Growing up can seem like a lonely trek through an unknown and unpopulated wilderness. Keeping a journal is a way of having the Goddess by your side all the time. I encourage you to keep a journal by your side as you read this book. Do the book’s exercises there—and move beyond them to self-guided thought. Use any form you please—I find a bound notebook is best, as I tend to lose separate pieces of paper. A simple spiral notebook is inexpensive and widely available, or you may prefer something grander such as a clothbound book with blank pages. As you develop your contact with the Goddess, your journal will become a wonderful companion. All travelers are advised to keep a record of their journey. A spiritual journey is no exception. In fact, keeping a journal can, in and of itself, be a spiritual practice. On days when you are anxious or blue, having a conversation with your Goddess Self—your truest, most sacred, divine self—is a great help. Writing is magic—and the Goddess gave us that wonderful tool with which to express our deepest feelings and needs.
Ask Her questions in your journal.
Give thanks for Her blessings you received that day.
Develop your relationship with Her wisdom.
Write affirmations about what you want for yourself over and over—repetition sinks them into the psyche and they become true.
Let your writing be free and spontaneous. Don’t worry about spelling or grammar. Just let it flow out of you.
Give yourself permission to say anything.
Record your Goddess Exercises.
Developing spiritual awareness involves the continual mixing of our inner, private Self with the details of our everyday, common-place life.
When people learn that I write books, they say to me, “You should write about me. My life would make a great book.” And it is true. Everyone’s life is a book, and every girl could benefit from writing the book of her own life. Writing in a journal is a way of keeping track of your thoughts and feelings as you explore your inner territory and develop a relationship with the Goddess within. Your journal will be a friend who is always there to hear your woes and celebrate your triumphs. You can think of it as The Book of My Life. Rereading pages you have written in the past can be an illuminating experience. You may wonder if the person who wrote those lines a few weeks or a year ago was really you.
Journal keeping was something that came to me late in life, but now I produce several hundred pages a year, easily the length of this book. And how I wish I had kept a copious journal during my teen years! What a treasure-house that would be now!
A journal is a marvelous tool for just about any purpose you want it to serve: companionship, a place to spill your thoughts and feelings, a friend who will keep your secrets, a factual record, the telling of your inner life. It can be used to communicate with the many layers of yourself, to experiment with forms of expression, to mirror your many facets.
Keeping a journal is great way to explore your inner workings—writing about your life’s experiences, both inward and outward, can bring fascinating insights and be full of delightful surprises. You’ll find yourself connecting with your hidden, deeply private, side.
And a Goddess journal is the perfect place to express any negative feelings. Just the act of writing about what distresses you is a step toward finding the solution. By keeping your Goddess journal regularly, as you read this book and afterward, and telling Her what you are experiencing, you connect with the taproot of Goddess energy and receive guidance.
The charm of journal writing is that it is entirely private. You can think of this activity as the externalizing of your inner being, a way of manifesting into concrete reality all the thought forms and feelings that float around inside you.
By following the way of the Goddess, you are already on a spiritual quest. You may call it something else—a search for meaning, finding yourself, or getting in touch with what you really want to do in life. Labels are unimportant. The spiritual quest is life, and life is a spiritual quest.
To take a spiritual journey and keep a record of it, we needn’t do anything dramatic, such as go off into a wilderness looking for visions or fast for days. That sort of spiritual vision quest can be a wonderfully illuminating experience and a thrilling adventure, but the real core of spirituality is tucked away in the corners of everyday life. Sunday, Monday, or Friday, rain or shine, cold or warm, all days are sacred in their happening and in their detail. Journal writing is a way of describing the territory you have traversed, of identifying and marking out the significant terrain—as such, it is also like mapmaking.
When fully experienced, journal writing has a liminal quality—it provokes a glow from within. I often imagine what it must have been like for archaeologist Howard Carter when, after years of searching and digging in the inhospitable Egyptian desert, he peered from amid the rubble into the gold-filled tomb of Tutankhamen and stood stunned before the wondrous sight of wall-to-wall gold and bejeweled riches beyond comparison. Symbolically speaking, this is the experience waiting for you as you proceed with what I call soul excavation, and begin to unearth your own inner treasures through the faithful keeping of your Goddess journal. By following your Goddess Self—what I call the “internal imperative”—you’ll find the life path that will fulfill you and allow you to live out of your authentic Self.
