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If you wanted to make a change in your life or to your stance in life...what would that be?  What would you be willing to do to make that happen?  These are important questions and questions which a fine group of young women are asking themselves right now!  They have written their intentions...claiming their act of power!  Next they will create the expression of that declaration...their act of expression.  It is an amazing thing to watch these ladies sit with the discomfort and the chaos that can come with asking these questions.  It takes courage and effort to take a new stance, to put a  new spin on any aspect of your life.  I wonder what your answers to these questions might be...What would your new stance look like...The young lady in this photo has taken her "warrior woman" stance and it is beautiful to me.  How might you show up in the world as your true expression of warrior woman.  
Women, You Must Learn to Be Warriors

Women, you must learn to be warriors
Now when times are dark and our men
Are afraid to tell us what is in their hearts.
there is so much trouble in our land
That is is up to you to decide
Which direction the wind must blow

Women, you are our tree of life
Just as you were a long time ago
When a man said:  carry my seed.
If you go forth from this darkness,
Telling our story of courage and survival,
Then our tree will grow strong with your words.

Women, do not worry about tomorrow.
Even when daylight is long in coming,
The sun remembers its place in the sky.
Take this blue shawl of knowledge and
Wrap it around your daughters, telling them'
That women must not be afraid to be warriors.

From 'Spirit Walker' by Nancy Woods
 
Inner Work 07/22/2009
 

One of the greatest gifts of working with the 'tools' of expressive arts is opening  the door to consciousness.  People wonder how it is that doing a piece of art or looking at your dreams or writing can do this.  The truth is that the expressive arts is a path into the unconscious and that it speaks in the same language as the unconscious; that is, the language of symbol and metaphor.  Think about a time that you had a really vivid dream.  You awoke with that feeling of 'wow'.  Notice the kinds of images and symbols that filled the dreams, the way that images moved with fluidity and that time and space were not limiting factors.  This is very much the way it is when working in the various modalities of expressive art. 

I find that many of us want to have quick theoretical answers and yet we feel so dissatisfied as we move back into our lives.  Why is this so?  Well, I read something yesterday that really answered this question for me...take a look:

" In the world of the psyche, it is your work, rather than your theoretical ideas, that builds consciousness.  If we go to our own dreams and sincerely work with the symbols that we find there, we generally learn most of what we need to know about ourselves and the meaning of our lives, regardless of how much we know of the psychological theories involved.  The point of inner work is to build consciousness.  By learning to do your own own inner work, you gain insight into the conflicts and challenges that your life presents.  You are able to search the hidden depths of your own unconscious to find the strengths and resources that wait to be discovered there." 
~Robert A. Johnson in Inner Work, page 13

A good place to start is to get a notebook and begin to write down your dreams.  Set your intention to awake and jot down the images.  It can be really interesting to see where your dreams will take you and, better yet, what they are trying to teach you!