Because I have spent so much time in foreign countries, learning and speaking foreign languages on the street… not in formal institutions, I often feel the rules academia apply to words and their origins are unnecessarily formal — they express the patriarchal perception that we have been living with for the past few thousand years.

Words on the street are phonetic and emotive….

I remember when I first arrived in Bali, we drove past a hand written sign hanging outside a shop… it stated in bold hand painted print ABIS.

I read that sign, flying past in my jeep and knew what they were saying.
They were out of whatever their customers were looking for.
Abyss in our language means ‘the end’… ‘the dark unknown place, where there is nothing left!”…

In this culture the word had been spelled phonetically and described the absence of a type of food the locals love to eat!

Through common usage, words take on new meanings and their connotation changes with every day that passes.

A perfect example to explain this phenomenon is ‘gay’…

Not so long ago it described people having fun together… I have heard it used by news reporters in Australia from the 1950’s. Through slang usage, ‘gay’ has metamorphosed into the word that describes the entire subculture and political movement for one-sex partnerships!

That’s quite a journey of evolution; perhaps just as strange as a word used in the west to describe the nothingness just before purgatory… ‘the abyss’ … transferred by the Dutch to Indonesia and a few hundred years later it is used to describe the absence of soup!

There are a few words that make a strange family in our language of today… sympathy, empathy, pity, pathetic… they all have an element where you are asked to ‘feel sorry for’ …

In Latin ‘path’ (Pathetic…sympathetic… ) means “feeling”; from ‘pax’ which means peace…

I can see straight away these words are from a patriarchal culture because they are using the prefix ‘pa’ from ‘pater’… father,  (Pa triarchal) the church fathers (not the mother) made the rules and we agreed to make them ‘right’.

We are living in strange times.  The media has a huge hold on the conscious reality we all ‘enjoy’ or ‘endure’ on a daily basis… the media is owned and operated by the big five, so if you want an original thought you have to look outside the box. You and I are a child of our times… an enlightened time, when we can gather all this information together and make some sense of what’s going on…

So let’s look at the word ‘pity’

We can tell it’s Anglo in origin.
Lots or pits in the UK… mostly coal and tar…

I feel in my bones that ‘pity’ describes something or someone ‘in the pits’ (which is still a term we use today to describe depression… or a low emotional condition).

Do we want to encourage ‘pitiful’ self-definition?

Should we have ‘pity’ on others?

‘Pity’ like it’s origins, describes a low energy, dark, deep and dirty like a coal pit.

It does not describe the object as much as it describes the mentality of the speaker…

I suggest you activate compassion (‘com’… together) for the world around you and give up all forms of ‘pity’ because by definition to feel ‘pity’ is to put yourself ABOVE the other…

Once you are ‘up there’ and the object of your attention is in their rightful place DOWN THERE then you are in control and your ego is in charge… probably planning an exhaustive emotional drama for the evening ahead, so it can feel alive and in control…

“Pity” is an arrogant, domineering, perspective, which it is best to leave at home, as it will get you into trouble.

Everyone is finally growing up and realizing we are indeed all worthy of equal opportunities and equal protection…
I mean… how did they get ‘in the pit’ to need ‘pity’ in the first place?

Blazing tales of wonder,
Remembering all we have ever been and are about to become
Your sister through chaos and comfort
Shankari the Alchemist

Writing could take me anywhere I wanted to go on the inside.  The terrain was safe because I could do it by myself and did not need others to ‘come out and play’.

Writing meant I could be fully engaged in my own mystery world, safe and evolving away from the mainstream, which always seemed so ignorant and boisterous. You see, I am truly a hermit at heart!

I wrote my first book over a very long period, six years  and it’s still not really out there because it was very personal and biographical and there are parts of me that are not as resolved and forgiven as I would wish. Some part is dedicated to success and there are other parts  that are not, because they feel unworthy or wrong or weak and stupid.

Self forgiveness…there is no greater healing tool on earth.

I believe everyone is in a constant dialogue with themselves, trying to find their way through to happiness… fulfillment.

For a long time I felt I had no permission to write because everyone needed me more; the kids, the job, the company, the staff — everything and everyone came first because I had it hooked up that I had to help everyone else into their success before I could have time for my own!

In the end this leaves people resentful and I was on my way when I was stopped by these profound words…

“You are their role model, no matter how hard you try to help them be successful they will never know how to experience success until you show them what it looks like and you can’t do that from the back of the room.
You must walk to the front of the room and be seen for who you are!”

In that moment, I felt as if the scales had fallen from my eyes. Now I had permission to explore the way to my own success through writing; which is a very solitary pursuit. I would feel guilty for shutting everyone out in order to write.

These days I feel as if writing is one of the gifts of my life… that I have such a rich and fulfilling inner world that sustains me and allows me to share my wisdom and my joy with the greater world.

In the mean time, while I was busy putting my writing on hold so I could support my family into their success, they were just busy picking up on my deep resentment so no one was benefited by my martyrdom. Never do it, it’s such a waste of time;  the kids I love so much don’t really understand the details they just feel the energy and the energy was not balanced.

If you feel like writing… do it NOW!

As I write in my new book “Art as a Healing Force”,  I believe… and have a knowing born of experience, that Art, Music, Magic, Meditation and our Experience of God are all rolled into one great  field of energy.

Like a gemstone with many faces, each face represents a different access point to the same world of Divine Force — the energy that allows us to turn inward and fall in love with the God Force as it expresses through ourselves and each other.

From the outside, it may look like it is an access point to somewhere completely different… but once you have begun your exploration in earnest, you will discover as all the great artists always do… that they all lead to the same place — to a personal relationship with The God Force.

My work as an author and my work as a jewelry designer is one and the same. In both I am sharing my experience of Divine Force and in the process I am looking for ways to serve the community.

Ways to empower, educate and strengthen the individual;  to share beauty, creativity, strength. And through these qualities, open the heart chakra, releasing fear and doubt. making way for a new you, better informed, more connected to each other and to your Source.

Healthier and happier and of more genuine service to the world around you — that is what most of us truly desire. We are not really all greedy looking for lots of cash. What we want is the sense of security and worth that cash is supposed to provide us — the ‘safety net’, the ‘security blanket’.

Artists, writers… in fact anyone with true experience will tell you, those things are not actually available through the accumulation of money.  That is a lie perpetrated by those factions that want to keep us all in nice tidy boxes.

Thank God for the artists of the world, they just keep on keeping on.

I am proud to say I am one of these fringe dwellers, through my writing, my jewelry, my gardens, my drawings, my mosaics, my music and my meditation…

I want to help the world around me become more balanced and empowered, in love with the beauty of The God Force as it shines through us into the world and shines back to us from our actions in the world.

It’s never about what you ‘say’ you will do or can do.
It’s about what you are doing now… today!

My advice to everyone is find something you love to do and do it everyday… sing, dance, write, draw, design jewelry, become a blessing in your world and share your joy with others less fortunate.