Sexual Sanctity: A Memoir of My Burning Times and Learning Times

Part Two: Chapter Two

Ama: Woman of the Sea

"Intense love does not measure — it just gives." ~ Mother Teresa

Section One: Learning to Freedive

To my utter bewilderment, Heom called me back home to Massachusetts, less than a year after I'd started my music journey. Although very confusing, and a bit maddening at the time, my Jungle Sense was clear: It was time to go home.

I remember the next couple of years would be in one sense, an extremely freeing time in my life, and in another sense, a time of intense learning; holding the the light of endless love, even when the pressure from inner and outer voices judged me harshly.

"May you always know the truth,

and see the lights surrounding you…

May your heart always be joyful,

May your song always be sung,

And may you stay,

Forever young." ~ “Forever Young” by, Bob Dylan/Joan Baez

There would be two more times in my life, when Heom would lead me through waters that would make the demons surface from "The Burning Times," in the way they needed to for purging, and the next stages of my life at that time. What I am referring to is the first time I "waded in the water," and almost drowned; the same accusing and torturous voices would surface.

On the outer plane, as the foundations of my old life would rumble, then shake, then rock, and finally break off in big chunks; on the inside, something truly powerful, and deadly, the way Heom is deadly, was occurring inside of me.

Those voices with their spiritual torture devices had come back just a handful of months after I came back from Tennessee. But I was rapidly catching onto how to keep them at bay, disengage, and ultimately dissolve them from my inner space. I followed the “Hum of Heom” with every breath, with every step. I began to experience God like I'd never experienced the Creator before in my life.

“The picture above is of a Traditional Ama Pearl Diver of Japan. These divers are women in Japan who practice a Sacred art/sport that has been practiced mostly by these women for 2000 years. They secure themselves to a line on a boat and they dive deep, deep into the ocean, without an oxygen tank, traditionally wearing only what she's wearing in this picture, and they collect shellfish to sell. They can hold their breath for two minutes and have a Sacred Practice of a special bubble/breath/low whistle sound release when they come back up, right before the surface. This breath release is known as ‘Isobue.’ These women live together in women- only communities by the sea.

Women are these Ama Divers. We turn to the water to pray, to cleanse - we birth and carry our babies from water, sometimes in water. We secure our line (grounding) and we dive deep, deep into the dark and holy womb of the Sea of Life. These Ama Divers (Ama means in Japanese ‘Woman of the Sea)" are noted in Japan for their unique, sacred ability, for this job over men. They are able to outwardly make I believe double or triple that of men divers. But inwardly, they are honored for their powerful inward, mystical nature as women, that is best suited for becoming one with the powerful, mystical nature of the sea.” ~ An Excerpt from My Writings

Meeting my husband-to-be was like experiencing a full-immersion baptism, in the form of a flash-flood. I was wading in the rolling black waters in the months after my return from Tennessee, leaning with every fiber of my Being, into my Wise Force-Field; that was now revealing Herself as the Immaculate Mountain River of Relentless Love, that is the Unconditional Love of God. I always knew this love from deep within; but the punishment for loving freely, and trusting the Intensity of this Immaculate Love was severe, from all sides.

There had been two other times in my life, during The Burning Times, when I experienced this Mountain River, though I hadn’t known it yet. I look back utterly awestruck now, when I see how Heom shielded me from further burnings in those times; that I see clearly now, were desperate to consume me, as I triumphed with my flow of the First Blood, crossing the threshold into Womanhood; and later, rose like Hell and High Water from the freezing first plunge to freedom.

The first time was at an intimate, Youth Church gathering to study our church and movement’s core scripture “The Exposition of the Divine Principle.” I was around sixteen then, and the gathering happened on one of our mid-school year vacations.

My menstruation cycles from the moment they began were always pretty heavy, but not alarmingly so. I quickly became settled in its rhythm; and as I look back, I see how the “Flow of Heom” was my first introduction to living like “Ama,” the Woman of the Sea, in her Tidal Belly.

