An excerpt from The Queen of My Self: Stepping
into Sovereignty in Midlife
By Donna Henes
www.TheQueenofMySelf.com
"You need only to claim the events
of your life to make yourself yours. When you truly possess
all you have been and done, which may take some time,
you are fierce with reality."
-Florida Scott-Maxwell, American/Scot psychologist and
writer
1884-1968
When I started introducing the Queen in workshops and
articles as a helpful archetype for midlife women, I received
many requests for detailed instructions on how to become
a Queen. “Dear Mama Donna,” women would write,
“I want to be a Queen, too. How do I access my power?
How can I feel good about myself? How do I change my life?
How do I find magic and spiritual wisdom? How do I know
what to do? How do I learn how to rule?” The reality
is that I cannot possibly know how anyone else will attain
her Queendom, I only know how I came into mine, and that
is largely through hindsight. The truth, my truth, at
least, is that there is no one truth. We must each find
our own way in this world. As a shaman, I teach through
example, but not through dictum. I can and do offer information,
exposure, personal experience, encouragement, inspiration,
suggestions and support to my constituents, but I cannot
— dare not — pass judgment or establish rules
and laws. It is simply not for me to say.
When my students and clients come to me for help and
spiritual guidance, I listen to their concerns and embrace
their needs. I pat them on the back, give them a good,
swift kick in the butt, or let them cry on my shoulder,
as needed. I can tell them what I did in such and such
situation, how I did it, what I learned from this or that
lesson, but I cannot tell them what they should do. How
do I know what their souls need? Only they know what they
know. I can, of course, aid them in reaching into the
well of their own deepest wisdom, and help them to hear
the messages from their best inner Selves. A woman who
has attended several of my workshops recently hugged me
and told me that I had changed her life. “Well,
no, of course, I didn’t, honey,” I assured
her. “You changed your own life.” The fact
of the matter remains that I could not give her what was
not already hers.
Taking Charge
"You take your life in your own hands,
and what happens? A terrible thing: no one to blame."
-Erica Jong, American writer
1942-
Each one of us has a story, a myth, a legend to write,
to paint — and to live. The shamanic assumption
from which I operate is that every person has her own
mission in this lifetime: her own path, her own dreams,
her own symbols and sensibilities, her own visions and
designs, her own way of learning, her own personalized
hard-won lessons. That we each have our own singular life
to live. That every one of us must figure out for ourselves
the fullest, richest, most effective, ethical, and satisfying
way in which to do it; and moreover, that each and every
one of us possesses the wisdom, the power, and the responsibility
to make it so.
The story of our lives is ours to create. We can design
our own roles and ideals, compose the scripts, and author
the sagas of our own futures and that of the environment
around us. While we cannot necessarily control the circumstances
and influences that present themselves to us in the course
of living, we can choose how we will respond to them when
they do arise. Our power of choice is our sole control
in the world. With each new paragraph, each turn of the
page, each new dawn, each moment in time, each blink of
the eye, we are gifted with another opportunity to exercise
our right to choose. Coffee or tea? Lemon or milk? Right
or left? Stairs or elevator? Vacuum? Vote? Cheat? Trust?
Care? Dare? Change? What paths we take, what decisions
we make, influence how the story will proceed and who
we will be from this day forth. As George Eliot reminds
us, "The strongest principle of growth lies in human
choice." The difficult times that we encounter in
our lives might tempt us to dull our senses and opt out
of any upsetting experiences, choosing not to let things
“get to us.” We often try to ignore the hard
parts — pain, fear, guilt, grief, confusion, anger,
and disappointment — dilute their impact, drown
them out in an endless list of pleasurable addictions:
soporifics, anesthetics, mood enhancers, caffeine, food,
hormones. We can even turn ourselves off altogether. The
point is we don’t have to engage in the emotional
upheaval. Nobody is making us. We could choose to drink
cabernet and watch Public Television, play cards, play
it safe, every night for the rest of our lives if we wanted
to. It is an option. It is ultimately up to us whether
we succumb to the unexamined life or try to figure out
what the hell is going on inside us and around us, and
engage in it, alter, change, and grow with it, so that
we might fulfill our greatest destiny and dreams.
