Casting Stars

Casting Stars

“Speak Lord, your servant is listening.”

The words of my morning prayer.

But to what god am I praying?

To what does one pray in a post-theistic state?

“Speak Self, your servant is listening.”

What is it my Self has to say?

What do I want from and for myself?

Self wants what the Self wants –

To be known.

What do I know of my Self?

Moving past defense mechanisms

And the armor designed to protect from the horrors of the world,

there is kindness

and deep sensitivity.

A heart too tender for the violences of this world

and the cruelty of man –

yet strong in its ability to endure the constant breaking –

held together by a love that sees promise

and the hidden good in it all.

Wise enough to have discarded hope (that fool’s game)

allowing Faith to take its place.

No longer wishing, but knowing,

in a deep, abiding way, that “it is good”

no matter how horrible that “good” might initially appear.

This is the Self I know.

The one who sees and knows.

Who seeks understanding in confusion.

Who looks for the higher way, the higher truth.

Who longs to know the Love in the center of it all

And who has no choice but to point it all out.

The messenger poet casting stars into the sky

helping humanity find its way.

Standing Still in a Chaotic World

Standing Still

Standing still

at the epicenter of

humanity’s quickening.

The cloak of my power wrapped around me:

Metallic gold for power.

Silver for gentleness.

Red for sovereignty.

Midnight for magic.

Black for protection.

White for wisdom.

Green for sanctity and purity of intention.

Magenta for love.

Purple – the color of transformation.

Still as a deeply rooted oak.

Flexible as a willow.

Interconnected as the birch and aspen.

Afire like maple in the fall.

Standing strength as the world

whips up the storms of its dying.

The ever-present death rattle

heaving complaints and false allegations.

Desperately believing it can hide from its doomed fate.

A fate long cast when

privilege forsook unity

and fear sacrificed love.

Has it been since the beginning that the world was doomed?

Humanity, its own worst enemy –

The only species intent on its own destruction.

But in standing still, I and mine are fine.

copyright Lauri Ann Lumby

Join Me Beside the Hearth

For over twenty-five years I have been a source of support for individuals through the most vulnerable and tender parts of their human journeys. I have counselled people through the unexpected death of a child. I have supported couples facing the “dark night” of their marriage. I have been a welcome guide and mentor in the human journey of spiritual growth and development. I have provided healing for those experiencing mental, emotional, and spiritual pain. I have been a source of support through midlife crises, divorce, job loss, empty nest, and other deeply transformational times of transition.

Whether working with me over the phone, via ZOOM, or in my home, you will find a warm and welcoming place here where you can step away from the chaos and unrest of the outside world and be supported in returning to your heart – for it is there you will find rest, peace, and the answers to life’s questions. My hearth-fire is always burning. You will find comfort and safety here.

With love,

Lauri

Email lauri@lauriannlumby.com to schedule a one-on-one session with me! We can meet via ZOOM, over the phone, or in my home if you are local. My suggested fee is $165.00 per session and I offer a sliding scale for those for whom $165.00 would be a reach. Don’t hesitate to reach out!

Are You Seeing This?

Never in my wildest dreams could I have imagined all that we (speaking specifically as a resident of the U.S.) would be made to see or the clarity through which this seeing would be revealed. Relating to this, a line from the 90’s sitcom, Seinfeld, comes to mind:

“It’s loathsome and hideous, yet I can’t look away.”

Since 2016, especially, the revelations have been swift and fierce; sometimes overwhelming and excruciating.  And yet, these are the evils we have been made to see, and it is our responsibility to see and acknowledge them. More importantly, it is our duty to hold the evil we are seeing accountable to their actions.

Let’s name a few, shall we:

  • The horror of child sex trafficking, and child sex cults.
  • The evil of clerical (priest) sexual abuse and its cover-up.
  • The horrific treatment of indigenous children – for all reasons – but especially residential schools.
  • The grotesque corruption of the US government – first in its foundation as an institution created to benefit wealthy (white) landowners on the backs of people of color – most recently in its departure from being a representative government (by the people for the people) to serving only the interests of those who paid for politician’s offices.
  • The unconscionable systems that have been put into place to hinder people of color from experiencing the same rights as whites as it relates specifically to education, employment, home ownership, safety, and protection.
  • The devolvement of our medical system from one meant to provide healing to one that profits off disease.
  • The evils of the pharmaceutical industries who have intentionally created a culture of opioid addiction.
  • Corporations who are more concerned with CEO salaries and shareholder profits than they are for the employees who make these salaries, etc. possible.
  • The selfishness and short-sightedness of the corporate system that has systematically destroyed our planet and now threatens the survival of our species.

