Head Shaving Ritual

This blog is a continual story that begins with the first posting in the Blog Archive, The Journey Begins. Click down the list to read entries, and click on arrows to reveal monthly drop-down menus.

These days, I hear of more and more women who are creating a sacred head shaving ritual instead of waking up to clumps of hair on their pillow or just standing in front of the bathroom mirror and shaving it all off. I knew that I wanted a ritual that expressed the power of the initiation I was about to endure, and I asked a friend of mine, Madhavi Shirman, who teaches ceremonial arts at the Star House in Boulder Co, to help me plan it.

Ria and Madhavi

Opening Invocation:

We gently invite the presence of Spiritual Source into this space, and ask Source to manifest within the following archetypal expressions: Warrior Goddess of Creation and Destruction, Kali, for the great good and healing of our sister Ria. We invite the Green Tara in all her Healing Glory and we invite Isis in her aspect of Powerful Resurrection. We call to our personal guides to light this evening with transformational love. We call to the alchemical elements of Mother Earth, Air, Fire, Water and Ether to quicken and enliven this space. We now weave and hold this space sacred.

Working with Sacred Sound

I set up an altar in our living room for the ritual, and empowered it with prayer, intention, sacred objects, candles, incense, flowers and offerings to the archetypal deities.

Lighting the Incense

The Altar

My Statement of Healing Intent:

I, Ria, intend to release all attachments that are hindering my healing and wholeness on the physical, emotional, mental, and spiritual levels.

• In the spirit of this intention, I offer my hair and my breast as Sacred Wounds in sacrifice to Kali, the archetypal expression of transformation, and ask her to transform my body to the highest state of purity, health and wholeness.
• In the spirit of this intention, I offer flowers, butterflies, incense, fruit, music, fire and water to Green Tara, the archetypal expression of healing, and ask her to transform my body to the highest state of purity, health and wholeness.
• In the spirit of this intention, I offer to Isis, the archetypal expression of regeneration, my lifelong intention to remember my true nature, and to re-member my lost parts which had left me homesick for heaven, but which are now restored to me. Thank you, Isis, for gifting me with heaven on earth.

Anointing with Oils

Ria and Cha Cha

Closing Words of Ritual:

I am undergoing a level of spiritual transformation that I never thought possible. It is the death of who I thought I was and the birth of someone I have never known. I accept this death rebirth process, and I trust the chemotherapy that is supporting my body to stay alive within it. I welcome this medicine, and know that it will alchemize into healing salve within my body. This ritual is a vow to accept my shamanic journey, and live within this new, refined vibration that is being birthed within me. It's a consecration of my commitment to embody my higher self. It's an acknowledgement of the death of my old patterns that no longer serve me, and a commitment to my rebirth.

I'd like to read this poem by David Whyte:

The Opening of Eyes

That day I saw beneath dark clouds

The passing light over the water

And I heard the voice of the world speak out

I knew then as I have before

Life is no passing memory of what has been

Nor the remaining pages of a great book

Waiting to be read.

It is the opening of eyes long closed

It is the vision of far off things

Seen for the silence they hold

It is the heart after years of Secret conversing

Speaking out loud in the clear air.

It is Moses in the desert fallen to his knees

Before the lit bush

It is the man throwing away his shoes

As if to enter heaven and finding himself astonished

Opened at last

Fallen in love

With solid ground.

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My First Chemotherapy

This blog is a continual story that begins with the first posting in the Blog Archive, The Journey Begins. Click down the list to read entries, and click on arrows to reveal monthly drop-down menus.

Once I made the decision to do chemotherapy, I knew that I had to radically change my attitude towards it. My first step was to thank Spirit for the opportunity to keep my body alive, and my second was to completely accept the drugs into my body. To accomplish this nearly impossible task, I had to perform a perfect 180 degree flip from old me to new me. Old me didn't believe in Western medicine because it had failed me in the past; new me was willing to give Western medicine another chance, and to go all the way, no holds barred. Whatever I had to deal with - puking, mouth sores, nausea, hair loss, sore throat, migraines, diarrhea, fevers, secondary infections, exhaustion, heart complications - I would accept and handle.

Jeremy Geffen, M.D.