A journal is somewhat like a butterfly net—we can use it to catch beautiful specimens, preserving them for future study and pleasure.
There is a well-known mythological symbol of two birds sitting in a tree—one is eating; the other is watching the one who eats. The symbol represents your two sides: the doer and the watcher. These might also be thought of as the actor and the recorder. The actor represents your outward existence, your struggles and achievements, your movements toward others, your participation. The recorder represents your inward life, your thoughts, feelings, attitudes, beliefs, hopes, and dreams. This part of yourself is the watcher, the one who reflects on what the actor is doing. It is contemplative. Carl Jung called these inner expressive powers archetypes, but we can think of them as vibrations to which we resonate at different levels.
Together, the actor and the recorder create consciousness. Just as thought without action produces no concrete results, action without thought is mere movement. Both are necessary to create a being conscious of itself and its actions. Do you remember your first conscious moment? There is a time when we first open our eyes to the world around us and see ourselves as both participating in that outer world and separate from it. Child specialists debate just when this happens in terms of age, but I see it as a continuous process.
Consciousness is our most precious possession. Without it, we are mere robots, only going through the motions of life, not really living. In the ability to think, reflect, and wonder, we possess treasures greater than any material riches on Earth.
We often feel confused about the difference between the words conscience and consciousness. Conscience is supposed to guide us in matters moral and ethical, but without awareness of the exact meaning of our actions, we cannot judge them. This is where consciousness comes in. When we become conscious of any negative effects associated with a behavior or thought pattern, we are in a position to change our behavior for the better. It is our ability to be aware that makes the difference. Consciousness makes awareness possible—it is our guiding inner companion who never goes away.
Without consciousness, we do not know who we are and cannot find out. This greatest of gifts should be guarded carefully and used wisely. The human mind can observe itself thinking—subject and object simultaneously. We can “see” ourselves doing what we do. The girl following the Goddess way is actually on a consciousness-raising mission. By seeking Her, you allow consciousness to emerge. It’s as though you were peeling away the layers of an onion—with each layer removed you get closer to the center.
As you get closer, you begin to hear the whisperings of the Goddess’s inner guidance. Subconscious information about the true implication of our actions may reach us first as a vague sensation, either mental or emotional. It can be a tension or a sense that something is about to happen. Consciousness may register no more than an ephemeral state of being, like the feeling that one has forgotten something important but cannot for the life of one remember what it is.
When we listen and pay attention to these sensations, to the still small voice, we hear the voice of the Goddess. The directions we need most often come from within, yet they can be mirrored by what is happening without. The question is: How can we sort through our multiplicity of feelings, sensations, intuitions, thoughts, and reactions to get to the core of the matter? The answer is through reflection. Consciousness thrives in the silence of reflection—and the Goddess Girl can use journal writing as valuable way to reflect.
The nineteenth-century American writer Willa Cather spoke of “the furniture of the mind,” and said, “Miracles seem to rest . . . upon our perceptions being made finer so that for a moment our eyes can see and our ears can hear that which is about us always.” We can furnish our minds with our conscious observations of everything both outside us and inside us.
A famous author was once invited to conduct a college writing class as a visiting lecturer. This awesome man marched into the room full of eager wannabe writers who, with pencils poised, were waiting for pearls of wisdom to drop from the great man’s mouth. Taking a firm stance behind the lectern, he barked out: “How many of you want to be writers?”
Seventy enthusiastically hopeful young arms shot up into the air simultaneously, waving like sea anemones. The master surveyed his class and then said softly, “Then get the hell home and write! Don’t waste your time in writing classes.”
With that, he turned on his heel and strode from the classroom leaving seventy young mouths gaping in his wake, for they realized they had heard Truth.
Many people are paralyzed when confronted with a blank page. They feel shy as if meeting a daunting stranger for the first time. Worries about “how to do it” rise up and inhibit the mind from transmitting to the hand the thoughts and feelings that seek written expression. But you needn’t let yourself be stopped by self-doubt or worries about how anyone else would judge your writing. A journal is a private place and should be guarded from intrusion. You only need to start the flow and it will continue itself, creating a bridge between the inner and outer worlds, connecting action with reflection.