Oh…..and let us not forget the biggest SEEING in front of us right now:

  • The US government funding genocide at the behest of the corporate military complex who again, paid for the government officials’ positions and therefore their votes.

This is just a tip of the iceberg and doesn’t even touch the things we’ve known all along: the prevalence of sexism, racism, genderism, xenophobia, etc. etc. etc.

In my lifetime, some of these seeings have always been known by some. Many are new to me, and to the majority of Americans, but we are indeed seeing! 

The revelations of the deep-seated evils in our world can be horrifying at first (which is why many still choose to deny them), but once we allow ourselves to sit with these revelations, we can accept these seeings as signs of a dying world in its collapse.  (hurray!)

As I have said a million times, and which the world is attesting to itself, the patriarchal, hierarchical world that has ruled humanity (or at least the Western world) for 5000 years, is dying. An unsustainable system built on fear, power, oppression, and control is in its death throes. The faster and more furious these revelations make themselves known, the closer we can know we are arriving at full system collapse.

Praise The Mother!

Knowing this, however, doesn’t make the seeing any easier!  The evils of the world are showing themselves, and being seen, which puts us in the awkward position of

  1. Having to process the shock and trauma of these seeings (some feel almost unbelievable),
  2. Having to support ourselves in the grief that arises in the shattering of our illusions.
  3. Having to manage the anger and rage that arises in the face of these injustices.
  4. And discerning how we are called to respond to these seeings along with what responsibility we might have for taking action in response to what we are now coming to know and understand.

This is a confusing time, but it is also an exciting time. Exciting because with the fast dying of what has been and the continuing revelations of its dying, the new world is being born. Seeds of this new world have been planted and are beginning to take root – when we look carefully, we can see the signs of new life.

The new life I’m beginning to see is partly made up of:

  • The increased access to information due to the internet and social media.
  • Advancing technologies including AI and other tools that have the potential of making our world more efficient, leaving us time to be more creative.
  • Creative innovations in agriculture (including a return to ancient ways), manufacturing, and transportation that are working together to create a cleaner, healthier world.
  • The generations of young adults who see through the bullshit and take no shit.
  • TV, films, and documentaries that are working to educate us directly and indirectly on the realities of our world and the hidden potentials therein.
  • Quantum physics, etc.
  • Increasing awareness and acceptance of the possibility of life on other worlds and in other dimensions.
  • Resources and tools that help creatives create and market their creations (ie: Etsy, printing on demand and self-publishing services, Red Bubble, etc.)

Again, this is just the tip of the iceberg, but these are some strong and clear examples of a new world being born in the face of the old world dying.

What is the new life that you are beginning to see?  


Victory of the Holy Bride

online course

Victory of the Holy Bride shatters over 2000 years of patriarchal dogma that cast the Book of Revelation in the role of doomsday prophecy and presents to you the tools for discovering a profoundly simple truth that is the key to inner peace and the formula through which we endure the “times of tribulation” while building a whole new world – one rooted in peace, understanding, wisdom, harmony and love. 

Beyond Ascension: Shadow Work

The farther we move along the path of our spiritual growth, the more our unhealed wounds, unacknowledged fears and ego-attachments rear their ugly heads.  These are the thought-forms, emotional reactions and behavior patterns that interfere with our ability to continue confidently on our path toward self-actualization.  Shadow work is the broad term that describes the spiritual practices that support us in healing and transforming these fears so that we are once again free to pursue the path of our highest good. 

Life Purpose

Our life’s purpose is to become self-actualized.  Through the process of self-actualization we are empowered to discover, nurture, cultivate and become empowered in our unique giftedness.  We are called to find meaning and purpose in our lives through the sharing of these gifts, for the sake of our own fulfillment, and in service to the betterment of the world.  Our soul is driven to pursue this path of self-actualization and it is through restlessness and longing that we are driven.

