Cyclical Consciousness and the Sacred Feminine

Online Tuesday evenings from 7:00 - 9:00 East Coast Time 

Four sessions - October 25 - November 15 

Cost: $280

Artwork above by Piper Sattva. 

If you'd like to join us, you'll need to register for this course through the Spiritual Life Center of Virginia here. 

All of creation bears witness to the cyclical nature of Reality. The wax and wane of the moon, the stars and planets that move from their place and return, the changing of seasons, ebb and flow of the tides, and the mysteries of life, death and rebirth all echo the curvaceously feminine ecosystems of the cosmos. Yet, we have flattened out these cyclical turnings into linear markers of progress measured in segments of from here to there, a contained world defined by values that are not our own. We forget the inevitable spirals of turning and re-turning that brings us back to our creative, primordial origins of receptivity, wholeness, and interconnectedness. The linear form of human consciousness (and the left hemisphere of the brain) is deeply entrenched in the exclusively masculine images of God that have held sway for millennia, upheld patriarchy, and thrown Earth’s entire ecology out of balance.

This four week course is an invitation back into the fullness of cyclical consciousness and our balanced, ecological, interwoven selves. The movement of the Sacred Feminine, flowing across time and space, is reawakening our energy body, our physical and emotional body, our intraconnection with trees and waters, land and creatures, and with the Source of life itself.

This program is for you if you have sensed the divine feminine calling you into another way of being in the world that is in contrast to patriarchal systems and institutions.

• The way of relationality and belonging
• The way of interconnection and embodiment
• The way of perceiving beyond entrenched stories
• The way of the heart over the tyranny of the mind
• The way of integration and balance
• The way of soul
• The way of love

Our time will move in sync with the cyclical Lunar Wisdom of the New Moon and through all its phases. We will attune with the living wisdom of creation, from the planets that guide and inform at the macro level to the smallest fungi at the micro. We will practice listening from our bodies, hearts and living energy and to the rest of the natural world. There will be orienting markers and practices shared that lead us into the fullness of what we are, interconnected with all of Life.  

We will attune to the cyclical nature and meaning of the planetary transit and archetype at the time of each module from the wisdom of Human Design and the Gene Keys. These connected modalities hold the codes of our evolutionary consciousness, revealing how we are imprinted by planetary bodies in relationship with the earth.

Week One: October 25  

Theme: In the Beginning 

Archetype: The Darkness Whisperer  

Element: Air

The course begins with an orientation to the invisible ecology connecting us with our fullness and the deep time web of belonging. We will look at the sacred feminine as our primordial belonging and origins, and how archaeology and anthropology reveal the original feminine ways that shaped an egalitarian society. We gather on the New Moon, attentive to the lunar wisdom that invites intention and initiation into what is emergent in our lives and in our culture evolving from our deep past. We learn to be in relationship with the unseen patterns that shape us as well as the guidance that comes from the invisible realm, planted within the sacred dark.

Week Two: November 1  

Theme: Karmic Relationships 

Archetype: Pattern Interrupter 

Element:  Earth

The land and stones that hold ancestral wisdom over millions of years are part of the ancestral ecology connecting us with our lineages. On this waxing moon, we gather on the sacred Celtic feast day of Samhain. A time set aside to re-member and honor ancestors and the liminal spaces that invite us to cross over into the other world. Through practices and orientations, we cross over into the world of intuition, the imaginal, and heart-based knowing to connect with our ancestral and spiritual  lineages. We will be led by the reality that we are more than a solitary individual, but are a microcosm of time and experiences that transcend our own. At this stage of consciousness, we are called to be pattern interrupters, to heal and transmute what no longer serves.

Week Three: November 8  

Theme: The Spark Within 

Archetype: The Divine Creative 

Element:  Fire

On this full moon and lunar eclipse, we welcome the eclipse as a harbinger of change, and the full moon as an aspect of our own fullness. Within all of us is a primal creative force that we may feel we can’t access because of conditioning and the long roots of patriarchy and control. And yet there is a spark within us ready to be fully lit to allow our radiance to shine through. This module is about staying true to our own inner authority and power, what it feels like, where it is located, how it is connected with our creative wisdom. The world needs our unique medicine, our distinct unique gifts, in service to the needs of a time of breakdown and emergence.

Week Four: November 15 

Theme: Integration 

Archetype: The Listener Within

Element: Water

This module is guided by the waning moon, tuning us toward our deeper wisdom, and the wisdom within all of nature. This is a receptive energy that opens to ‘what is’ in every moment. It does not effort or try to fix things. We learn to listen with all of our senses, with our whole body, for what life is bringing forward in this moment. We will integrate what has come forward during these four weeks for our path forward, opening to whatever is ready to release to bring forward new ways of knowing and being in the world.

This course is offered through Shenandoah Valley Church of the Wild, Hagia Sophia and the Spiritual Life Center of Virginia.

Program Hosts:

Valerie Luna Serrels is a co-founder and Director of the Wild Church Network, founder and guide of Shenandoah Valley Church of the WIld, and founder and ecospiritual guide in the way of the sacred feminine at Hagia Sophia. She is a trained spiritual guide, Reiki and energy practitioner, and Human Design and Gene Keys guide. She is the author of the chapter, "Restorative Justice With the Earth" in the book Listening to the Movement: Essays on New Growth and New Challenges in Restorative Justice, along with other articles. She is mother and crone, in awe of her five grown children and one grandchild. She lives on the beautiful lands sustained by multiple peoples indigenous to the area now known as the Shenandoah Valley for thousands of years prior to European settlement, aware of the complexity of her Celtic ancestral identity as both colonized and colonizer, and works at these edges. 

 https://www.hagsophia.com 

https://www.churchofthewildshenvalley.com 

https://wildchurchnetwork.com 

Joy Celeste Crawford is a long time Eco-Spiritual Guide living in intimate relationship with Earth and the Divine Feminine. She is founder of the Spiritual Life Center of Virginia, LLC, and co-founder of Church of the Wild James River, and Kindred Project - a weekly international contemplative prayer gathering. As a beekeeper and forager of wild medicinal plants, Joy is a keen observer of the cyclical consciousness that flows through all Sacred Earth Community. She holds Masters degrees in Theology and Christian Education, an Eco-Ministry Certificate from Seminary of the Wild, and a Certificate in Spiritual Guidance from the Shalem Institute where she also serves on staff. Joy offers individual and group spiritual guidance and retreats online and from her home in rural Virginia where she lives with her husband and dog on the banks of the James River, known before European colonization as the Powhatan River and ancestral home to the Native American Monacan people. She is mother of two fierce and gentle adult daughters. www.SpiritualLifeCenterVA.org