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Somethimes We All Need Just A Little More Protection

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The saying goes, “Into every life a little rain must fall” — but sometimes that rain seem to turn into a cloud burst. That’s how it’s been for me lately. In the Fall, I acted as primary caretaker as first my mother, then my brother faced severe life-threatening illnesses. Then, just when the dust had begun to settle on that front, I suddenly find that I’m going through a divorce after twenty years of marriage.

The silver lining, especially in this latest high-stress situation, has been my friends who have gathered around to aid and support me. In addition, the support and guidance of my spirit guides has been rather spectacular, too. On a recent weekend, for example, one friend spirited me out of town as her guest at an informal woman’s retreat at Camp Ronora near Watervliet, Michigan. On Saturday evening, Sally, the woman who organized the retreat, pulled out a book and accompanying deck of cards entitled, The Goddess Oracle. Each of us picked a card and enjoyed hearing the accompanying poem, mythology, meaning, and ritual from the book.

That night, I had a dream. Just one word, “Artemis,” kept flashing in my mind’s eye along with a voiceover telling me to “remember this word.” It was one of those dreams that is so powerful that you don’t even have to write it down. You just remember. I knew that Artemis was a goddess, but that’s about all. So, the next morning, as some of us gathered over coffee in the kitchen, I shared my dream and asked if anyone could tell me more about my word. Sally opened her book to the section on the Goddess Artemis, the huntress (also called Diana in Roman mythology, a name I was more familiar with). The Artemis section fit right into my current situation. In The Goddess Oracle, Artemis stands for selfhood, and the information and ritual focuses on retrieving parts of yourself and separating that which needs to be separated in order to become a whole and healthy self. At the end of the Artemis ritual, the suggestion is made for reinforcing boundaries, a task that can be accomplished with the information and ritual in the Goddess Durga section. Again, the information in that section spoke to my current needs. In fact, back in the City, the importance of the added protection of these rituals became an important centering technique during an especially trying episode that threatened to flip me into a fearful state.

The whole incident made me think a lot about the value of protection rituals — not just the prayers and visualizations that commonly accompany many of our daily meditations, but specific activities and words designed to heighten and amplify the protection we’ve already established. What kind of help would I find if I plugged the words “protection rituals” into Google? The answers vary. A lot of sites are designed to entice you to buy oils, crystals, and other protection-related gear, or offer to send you kits complete with everything you need for a price. A few sites, however, actually give you concrete information that lets you explore a variety of rituals before deciding which is best for you. One of the best is A Mystickal Grove (www.AmystickalGrove.com). Several articles with a variety of protection rituals are featured, but that section is a bit tricky to get to. On the home page, click on the “Study Section” link, then scroll down and click on the “Spells, Rituals, and Craft” link, then scroll down again and click on the “protection” link. Finally you’re there. The articles include rituals like “A Knights Chant,” submitted by AMG member Bob Black. This chant, states Black, was spoken to him when he was very young by a Knight who had gone before. “I use it,” he says, “when I am afraid.” The chant goes like this:

The Lords of light be with me,
Remove the darkeness from me,
Be the strength within me,
And all their wisdom guide me.

Another example, is a “Prayer for Strength and Protection,” written by Flame’s Shadow:

God and Goddess of the skies
please respond to my cries.
Lift me up in your strong arms
away from those who seek to harm.
Shield me from the awful rage
that shall face me day to day.
Help me be strong in what I do
and help my heart remain true.
Give me strength to face each day
and the hardships before me lain.
Let those who I love love me in return
and everyday let me learn.
I bid you both my spirit keep
while I’m awake and asleep.
So mote it be.

One unique feature at this site are the reader ratings for each ritual submission. For example, “A Knights Chant” received a 7.5 out of 10 rating by 11 readers and the “Prayer for Strength and Protection” received a 7.0 out of 10 rating by 24 readers.

Another site with valuable protection-related information is Starefires Circle (http://starfirescircle.com/protection.html). The protection section at this site explains things like shields and bubbles of protection. Shields, for example, are usually circular and vary from being a few inches wide to being several feet in diameter. “Some people,” the section states, “use a shield made of mirror glass, and they sense this shield actively reflecting whatever atmosphere is coming at them.

Finally, I found that The Goddess Oracle has a site of its own (www.goddessoracle.com). This site states that the Oracle is “a potent tool for healing and wholeness through The Goddess and Ritual.” The site not only provides information about the book and cards, but introduces you to the extraordinary artwork of illustrator and illuminator Hrana Janto.

PS: Remember, this whole odyssey started during a retreat at Camp Ronora in Michigan. The Monthly Aspectarian readers may have heard of the camp in connection with the Shaman retreats that are regularly held there. It’s a marvelous, magical place, that is owned by Deej, a Shawnee woman, and her husband who are dedicated to the principles of nature conservancy. You can get an inkling about what the Camp Ronora experience is like by checking out the “About Us” section of their web site (www.ronora.org). The poem by Deej says it all:

Ronora is…
an experience, a feeling, a lesson, ceremony...
where our Earth Mother lives and breathes,
where birds speak and one understands,
where the four-legged, two-legged,
& winged ones commune.

Ronora is…
where understanding begins,
where a century-old turtle named Moby lives in
the lake, a 2-mile hike,
seeing the rare Red Lily, the
monarch and the
woodcock grow and flourish,
a Harvest Moon before lodge,
a coyote’s howl,
a sighting of one’s Self,
Believing, while sitting at Grace in the Woods,
where no one is a stranger,
where there is laughter and tears.

Ronora is…
where sorrow and shame are buried,
where trust and love grows instead,
a starlit sky abounds and surrounds,
where healing begins & the pain ends....
Ronora is where we meet ourselves.

Ronora is a place I certainly want to go back to. Check out the information on their site. I’m sure you’ll find that this is a place that you’d like to experience too.

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Mary Montgomery-Clifford is a certified web author and developer. Her company, Montgomery Media Enterprises ("Freelancing with Finesse!"), specializes in public relations, events, promotions, writing project and web authoring, development and publicity. Ms. Montgomery-Clifford has a Master's Degree in religious studies from Chicago Theological Seminary (CTS) in June 2002 and is working on a Ph.D. with a focus on the new scholarship of Unlimited Love and the Other Regarding Virtues in the Fall of 2002. She is also in the process of completing the Morris Pratt Institute Course on Modern Spiritualism. Contact her via e-mail at Monty764@aol.com, by phone at 773-235-8821 or at her web site at www.montymedia.com.

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