Spiritual Awakening

Somewhere around the time of our first Saturn return, we begin to awaken to the calling of our Soul, and again with renewed vigor at midlife.  We become dissatisfied with life as we know it, longing for something that is more fulfilling and which gives our life a sense of meaning and purpose.  We are awakened through restlessness, boredom, dissatisfaction, impatience and an insatiable yearning for that which we cannot yet describe.

Spiritual Growth

As we pursue this inner longing, we are led to resources and tools to support us in our spiritual growth.  In this process of spiritual growth, we seek to uncover the answer to three questions: 

Who am I?

Whose am I?

What are my gifts and how am I called to use them?

Spiritual Practices

It is through our spiritual practices that we find the answer to these questions.  Any activity that supports us in remembering peace, love and joy can be considered a spiritual practice when approached as such.  Meditation, prayer, mindfulness, contemplation, movement, rigorous physical exercise, being in nature, creative expression, the search for knowledge, our interpersonal relationships, and lovemaking can all be vehicles through which we come in contact with our Soul – our highest truth and the path toward self-actualization. It is also through these practices that we come in contact with our shadow.

The Shadow

The shadow is made up of our unacknowledged fears, ego- attachments and unhealed wounds.  It is within the shadow that we carry the pain of every rejection, criticism, condemnation, betrayal, disappointment, failure, loss, trauma, and every self-defense mechanism we ever built around this pain.  It is in the shadow where our fears reside, along with the part of us that seeks approval from or power over others.  It is also within the shadow that we carry our self-rejection – every experience or aspect of ourselves that has been set aside as imperfect, ugly, shameful, and condemnable.  The shadow contains all that we have hidden from ourselves and attempted to hide from the world.

What We Resist Persists

There is great wisdom in the Buddhist adage, “What we resist will persist.”  This is especially true of the shadow.  Ignoring our fears, unhealed wounds, ego- attachments and self-rejection allowed us the illusion of safety, or at the very least, control.  Safety and control, however, are simply illusions.  Ignoring our past hurts did not save us from future wounding.  In fact, ignoring those hurts likely caused us to become more vulnerable.  No matter how much we push these fears and unhealed wounds away, the more they tend to find their way out through passive aggressive behaviors, negative and disproportionate reactions, self-numbing and self-harming behaviors.  As we move along the path of our spiritual growth, we find that the more we try to resist what we placed in the shadows, the more it seeks to be known.

Shadow Work

This is where shadow work proves beneficial and ultimately empowering.  Shadow work is the courageous process of confronting the ghosts of our past and bringing them to the light.  Engaging in shadow work, we take the time to identify and be present to every fear, unhealed wound and ego-attachment that might try to hinder us on our path of spiritual growth.  We allow ourselves to be present to the hurt, the pain, the fear, the anger, and every emotion in between as we allow those “demons” to be healed and transformed.  As we allow ourselves to be present, we are freed from these fears and are empowered to continue in the way of our truth.


3 live, online sessions

March 6, 13 and 20, 2024

Wednesdays 6:30 – 8:30 pm (Central Time)

LIVE via ZOOM

The Dangers of Spiritual By-Pass

Spiritual bypass can best be described as: “the tendency to use spiritual ideas and practices to sidestep or avoid facing unresolved emotional issues, psychological wounds, and unfinished developmental tasks”(Welwood, J. (2000) [1984]. “Between heaven and earth: principles of inner work”. Toward a psychology of awakening: Buddhism, psychotherapy, and the path of personal and spiritual transformation. Boston: Shambhala Publications. pp. 11–21.).

In spiritual bypass, we avoid, ignore, deny, suppress and repress the challenges, difficulties, disappointments, and suffering that are inherent within the human condition.  Spiritual bypass also includes avoidance and denial of the shadow.  The shadow is made up of our unhealed wounds, unacknowledged fears and includes all the aspects of ourselves that we have rejected because we have deemed them unacceptable. 

