I wanted to bring up a book I keep thinking about.

[lildreamer316]

I was reading the Matthew messages; and the recurring theme there has been Balance. Of course this is a predominant theme in many practices and resources that we here in this group use; but this book keeps knocking on my brain so I thought I'd put it out there. (must be important for something!)

When I was in my first semester in college; a Quaker school in fact; one of our professors had us read Riane Eisler's The Chalice And The Blade. Now; at first this seems to be a feminist-leaning history lesson; but her obvious and only conclusion is the need for a partnership society between the masculine and feminine forces. I think the only objection many of us have is that we do not remember the days of matriarchal rule; so we in the feminine form feel as if we need "our time" to balance that out. She points out that the matriarchal society was in place first; and was overrun by the patriarchal ones. ANYway..

It seems she has written a sequel that delves into the partnership idea even more specifically; called The Power of Partnership: Seven Relationships That Will Change Your Life. I have not read this yet; but am excited about what she is doing here. I personally am tired of the idea that we must be angry at the opposite sex (or the masculine ideals in general)--I just want to move foreword and find solutions.

I find this take/angle on our current situations fascinating in both a historical and spiritual sense. It helps me track how the planet as a whole has spiritually progressed, or regressed in sections, from age to age. Learning from the past is always a good idea, and this seems to cut through most of the imposed history to what really went on in the development of western civilization (as well as others).

I just wanted to put it out there in case some of you had not read it and are interested in that kind of thing. I find her vision of the future to be an encouraging one, and one that is sensible.

(BTW I REALLY think I was a man in my last life--sheesh!!:eyes: )

[Bluestar]

1. Thank You Lil Dreamer

I looked up her website. I am very interested in what she has to say. I am writing a book about spirituality in business (don't laugh, it can happen) and I have a lot of material about combining the male and female energies to make companies successful. I am going to order Riane's new book.

Bluestar

[lildreamer316]

2. Oh of course!

..it has to happen! I really believe in my heart that business and the corporate world cannot survive much longer in the dominant paradigm they have going now. De-valuing the worker and not encouraging the best performance have their price and whoa; is it REALLY being paid!! This ties in to the vision I have for the future of the industry I have been a part of for 13 years. I can see clearly exactly how this industry is going to change, who is going to be in the forefront of it; and what skills are going to be needed. I am excited by my vision; because I am trying to put a product in place that will capitalize on this shift in the biz and what is going to be needed. As soon as I can get with a lawyer;I am on my way!!
Best of luck with your book!! Have you read any of Joe Vitale's work? That kind of ties in with what you are doing also. Please let us know when you get it going.

[Cleita]

3. Have you ever read anything by Marija Gimbutas the

anthropologist? She believes that neolithic cultures in Europe were matrilineal and matriarchal. She thought that they were that way for thousands of years. She thinks that metallurgy. especially the invention of bronze and the taming of horses brought the Europeans a warrior culture and patriarchalism.

The timing is about the beginning of the Age of Pisces. Also, the stone age Europeans worshipped a Mother Goddess as above all the other gods. Does the title "Queen of Heaven" ring a bell? I believe it's been handed down since those times and there was always a goddess that would acquire the title, most recently, Mary the mother of Jesus.

I will try to find your book it sounds like something that would interest me.

[lildreamer316]

4. Oh yes.

I know of her but have not read her work. She is right on the money, though; and this is the same basic premise Eisler uses. "When God Was A Woman" by Merlin Stone is about this too, athough I'm sure you've already read that one. You know what I found because of these books? The Mists Of Avalon. I think it really puts a human face on the whole thing. The introduction/preface, really, is pure poetry.

"For this is the thing the priests do not know, with their One God and One Truth: that there is no such thing as a true tale. Truth had many faces and the truth is like the old road to Avalon; it depends on your own will, and your own thoughts, whither the road will take you, and whether, at the end, you arrive in the Holy Isle of Eternity or among the priests with their bells and their death and their Satan and Hell and damnation . . . but perhaps I am unjust even to them. Even the Lady of the Lake, who hated a priest's robe as she would have hated a poisonous viper, and with good cause too, chid me once for speaking evil of their God.

"For all the Gods are one God," she said to me then, as she had said many times before, and as I have said to my own novices many times, and as every priestess who comes after me will say again, "and all the Goddesses are one Goddess, and there is only one Initiator. And to every man his own truth, and the God within."

[Cleita]

5. Yeah, I read the "Mists of Avalon" or parts of it, every now

and then when I need to remind myself that women can regain the respect they once had.