THE RETURN OF THE MAGDALENES
Before I began writing this book I was visited by a consciousness known as the Magdalenes. The Magdalenes are Priestesses from the Essene, Isis, and Avalonian lineages. Powerful mystics and female scholars trained in the healing, mystical, gnostic, Celtic, and sacred arts of Isis. They first came to me upon my first visit to the red springs in the Chalice Well Gardens in Glastonbury where the Michael and Mary ley lines meet. It was there that I was given the title and energetic download for this book. Upon my second visit I received more. My third initiation took place after a ritual with my friend Meggan Watterson.
For some time I kept it tucked away in my heart, not even telling my publisher because, to be honest, it felt so much bigger than me. How could I talk about embodying feminine power in full, when parts of me still denied her so? How could I write about unbinding ourselves when I was still unraveling? How could I possibly write about healing lifetimes of persecution when I was still to finish doing so myself? How could I write about being held by the Mother when at times I was still relying on my own strength?
But the Magdalenes kept coming back and I finally surrendered to the fact that the journey of rising is never done. As I described earlier, a surge of clients with a pattern of past-life persecution kept showing up for sessions. Real-life Magdalene sisters from times past began appearing in my own life, midwives destined to encourage and hold the space, as I unbound myself from my own patriarchal methods of survival, protection, and ways of being that this book demanded from me – from us, as we forge a new path for women into this new age.
The Magdalenes are not one woman, but rather an order of consciousness. Awakening in so many of us and rising all over the planet. Many of us ancient Magdalene initiates, Priestesses of Avalon, Isis, and Essene mystics who have been returning throughout significant periods of history to do the work of She.
Magdalenes are here to spark a new consciousness on the planet, one where the masculine and feminine are returned back to balance. Where the light of our soul is the thing that unites all. One where all people are reconnected with the sacred wisdom of their soul and within their womb and body. One where we surrender to the cyclic nature and natural rhythm of Life.
Magdalenes are here to remind others that it is safe now to share our voice and come out of hiding. That it is safe to open the front and back of our hearts. That it is safe to trust our inner wisdom and ancient knowing. That it is safe to embody our power in full force. To stop striving and soften. To choose pleasure not pressure. And to release the old identities that once served us without judgment.
Most Magdalenes have always been aware of their divine nature, embodying a certain remembering that there was something that they came here to share. Magdalenes are ancient souls who have a certain unshakable remembering of a time long before, where life on Earth was in complete harmony, many incarnated in ancient motherlands such as Lemuria, ancient Egypt, Atlantis, and Avalon. Living in community where all people were appreciated for their true nature. Where women could be trusted and not seen as competition. Where heaven was a place on Earth. In their deepest hearts, Magdalenes believe that this is possible once again. This is why so many have returned.
Magdalenes are here to gently yet fiercely rock each and every one of us back to harmony with the Mother (Earth). A Magdalene’s heart is both gentle and fierce. She has the capacity to hold so much. A Magdalene sees beyond doctrine and recognizes the golden thread weaving through every religion. For this reason she may struggle with choosing a specific faith; however, she is a believer and her faith is unshakable.
Magdalenes are able to hold space for another without saying a word. Their energy is able to transmute and recalibrate things back to congruence. Strategically placed all over the world, many Magdalenes have a gypsy spirit, knowing when it is time to move. As if guided by a force beyond themselves, they just knows where they need to be when, even if the logical mind takes some convincing.
Magdalenes may hold great grief from times when their voice and the voice of others was silenced and snubbed out, and indeed in parts of the world still is. It is this that Magdalenes are here to heal.
With the world in the state that it is in it is easy to get overwhelmed and feel like there is nothing we can do or that what we are doing is never enough. However, we must remember that the way to heal this planet is first by healing ourselves.
The Magdalene consciousness is (re)awakening in us all. It doesn’t matter if your path involves reaching many or just healing yourself. No work is more or less holy. It is time for us to activate the light that we so long ago planted. To activate, embody and anchor it in whatever pocket of the planet we are situated. To free all parts of the feminine that have been bound.
Unbound, unbound, forever unbound.
UNBOUND, UNBOUND, FOREVER UNBOUND
After working with the Magdalene consciousness that was rising within me for a while, I could feel a fiercer, more powerful, and potent feminine, bubbling beneath the surface. One who while She may have been bound or contained in the past was now readying herself to rise.
On one of my trips to Glastonbury I went to the crystal shop ‘Stone Age’ looking for something to anchor this new powerful feminine that I could feel rising within me. While I was there a large, dark moonstone ring called my name. It looked more like a sorcerer’s ring than my normal light-filled Virgo Priestess style. A mirror for the darker unclaimed feminine, my Scorpio rising.
A couple of weeks later my friend Meggan Watterson arrived in London after her own returning to Glastonbury. Within a few seconds of meeting each other in the hotel lobby, she grabbed my hand and questioned: ‘Where did you get that ring?’ She later revealed that she had seen the same one in her dreams and even looked for it while she was in Glastonbury.
