7 months ago I saw that one of my teachers and guides that I have followed for 15 years, Lissa Rankin, was offering a therapeutic writing withdrawal in Malta in early November. My first reaction, with the illusion of a girl jumping with joy was «I want to go!» And immediately another serious and judicious voice said, «you can’t, it’s too expensive.»

I showed Gemma the retirement proposal. It was done on an island with which I have dreamed of visiting for 25 years, full of prehistoric temples, huge engravings of spirals and voluptuous female figures. He immediately told me, «Sign up! I help you if necessary.»

At that moment I also felt my mother telling me, «I support you, do not hesitate.» The date of retirement was going to coincide almost exactly with the fifth anniversary of his death.

When I saw how tears jumped to that girl who grew up filling newspapers and writing letters to express her intricate internal world, I made the first payment. My rigid part was very scared. But now that I have finished the withdrawal, I would say that it has relaxed more than ever. He has even put to dance, as he had not done before, and has recovered a lot of lighthouse songs from his adolescence.

Now I understand the meaning of the name of the island -Gozo- where we were writing joyful 16 women from different parts of the world. It will take a good time, at my turtle rhythm, to integrate all the gifts of this retirement. I have been able to water with a lot of love the seed of a book that I am starting, based on the myth of Inanna – its descent and ascent of the underworld – interspersed with autobiographical texts.

I love that these writings can now be guided by the vision of IFS (internal family systems), which Lissa has transmitted and integrated so delicate, deep and complete in retirement. I know that this way of writing is healer, and that it can also be healer for those who read it.

Thanks Gemma. Thank you, mum. Thanks to each woman in that circle, full of respect, care and generosity.

Many of them were from the United States and when the results of the elections in the middle of the retirement arrived, along with all the images and news from Valencia, we feel a great shake inside.

I have a strange feeling these days. On the one hand, I feel more than ever my vulnerability, that we are traveling a very fragile era as humanity and that times of much more intensity come. On the other hand, I feel more light and more love inside than ever in my life, even, I would say, hope. I hug these two parts, these two states present at the same time.

After the joy, I had one of the most powerful experiences of my life. I managed, miraculously, last -minute entries to the hypogeo Hal Saflieni, an exquisite underground temple built 6000 years ago, dedicated only to the burial of the dead of the Neolitic community of that time.

I do not exaggerate when I say I was with tears in my eyes for almost every 45 minutes of the guided tour. The feeling of going down to the underworld was impressive. There is so much beauty in the structure, which seems like the temples in other parts of the island, with portals, with caves and altars. I imagined songs, rituals, connection with the ancestors, in the light of torches. Visualize deaths of death, guarding this space.

A few days before I had read a beautiful text by Francis Weller, author of «The Wild Edge of Sorrow», speaking of the collective descent experience that we are living as humanity in these times. His words -which I have translated into Spanish and sent you next -, together with the experience in the depths of the hypogeo (of the Greek, underground chamber), are giving me inspiration and calm in the midst of all the intensity of these days and months.

I know that these words come with many very condensed reflections and news. I also want you to together, at a distance, We can take slow and soft breaths, feeling the firmness and nutrition of the earth under our feet, to host everything that moves inside. And strength to continue being a lighthouse.

The long darkness

«We have entered a long descent season, which takes us to the unknown. In the images of the myths and fairy tales, we have abandoned the ordinary world and we have entered the underworld, a blind, gloomy and strange terrain.

I have come to call this time of descent, the long darkness. Decades may pass or, more likely, a few generations before we see the other shore of this crisis, if we succeed. I say this not with a note of despair, or with an attitude of hopelessness, but, instead, recognizing and valuing the necessary work that is carried out in the dark.

It is the kingdom of the soul, of whispers and dreams, mystery and imagination, death and ancestors. It is an essential, inevitable and necessary territory, which offers a form of gestation of the soul that can gradually shape our deepest, personal and community lives.

Certain things can only happen in this grotto of darkness. Let’s think about the wild network of roots and microbes, mycelium and minerals, which makes possible everything we see in the daytime, or in the extensive networks within our own bodies, which bring blood, nutrients, oxygen and thoughts to our body lives. All this happens in the dark.

The requirements for this moment are not known of achievement and growth, of clarity and power. No, this season is asking for a new rhythm, one that is more in tune with humility and listening, stillness and rest. I hope that each and each will find small places of refuge that support our intimacy with the soul ».

Francis Weller.

This photo is from Hal Saflieni hypogeum in Malta.