That week I was at the youth retreat, my period gushed, and gushed, even more than normal. But I remember not feeling like I was being drained of life force; actually, quite the opposite. Although I felt a little wobbly at times, I remember feeling a sense of immense power that I didn't quite understand at the time. I had this sense that I was like a mother hen protecting her brood, that were the girls at the retreat. I couldn't understand why I felt that somehow the force of that menstrual flow was keeping dark forces at bay.

The second time I experienced the "Heom River" was right after I'd taken the spiritual plunge down the vertical mountainside, following the Wild Horses of Heom. I see only now, the deep spiritual significance of signing up for a certain church program at the time. This church program had a good premise, like a good intention, that leads "Little Red Riding Hood" straight into the wolf's clutches. That premise or intention was for this program to be like a Spiritual Boot Camp for Youth; training the Soul in a sense, to be vigilant to spiritual devotion and growth.

At the time, although I had been able to escape the freezing whirlpool of internal torment, and cling to Heom's rescue line, I was still riddled with those deep, internal wounds. For some reason, I thought that what I most likely needed was to pay severe penance; to make up for whatever my alleged guilt was- that these internal voices and lashings were so adamant I had.

I see how Heom's wisdom was woven, like the tree's roots in the graveyard, deep, deep inside that wretched, and profound journey I took across the United States with this youth group. The fact is, we weren't fed properly, or given enough sleep. Young women, and men, were dropped off in very unstable neighborhoods to do the mission work, without almost any protection. It was all concealed in the premise that this "discipline," or "training," was developing our "trust in God.” But it only takes one or a few, abusive, and controlling leaders, to, in an emotional, spiritual, and psychological sense, make an arrest, torment and terrorize a person or group into "confessing" their alleged "crimes," and in utter despair- that person "confesses," and is given a spectated "burning," and made an example of-for all to see, and be totally controlled by.

This program had become seized by the spiritual, psychological Inquisition of Burning Modern Culture. While secular culture feverishly mined, and siphoned the Life Force, to overlay, and insert political, sexualized agendas in the country's youth; our religious organization reacted to this by mining, and siphoning the Life Force, to instill in youth a twisted sense of "devotion." The issue isn't discipline, or devotion; it's what we are being disciplined in, and controlled into being devoted to.

The day the second Flash-Flood began, I was doing daily, spiritual-mission work with a group of young women and men my age. I don’t know how I managed to keep up with my menstrual flow that week; but I do know the Wild Horses of Heom are, in the most Essentially Feminine Sense, this Flow. I managed because despite any blindness, neglect, or abuse concerning the Sacred Feminine that was running rampant through the culture and the program, the Cosmic Pendulum continues to swing with deadly precision; and the One from which all things Live, Die and are Reborn, will always have the last say.

The spiritual flash flood that occurred when I met my husband-to-be, forced me under so rapidly, I barely had any time to think. It happened when we were hanging out in Boston, MA one day, on one of our first dates. For the first time in his life, my husband was also thrown into the rapids of the many-decades-lost-art of courtship, though, as I’d learn later, I wasn’t by a long-shot, his first woman. To my utter exasperation and panic, I could not explain what happened that day, but I see now that my Force-Field allowed his Force-Field to become instantly connected to mine.

For years, even after that summer I worked in the Devil’s Kitchen, and discovered how powerful my Force-Field protection was, I would learn that it was really no use trying to circumvent it, or ignore it. Heom’s Wisdom was, and is, imbued deeply inside it, inside me. There were times in those years before my husband, that I was shocked, and a little frustrated that my Force-Field would not allow any intimacy with even a couple, potential young suitors at different times, who I thought could have been good mates; but She was adamant, and would not budge, until my husband.

But we didn’t even kiss for the first weeks, or couple of months of seeing one another. We just hung out, and enjoyed each other’s company. That day our Force-Fields connected, it felt like all Hell broke loose inside my head and heart; like someone threw a rock at a wasp’s nest inside my mind, spirit and body, then pushed me under water.

