According to Greek mythology, Zeus set the Great Bear in the sky to protect her from his jealous wife, but prior to Hera's revenge, Ma Bear was Callisto, an exceptionally beautiful nymph whose love of hunting inspired her devotion to the Goddess Artemis. Artemis required a vow of perpetual virginity from all her devotees because she wanted them unencumbered by domestic chores and thus free to pursue the hunt.
One afternoon while Callisto napped in the woods, Zeus caught sight of her and was totally captivated by her beauty. The bow and quiver by her side tipped him off—she had taken the vow—so he disguised himself to look like Artemis. That way, he could rouse her without causing alarm. But once she was fully awake, the disguise failed and she fought him off with all her might. Nonetheless, Zeus had his way with her.
Silently, Callisto bore her shame which grew far deeper with the realization that she was pregnant. As her time drew near, Artemis called her entire retinue into a lovely pond for a moonlit bath. Callisto demurred, but Artemis insisted, so she reluctantly disrobed. Furious at Callisto for breaking the vow, Artemis grabbed her by the hair, threw her out of the pond and sent her away.
From Mount Olympus, Zeus watched as Callisto gave birth to his son. Feeling something was amiss, Hera spied on her husband while he watched. Accurately, she intuited his infidelity and retaliated by turning Callisto into a bear. While Hera gloated, Zeus found a nurse to care for his son.
No longer a huntress, Callisto was now prey. Year after year, she was hunted down like a wild beast until the fateful day when she came face to face with her own son. Unaware that the bear in his sight was his mother, the boy drew his bow. Just as the arrow was about to strike, Zeus intervened by hurling them both into the sky where they live eternally among the stars.
The archetypes embedded in this myth define much of the necessary unraveling currently happening in our ascension process. Zeus, the ultimate patriarch, is characterized by his sense of entitlement. He cares enough to save Callisto from certain death, but only after he has robbed her of the independent life she chose, then of the experience of motherhood which he forced upon her. Surely, Hera's jealousy is to blame for the later, but wasn't it Zeus who pushed the button? Artemis, cold-hearted and inflexible, sees only from her own perspective. She can't even ask a question because she's unwilling to be swayed by the answer. And Callisto is the victim of her own beauty.
As we ascend from paternity consciousness to unity consciousness, we recognize all the above traits within ourselves. Entitlement, jealousy, inflexibility, and victimhood are not gender-exclusive. By owning our undesirable qualities, we develop genuine compassion for ourselves and for others. Compassion, above all other traits, facilitates soul integration. The character defects personified by the gods predate the patriarchy and harken back to the pre-historic matriarchy. We are rapidly moving beyond that polarity towards the Divine Feminine which is Heart Centered Unity.
What does the Great Bear myth have to do with the Four Keepers of the Temple and their Earthly mission? To answer that question, I must tell you about Ma Bear's right front paw, which is composed of two sets of binary stars known as Talitha Borealis and Talitha Australis. To the naked eye, each set appears as a single star when in fact the two sets are a system of four stars. We, the Four Keepers, came to Earth through this star system in Ma Bear's front paw so that we could absorb all of her wounds. It's worth mentioning that the planet Mars was right on the paw at 2 degrees of Leo[1], lending energy and strength to bear the suffering Callisto endured. It's also worth mentioning that the four stargates we passed through hold the etheric imprints of the four races—yellow, red, black and white—and that's the order in which we entered the temple.
Yellow (0-12): With black hair and slanted almond-shaped eyes, The Asian imprint was so prominent at Jan's birth that friends teasingly asked her mother if she'd slept with the Chinese grocer. Within months, the black hair disappeared, and throughout her twelve-years in the temple, Jan never grew used to the yellow hair and blue eyes reflected in the mirror. When she was nine, she received a sewing machine for Christmas and the first items she taught herself to make were Asian-style outfits with Mandarin collars for her dolls.
Red (12-28): Jan Two lived in a constant state of déjà vu. Of course, she'd never heard that word and couldn't imagine asking anyone to explain the memories that surfaced while she studied the indigenous cultures of Central and South America, but the parochial school setting brought back to life the Spanish conquest when, as a child slave, she had never questioned her submission to the patriarchy.
Black (28-41): Jan Three fully embraced her sexuality. Of the four keepers, she was by far the most social, sensual, intellectual and rebellious. Constantly surrounded by artists and musicians, her life was defined by creative pursuits. Fiercely passionate, she's the one who gathered the courage to start breaking free from the patriarchy.
White (41- ): Just like my predecessors, I used Jan's name, but only for a short time. Then I took my true name. As Briah, I've reclaimed The Hermit, but I also embody the Wounded Healer archetype. If you've read the previous chapters, the personal implications are obvious. Until I exit this sacred body temple, I will continue to err in judgment, so I am honor-bound to stay the course. But healing goes far beyond my personal wounds. I carry the wounds of my predecessors. And since the four of us entered through the four stargates, I carry the ancestral wounds of the four races. Indeed, several healers who worked with me during my early forties claimed that the grief I carried was totally disproportionate my personal suffering. They were right.
[1] LEO 2—A horn of brass to be used as a hearing aid. Subnormal and supernormal as one. Bearing a karmic handicap in which you cannot get away from yourself for a moment. Yet this opens the doors to a destiny-dedication that is monumentally strong. Your world reverberates endlessly with your own individual themes. You are trapped in the form of individual selfhood. Yet for all its excesses and fanaticisms, this is the perfect situation to lead you through to where you need to go. Because by meeting yourself at every turn, in every possible guise, you are deeply pulled down into a self-expansive pathway where there had been extreme constriction and radical blockage. The transition is arduous and consuming. It feels as though it is impossible to break through. But the very things that characteristically and thematically just will not let you go shall become the ultimate springboard. You wear out your old programs the hard and laborious way, by being at their mercy and learning that somebody in here is ready for something fantastically different and will do whatever it takes to thin out all the delusions, and make personal egoism intolerable, insufferable, and just too big of a joke not to get, ever again.— Inside Degrees. Developing Your Soul Biography Using the Chandra Symbols, Ellias Lonsdale
No comments:
Post a Comment