Letter from Cressida Pryor
October 29, 2023
FOI Samhain Letter 2023
Dear FOI Friends,
This is a time of great hurting and pain in the world...we may call on the wisdom and ancestral insights at this time and maybe find more layers of hurt and pain expressed in many languages, symbols and complexity...disheartened we turn away from previous 'ways of doing things'...the racism, the judgement of difference, the willingness to shrug off being the 'odd person out'...
So what to do? What are fresh ways to respond to 'old wounds'?
Since the last Equinox I have transitioned through and attempted to embrace the barrier marked 'three score years and ten' talked of in the Bible, Shakespeare and many other wisdom sources...it’s a big milestone. And rather than crumble beneath the weight of its burdens and hide beneath its shadow I have attempted to see it as a renaissance of me as the 'older woman'. I prefer this terminology to just an 'old woman' which feels judgmental and restricting. Certainly in my own ageism and impatience with the 'old driver' for example that seems to dither and crawl, terrified in life’s 'slow lane'...
I’d rather embrace the 'older woman’s' willingness to step out of the mainstream and risk the unexpected.
I am referring to 85 year old Yocheved Lifschitz who at the moment of her release from being a hostage in Gaza, paused at the Rafa crossing, turned to grip the hand of one of her masked Hamas militant captors and said to him "Shalom"...
Shalom has a complexity of meaning, it is on one level 'peace' and it also refers to the state of wholeness and completeness...which, in its mystical sense is a state of non-separation, of oneness...
On any level this was a moment of sacred 'I- thou' human connection rare within the horror and degradation of what is unfolding now in the Middle East...
Divine Mother, may we allow ourselves the chance to relate with something that is greater than ourselves, that encourages us to be the best we can possibly be and to make the most of this gift of life that we have been given.
May we always spot the jewels and treasures in our lives even if they are to be found in unexpected places.
May the Divine Light and Love that shines today be illuminated and inspired by all that is great and good, and may we, in the FOI be part of this.
So may it be. Amen. Shalom.
Cressida, FOI Steward