I was in a panic, and serious, swelling, rolling waves of doubt began to try and overtake me about seeing this man. But, to my utter bewilderment, amazement, and shock, the Wild Horses of Heom kept going straight for him, surrounding him, and me, in what we’d come to find out, was, and still is, a Deeply Intense, and Cosmic Will of Love.

With our Force-Fields connected now, although I was overwhelmed to say the least, I am a strong swimmer, and the first thing a person learns in swimming is not to panic, and not to fight against the tide, but to swim as much as possible with the tide, while keeping your head above water. However, there are going to be times you can not keep your head above water, and you need to learn how to relax and hold your breath. Little did I know, Heom, was throwing me headlong into training as a Spiritual Ama.

Section Two: Sexual Sanctity

"Accepting that the ever-watchful, hovering, protective psychic mother is not adequate as a central guide for one’s future instinctual life (the too-good mother dies). Taking on the task of being on one’s own, developing one’s own consciousness about danger, intrigue, politic. Becoming alert by oneself, for oneself. Letting die what must die. As the too-good mother dies, the new woman is born."

~ “Women Who Run With the Wolves,” by Dr. Clarissa Pinkola Estes

The Burning Fever and affliction in my family became so maddeningly crystal clear in the last few years, when two of my sisters, at different times, came home pregnant and unmarried, while my mother shut her mouth and allowed them to bring home their partners and fathers of their children and share a room; without so much as an introduction to the family. My husband and I by that time had been married legally for about eight years, and we had at least four children.

Nine years prior, when I shared with my mother that my husband, fiance at the time, and I had consummated our relationship; being a woman of traditional values, she naturally let me know that until we were legally married, we were not to sleep in the same room in her and my father’s house. She said,

“If you get pregnant, and are not married, you and your fiance need to find another place to live. However, you are welcome if you are married.”

“Fair enough,” I thought.

I began to realize with intense clarity that the abusive thinking that used to ensnare me, again and again within my family dynamic, was not only not going away or being addressed; it was doubling down, with sinister determination. One of the partners I would learn was abusive to my sister, and struggled with the seemingly foreign notion that he should provide for his son. The other partner was given a place to stay in my parent’s house, together with my sister, no questions asked; they seemed to barely know his name.

When it came down to the brass tacks of what was right, and safe for our kids, my husband and I decided to keep our kids away from the family situation. Strange men, who were not being held accountable when it came to basic, partnership and childrearing principles within established family dynamics around children, were being allowed to come and go as they pleased.

In other words, in the end, nothing that I had been raised with; the best of the principles, etiquette and integrity surrounding family relations, seemed to be given any credence. As I write now, I see how mined and siphoned the natural, Soulful resources of my family were. Deep within my family’s collective psyche, an overbearing, controlling, and infantile, “too-good mother,” had long worn out her welcome, and the result was a band of controlling, infantile, and unaccountable children; including, and especially my mother. As long as I stuck around, they’d just keep pushing the fall-outs of any problems the family had, on me. The problems that my husband and I faced within our marriage, would be given the central spot-light for reasons that, especially I, needed to shut-up, and sit-by, while my family continued to do as they pleased; regardless of the children we had in the house.

The injustice, or immorality of the situation would never be addressed, because I was learning one very important thing about the chronic toxicity of my family: Emotionally, and psychologically, I was not considered a person; I was their scapegoat. If I pointed out, or reacted to the fact that the fall-outs of a siphoned Everglades were dangerous, they’d just create a social situation for me, with them, that would routinely, become unbearable.

“The first records of sanction come from the 1500s. It is derived from the Latin sancīre, meaning ‘to decree’ or ‘to prescribe by law.’ Sancīre also means ‘to make holy’ and is the root of words like sanctify and sanctuary.” ~ Dictionary.com

When my husband and I made love for the first time, I was a virgin. We had kissed before then, and were intimate, and it all had been firsts for me.