Spiritual bypass takes many forms, but in essence the action is the same – hoping, believing, acting as if we can simply meditate, pray, chant, or positively affirmation our struggles away.  The universal outcome of spiritual bypass is always the same and is best articulated in the Buddhist saying, “What we resist will persist.”  Through spiritual bypass, we are not dealing with, confronting, healing or transforming anything; we are simply sweeping it under the rug. As is true of everything we avoid, deny, ignore, the rug can only hold so much.  The rug will eventually explode and everything we have shoved under it will come out to haunt us.  Even if we are successful in keeping it all under the rug, what we have resisted and ignored will find its way out sideways – usually in non-loving behaviors toward ourselves or others. Often these behaviors become compulsive (ie: addictions), are disproportionate or uncharacteristic of our true nature.   

Some very clear examples of spiritual bypass and the negative consequence of this pattern of behavior includes: the clergy sex abuse crisis, narcissistic behaviors, abuse, co-dependency, homophobia, violence against children, school shootings and other forms of terrorism.  What we resist will persist and what we suppress will find its way out whether we want it to or not.  I would further suggest that we are currently living in a world seriously caught up in its own bypass – ignoring, denying, projecting away the darkness and pretending that it is all ok when in fact it is not!  Societal bypass is exhibited in our divisive culture where many refuse to see the truth that is staring them in the face because it makes them feel uncomfortable (triggering their own unacknowledged anxiety or unhealed fears), or who instead of acknowledging their role in darkness that exists in our society, either ignore it or project the blame onto someone else.  The bottom line is that we cannot meditate, mantra, pray,“beam love,” think good thoughts, repeat positive affirmations, “La La” the darkness away. Until we learn to face our darkness (individually and collectively) we are guilty of bypass and the darkness will not only persist, it will become worse. 

Now, I will wholeheartedly admit that I am not innocent as it relates to spiritual bypass.   I too have ventured down its path.  I will admit that it felt good there – for awhile – but eventually it kicked my ass! I have since learned that the only way out is through.  If we want to be free of our inner fears, unhealed wounds, and perceived imperfections, we have to go deep into them, feel them, wallow in them, and THEN through our spiritual practices, find our way through them.  In this, we are not covering the darkness with the light; neither are we turning the darkness into the light.  Instead, we are finding the light that is already present within the darkness – if only we have the courage to go there.

The work of dealing with our shadow and confronting all that is broken within us is hard!  It requires personal accountability, self-knowledge, courageous honesty, humility, vulnerability, and discipline.  It also requires the understanding and belief that in the overall scheme of things, what we are tempted to call “darkness” is in fact our light.  Within the struggle, suffering, struggles, challenges and all the things we want to deny or reject about our human experience is there to serve the light.  It is within these perceived challenges where we find our greatest gifts. 


Wednesdays, March 6,13,20, 2024

6:30 – 8:30 pm central time

What You Resist Will Persist

There is a quote that has been attributed to Buddhism that I have found to be uncompromisingly true:

“What you resist will persist.”

In my own journey of self-actualization and in the 25 years I have accompanied and guided others through theirs, I have witnessed the proof of this. To this statement, I would further add:

“What you resist, avoid, ignore, suppress, repress, deny, try to escape, etc. will persist.”

As much as we might try, we cannot run from our demons.  That which we do not acknowledge and work on healing will find its way out sideways in non-loving and compulsive behaviors either toward ourselves or others.  That which we do not heal as a culture/world is doomed to repeat itself. In this repetition, the oppressed becomes the oppressor; the abused becomes the abuser; and we end up marrying our unhealed wounds. We cannot escape this truth and we don’t need to look very far to see the proof of it. Most often, the proof is as close as looking in the mirror.

At the center of the process of human development is the healing of our wounds.  By no effort of our own, that which is unhealed within us will make itself known for the purpose of being acknowledged and healed.  When we ignore those wounds, or refuse to do the work of healing them, they don’t go away.  Instead, they become magnified and compounded, making our journey even more difficult.  Our compulsions become addictions. Our guilt-driven conditioning becomes a cycle of self-loathing which we feed through a wide variety of means.  The places where we have felt rejected become a co-dependent drive to find someone (usually unhealthy) to love. 

Ignoring, suppressing, repressing, denying our wounds only causes further harm.  As long as we are bypassing our pain, we are its prisoner.  We will never be free as human beings until we heal our wounds.