"If you have made mistakes, even serious
mistakes, there is always another chance for you. And
supposing you have tried and failed again and again, you
may have a fresh start any moment you choose, for this
thing we call ‘failure’ is not the falling
down, but the staying down."
-Mary Pickford, Canadian-born American Actress
1893-1979
At midlife, we are at a major crossroads in our lives,
and we can choose to move ahead, turn right or left, stay
where we are, or go back where we came from. The Queen
chooses always to choose, to involve Herself fully in
the process of Her life and living, and to actively direct
the drama of Her myth. She urges us take up the challenges
of changing, of aging, engaging in all that life has to
offer. And She reminds us to look upon the difficulties,
disruptions, disappointments, fears, and failures we have
experienced as important life lessons, without which we
could never hope to ascend to a throne of responsibility
and rule. She encourages us to entertain the entire palette
of our emotions, for there is where we find our strength
and knowledge and true value. Some things in life just
have to be learned the hard way and evading them is counter-productive
and eventually destructive. The only way to get through
them is to go through them. There is a wonderful old African-American
Spiritual that says, “So high, you can’t get
over it. So low, you can’t get under it. So wide
you can’t get around it. You gotta go through the
door.”
"I postpone death by living, by suffering,
by error,
by risking, by giving, by losing. "
-Anais Nin, French writer
1903-1977
Donna Henes, Urban Shaman, is a contemporary
ceremonialist specializing in multi-cultural ritual celebration
of the cycles of the seasons and the seasons of our lives.
She is the author of The Queen of My Self, The
Moon Watcher's Companion, Celestially Auspicious
Occasions, and Dressing Our Wounds In Warm Clothes,
as well as the CD, Reverence To Her: Mythology, The
Matriarchy & Me. She is also the editor and publisher
of the highly acclaimed quarterly journal, Always
In Season: Living In Sync with the Cycles, In 1982,
she composed the first (and to this date, the only) satellite
peace message in space: "chants for peace * chance
for peace." Mama Donna, as she is affectionately
known, has offered lectures, workshops, circles, and celebrations
worldwide for 30 years. She is the director of Mama Donna’s
Tea Garden & Healing Haven, a ceremonial center, ritual
consultancy and spirit shop in Exotic Brooklyn, New York.
Come join Donna at her workshop ...
QUEEN of MY SELF
Women Stepping Into Sovereignty in Mid Life
September 12, 2004
at the Wise Woman Center, in Woodstock NY
"I am a contemporary ceremonialist.
We will sit in a ceremonial counsel circle in the company
of other would-be-queens. We will reflect upon and realize
the wealth of our experience, our resources, and our best
intentions. Buoyed by encouragement and spirited support,
we will summon up, name, and claim our strengths and forgive
ourselves our weaknesses.
We will stoke the fires of our fierce pride, and empower
our selves and each other. We will drum up the passion
to fuel our power, and chant the patient persistence to
maintain it. The day will culminate in a Crowning Ceremony
wherein we will appoint and anoint ourselves with our
own authority."
TURN YOUR MID-LIFE CRISIS INTO A CROWNING
ACHIEVEMENT!
1 day: $50-$75. $25 deposit. Register for this workshop
today.
Go to http://www.susunweed.com/Workshops.htm#register
For further information about Mama Donna,
a list of services and publications, a calendar of upcoming
events and a complimentary issue of Always in Season:
Living in Sync with the Cycles contact:
MAMA DONNA'S TEA GARDEN AND HEALING HAVEN
PO Box 380403
Exotic Brooklyn, NY 11238-0403
Phone/Fax 718-857-2247
Email: CityShaman@aol.com
http://www.DonnaHenes.net
http://www.TheQueenofMySelf.com