My beloved is mine and I am His. 

These are words from the Song of Solomon in the King James Version of the Bible. I have always found comfort in them, as they represent to me the intimate loving relationship between Mother and Father God. 

When we speak about the Mother and the Father, we often name the differences. I suggest we pay attention to the blending of their love affair. I have often been seen as having a masculine expression. Something every girl or woman wants to hear! I remember being mocked in high school at a picnic when I was breaking sticks with my knee so we could start a fire. One of the boys said insultingly, “How ladylike.” I wasn’t that sure of myself at the time and really did want to be seen as attractive as a girl, not realizing my strength and independence made me unattractive, at least to that particular group of boys. Perhaps girls were only allowed to have and enjoy fires if boys built them!

We are each very unique blends of these two spiritual expressions. What is important is how life moves through them. Each unique combination offers unique blessings. If we focus on the love affair, we can allow that love affair to be present within ourselves.

There is so much that can interfere with our understanding of the beautiful essences of Mother and Father God. Even the words that name them can be limiting. Mother, Father, feminine, masculine, male, female. These may all seem the same, but each set carries some elements of culture with them. Have you ever been in the presence of a man where you felt safe, seen, loved, and empowered? How about with a woman who was kind, supportive, loving, and protective? I have. I felt bathed in their love and wanted more. I didn’t feel the need to analyze what made them that way. I wanted to be that way.

I often found myself calling them to mind when I was uncertain of what to do or was feeling overwhelmed. I would feel clarity and support just by thinking about them. I was meeting their spirits at the headwaters of my soul. They introduced me to the experience there. At the headwaters, there is this joyous atmosphere of clarity and possibility—an experience of union.

Things in my world have not always been so clear. There have been plenty of cultural overlays to my learning about what it means to be a woman or a man. In the years I have been alive, there has been a great change to the identity and freedoms of women in the United States. Women’s liberation, free love, and reproductive rights all contributed. Single mothers were labeled “unwed mothers” and were judged and hidden as a sinful occurrence. There wasn’t much said about the men who participated in those pregnancies. On the other hand, getting married and having a child would change you from a girl to a woman, regardless of your age. Choosing to be single was seen as a sad situation compared to the excitement shared when an engagement was announced.

I name these things not to judge but to point out how we see things through the eyes of a culture that has forgotten the headwaters of our being. There is an innocence, a beauty, a potential at the headwaters. Creation and beauty can be manifested if we allow ourselves to be the means for that beautiful energy to move through us. At the headwaters, there is purity, power, nourishment, forgiveness, and great potential for new life.

I have taught attunement for a number of years. When we speak about the spirit of blessing that comes to focus in the pancreas, we speak about the primal bond of blessing coming from God to our hearts. This happens easily at the headwaters of our soul. This kind of experience is often known between the mother and father with their newborn. Often, people have difficulty receiving that blessing as adults. Why? They measure themselves according to the culture they have been taught and decide they are unworthy. I am not a good or worthy man or woman. They may be able to offer a blessing, but receive one? Not so easy.

At the headwaters, we are open and free. There is an innocence there—a protection, an encouragement, a power that is always available. The love of the Divine Masculine and Feminine is freely given. In watching a video clip of a young boy answering the question, “What is God?” he said, “The universe doesn’t speak English; it speaks frequency, and this is the most honest language in the world.” He was missing his front teeth, so he was probably 6 or 7. At the headwaters of the river, we know that frequency. We can commune with it and receive the blessing.

Yesterday, I was walking in the rain, and I came to a corner where there was a small lake. I stopped my walk to go looking for the blockage that was causing the water to be blocked. I walked down the street and found a mound of leaves creating a dam. I used my shoe to slide the leaves out of the way, and voila! A free-moving river appeared. It stopped a second time, so I had to go farther down to release another blockage. Victory! The water was making it to the drain. My childlike spirit was so excited to see the rushing water freed up.

This is what it is like in our experience. Someone tells us how to be, and we get blocked up because that is not how we are built. And we try and try to fit in. The leaves pile up. We may release “the river” by addressing a blockage, and then another one appears that needs attention. The blockages continue to appear when we believe something is wrong with us and stop the flow of our love.

When I was a girl, my mother would say in a critical tone, “You’re just like the Anetrini’s,” my dad’s side of the family. I used to think, Of course I am! He’s my father. I had parts of both my parents in me. Trying to analyze which parts came from where was not only impossible, it was ripping apart the very things that made me, me. I was a blend of both of them, my mother and my father. I was a product of both of them. That is true spiritually, too; Mother and Father reside in each one.

I didn’t know this as a child. I was taught God was always watching me and determining if I was worthy of His love. It’s obvious to me now that there were other human beings determining if I was worthy based on their teaching of what a good girl was. I used to question my mother, and she would wash my mouth out with soap. I learned to enjoy the taste of Ivory soap! I thought I was being bad, but I wasn’t. I really wanted to understand. And I was learning. I see the dynamic differently now. I had a strong mind and a determined spirit, and I was figuring out who I was and how to be in my life. No one was pointing me to the headwaters of my soul.

It is a privilege now to return there. To feel the pure current of opportunity and life current ready to move through me. It is also a privilege to reside there so others may find their way. Don’t you agree?

Let us rejoice and enjoy the variety of our spiritual inheritances. Let us receive each other’s gifts and create together. Let us return to the headwaters of our soul, where the presence of Mother and Father are known and we are held and loved and invited into creating a new world.