Tom Jacobs
New: Loving Lilith: An End to Shame. A channeled home-study course to help you work through old Lilith anger and pain in grounded, effective ways.
Over the last few years, I’ve been working on channeling my anger at the suppression of the feminine down creative avenues. It’s actually pretty hard – much harder than I anticipated. The thread of discontent in me runs incredibly deep, and since I’ve been doing work with clients to help them de-condition from ways of thinking, being, and living that are rooted in patriarchal culture, I’ve seen how widespread is the damage from them. I feel it in me, and I feel it in my clients. I work incredibly hard to bring a vision of changing our relationship with Lilith to people, and it’s something I take very seriously.
A few months ago someone read a blog post of mine on Lilith and e-mailed me he or she sensed a lot of anger in me, and advised me to figure out how to release it. As I read it, I bit my lip. Yes, I’m angry, I thought, how dare you tell me to let it go. This is real. This is serious. You think I can just get over it? Do you have any expletiving idea what is going on on this planet?! It’s not going away. So I turn it into work that makes a positive impact on people’s lives and that feels great, and most times that’s enough.
Anger when it comes to Lilith is easy. We feel stepped on or suppressed and we want to react in certain ways. Yet it is critically important to figure out creative ways to deal with it. The anger is real and I feel very strongly that denying it or wishing it away does nothing. We have to feel it consciously and then make decisions that support us in our evolution (using that energy to create peace, harmony, and justice), not waging a war on those waging a war on the feminine. Responding to violence with violence never ends violence.
As I write this, various family members are calling or e-mailing me today wishing me a happy Hannukah. I haven’t identified as Jewish for twenty years, when as a 16 year-old I actually read what was in the prayer book – this is not what god wants! was the startling realization that took me our of there in a heartbeat. Since then, my sister has embraced the religion, married a man who in time became a rabbi, and is as devout as they come. My mother and other relatives seem to feel comfort in the connection stemming from that shared heritage.
I usually wish everyone a happy Hannukah in return, but I can’t this year. I just can’t. I don’t think I can ignore the messages but I can no longer pretend that it feels right to be associated with that religion in any way. Right now, I’m feeling the anger of frankly centuries that I’ve been collecting at misogynist ways of being that are masqueraded as the laws of a god who has our best interests at heart.
But I’m feeling full of the desire to do something about it. A new level of it.
My work has me telling Lilith’s story to many, many people. For the last five or so years I’ve been sort of specializing in Lilith. Earlier this year I put out a book on how we live the stories of mythological figures, and it has four chapters on how we experience the archetype of Lilith. I also offer an original true Black Moon Lilith natal report to support people in getting to know, accepting, and loving this part of themselves that we have all been taught to fear, hate, and hide. So this holiday season I’m challenged to figure out how I will communicate with those family members. For me to honor Lilith within me, something proactive and productive needs to be said.
We are taught that all Lilith stories end in anger, revulsion, domination/submission, abuse, suppression, shunning/banishing, and rape of one kind or another. In my work with Lilith I not only retell her story but also spell out an archetypal process to make plain our options. These stories don’t have to end in anger. We can build bridges but we have to begin with being utterly honest about who we are and sticking to it no matter what, believing not just in ourselves but in the means we rely on to know who we are, including listening to instinct at every turn – a very Lilith way to be.
When we follow these issues through to conclusion in our lives, we will always encounter in others the expectation that it has to end in anger, etc. Building bridges therefore may require effort. But putting in this effort to honor who you are helps heal the collective wound that has resulted from the 6,000 year old war on the feminine. Loving Lilith within yourself helps heal Lilith in those around you. Changing the outcome of the story by building bridges feeds our collective need to nurture and nourish the feminine in all humans and the other members of the earth community including the earth itself.
I’m not yet sure how I’m going to respond to my family, but I know I’ll find the right words once I’ve been with the anger for a bit and decided not to lash out at them or anyone else. Once I am able to turn the anger into a proactive statement of who I am and who I’m going to be.
If you’re interested in Lilith and other goddess archetypes, check out my book Living Myth: Exploring Archetypal Journeys, available here. Get the original and groundbreaking Lilith and 2012 natal reports here ($35 for both right now, regularly $27 each).
Tom Jacobs is an evolutionary astrologer, medium, channel, author, and coach offering insight into why your soul is here and guidance about how to make it happen. Contact him via his site for private readings and to learn about intuitive coaching. Tom is the author of five books on metaphysics and astrology available via his site and Amazon. Chiron, 2012, and the Aquarian Age: The Key and How to Use It is his new 11-hour MP3 course, also available through his site.