After a few sips of red wine in the hotel bar, we went upstairs to Meggan’s room to get on with the sacred work we do best, by performing a ritual for each other. Using rose petals, rose oil, Chalice Well water, sage, and candles, we held space for the other. For my ritual we focused on releasing any way I had been keeping my power and soul’s voice bound.
As Meggan placed the blessed water on my third eye, throat, and heart, and glided sage around the back of my heart she whispered, ‘Unbound, unbound, forever unbound.’ I could feel the lifetimes of built-up protection continue to fall away making space for my ferociously rising unclaimed power.
That night a loud bang in my bedroom startled me awake. Sitting up I discovered that my diary (which I’d left on the nightstand) was halfway across the room, lying there wide open, with the pen on top of it. Moved by a force beyond me, I scooped up the book and pen and began writing.
We are the Magdalenes. You have been initiated,
now go initiate others so they too can remember.
We are here. We are here. We are here. Hear our prayer.
We are here. We are here. We are here. Hear our prayer.
Without knowing it, I’d found myself in the sunroom with my harmonium chanting a song in full. I had only just started playing the harmonium and could barely play a chant let alone create one. I let myself be sung, as though receiving some sort of recalibration and initiation while allowing them to sing through me. I looked at my phone and discovered that two hours had passed, but it felt like 10 minutes.
A week later while in Chicago I had the most amazing dream. I was shrouded in cloth and surrounded by my Magdalene sisters. Meggan was there, so was Madeline, and many others who had been part of my journey of unbinding, reclaiming, and rising. Some I knew by face, some by soul. Priestesses of Isis, gathered around me, lovingly, carefully unraveling the cloth that had me bound for so long. This cloth representing all of the ways I had kept my own power bound, presence contained and wisdom silenced. Layers of protection, necessary in the past but not anymore. As they unraveled the cloth, they placed soothing herbal oils over my body while whispering over and over again,
‘Unbound, unbound, forever un
bound.’
When I awoke the next morning, the sun warming my face, I knew something significant had shifted. While putting on my mascara I notice hundreds of beams of light dancing all around the room. The whole room, a mirror ball. Trying to work out where these beautiful reflections were coming from, I eventually discovered that the light was being reflected off the gold, sequined wings on the back of my Victoria’s Secret angel winged hoodie.
I burst into tears feeling the presence of all the Magdalene sisters who had been part of this healing. Lifetimes in the making. Feeling their presence and knowing that when we feel safe enough to open the front and back of our heart our light is shared without effort or burden. I felt a weight lift off me. I knew it no longer needed to be hard and it was once again safe to open the back of my heart. That I was ever held and that I didn’t need to do this work in hiding or on my own anymore.
A week later, at the Mind Body Spirit Festival in Birmingham, I was finally, at long last, no longer afraid to speak.
SPIRITUAL CLOSETS
With all of the persecution that has gone on over the past few thousand years, it’s no wonder that so many of us find ourselves in a spiritual closet of some sort. It took me 17 years to step fully out of mine! I’ve come to discover that those who step into spiritual closets don’t do so because they doubt their beliefs, rather they do it because their beliefs are such a big part of who they are. And the spiritual closet is a form of protection from being rejected for who they truly are.
I’ll never forget the day I began to see the hilarity of hiding out in a spiritual closet. Prior to this, my spiritual books would be always hidden away in my handbag. One day at work I was searching for something in it and emptied the contents onto my desk. One of my male colleagues read the title of the book and made a harmless joke. I scooped up the book and hid it away again feeling like I had just been outed and judged.
About 10 minutes later he emerged from the bathroom dressed head to toe in cycle gear ready to ride home. I made a playful remark highlighting his nappy bike pants and clippy-cloppy shoes like I always did. He laughed it off and wished me a good night. In that moment I realized that there was no difference between my passion for the soul and his passion for cycling. He didn’t take anything I said personally, so why should I?
We must not waste our time hiding parts of who we are from the world around us. It is our weirdness, our secret passions, our deepest beliefs that make us who we are. Come out of whatever closet you are in.
RISE SISTER RISE
Where in your life are you hiding?
What would happen if instead of hiding,
you allowed everyone to see you fully?
RECLAIMING ‘WITCH’ (THE NATURAL WITCH)
‘I am a witch, by which I mean that I am somebody who
believes that the Earth is sacred, and that women and
women’s bodies are one expression of that sacred thing.’
STARHAWK
‘You’re a witch.’
What if that were a good thing? What if being a witch was not something to be accused of, rather a title we claimed proudly?
An acknowledgment that you draw your strength from deep within, rather than an external source. That you know how to work with the powers of the Earth and Universe to manifest what you desire. What if it meant you were in touch with your feminine wisdom, that you owned your authentic power and were not afraid to show it? What if it meant you lived your life in deep reverence to and in flow with the cycles and rhythms of the moon, the tides, the seasons, nature, and Life?
