This Project’s Story
The story of Raven Essences is the story of my journey into deep listening—to my Self, to Nature, and to the soul of those seeking my intuitive council. As with all stories, this one began far before I consciously understood what was happening, but now appreciate in retrospect.
early 90s
OBSIDIAN
Grounding has never been easy for me. As a dominantly intuitive artist, I have always tended to build my castles in the sky. My descent came, as with many people, in mid-life through a series of events that dropped me to my knees. I left a spiritual community that had provided direction, home, and companionship for nearly twenty years, and once on my own, I found the “real” world very challenging. Making a living, raising my two boys alone, and discovering my own spiritual connections were skills that I was forced to develop rather late in life. I thought I was managing quite well until I became pregnant. Though this could not have come at a worse time, intuitively I knew that I must welcome this baby.
One night I had a dream with the single word, “Obsidian.” Looking up the word up in a dictionary, I learned obsidian is a black, glass-like stone originating from the centre of the earth. Later that day I found a beautiful obsidian egg at a local rock shop. I knew I was entering a dark period, and the black egg seemed to mirror my journey, yet when I held it up to the light, I saw thousands of tiny, shimmering golden filaments in the dark orb. I felt a rush of reassuring calm. The darkness I feared entering actually held an unfamiliar and very beautiful light. Obsidian signalled my journey into the deep feminine where I would eventually explore the Earth’s dark wisdom.
TALULAH
Seven months into the pregnancy, I became suddenly and abnormally huge. My midwife wondered if I might be carrying twins and sent me for an ultrasound, which indicated there was only one baby but there were also some problems. A battery of tests revealed that the baby was a dwarf, and though that was unusual, she also had no lungs. Her entire chest cavity was filled with only her tiny heart. Though I was shocked, I also relieved. Clearly there was no ambivalence about her intention. She was not meant to breathe beyond her time in my womb.
I prepared for her birth, knowing it would also be her death. It took four days of labor before she was born. The Gulf War was raging throughout this time, and peace was achieved the morning she was delivered. I held and sang to her for twenty-five minutes as she lay on my belly, the umbilical cord still binding us as she gently passed away.
I named her Talulah Raven. Talulah means beautiful waters, and she was born in a flood of amniotic fluid. It sounds like the Native Indian word ‘Taliloque’ which means ‘little people.’ I called her Raven because she drew me into the the heart of the earth’s dark mysteries.
“I have always tended to build my castles in the sky. My descent came, as with many people, in mid-life through a series of events that dropped me to my knees.”
mid to late 90s
BEGINNING TO LISTEN
Wanting to believe that Talulah’s brief life had some deeper significance, I sat at my desk almost every day for three years, connecting with her spirit through my body’s visceral memory of her presence. Though I had considerable skepticism, I could not dismiss the words I found myself writing. They were wise, loving, firm, and practical. The messages ranged from esoteric insights to mundane instructions, “Get your tulips planted, now!” Each time I wrote, I felt more grounded and centred. At the same time, I couldn’t talk about this with many people, and I struggled with the question, “Whose voice is this—Talulah’s, mine, or a combination of both?”
These years were a quiet and relatively tranquil time in which I taught music, planted my first garden, and watched my boys grow into young men. While I no longer receive messages from Talulah, this intense period of automatic writing taught me how to listen below the surface noise of daily activities into the deeper realms of life’s mysteries. By opening my heart, listening and acting on what I received, I developed the ability to hear the poetic language of plants and trees, and eventually the hearts of my fellow human beings.
THE FIRST ESSENCES
In 1995, a friend casually asked me to make a flower essence from the Datura plant in my garden. I made the essence and wrote down what I sensed but gave it very little attention. Rather playfully, I made a few essences that summer, but it was my friends who saw their potential. To be sure for myself, I asked thirty different practitioners to test them with their clients. After several months, their positive feedback and my own inner knowing called me to commit to this work. In 1996, I made a hundred and twenty essences. It was an amazing summer, a white-heat creative time where every quiet moment in the garden yielded a new insight. Keeping a notebook nearby when I gardened, I found it easy to discern the essence of each plant, which was dictated to me in poetic fragments. When I tried to capture their essence without deep body-listening, my link with Nature would immediately collapse. Clearly, my job was simple— to fully open, receive, and trust.
