HONORING MOTHERING FOR ALL
As we collectively honor our biological, spiritual, earth mothers, I invite you to join me in honoring MOTHERING as a force of the Divine Feminine that we all have access to.
Ram Dass taught me that we invite one another into the infinite flowing stream of love. It is only an illusion that this love we access so deeply in our heart body awareness is ever “gone”. The stream of love is something we all have access to, even if and when relationships change.
Along with the more literal relationships we have to beings who are mothers, I invite you to consider all the relationships in your life (with people, animals, places, activities) that support you in an experience of being mothered, mothering yourself and mothering others.
Connection is a pathway of nourishing support. We are born with an expectation of connection, care, love and protection. None of us had a perfect childhood. Whatever we did receive and did not receive is part of our past. The past does not matter unless it continues to show up in the present (thank you to my/our teacher Gabor Maté for showing this).
MOTHERING has an energy of nurturing, allowing, gentleness, presence, protection, healthy limits and unconditional positive regard. We need to be nurtured and mothered as children and we continue to need it in unique ways as adults through our relationships and experiences.
What shifts when we are open to learning how to actively honor nurturing ourselves and one another?
What shifts when we meet and connect with ourselves with the gentleness a mother can at times offer her own child?
There is no perfect mother and perhaps that is the beauty of the richness of MOTHERING. Pain is a call for nurturing and pain is a way our human experience is imperfect. Through this, there is the ripe fruit of being invited to learn to love ourselves through active listening and understanding.
“What is love? Love is treating your heart with a great deal of tenderness, with understanding, love, and compassion. If you cannot treat your own heart this way, how can you treat your partner with understanding and love?”
-Thích Nhất Hạnh
As we move on from a collective appreciation for MOTHERS which can be a layered and challenging day for so many of us, I wonder what relationships and experiences in your life invite you deeper into HONORING MOTHERING.
Below are a few journal and/or dialogue prompts to inspire you into appreciation and HONORING MOTHERING.
*What relationships in your life support and inspire you to be more nurturing towards yourself and others?
*What environments and sensory experiences nurture you?
*What foods, clothing textures, fluids and smells nourish your heart and body?
*Recall a time when you experienced a deep, full body sense of ease and wellness. Notice what comes up for you and allow yourself to connect with your body, heart and breath for a few moments.
*Are there any relationship connections or experiences you want to create or invite that will nurture, nourish and support you at this time and going forward?
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I fully honor you on your life path, wherever you are and whatever you might be engaging with at this time. Being an active participant in a healing process is a profound choice that supports each one of us personally and generatively nourishes all of life collectively. Your heart body ease and wellness participates as part of the whole and touches all those around you.
Will you join me in acknowledging and celebrating your wholeness and precious heart body wisdom?
May all beings experience heart peace, love and belonging.
With heart appreciation,
Leigh Aschoff
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