Writing is a sorting process. It is also a great teacher. A dialogue with yourself is never dull or uninteresting. So, please lay aside your fears that somehow you won’t get it right. There’s no right or wrong. It doesn’t matter if you have terrible handwriting or are a master at calligraphy. You can make Ds in English or win prizes for composition. Your Goddess journal doesn’t care about that. The Goddess just wants to hear what you think and feel regularly. If you do lack writing skills, what better way to improve them than by writing?
Write. That’s all. And don’t worry about the details. Just put them down as you see fit. You can also draw, doodle, paste in cutouts, or do anything else that pleases you. If you like structure, be neat and orderly. If you don’t, scribble any old way (as long as you can read it later).
There is no “right” time to write in your journal—occasionally you may give it more time; frequently, less time. Sometimes you write simply because you come to an activity in this book; sometimes you inspire yourself to write. You are following your own rhythm—let the journal “speak” to you when it wants your attention. I do recommend writing as frequently as you can manage—daily if possible. The end of the day, in the quiet period just before bedtime, is a good time to write. This time of pre-sleep can influence your dreams. It’s also good to combine journal writing with your relaxation and meditation periods. The time just after waking is excellent as well—I like to use this time to fit together the experiences of the previous day and the night’s dreams. Whenever you write, for however long, you enhance your consciousness.
Like timing, writing locations will vary for each girl, depending on your personal conditions of space and privacy. To my mind, the ideal situation is to have a quiet, regular spot that is entirely private, at least for the time you are writing. As with doing relaxations and meditations (and journal keeping is a form of meditation), using the same place all the time is conducive to the activity. When the Goddess senses that you are in your writing spot and ready to make contact, you will shift into the right gear automatically. I sometimes sit at my computer and simply stare out the window at my garden for a few minutes until the flow begins.
However, I also know people who can placidly write in the middle of a traffic jam. One man I know carries his notebook in his glove compartment just for that purpose. He finds that when everyone around him is losing it, writing in his journal keeps him calm and collected. Others comfortably write while commuting on a train or bus. As with all the other exercises in this book, it’s entirely up to you and your needs.
Keeping a Goddess journal allows you to discover significant patterns—your life is not an accidental or random event; it has meaning and purpose. Your Goddess journal helps you to discover how the events of your life fit together into a meaningful whole. It gives you information about what you care about and what you find unimportant, what you enjoy and what you find unpleasant, what you’re good at and what you struggle with. This information can help you live the life you were born to live in the best possible way for you.
If you are already a journal keeper, keeping a Goddess journal will be no problem. If you are new to journal keeping, you may need some time to become acclimated to writing about yourself and your experiences on a regular basis. Writing is a form of self-healing, and having a dialogue with the Goddess should be enjoyable. Make it a habit to write self-created affirmations daily. Remind yourself that you are a Goddess Girl with all the wonderful female qualities that She has given to you.
The amount of time you spend writing in your Goddess journal is entirely up to you and may vary depending on whatever else is going on in your life. During a six-month period when I was undergoing an intense healing after a plunge into the pit of depression, I wrote many pages every day. In fact, keeping my journal became, for that period of time, my life work.
Most people find themselves struggling with depression sometime in their lives, and teens often find themselves coping with it. Writing about those bad feelings can help to overcome them. If I hadn’t recorded everything, I might have forgotten many of the lessons I learned, lost the details of my journey, or even had the whole experience fade away like last summer’s flowers.
Rereading what you have written the next day or a year later can be an illuminating experience. For one thing, you may not be aware of how much progress you’ve made until you see where you were this time last year. Enjoy your journal—think of the Goddess as someone wonderful who loves you and wants only the best for you, who offers you loving guidance.
Your Goddess journal serves as a private record of your spiritual growth and is an excellent tool for coming to understand your individual pilgrimage on this Earth. In it, you will experience the adventure of your life—the discovery of your authentic Goddess Self.
