lives are spent in the head that we don't listen to the language of our bodies. On a physical level, we dismiss aches and pains as normal and do not try and nurture our bodies so that we heal, we tend to carry on regardless.

Beyond that, when we spend the majority of our time in our heads, we cut ourselves off from the messages of our bodies, our intuition, our instinct, out desires - these are the languages of Shakti within us - the subtle voices of our soul - our own true rhythm.

When we rest in the body, we can hear voices from the past, we can release trapped emotions, pain that we have held onto. Often our minds have a way of dealing with trauma or painful events… it is to bury them deep inside. Deep inside is within the very cells of our body, within our muscles, our bones, our skin, our organs. We create disease within the body through not expressing, honouring or letting go of our pain, our grief, our anger.

Moving the body, letting our awareness sink into every limb and every cell is a way of reconnecting to our life force, our Shakti energy.

Avtar Kaur has devised a divine technique which she calls Shakti Dance. "Dance can be one of the purest expressions of our being," says Avtar. "When the body is massaged through movement and through mindfulness, dance becomes yoga. When physical tensions are released, then the mind relaxes and expands to transcendence."

Through the energy of music and movement, a new creativity flows through us, creating a heightened awareness of our body and soul. "It connects you to the divine feminine within." So just lose yourself in movement, in dance. Let your awareness drop into the body, forget the mind and let your body flow, let the dance dance you and see the spark of Shakti within you.

Another way to work with the healing energy of the Goddess is through aromatherapy, so here is a beautiful oil you can create.

Blend four drops each of frankincense, sandalwood, jasmine and lotus and just one drop of elderberry. You can use it in a burner or add to a base oil like sesame or grapeseed for massage.

Goddess Oil is a blend to bring out a woman's spirituality. Author of Magickal Aromatherapy Gwydion O'Hara says "it aligns the mind, heart and soul with the spirit of the goddesses who have been worshipped throughout the history of the world's religions."

Check out www.shaktidance.net for more information on Shakti Dance workshops around the world.