My husband has often described to me over the years how intense I had been that first time we made love, and he isn't wrong about that. He was my first, and I've always been faithful, and always will be.¹

The intensity he describes that came from within me, I distinctly remember was coming from a very deep, sanctioned, but wild place. One day, I just knew that I needed to make love to him for the first time, impracticality, and ceremony be damned. We were driving in a mini-van, and I just suddenly knew I needed to "grab him by his collar" so-to-speak, and cross that threshold with him.

Over the years he has described to me in more and more detail, the internal war he was having with himself at that moment, that had been going on inside him since we began dating. As I go over these very personal, private, and holy places within myself, as part of the journey that has been my life; I see the deep significance of being driven to catch him off guard like that.

My husband describes how he was trying to put off the accountability, and responsibility that our relationship would mean for him. For the last few years he had thrown himself into the Burning Hook-Up Culture that was incidentally, burning the proverbial candle at both ends; and he was happily sinking deeper, and deeper into a hot, addicted and very useless puddle of wax. A "hot mess," as it were.

He has told me many times, and each time the memory deepens, that he was fighting with himself saying, "If you have sex with this wonderful woman, that's it, you're with her for good. There's no half-way with an upright lady such as this; you control your desires right now if you don't plan to stay with her, and marry her."

The word "Sanction," denotes a certain feeling or meaning of protection. In other words, to "Sanctify" something is to make it Holy; and the root, religious meaning of "Holy," has an ancient relationship to the word "Whole." When something is whole, it is strong, protected, when something is broken, it is weak, sickly, vulnerable.

I look back and I see how our relationship was Sanctioned, or made Holy through certain connective factors that are directly rooted in accountability. Both of us recognized the spiritual significance of our meeting, and being together. I see more clearly now how my husband's spiral into sexually addictive behavior in his early twenties had to do with not wanting to face painful truths in his life. For him the Burning Times had come, but he wouldn't find his way out fully, until over a decade later.

Section Three: Lovers of Ama

The slashes and gashes from the Burning Culture I have sustained concerning Sexual Sanctity have deeply affected my life, and for many years this extremely private, and personal part of my life remained carefully tucked away from curious, prying or abusive persons, protected, and sanctioned; by the Wild Horses of Heom.

The Burning Modern Culture I learned since I was a young girl, views Sexual Sanctity as a threat; and the Religious Burning Culture views Sexual Sanctity as a point of power, to be controlled by those primarily with position, and power in the community.

In my family, these two worlds meet; burning the cultural, social candle at both ends, and looking back I see how my relationship, then marriage to my husband, was too often used as a way for both worlds to scapegoat whenever it suited them. Too often, at the end of the day however, the hot, rapidly melting, and wasted candle wax would be left to drip, abandoning all Spiritual Sanctions of family accountability - and burn me solely. As too often, once again, I was the only one listening for rustling, whinnying, shifting, or the pounding of hooves.

When my husband and I became lovers the Wild Horses of Heom continued to guide my every step. But we were learning to freedive in deep water now. When I look back, I see how the bedrock foundations of Life as we knew it, and as we didn't, for us, our families, friends, and perspective communities were beginning to shift with each dive, and I remember the resulting earthquakes distinctly.

"At the twilight of our lives,

We will be judged on love alone."

~ Saint John of the Cross

"Don't ruin your lives by implementing sanctions to relationships, and marrying young," the Secular Burning Culture said.

"Don't ruin your lives by marrying people the Church hasn't sanctioned," said the Burning Religious Community.

But I know now, our most relentless Judge was, and is neither world; it was, and is, Love, and Love Alone. As both worlds burned both ends of the same Social Candle, devouring themselves; Love Judged our Holy Sanction, and Love will be the last Judge of this mess, and triumph that is our Marriage Union.