If you find yourself responding to the idea of writing regularly in your journal with the excuse that you don’t have the time, my answer is: We find the time for what we feel is important to us.
Decide if you will write by hand or keyboard.
If by hand, select loose-leaf paper or a bound book.
Choose a book that opens flat.
Do you prefer lined paper or unlined?
The writing implement you use should be one that is permanent and does not smear. You may want to reserve a special pen or pencil just for journal writing.
If using a keyboard, you can use three-hole-punched paper and keep your pages in a binder.
Or, create a file folder, or a computer file.
Browse in a stationery store for an assortment of pens, markers, or colored pencils and use them for a variety of moods and experiences. One client records all of her dreams in purple.
You have the time to watch TV, go to the movies, chat on the internet, hang out with friends, visit the mall, play sports, and lots of other activities. Your Goddess journal is meant to be another pleasure, not a chore. If at first it seems an unwelcome task or a burden, take heart and keep at it. This is a rewarding and important facet of your overall spiritual development.
Often I’m asked, “How much should I write?” Well, how long is a piece of string? This is a question that can only be answered by you and your personality. My only advice is to write what you want, where you want, for how long you want. If you feel you have nothing to say to yourself, don’t write at all. You may write copiously or sparsely, and do either or both at different times in your life. There’s no minimum and no maximum. Sometimes I jot down a few words; at other times, I write several pages. For those accustomed to taking notes, jotting a few lines in your own brand of shorthand suffices to jog your memories when you reread. Others find that starting to write in your journal sparks an outpouring of immense detail.
Still not sure how to begin? Try some of the following short exercises to get flowing with journal keeping.
Practice flow writing. To do this, simply write anything that comes to mind for fifteen minutes.
Write an outline of the major turning points of your life for later elaboration.
Ask yourself where you are now and write about it.
Create a piece of artwork to represent your vision of the Goddess.
Meditate upon a symbol that would express your personality and write about it or draw it.
Find some pictures that express the Goddess to you and make a collage of them.
Write a description of your solar self—the action side of your personality.
Write a description of your lunar self—the side of yourself that takes time to reflect.
Write a dialogue between your solar and lunar selves.
Write a letter to yourself about why you are keeping this journal, what you intend to accomplish.
Write a letter to the Goddess.
If at first you feel shy or have difficulty, don’t worry. It’s only stage fright and you will get over it. Remember, this is your personal Goddess journal and no one else ever need see it. If you feel uptight or restricted, go for a walk or do a relaxation exercise before writing. Remind yourself that you are doing this for you. It’s not schoolwork, a book report, or a test. It’s your artwork.
Consider your Goddess journal a gift you give yourself. You might think of it as a hobby. Rereading what you have written is a pleasant way to remind yourself of how much progress you have made. Like a photo album of a vacation trip, it will bring back the memories.
Think of your journal as a wise adviser and friend to whom you can turn whenever you need a boost or someone to talk with. Your journal is someone you can tell your day to without worrying about lack of interest. Enjoy it as you would enjoy spending time with any loved one who is genuinely interested in you, your problems, your daily life, your successes, your setbacks, your dreams, and your goals. In fact, you can consider the time you spend with your journal as time spent with the Goddess herself, the Source of All.
“Like mother, like daughter.” Does that phrase give you the horrors or do feel proud to be like your mother? Whichever way you feel, as girls, we unconsciously model ourselves after our mothers and other important female relatives. Sometimes this is great, but sometimes we pick up beliefs or attitudes that hold us back us from becoming our authentic Selves. A good way to explore yourself, your beliefs, attitudes, talents, interests, sense of humor, strengths, and weaknesses is to learn more about your female ancestors. What were their hopes and dreams when they were girls like you? What did they end up doing with their lives? It pays to consciously explore your feminine history. Being aware of what has gone before will give you the jump on taking control of your own Goddess Girl life.
To give you an example of what a female family history might be like, I asked a friend to do hers and allow me to publish it in this book. When she sent me her story, she commented that “the female family history really touched a chord for me. I could see how a conscious exploration of the female family patterns of behavior, beliefs, response to the culture at large, roles assumed (as girlfriends, wives, and mothers) would be an incredibly illuminating—and freeing—exercise. It certainly was for me!” Her history follows.
