Have you been asking for what you want over and over?

Are you worn out with asking for what you want?
Do you wonder what you might be ‘getting wrong’?
Do you judge yourself for how things are turning out?
Do you desire to serve the Divine
but aren’t quite sure how to know what that looks like?

Then this is for you.

Work in Progress

Tree of Life Stream this weekend is here – join live or watch the recording

For Those who desire
to serve the Divine

Dear One,

Have you been taught that the way to go
is to ask and ask for what you want?
Are you worn out with wanting?

Over and over and over we ask.
We ask until we are empty with wanting.
We ‘learn’ we are not filled, by voices outside the soul.
Yet we also ‘learn’ it is not good to be empty.
Taunting of the promises we have yet to acquire.

To be empty and full at the same time
is the riddle of saints and sages.

Can you want what you have?
I ask myself this question almost as much
as I used to ask for what I want.

Sometimes it happens the way you want. Often not.
Yet this method continues as if it is gold.
Maybe it isn’t, or at least not in the way we have been ‘using’ it.
Maybe it is using us instead.

Maybe continuing to ask and falling short over and over
is causing a deeper discontent.
Have you thought of the price of not ever
having just want you want
because you have named it so many times
you are clear on everything that it isn’t?

What if you are asking a question you have worn out?

I wonder if enough praise is returned on desires that are granted.
Do you even know, when you get what you want?
Do you pause and praise the One?
Do a happy dance, tell the world
or are you onto the next bigger thing?

What happens when the prayers go unanswered?
Do you turn? Do you turn in, turn away?
Turn on ourselves and find ourselves not worthy,
or somehow not asking with just the right tone of voice?
Our mojo must have gotten mixed up in transmission, right?
(Why isn’t this working for ME?)Are we then undeserving?

Oh please, let us wake from this slumber of self condemnation
for not being able to create the reality we think we want.
What we DO create, is our own experience.
Methods of asking are being hawked by the bunches.
I myself, have tried many.

We wear out the night with incantations
of what we have been taught we want.
Will we pause and tune in to what the soul requests of us?
What we might be made for or from?

When we lose it all again,
we will make stories up about all of it that aren’t true
in an effort to make sense of something
we were never intended to name.

Do you still think good people get good things
and bad people should then get bad things?
That is an idea from childhood long gone.
Then if good people don’t get good things
they are doing something wrong?
Do you think this, about yourself and your loved ones?
Set yourself free from this.

Consider this:

Instead of asking for what you want,

Ask:

What is wanted from you?

Then don’t fill in the blank.
Wait on the Divine presence.
Wait and listen with the ears
you can barely hear.

I don’t mean sacrifice, I don’teven mean selfless service,
I don’t mean overgiving and doing what is not yours to do
just so it can get done and no one is as good at it as you are.

The reason to ask what is wanted from you,
instead of what you want is this:

You get a different answer for a long time.
That different answer reveals hidden things to you
that you would not see otherwise.
There, just there, in the in between,
the holy place shines with loving!

Eventually, some fine day when you barely expect it,
what you want and what is wanted of you come together.

Your supple invitation culminates into coherent beauty.
Whooooooosh. This feeling is luminous!
A falling love that alchemizes your antiquated mythos.
Consecrate the days you have with loving.
That is where the real receiving lives.

I know, we often feel desperate.
I have felt this too.
In times of desperation I still resort to begging,
yanking on the universe with wailing and rose petals.
But when I don’t need to, I don’t.
This teaching does not come easy, practice is required.
Knowing when and how to ask IS part of the equation,
yet it may be different than you have been taught.

If you have been asking for what you want
for as long as you can remember,
try this:

Ask what is wanted of you….

And then see what happens.
You might be surprised.
And surprising yourself is a wonderful thing!

In this way, you become the offering.
Being the offering opens so much more of you
to the mystery that was available all around you,
that you could not receive,
because all the wanting was deafening the radiance.
You have become the talisman, consecrated for loving.

May our requests become sweet prayers
in the presence of the Divine One.

Shiloh Sophia

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FYI I am always talking to myself in these kinds of poems – not pointing fingers, yet the severity is an attempt to wake us from slumber not to make wrong. I am sure you know this but it bears speaking.

Talisman comes from the Greek word, teleo, meaning to consecrate or ceremony. Also earlier meaning is completion. Also has telos meaning ultimate object or aim. So the thought is, that we become what is consecrated. In this case, choosing to consecrate yourself to the Divine, indeed this is a self initiation. Self initiation is really at the root of my work in Intentional Creativity.

The other reason I wanted to send this particular writing to you, even though it does involve my faith somewhat, is because the idea that you are the gift, you are the offering, is distinct than many other ways of being in the world. Through the training path you have chosen, you desire to be of service to yourself and others, and that path takes rigor and contemplation.

Blessed Be!

Here I am with Carmen Baraka, Spirit Warrior, she is one of my Native American teachers and often makes a guest appearance in our programs.

Dear One,

Greetings to you! I woke up this morning with a desire to write down the ideas above that has been flowing through my mind and heart about how we think about what we want. The reason for it arising so strongly is two fold, touching on matters of life and death!

1. LIFE: Talking to close to 100 women for Color of Woman Teacher Training always has me learn more about where I actually am, and where the work actually is. And writing for Red Thread Guide curriculum has me getting very clear on the role that ritual plays with Intentional Creativity. Working with you is LIFE giving.

2. DEATH: Recently I have experienced so much death in my community that it is catalyzing consciousness in a new and mighty way. And bringing to mind what is truly precious, and what I really want to experience and how I want to show up. Further, how much I cherish my part in supporting women in becoming empowered to lead their communities in circle.

What I really want, is to be a blessing and do my sacred work, and, I am. Part of being on my Red Thread means lots of Shiloh paintings and musings to pepper your path sometimes with tears, and sometimes with hot sauce! Writing for me helps me to know what I know, as I am writing. Painting works the same way, I discover more as I go along. That is part of the sacred work of Intentional Creativity, learning a way of listening that is so fresh, and actually astonishing, in the brightness of it.

As we enter the Season, I am sending my love along the red thread. I am going to be on sabbatical for two weeks starting on the Feast Day of the Guadalupe, December 12, and so emails from me personally will be less and so will communications from the team, so we can all take a break. That said there are three big classes coming up in January – and after that I won’t be offering almost anything until May. So if you desire to study with me in 2018 – consider IMAGINE, Red Madonna or LEGEND. Only Legend is open for registration, as well as our class Tree of Life starting this weekend. You can find them both here www.cosmicowgirls.com. So you will continue to hear from us about those but regular Red Thread Letters may be more quiet.

I have SO MUCH to tell you, yet I know it is time for a sacred sabbath time with my husband, Jonathan. We are traveling alone to a place we have never been to spend our Holy Days in quiet snow covered mountains.

With great heart and a splash of red paint,