One of the great challenges to healing these wounds, however, are all the systems/programs/self-proclaimed teachers/conditioning that encourage distractions or denial over the gritty work of transformation.  “Get over it and move on.”  “Let it go.”  “Offer it up.” “Just keep busy:” “Think positive thoughts.” “Just be grateful.”  “It could be worse.” are all platitudes driven into us by systems that have failed to do their own healing and who are then projecting their unhealed wounds onto their followers.  Anything or anyone that tells us to ignore/deny/suppress/avoid our pain is detrimental to our emotional, mental, psychological, and spiritual wellbeing; and is thwarting our path to true freedom.

While complete freedom can never be fully attained, our Soul compels us to continually seek it out.  Confronting and transforming our wounds, and the conditioning that created them in the first place, is the only sure path to that freedom.  Anything that tells us otherwise is a lie.

Ascension is not the goal, neither is it the purpose of the human journey. Instead, ascension is recognized as the midpoint of the human experience, and a danger for those who would seek to remain there. As was well-attested by the ancients, we are not meant to escape the human condition, but are meant to immerse ourselves fully within it. In this, we move beyond ascension (unity consciousness) and toward full Divine embodiment – the true purpose of the human experience. 

Live, Online, Course

Wednesdays, March 6, 13, 20, 2024

6:30 – 8:30 pm central time

Don’t Get Stuck at Ascension

For the past number of years, we have been experiencing the great awakening of human consciousness.  This awakening has been given many names and equally as many faces.  Some call it the “New Age Movement” (for the record, there is nothing “New” about New Age. It is simply a rediscovery and reclaiming of what Mystics and Prophets have known all along).  Others call it Ascension.  I’m sure there are other names, but we’ll leave it at that.  While there have been many positive aspects to this awakening, there is one ENORMOUS DANGER and pitfall which very few acknowledge and even more fall into:

The Danger of getting stuck at Ascension.

Ascension is NOT the path to our wholeness.  Ascension is not the goal.  Ascension is not the final outcome.  In fact, our human journey toward wholeness – where we are one with our Divine and Human selves – is not complete until we have moved past ascension and are willing to descend into the depths of our own, as well as the world’s darkness.  Descending is the profoundly challenging (and yet deeply liberating and rewarding) part of our journey toward wholeness where we come face to face with:

  • Our unhealed wounds.
  • Our unacknowledged anxiety.
  • Our egoic attachments.
  • Our societal conditioning.
  • The inner demons that have hindered us from fulfilling our mission and purpose on this plane.
  • Death.

After we ascend and discover the ecstasy of our Union with the Divine (our higher and truest self), we have to bring that Union into embodiment.  The only way to embody our true and Divine Self is to let it come through us, bringing us face to face with all of who and what we are that is not in alignment with Love.  This is the work of the Shadow Worker and where our true gifts come to light.

The truth about Descending is that we cannot “LaLa” the darkness away.  Neither can we avoid it by escaping into reverie.  We don’t change things by thinking the right thoughts, raising our vibration, eating “more highly vibrational foods,” or through thoughts and prayers. We have to do the messy, dirty, sometimes terrifying work of turning away from the light and toward the darkness.  This is the DEEP DIVE that has nothing to do with “Dark Night of the Soul” and everything to do with the BIRTH of our Soul.  Here, the fragmented and broken parts of our humanness are acknowledged, transformed, and then released so that only Love remains.  I will make no bones about this part:  the LOVE that we are is not some glittery, flowy, rainbow filled unicorn of light.  This is the LOVE that can withstand all that we are, all the world is, and everything life will hand us, without turning tail and running away.  This is the Love made up of fierce courage.  It is the Love of Mother Kali who cuts away all that is not supportive of our mission and purpose on this plane.  On a collective level, it is the Love of the Destroyer that burns down whatever stands in the way of our human evolution – even the Brazilian Rainforest if that is what it takes to

WAKE US UP

But again, here is the trick:  We do not arrive at our wholeness through “love and light.”  We get there by burning the f’cker down.  And the work starts and ends with ourselves!

If we are not willing to do the challenging work of facing and being with our darkness and our greatest fears, then we cannot be a source of Love and support for our dying world.  If we do not do this critically important work, choosing instead to escape into Ascension, then we will suffer the consequences.

While Ascending past the illusion of separation and finding our Union with Self is an important first step, avoiding the Descent will paralyze us with this one critical truth:

What we resist will persist!