Both of my grandmothers went to college, which was very unusual for women who were born in the late 1800s. My mother’s mother entered college at the early age of sixteen. After graduation, she worked as a research librarian for ten years but stopped working when she married, as was expected of women of that era.
My father’s mother went to college as an adult, when her children were grown and in college themselves. She graduated first in her class with a degree in accounting and was offered a job at the prestigious Chase Manhattan Bank in New York City. However, her husband—a prominent eye surgeon—refused to allow her to accept the job. He was afraid people would think he couldn’t support his wife! So, she had no choice but to relegate her abilities to keeping his medical practice books and the household accounts.
My aunt, the same doctor’s daughter, was a serious student of ballet when she was in high school. After seeing her dance in a recital, a scout from the New York City Ballet Theater School offered her a place in the famous company’s academy. But my grandfather would not allow her to attend the school. His reason? “Nice girls don’t pursue a career on the stage.” Case closed.
Then, she decided that because she was also good at science, she wanted to become a doctor like her father. When she presented this idea to him, he informed her that he would not pay for her to go to medical school. Why? Because he didn’t believe in women doctors. He did consent to send her to Smith College, at that time a training school for wives-to-be of well-to-do young men who were expected to succeed. After graduation, she married and became a homemaker.
At this point in taking my female family history I started feeling discouraged that these strong, intelligent, and talented women had been so held back by men telling them what they could and could not do. In fact, I was enraged. But I had more to learn that would dismay me.
My own mother graduated first in her high school class in Bennington, Vermont, and won a full scholarship to the college there. She worked at the college for several years after graduation but eventually moved to New York, where she met my father, a photographer and documentary filmmaker. After he’d asked her to marry him, he was offered a job on a filmmaking project in South America, so they combined their honeymoon with a working trip. While there, my mother took up photography herself, shooting black-and-white still photographs, while my father worked on the film project.
Here’s the really sad part of my mother’s story: When they returned to the States and settled down, she quit photography. As a child, I assumed that all those beautiful shots of South American scenes and people were my father’s work—after all, he was the professional photographer. Many years later, I noticed my mother’s name on the back of each print and understood that she had taken those glorious photographs. I was astounded and asked her why she had not continued taking pictures. She told me that she’d begun to realize that she might be a better photographer than her husband. She feared that her talent would show him up and “threaten the marriage.”
I feel that my father would actually have been proud of my mother’s talent and accomplishment, but women of her generation had been trained not to upstage their husbands, and that ingrained attitude affected her deeply. My mother didn’t just sit at home; she started a library at the elementary school my sister and I attended and ran it for ten years. But—despite the fact that she held a master’s degree in children’s literature—it never occurred to her that she deserved to be paid for her work. She was just another married woman doing her part as a volunteer.
Needless to say, all of this affected my own life, but I wasn’t aware to what degree until much later. Although I had heard these stories about my female relatives all my life, I didn’t explore them consciously until I was in my forties. I had spent eighteen years in a difficult marriage, always putting the needs of my husband and my two children before my own (as I believed I was supposed to do according to unspoken patriarchal tradition). But after I separated from my husband and entered individual therapy, I began to explore my female family history more closely. It was then that I started to recognize the family pattern of extraordinary talent going to waste because of the unfair social restraints placed on girls and women.
Finally, I realized I could run my own life as I pleased. I heard that “still small voice” inside whispering to me, “You can do what you want. It’s okay to succeed. Go ahead, follow your dreams.”
I realized that I’d been holding myself back because striking out on my own and making something of myself would feel like a betrayal of my own mother and my other female relatives, who had given up their dreams of career and success.
So I returned to school, taking writing classes and a graduate course designed to prepare students to work in the publishing industry, and became a writer and editor with a satisfying job that lets me utilize my talents and abilities to the utmost. It’s not an easy life, but it’s a rewarding one.
And as my daughter reached her teens, I made a point of sharing my female family history with her, letting her know she can be whatever she wants to be. A talented art student, she’s working hard, honing her skills and practicing her craft. Nothing’s going to keep this Goddess Girl from following her dreams.