In a private consultation I had with Dr. Jeremy Geffen, author of The Journey Through Cancer, Jeremy emphasized how important it is to resolve any doubts about doing chemo before you start. He deeply believes in the body-mind connection, and feels that holding a split attitude about chemo i.e. "it's a terrible poison but there's no other chance for me," can actually worsen the side effects and lessen the chance the chemo has to be effective. Here's a quote from Jeremy's book, p. 77:

As a patient, you must at some point find a way to suspend the unceasing activity of a doubing mind. This is not to suggest that you should abandon thinking or abdicate your sovereign right to know and understand what is happening to you. However if the doubting mind is left unchecked, it can seriously undermine the treatment process.

There is a strong field of fear surrounding chemotherapy because it has sometimes brought more suffering into the cancer patient's life. If a cancer patient makes the decision to do chemotherapy, I think it's imperative to dissolve that fear in the way that's right for each individual. Some people might pray to Jesus, some might use self-hypnosis, others might engage their will. Because working with archetypes comes so naturally to me, I do meditations, visualizations and active imagination sessions with the Medicine Buddha that have helped me to accept the chemotherapy as healing balm that flows from his medicine bowl into my body. And I also imagine the great protector Mahakala absorbing any excess chemo that might cause collateral damage.

Here I am at my first chemotherapy session. My sweetheart, Ken, and my dear friend Aubrey were with me, and they both videotaped the treatment. The syringe of red liquid that you see in the foreground is adriamycin, is a very potent chemo that's nicknamed "the red devil."

Me and my new friend, "the red devil"

The first time I heard that adriamycin is nicknamed "the red devil," I felt uneasy and frightened of it. Then I remembered that I used to love Red Devils candy when I was a kid. It was hot, spicy, and tasted like cinnamon. I decided to make a conscious association in my mind between Red Devils candy and Red Devil adriamycin, and it worked! It might sound silly, but my fear of adriamycin dissolved. In Jeremy's book, he talks about how important the meanings are that we assign to different words or events. He says that "if beliefs are the 'truths' we attach to ideas and experiences in the real world, meanings are the significance we give to those ideas and experiences." These are profound words that have the potential to change our lives. For example, here are two different meanings I can assign to having cancer. I can choose to fall into a deep depression and become convinced that I am being punished by God, or I can look at my cancer as an opportunity to learn, grow, help others, and learn how to love more fully.

Sweet Aubrey and me

And believe me, I am no Pollyanna. I've experienced plenty of depression, doubt, fear and anxiety in my life. But there is something about my having cancer that has rocked my boat so dramatically that whole handfuls of my beliefs about life have been uprooted. I truly have the feeling that anything is possible. Yes, I might die, but I also might live. Yes, I have a tumor but I also am learning how to dissolve it, and not just with the chemo. Love is dissolving it. I love myself more now than ever before in my life. I love my body, my injured breast, my cellulite, my aging thighs, my wrinkles, my eyes, my bones, my fingernails...I love every little part of my body. And if you know anything about women, especially middle-aged women, that's a miracle.

My sweetheart, Ken, and me

To get back to Jeremy's book, I really recommend it. It's divided into seven sections, loosely based on the seven chakras. The first is Level One: Education and Information, in which he talks about the basic facts about cancer. Level Two is Connection with Others - we can't get through this alone. Level Three is The Body as Garden, and he discusses all sorts of adjunct holistic healing. In Level Four, Emotional Healing, is a very important one. In fact, Jeremy says, "not one single person has ever truly healed from cancer without undergoing a transformation and healing of their emotional self." Level Five is The Nature of Mind, in which concepts like "thought," "belief," "meaning," and "focus," are discussed. Level Six is Life Assessment, which asks the question, "What is the real meaning and purpose of my life?" And Level Seven is The Nature of Spirit, in which Jeremy has chosen the following quote to begin his chapter:

Whatever be the means adopted, you must at last return to the Self. So why not abide in the Self here and now?

Bhagavan Sri Ramana Maharshi (1879 - 1950)

I would love to hear from you. To leave a comment about this posting, scroll down and type inside the white box below the heading, POST A COMMENT. Underneath the white box, it says Comment as: with a white bar that says Ria Moran (Google). Click the arrows on the right and a dropdown menu will appear. Choose name/URL and type in your name. The URL is not necessary. Or, if you wish, you may choose to leave a comment anonymously. Then click Post Comment in the next white box and your comment will be published. Thank you!