[Lauren Potts]

Benjamin, I just appreciate you and your response so wholeheartedly 💖 First, I hope to attend “Soul Church” on Sunday – I will be camping but it’s not particularly remote so as long as I have service and a charge on my phone I will zoom in.

I’m so glad you took the time you needed last week, and that your cup is filling. I see how deeply and consistently you show up in care of others – and I get it. I love being able to show up in that way for others, as I’m sure you do as well. But I’m still learning the dance of not leaving myself completely in the spirit of service.

I’ve languaged this post above in a real and raw way, and the feelings are true. But in reality I also know that this time around I left myself a little less than I did the last time. I’m a little gentler and more nurturing to myself. When I say I turned away from my supports I mean I skipped a few days here and there. I responded more quickly by reserving Saturday this past weekend to have zero commitments and to do exactly as I pleased all day long. And it made a difference. And my dreams showed up for me today in a way I could truly see/hear/feel/know the truth of the moment for me, for which I am extremely grateful. As you say – this work takes time. I don’t imagine it’s my last time working this part of the circle. But I know a little more now and hope to keep these insights close to my heart the next time I lose my way.

[Lauren Potts]

Gorgeous, Vicki. Thanks for sharing. I’ll be passing this one along as well🙏💖🙏

[Lauren Potts]

So gorgeous, Rebecca. I love this piece and feel what you’re pointing to. Thanks for sharing!

[Lauren Potts]

Benjamin, I just came over here to re-read your PM and affirm to you that I see you, I value every bit of this process you have shared, and I am grateful for your example of patient and tenacious tending to that which calls to be healed. Through the good, the bad and the ugly of it all. It is true, as you have noted, that there are some overlaps in our family of origin stories. I’m so glad that we now get some overlap in real-time community as we do the work of attending to what has been and nurturing the unfolding of who we are here to be. I echo Vicki’s sentiments as well that it is AWEsome to see what your experience has led to in the creation of this community, and that of ANP. And I offer solidarity in the dailyness of continued tending to your soul. Right there with you and grateful to be in your company. Thank you for your share. 🙏💖🙏

[Lauren Potts]

Oooh, the nuance between self-soothe and self-care. So good. Thanks, Kelli, and thanks too for the X day concept. I like the idea of having a loose schedule for these days so they don’t just slip away.

[Lauren Potts]

You are certainly not alone in this, Lucy, and I’m glad to hear that this sharing was supportive for you too 💖.

Benjamin, great point about reminding each other to turn off being an integral aspect of supportive community. I’m realizing that part of my “spiritual temper tantrum” was that I had lost perspective on the things that support me and had turned them from gorgeous and spacious moments of reconnection to tasks on my never-ending to-do list that I was resenting. And they were among the first to get cut from that list when demands outpaced my availability. The dream that I referenced above had a few different presentations of the idea of a perspective shift. I was on a journey to a temple and when I arrived I saw, with distaste, only a commercial center. I circled/spiraled around it only to find that from a different vantage point it was, in fact, the temple I was seeking only covered over with a disguise. Also in that dream a conversation with you and Lorie about the magic and glory of a sunset being fully apparent to one person while another experienced it as ho-hum and flat.

[Lauren Potts]

Christine, thanks for your response, support, and for the term “spiritual hangover!” Another good one to apply here, for sure.

[Lauren Potts]

Hey Benjamin – it was a lovely weekend to be in nature and among a (very large) crew of close friends and all of our families. The kids had a blast roving in wild, independent packs through the woods and water, as Nature intended 🙂 I really did hope to get online for Soul Church and could have benefitted from that dose of soulfulness, but there was just no reception where we were. I will definitely be there next time and hope to make some other events on ANP this month as well.

Thanks for your response above. I do see the Virgo aspect to this. My history in coming from such a large family and always feeling like I needed to show up for others before myself features prominently in this part of my learning as well. I bet you know something about that yourself too 😉 Which came first, the Virgo rising or the family circumstances? 🙃 That chicken/egg aspect of how a chart plays out in a life is fascinating to me!

[Lauren Potts]

Hey Babbie, thank you for response and reflection. I resonate with every single word you shared! “Spiritual temper-tantrum” is exactly what this has been, and it is a desire to go back to sleep. But you’re right – that would never work for me as I know it would never work for you or most of us here. It’s not at all why we’re here.

Being in a gorgeous spot at the north point of the Chesapeake Bay for the last several days definitely has me recalibrated and my nervous system more regulated. I also truly need alone time every day – time to go within and anchor in my own presence, in silence, without the pull of anyone else’s energy. I agree with your teacher and I can see that I’m experiencing these needs as a non-negotiable aspects of self care now where that wasn’t always the case before. I’ve observed it in my clients as well over the past two years. We’re called to show up with all that we know and given the reminders pretty quickly of why it doesn’t work well for anyone to half-ass this self care business once you’ve found things that work! Spiritual temper tantrum aside, I’m appreciative of the course corrections 🙂

[Lauren Potts]

Lorie, thanks for repeating that invitation and you guys will definitely be the first to know when I get a class together to share 🙂 The melding of modalities with archetypal energies as the binding link has been the thing that lights me up most for years and it feels inevitable (and exciting) that this link between Tarot and acupuncture will be something I share beyond my treatment room. There’s such richness in the way the two complement each other!

[Lauren Potts]

Hi Benjamin! Yes, exactly, when The Lovers shows up there has often been some sort of externalization or projection of power onto another (person or place or thing) and the invitation is to see how that which you are drawn to is a calling from within yourself – an aspect of this inner marriage wanting to express. This was not the first time I’ve read Lorie’s work expressing concepts that feel straight out of the Tarot deck and it’s always fun for me to make the connection 🙂

[Lauren Potts]

Reading Alchemy of Inner Work this morning and I’m struck by @LorieEveDechar ’s description of the alchemical marriage and how it’s a perfect description of my understanding of The Lovers archetype in Tarot. Lorie, I see the aspect of conniunctio present in Temperance as a leveled up integration of the awareness that The Lovers invites us into. The Lovers often shows up, in my experience, in the same way a dream or life situation arises when we find something external captivating and can’t put down some level of obsession with it. As you write here it’s pointing to that which wants to awaken from within. It’s a hard concept to communicate effectively in readings sometimes. Thanks for this language to help flesh out my understanding!

[Lauren Potts]

Thanks, Lorne! I may have an overabundance of CEUs for this period anyway, in which case it would be moot. I haven’t added it all up yet and was just wondering if I should count this. I’ll give it a try if it’s needed. I appreciate your response.

[Lauren Potts]

Hi Lorne,

Just to clarify – are you saying if we used a CEU from Healthy Seminars/Pro-D for the Trauma course previously (I completed in 2017), we can use it again for CEUs in 2022?

Thanks,
Lauren

[Lauren Potts]

Gorgeous, Babbie, thank you 🙏💖🙏

And thank you @loriedechar for stoking the Fire – right on time 🙂