The Holy Wild. Danielle Dulsky

Road of liberation taking stock of her past. She considers those youthful days before the garden took her, before the underworld began to feel confining, and she traces her patterns of disconnection and relationship, abundance and scarcity, and fruition and void. She harvests a deep knowing, an in-the-bones understanding, of who she truly is during her most joyous moments. She lets the dead parts shrivel and fall off as she walks, and she surrenders to nature’s storm with her whole body and soul.

       Part 1. Tracing the Feeling Mind

      Consider your entire life, my love, to be an epic myth consisting of an unknown number of chapters. You are the heroine, and up until this very moment you have lived the first ten of these chapters. Title these ten chapters accordingly now, writing in your journal as if you were both historian and prophet. You are living the end of the tenth chapter in this moment, but the latter chapters are the yet-to-come. Go back into the lived chapters now and make note of moments of bhava, or feeling mind; these are moments when your spirit, mind, and body were all yoked together, vibrating with the universal frequency. These are moments not of great epiphany or ecstasy but rather of feeling very much in the flow with life’s design. In these moments, you were the truest version of yourself you could possibly be.

      Common activities associated with feeling-mind moments include dance, creation in its myriad forms, gardening or connecting to the Earth, sexual union, and, for some, teaching or being in meaningful communion with others. Everyone’s required conditions for experiencing this feeling-mind sensation are different, but these moments are invaluable clues to your soul’s purpose. Once you understand these pivotal moments in your life chapters, trace the patterns within them and make note of common themes. Do you have a consistent reflection of sacred solitude in these moments? What elements from nature are emphasized? Tracking your feeling mind is a majestic act of self-study, and the darker times when, perhaps, there were entire life chapters without this in-the-flow sensation are just as telling as the joyous moments of ease and wonder. See if you can track five patterns in these moments of flow, these moments of grace and at-oneness.

      Not forcing yourself to speculate on any other details about the yet-to-come, ask yourself this: What is the title of the eleventh chapter, if it starts in this moment? You do not need to be specific; a simple word will suffice. What chapter begins now and ends on some unknown, mysterious night in the future?

      On your blank page or canvas, draw a circle at the center and write the title of your eleventh chapter inside it. If you feel so inclined, feel free to make this central circle symbolize the “forbidden fruit,” giving it an apple shape, a red color, or another telling design element that speaks “passion” to you. Create five leaves or petals of similar size radiating around the circle. In these shapes, write your five patterns, coloring them a shade of green or another hue that symbolizes “homecoming,” “the wilds,” or “ground” to you. You might leave this drawing on your altar or in a wild sanctuary in your home until you have time to move on to part 2, or, if you have the time now, continue to root-scar exploration.

       Part 2. Root Scars and Genuine Currencies

      The root chakra is unique to every wild woman; it is an energetic, primal space wherein all beliefs about body, sustenance, home, finances, and survival reside. The root chakra’s health is inextricably bound to a woman’s felt sense of self-worth, her ability to stand on her own two feet and claim her right to take up space. The soul-wound of feminine spiritual oppression resides at the root as a resonating fear that may be small-voiced but persistent, and reflection on the liberation journey necessarily gives a nod to the fundamental role played by self-worth in the decision to escape from the garden.

      Your sense of self-value, Priestess, is sourced directly from your soul-deep currencies. Just as money is nothing more than stored energy, you have a specific hierarchy of values that informs your self-esteem and, by extension, your spiritual agency. Common values wild women often share are creative expression, adventure, family, freedom, magick, and sustainability, though the range of values embodied by a Priestess is infinite, for she is the cosmic source of all things. Know that no woman will prioritize her values in the same way, though, with those from individualistic cultures having value systems that likely differ radically from those from collectivist cultures.

      In reflecting specifically on a woman’s Red Road journey, however, it is not what these values are that is as important as how authentically you believe you have the right to these deep currencies. For example, if I truly value freedom but pack my schedule to the brim so often that I am precluded from having any time to myself, any opportunities for travel, or anything else that makes me feel genuinely free, then there may be a root-chakral defect blocking my right to have what I crave most. Similarly, if I truly value groundedness and security but am constantly leaking my funds and succumbing to an unfruitful wanderlust, then I am engaging in a certain and sure self-sabotage.

      Ask yourself what you value most. Ask your deep self to speak about the nature of your longing during your quietest moments, and then ask yourself whether you truly believe you have the right to satisfy those cravings. Dig down underneath the power leakages and misguided investments to make visible the gaps between what you have and what you hold dear.

      Priestess, your truest values are tattooed on your bones. They incarnated into your body along with your soul’s purpose, and they are clues to the role you play in this grand cosmic design.

      The catalyst for your liberation was, and indeed always remains, a felt experience of the discrepancy between what you value most, what you get on your knees and pray for, and what you have. First, though, my love, first, you recognize your right to have what you value. There is a moment when the wild woman howls to the moon: No. No, this is not good enough. I deserve better, and I want more.

      Ask yourself what you truly value, and see if you can trace seven core currencies you hold as your own. They might be time spent in nature, meaningful family connection, creative work, participation in social justice groups, environmental activism, movement alchemy, hedonism, or sensual nourishment. You know it is one of your core currencies if, when you lack this thing, you have a lower sense of self-worth, an embodied longing for that particular fulfillment only this currency could provide. Mind you, you do not feel that longing because you believe you should; you feel it because your soul thrives on, is fueled by, those truest values of yours.

      Once you have identified those seven currencies, create seven serpentine loops around and between the five-petal layer of your drawing from part 1. There is no correct way to do this, and the artist can never betray her own art. However you create these snakelike curves or spirals, know it is perfect, and write your currency words here, inside these shapes. Choose a color that symbolizes “abundance” or “wealth” for this part of the design, and then draw a large, organically circular border around the entire work; color this border red to symbolize the Red Road. You may leave this drawing on your altar until you have time to return, or move on if you have the time and will.

       Part 3. Opening to the Eleventh Chapter

      Now, Priestess, knowing what it is you truly value, write a single pivotal scene in your eleventh chapter, the next chapter that you titled at the center of your artwork. Write this scene as if you were remembering a future full of feeling-mind moments. This is not a fluffy exercise in the Law of Attraction; it is a thorough examination of what is already yours and a written invocation to celebrate your own homecoming. Witches want proof their magick has merit, my love, and your lived experience is all the evidence you need.

      Envision that key scene where you are truly living out your purpose, even if that purpose does not seem particularly productive by conventional definitions of success or achievement. Pay special attention, Priestess, to your moments of bhava and your values — both reflected in your work of art — and handcraft this scene precisely as you want to live it. Describe your feelings in this chapter in as much sensory detail as possible, and describe what your wild home looks like, whether it is a physical space or metaphorical way of being in the world. What conditions can you create in your life now that will support your feeling-mind experience, that purely present state during which you are both whole unto yourself and connected to all things? Most important, ask yourself this: What gaps