As a friend of mine once observed, “God is a nag!”  I would translate that by saying that our True Self, our Soul is a heartless bitch!  She will hound us until our work is done.  The harder we work against Her, the more vicious She becomes. Choosing only Ascension, imprisons us in our darkness which then comes out sideways in:

  • Blaming.
  • Shaming.
  • Manipulating.
  • Passive Aggressive and .Bullying Behaviors.
  • And the king of all demons:  DENIAL. 

When we are stuck in ascension, we are blind to our darkness (oh, we might see it, but we will do everything we can to “La La” it away).  We pretend it isn’t there.  We avoid anything that might have to do with death, disappointment, failure or inner conflict.  We pretend we know ourselves, when we really do not.  Our unhealed wounds come out sideways as we spin round and round in the drain of our inability to be completely and wholly accountable to and responsible for ourselves. 

The journey if descent is excruciating, but staying in ascension is even worse!  How would you like to spend an eternity in the game of pretend?  Pretty soon you can no longer remember the lies you have told yourself to stay in the light as your darkness overtakes you.

Sigh.

Here’s the really funny thing about this truth……Jesus knew it, and so did the Kabbalists who were likely his teachers. 

Jesus saw Nathanael coming toward him and said of him,
“Here is a true child of Israel.
There is no duplicity in him.”
Nathanael said to him, “How do you know me?”
Jesus answered and said to him,
“Before Philip called you, I saw you under the fig tree.”
Nathanael answered him,
“Rabbi, you are the Son of God; you are the King of Israel.”
Jesus answered and said to him,
“Do you believe
because I told you that I saw you under the fig tree?
You will see greater things than this.”
And he said to him, “Amen, amen, I say to you,
you will see heaven opened and the angels of God
ascending and descending on the Son of Man.”

JN 1: 47-51

“Amen, amen, I say to you,
you will see heaven opened and the angels of God
ascending and descending on the Son of Man.”

In the cryptic statement above, Jesus is describing the initiatory process that he was inviting Nathaniel into.  Jesus is describing the ascending and descending process of coming into our wholeness as human beings.  Before the institutional Church designated Jesus “the only Son of Man,”  this was a common phrase which simply meant all of human kind.  Here Jesus is saying, “Nathaniel, if you come with me, I will show you how to become a fully integrated human being – Divine and Human, balanced in your masculine and feminine, and living out the fullness of your mission and purpose on this plane.”  In short, Jesus was inviting Nathaniel to join him in the knowledge of “the kingdom of God,” the word Jesus used to describe the fulfillment of our human spiritual journey:

To know Oneness with –

  • The Divine
  • Ourselves
  • Each other
  • All of creation.

The kingdom of God.  Enlightenment.  Wholeness.  Peace.  Contentment and Joy.

But as the Tree of Life demonstrates, the journey of Oneness that Jesus promised did not end in our meeting with God.  Instead, we have to bring our Union with the Divine fully into our human experience where we can live it out. 


March 6, 13, 20, 2024

  • Discover the distinction between ascension and embodiment and their proper roles in your journey.
  • Understand the temptations to remaining in ascension.
  • Identify the symptoms of resistance to embodiment.
  • Explore the ancient map of the human spiritual journey as it was articulate through the Kabbalah. 
  • Learn the predictable stages of depth work required for embodiment. 
  • Join in this exploration through sharing and discussion in the company of like-minded individuals. 

Beyond Ascension: Upcoming Live Course

Ascension is not the goal, neither is it the purpose of the human journey. Instead, ascension is recognized as the midpoint of the human experience, and a danger for those who would seek to remain there. As was well-attested by the ancients, we are not meant to escape the human condition, but are meant to immerse ourselves fully within it. In this, we move beyond ascension (unity consciousness) and toward full Divine embodiment – the true purpose of the human experience. 

In this live, online, course you will:

  • Discover the distinction between ascension and embodiment and their proper roles in your journey.
  • Understand the temptations to remaining in ascension.
  • Identify the symptoms of resistance to embodiment.
  • Explore the ancient map of the human spiritual journey as it was articulate through the Kabbalah. 
  • Learn the predictable stages of depth work required for embodiment. 
  • Join in this exploration through sharing and discussion in the company of like-minded individuals. 

3 Live Sessions via ZOOM

March 6, 13, 20, 2024

6:30 – 8:30 pm central time