Sedna

An Ancient Northern Indigenous Tale: Retold By Anshin B Kelly

Once, at a time before there was time, there lived a family in the far North. This family lived in domed houses made of ice, snow, wood and animal skins. At the center of their house was a fire pit, and in the center of the ceiling of the dome was a smoke hole. The doorway to the house was a small tunnel to ensure that the elements of their frozen homeland would not enter, and to protect against wild animals.

This family, like all the families in their clan, lived by skilled hunting, fishing, cooking, and the crafting of seal skin garments, bedding and footwear. Their culture was a culture of trust and harmony, and so invasion and dysfunction were less likely to occur. If there was harmful disruption of any kind, the elders of the community were deeply aware, and they took care to address it immediately and skillfully, with as much force, compassion and love that seemed appropriate. Any predators that wished to invade the community were hard pressed to find a way in that would take hold destructively and fundamentally within the community.

One day, a stranger was traveling from another village across the ice and came upon the family's ice dwelling. He looked like the people of these Northern clans, and so the family was hospitable to him and invited him to sleep by the fire, after including him at their evening meal. He had no apparent reason to invoke suspicion, except for a subtle glint in his eyes that only the most intuitive of people could discern.

The next morning he left before sunrise, before the family had risen. The family went on with their lives for the next several months, when it became obvious that their youngest daughter was pregnant. Though her mother begged and pleaded with her husband, the father flew into a fury that even he couldn't explain, or find a way to control. Like a man possessed he dragged his youngest daughter out to his kayak and took off with her to a remote part of the ocean. He then grabbed her, picked her up and threw her over the side of the kayak. His poor daughter screamed in horror and terror, and clung to the side of the kayak begging and pleading with her father to pull her back. The more she pleaded the more possessed he became and he took out his knife and chopped off her fingers. His daughter, in a final surge of superhuman strength desperately hooked her forearms to the side of the kayak, but her father, now full of what could only be explained as demonic forces chopped her arms off and his youngest daughter fell to her death in the ice-cold ocean.

But she did not die, for her fingers and limbs became the many creatures of the ocean, and the youngest daughter of a family of the Northern Clans transformed into Sedna, the Great Undersea Mother of Life, Death and Rebirth. It is said that her innocence was embodied in the new life she carried in her womb, and the birth of that light gave way to her life-saving and Divine Transformation.

Sedna's dwelling is in a place so deep in the ocean, that only the most pure and discerning people can find it. However, even when they find it, the doorway to her dwelling is only a very small slit in the side of a great volcano. To invoke the Great Mother, the pure and discerning Soul must have a faith, resilience and patience that surpasses most women and men in order to pass through Her sacred opening. The old people say that when one manages to unconditionally wait on the Great Mother's timing, even in the dark depths of the Soul's deepest journeys, their reward in Love, Life and Abundance is unsurpassed. Their ability to replenish themselves and those around them is eternal, for they have seen and accepted death and woundedness, so that life may be planted, grown and born anew.

Heom awaits her Initiates, far, far beneath the rolling black waters. Burning Modern Culture, the candle burning at both ends; remains blind and deaf to the purpose of a candle. The sustainability of obedience to Cosmic Principles; the Cradle of Life, Death and Rebirth, and the Cosmic Pendulum that keeps perfect time in Eternity. The candle, or fire in the middle of the Ice Dwelling, can not be given improper, or inappropriate sanctions by manipulative forces, or naivete, without terrible, terrible consequences. This has always been, and will always be.

Waking up to what we've done destructively, or destruction we've allowed consciously, or unconsciously, physically, emotionally, or spiritually; is many times an excruciating experience. Though the crimes to Soul themselves are bad enough, the "nail in the coffin," is almost always, our inability to face what we've done; to face our part, great or small, in what has happened; personally, familially, societally, or culturally.

When everything came out, only less than 24 months ago, about my husband's sexually addictive behavior, that has gone, albeit felt many times, yet unseen over the last twelve years we've been together; it would be the second time in my life I jolted awake, my eyes opened fully, to what has been gnawing at me, deep, deep below the surface.

