Dismantling the Inner Patriarch

I couldn’t bring myself to write a Friday post ON Friday because I was in the middle of my own maelstrom of self-doubt. On Friday I flew to LA for the most incredible opportunity to speak at the Natural Beekeeping Conference put on by @Honeylove.

I had been invited to speak on the topics I often write about: why we keep bees and my experiences with bee shamanism. While I love these subjects, I am not used to talking about them at a conference in front of people with complex presentations on innovation, science, methodology and technique. ⠀

As the weekend went on I gathered so much applicable, fascinating information. I took copious notes. I listened to captivating conversations. But I also, quietly railed against my own nature, questioned my professional value, and felt exquisitely sensitive to the fact that my presentation was NOT about how to keep/save/study bees. It was about restoring our relationship with bees. I spoke a lot about love, mystery, and the liminal. ⠀

I wasn’t due to speak until the end, so I had all this time to question everything I stand for. To feel small as a woman. To feel like my work didn’t have value without quantifiable, tangible, physical proof. I fell for the top down model of valuing intellect over intuition. Patriarchy got me good. I was submerged in the quagmire of what happens when we let a world view tell us that one aspect of our humanity is more relevant than the other. It was fascinating.⠀

I basically gave a talk in support of all that was being suppressed by my own interior judge. It felt great. Well, the judging felt like shit, but the talk felt great. So did the camaraderie, reception from those who attended, and the commingling over the weekend, of so many devoted folks. I am so fortunate to be in a field that is starting to value the feminine/intuitive/somatic experience alongside our more “traditional” values.⠀

What could be possible for this Earth if we married the exquisite intellect with the intelligence of the body and intuition? Maybe we should ask the bees.

Let the Bees Lead You

I know it’s called “beekeeping friday” and I ought to talk about beekeeping, but the thing is, nothing with bees is linear. This photo is all about beekeeping. It’s also about finding your voice, trusting the path, sisterhood, and magic. It’s also about hard work, discipline, punches to the ego, and realness. ⠀
⠀
This photo is from yesterday in France, after finishing the evening’s work with my bee sister and trusted colleague, Gina. It’s taken a lot of trust and surrender to get here. We didn’t know this was coming when we stepped onto the lemniscatic path. I didn’t know work could look like this. So here we are: this is our debrief after after a hard day’s work. This is also a moment in my actual life where bees brought me to the south of France to teach bee shamanism in an open air barn with this view. ⠀
⠀
What I’m saying is, I fell in love with bees. I fell in love with the mystery behind their ways and the history woven into women’s relationship to the hive. I started beekeeping, in part to save my heart (and life) after miscarriage. I have followed the strange and crooked path of listening to the wild one within and the wild ones without. That path has landed me in the gracious arms of a growing hive of bee women who are courageously facing their own tangled fears in order to become voices for the earth and the feminine once more. To claim sovereignty, eros, seership and the full expression of self.⠀
⠀
So this is about beekeeping, because beekeeping is about listening to the bees, and in my book, listening to the bees goes far beyond the realm of “normal” and sails straight into the land of mythic reality. The bees fly on crooked paths through liminal thresholds, and when we let them, they show us how to do the same.