THE DREAM
In 1997, I had a dream that provided me with the complete recipe for the Raven Essence project. I am in a dark green wooded area. Near a stream, there is a square wooden table. Two men and two women are seated around the table, an image of perfect symmetry. As I stand nearby, I hear each of them, one after the other, repeat this phrase: “Precious is my garden, and my garden is me.” Then I go to the nearby stream… and the dream ends.
The phrase kept gently drumming in me like a mantra, “Precious is my garden, and my garden is me.” While I recognized the ‘preciousness’ of my garden, I could scarcely feel my own unique value. The dream continued echoing through the years as a guiding principle while I gardened and developed the flower essence project. The dream constantly reminded me that my love affair with Nature was not only about intimacy with the great outdoors. For true balance, I needed to cultivate the inner garden of my body and soul.
“When I tried to capture the essence of the plants without deep body-listening, my link with Nature would immediately collapse. Clearly, my job was simple—to fully open, receive, and trust.”
a new millenium
LISTENING WITH
My conversations in the garden combined with the safe intimacy of a therapeutic container with a very wise and grounded man established the foundation for the Raven Essence project. As I learned the principles of co-creative relationship with plants, I gradually applied this approach to my work with clients. I wanted to listen with, not just to them. While most healing modalities address traumas that compromise the body-soul, I was drawn to the life-force seeking creative expression within each person. Instead of focusing solely on what was wrong, like a gardener, I tracked the ways each person’s soul-seeds naturally yearned to grow. I wondered, “What creative impulse is pressing to be expressed? What specific elements are needed for them to thrive?”
There were no cliched answers. As with my listening to Talulah and the plants, I found myself articulating information and ideas I had never considered. Once again I was a student, only this time Nature was teaching me through the life-force pulsing within each person.
GAIA’S INVITATION
In 2004, I decided to go into semi-retreat to deepen my relationship with Nature, beyond the flower essence practice. Some powerful energetic shifts along with meditative insights about the state of the environment inspired me to connect directly with Gaia, our Mother Earth. In some ways, I was still observing Gaia from within the glass bubble of my consciousness. Centuries of rationalism, religious beliefs and viewing Nature as a commodity, prevent us from feeling Gaia’s inner life. Wanting to make a deeper connection with the spirit of the Earth, I opened myself to listen with fresh ears.
The work required immense concentration and stillness. For almost nine months I gave no workshops and only saw the minimum number of clients. The culmination of this work is called “Gaia’s Invitation”, a collection of 120 poems with cards for divination. The poems were unlike anything I had ever written before. As Her voice emerged through my meditations, Gaia revealed Her painful grief, shared Her vision for humanity’s creative role, and addressed what we need to do to be in right relationship with Her.
THE STORY CONTINUES
Like all stories, there comes a time when you believe you have outgrown them, when you muster the intention to move past them. However, stories born from soul remain in our roots even as we branch out in new directions.
There came a time when my own growth expanded beyond the Raven Essence story, and I needed to find a voice that more fully represented my present self. Assuming this would enable a healthy and necessary detachment from the original project, I was surprised when this living project revealed that it too had evolved beyond its original form! The essences wove their way into my new work with women’s circles, webinars and retreats, enhancing and amplifying what was emerging in my creative field. The essence definitions (as well as Gaia’s Invitation) have evolved as an invaluable divinatory system. An integral part of my own daily life, they also serve a wide range of individuals and practitioners.
Most powerful of all though was this:
With more than two decades behind me, I have a much clearer understanding of what was gifted to and through me by operating Raven Essences as a living project. Trusting and following the guidance I received through deep listening gifted me with remarkable insights into Nature’s wisdom. Now, with even greater care and a poised sense of urgency, I continue listening as the cries of the Earth command our full attention. May we all turn our heart’s ear and be willing to hear what She is calling forth within each of us.
Moving on, the two months of meditative listening that birthed The Book of Snake in the winter of 2015 was published in the summer of 2021. Meanwhile, quietly pulsing in several large binders and dozens of journals, other writings are patiently waiting, perhaps to be re-read and pondered, or to be edited and published…