My husband describes after he participated in sexually addictive acts outside of our marriage with women, what he calls the "Post Cum Clarity." The excruciating clarity that takes over in the moment between oblivion, and falling into justifications once more. That moment is Heom; The Narrow Pass, The Strategic Point, The Dangerous Force. The slit deep, deep in the undersea volcano where Sedna lives.

When we slip beneath the freezing waters, letting go of all basic sanctions; of eating and sleeping, of relational, and sexual respect, of responsibility regarding alcohol or other substances, of mental and emotional self-control, of Religions Freedom, of Free Will; another force enters us, a dark force, a tormented, and controlling force.

There is absolutely no coincidence that mutilation practices such as loose and expedient use of cesarean sections, episiotomy, abortions, and other uterine, and baby mutilations, and invasions, are considered solutions to the terrible intra-psychic suffering of women in Burning Modernity. Not to mention those same Burning Agendas being forced, and extorted as a solution to women's suffering all over the world.

Although my husband was not a virgin when he met me, and later consummated our relationship, just a handful of years ago, he and I together could look each other dead in the eyes and conclude together, that he had absolutely been a virgin; meaning uninitiated, in the ways of Deep Love, Commitment, Growth, and Integrity, until me. In that way, I was the more experienced "Lover," in Life and Love.

All the "sex" (lowercase s.e.x.) in the world, will not, and can not a "Wholly" Person make, or a "Wholly" marriage make.

The most egregiously drained and scorched areas within my husband's psyche when I met him, were areas I would learn, his mother very carefully made sure would remain drained, and overlaid with Burning Cultural agendas, from since he was a small boy. His mother did not attend our wedding celebration, because she made it clear verbally over the years that, "we'd ruined our lives by getting married and having children young."

When she found out I was pregnant with her first grandchild she pushed to abort her. Over the years she gave my husband the space in her house to chronically run away to, and hide out, away from his responsibilities. At every turn, bump, struggle and crevasse in the road she had a chance to influence concerning our marriage, she made sure to stroke, wheedle, and even harass his conflicted, and tortured heart into justifications about his neglect, egoism, and abuse in our marriage.

When my husband and I started having sex, the biggest monsters guarded the deeply mined, and scorched areas of his psyche, where a thriving, intra-psychic Everglades, would have embodied the inseparable connection between sex, and babies. It became abundantly clear to me, that he had been groomed by familial and cultural Burning, and he resented having to think about the possibility of me having an unplanned pregnancy. He'd always just fallen on the knife of expedient, unquestioned, popularized, and centralized womb-invasion practices as a last minute, and primary "solution" to that outcome.

Through a very deep, and painful journey of finding where the Wholly Sanctions are within my own heart, my own body, and my own mind, I was able to stand with Heom on this central issue, even in those early days; that Narrow Pass, Strategic Point, and Dangerous Force within my most Essential Instincts, would not mutilate psychically or otherwise, the Cosmic Connection between sex and babies. If he wanted to have sex with me I concluded, then he'd better accept the possibility of a baby.

My husband and I have always been exceptionally, sexually compatible. But that doesn't mean that we haven't had to work at it in order to keep the health of that compatibility moist, and therefore fertile; and not just physically either. The wandering, siphoned Modern Person, won't stay put long enough to allow anything to germinate, grow, or reveal itself in its own good time. Good Sex (capital SEX), Absolute Sex, take time to learn, to get right, to let go of, and learn all over again. Avoiding, splitting, and detouring isn't going to engender anything Wholly in a person or relationship; the mentality and behavior is broken, and so it will only produce broken results.

1. I see now that, God was very clear that I not enter into any sexual actions/relations with any man, until my husband, and for some very important reason, this was central to my protection, and cultivation as a Healer, Traditional Midwife, and Spiritual Leader.