Wise Woman. Wild Woman. Empowered Woman.
That you were interesting, opinionated even and unafraid of speaking your truth. That you believed there is magic inside you and every person too. That you believed in the power of ritual, the four elements and your ability to be transformed. It is time that we reclaim ‘witch’ and show that it is not something to be afraid of. Not in a hipster trendy way, rather in a way that honors the potency of who you are and the women who so courageously paved this path before us, regardless of the consequences.
Most people confuse the practice of Wicca with witchcraft. However, what I refer to as Natural Witchcraft dates back further than all of the great religions. Natural Witchcraft is the worship of Mother God and her seasons. As seeing all of life as sacred. Of tapping into the power and wisdom that we have within each and every one of us.
If all women were in touch with their inner wisdom and unafraid to own their natural power then the world would be a very different place. If all women surrendered to the Earth’s natural rhythms, this planet would be so much more harmonious. Let’s wipe clear the propaganda of the Middle Ages. Let’s lift the stigma of the witch and allow its meaning to return to one of empowerment.
Let’s reclaim ‘witch’ from being something we need to hide, to something that we can proudly own. Let’s come out from the shadows and unleash the light that we have been doing our best to keep protected for fear of being misunderstood or harmed.
Let’s make being called a ‘witch’ mean someone who knows her power, trusts her intuition, and isn’t afraid to share her authentic magic and medicine with the world.
A wise woman. An awakened woman. An empowered woman. Someone who knows how to heal herself and others.
I am a Natural Witch. If you are reading this, chances are you are too.
Come out from hiding, you are needed here.
RISE SISTER RISE
Are you a Natural Witch?
How are you playing small for fear of
being misunderstood or judged?
HEALERS, WE NEED YOU
To heal is to make something whole again. A healer holds the vibration of wholeness and invites the other to see that too. To believe in that. To surrender to that. To choose that.
Now more than ever we need more healers to rise up. People who are able to see wholeness, not what is broken. People who can see the light in the darkness. People devoted to their own self-healing. People determined to see the wholeness of those they come into contact with. To encourage the butterfly’s wings to grow rather than see them as stuck in a cocoon. To see the potential of what is possible, To nurse, stand beside, forge new paths and create art that inspires.
Healers don’t just exist in the medical sense. There are other types too. Artists and mothers. Midwives and teachers. Singers and solicitors. Storytellers and bartenders. People who trust in their ability to heal the world around them by healing themselves. People devoted to nurturing themselves, others and this world back to wholeness. That is what makes a healer. The ability to see the wholeness of ourselves and all of Life. Heal the world. Surrender to your wholeness now.
#RISESISTERRISE MANTRA
I surrender to my ability to heal and be healed.
Instead of seeing what is broken, I choose to
see invitations to return to wholeness.
SET YOUR SOUL’S VOICE FREE
Now is the time to release your voice. To share your song. Expressing all of the things that your soul has to say. To be heard and to speak freely. Clear the chimney of your soul so those around you can hear the music you came to share. Let the sharing of your voice be your own medicine. Cathartic. And while you’re at it, offer it up as medicine for those who lack the courage to do the same.
The days of persecution that your soul remembers are over. This does not mean that everyone will understand you or agree with you or even like what you have to bring. The more daring and true to your message, the more likely you will attract the attention of those who are not yet ready to hear you. But at least you will no longer be holding your magic inside.
When you share your voice, those who can hear you, who are waiting to hear what you have to say will flock to your side and sing along. Drinking up what you have to share like nectar. Cheering you on as you guide the way.
There are many who will be energetically activated simply by your decision to share. Your voice, igniting something indescribable in
them. Set your soul’s voice free.
RISE SISTER RISE
How are you being called to share your voice in a bigger way?
If you weren’t afraid, what would you do?
RITUAL: RELEASING VOWS OF SILENCE AND CALLING BACK YOUR POWER
Light four candles and place them in a circle around you. One in front of you, one behind you, one to the left and one to the right.
Imagine a beautiful rose at your heart center, or hold a real one there. As you breathe deeply, imagine it opening softly and courageously, petal by petal. Call upon the power of Mother Earth to support you.
Imagine a stream of light connecting you to the heavens above, connecting you to the unified field of All That Is, while saying the following invocation:
‘Akashic Records Division, Magdalene Sisters, Priestesses
of Avalon and Isis, Durga, Kali Ma, all of the Marys,
Lakshmi, Saraswati, Shakti, and rising feminine energy,
I request the following in all dimensions,
past, present, and future.
Remove and render void any vows, contracts, bindings,
or ways I have knowingly or unknowingly chosen
to keep, or be forced to keep, my voice or power
restrained or contained in this life and any other.
Remove all layers of protection preventing me from stepping
into the full radiance of who I am and came here to be.
Sever all old identities and ways of being that may have served
me in the past but are no longer necessary in present time.
Release anything that I am carrying that is not mine.
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