Photos: Robert Gonzales
Walking into the Lunosol Studios, we discover a transformed space of wonder and color. The canvasing over head set the mood with bright hues and sacred geometry. There was an altar in the middle of the room with crystals and a bowl of fruit for us all to enjoy. Kate Maranville-Hiser with the Cicada Moon Collective was sitting in the middle with the cacao waiting for everyone to arrive. There were pillows and canvases on easels in a circle around the room with a palette and paint brushes for each person.
After everyone arrived and settled into the places of their choosing, Ivy welcomed us all into the space and invited Kate to start the ceremony. We start with a ding, a toll from the bell Kate is holding, and continue with a few deep breaths in through the nose and out through the mouth. Kate’s soothing guidance held a placid space to relax. We added a voiced exhale, creating a beautiful harmony in the air of mixed voices and vibrations. After centering and finding our zen, Kate guided us to the heart chakra where we repeated our mantra, “I lovingly accept myself completely as I am.”
Sometimes this may be hard to hear because we hardly accept or love ourselves as we are. Sometimes we need to tell ourselves this a multitude of times just to be able to accept ourselves just a little. It can be the hardest thing, but it is okay to love yourself. We sat and meditated for a while. With our inner 3rd eye, we explored our heart chakra: it’s sizes, shapes, colors, symbols, animals, smells, sounds, scenery, seriousness, silliness, pain, darkness, light, allusions, and imagery. We open ourselves and our heart to this new experience.
We receive the cacao and pass it around the circle until everyone receives their own cup. We sip. The raw cacao is a high vibration of bitter with earthly tones and a bit of sweetness from the rose petals. It is liquefied to the point that we can easily drink it. After we sip, it is time to paint; and so, Kate hands the venture back to Ivy, the local artist that is doing the guided painting.
Ivy begins to describe the connection with the heart chakra meditation and discusses coming up to choose the colors we saw and the imagery held in our mind from this deep dive into ourselves. She speaks of how one may convey the symbols and emotions onto the canvass. We all choose the colors and begin to paint.
Those who feel free to contribute start discussing the experiences of the heart chakra journey, the imagery we felt. One speaks of how they saw a jungle-like forest of trees, with this tiger hiding his head behind them almost merrily playing with laughter before revealing itself. Another speaks of surprising dark pockets in a sea of happy. bright, colorful landscapes. One speaks of family and his daughter coming to him. Everyone created a safe place of honesty and vulnerability with an environment of willingness to share heart truths. We all continue to explore our canvases: an intense fire, sacred geometry, peering out of a cave to a mountain scene, beautiful beach landscape images. We all create our art from the heart.
As we clean up and pack up, there is already a sense of longing, a sense of belonging, a sense of connection, and a sense of family. It’s like we really don’t want to go. We don’t want it to be over. But all good things must transit to other things, and so, Kate calls our attentions to focus with a ding from her bell. She thanks us for participating. Once again, she acknowledges how amazing Lunosol did creating this space for us by thanking all the individuals involved. Then we repeat the mantra, “I lovely accept myself completely as I am.”
By the end of this experience, it was much easier to say this time, and I believed it way more readily. We finished with our voiced exhales and deep breath enjoying the harmonies of our new friends. There is something special held in togetherness where all these different entities of multiple experiences, backgrounds, and pasts can conjointly be a part of something bigger than themselves that you truly feel how the whole is bigger than the sum of its parts. And with experiences like these, I feel way more whole!
