Fox Medicine: Being seen by the Divine

I have sat down several times, wondering how to share this week’s inspiration with you. Usually I have a clear idea that is just chomping at the bit to be liberated into the written word, but today (which makes perfect sense if you read on), the experience I want to share is so intense, I’m not sure how it will unfold. The message is waiting to be revealed and requiring that I simply sit down, without any sort of agenda, and allow Spirit to guide my fingers.

What I am about to share is immensely sacred and intimate and my prayer is that it holds the inspiration and guidance for you that it has offered in my life.

A year ago, during a rare, but nonetheless challenging time, I fell into a day full of self-doubt. I was having a crisis of faith, QUESTIONING EVERYTHING that I’ve built my life on. Finally, after feeling stuck and overwhelmed for hours, I got my butt out of the house to go for a walk. No more than 5 minutes down the very busy trail by my house, I came across a fox skull (totally random and so out of the blue). I put tobacco down and prayed with it, asking if this was something for me (I’m really learning that it’s good NOT to take anything that is not truly mine, as all things hold medicine and the wrong medicine is, well, just wrong). The overwhelming message I got was that the skull was there as a reminder from Spirit that, no matter what happens to my faith, I am always seen and held.
Fox skull

Fast forward to just a few weeks ago. Fox has continued to appear, more and more frequently. Showing up to visit the new sweat lodge that the Native American Church has built at our home, and remind me that, despite my sometimes lack of ability to see the big picture, the big picture does not fail to see me.
Fox in nature

Last week, I was on that trail again, and a fox jumped out of the tree in front of me and took off around the bend. I was in total doubt, telling mysel I had made it up. It must have been a raccoon. No fox would be so obvious in the middle of the day. And just as I was convincing myself I had not actually seen him, I rounded the bend, and there he was, standing and looking at me over his shoulder. It was obvious he was there, waiting for me to really see him. I gasped as we made eye contact. I looked at him and really took it in. I said “Wow, thank you, beauty!” and then he disappeared as quick as lightning.

The next night, I went to my weekly Chanupa prayer circle and one of my prayers was to really deepen with and understand Fox Medicine. A few short days later, I went out on the same trail. Before I left, I stopped in at the Crone Altar (the latest archetype we danced with in the Living Wisdom School). The Crone had melted open the raw chocolate I’d offered her, and she told me to bring sweetgrass for my walk. I found a golf ball with the number 13 hand-written on it (a very magical symbol of death, transformation and change). I perked up my senses and thought “This is a nature oracle! Pay attention to what else you find that is unusual. It will be guidance for the road ahead.”
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Within minutes, I rounded the bend and there he was again, but this time, the fox was dead. I instantly started to cry. The first flash that hit me was a recognition of him being my kin. My brother. The next flash was deep grief for the death of this beautiful being. The next sense that hit me was immense gratitude as it was unmistakable that he had come to offer up the medicine that I had just prayed for.
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Spirit had guided me to bring a braid of sweetgrass with me that day, and so I knelt down by his beautiful body, prayed with the offering, and asked what I was to do with this experience. As I placed the sweetgrass and my hand on his heart, I got the message that I was to take him home and let Spirit guide me as to how to care for him in a good way.

I did a tobacco blessing on him, lit sage and the sweetgrass, and then brought his perfect, lifeless body home with me, in my arms, like a baby. All I could feel was a swirling of different emotions: sensing this being as my brother, grief and gratitude.

I reached out to the medicine man who guides our Medicine Path Native American Church ceremonies that are such a huge part of my life, and other members of our community for some support in how to really honor this almost unbelievable medicine gift.

What landed for me was that I was to take his skin. Something I’ve never done and felt not just a little intimidated to do. But with prayer, and the support and presence of a dear sister, Ayden, I became intensely intimate with this beautiful creature. With many prayers, offerings, and empty presence, I did my best to honor my brother and to fully receive his sacrifice in a way that could serve my path and beyond.

Since I first laid eyes on him, I have felt shifted. There has been so much that has opened up for me in my heart, my vision, my mind and my body. Some of it is still floating around on the etheric plane, but some of it is landing, and because this offering is so powerful, I want to share it with you since I feel that we are all, in some way, on the same journey together, and there is wisdom that can serve us all here.

LESSONS FROM FOX:
1) You are always seen by the Divine, even if you can’t see Him/Her.
2) The deep recognition that happens at the heart-knowing level, holds within it the wisdom of death. Everything and everyone we “recognize” or take in as a part of our journey will some day not be there. Embrace them anyway. Let the breaking open of the heart be an allowance for what is – the gift and the inevitable loss. Don’t miss out on potent medicine, gifts and lessons in an attempt to avoid the pain of loss.
3) Grief is inherent in every deep connection, and when we can be present with the FULL experience, it creates beauty, feeds the Holy, and gives us medicine unavailable from the mundane world that tends to filter out the parts of the human experience that are messy.
4) Being fully available to receive what the Divine has to offer us (and honor it) is more fulfilling and enriching than any social status or efforts at “progress” could yield.

I feel, unquestionably and fully seen by my Creator. There is no amount of money, or material/social acquisition that could compare. These experiences are not found on-line, and seldom at the mall or other landscapes of human cleverness. They exist in the in-between spaces we forget about. The moments that our busy schedules tend to push out.

For me, these potent communications, hit-on-the-head-with-a-frying-pan sort of answers to prayers, are the most valuable experience I could have. They let me know I am remembered and snarl at self-doubt, keeping it at bay.

As I complete, I have these questions for you:
Where are you hiding from the Holy (through busy-ness and lack of presence)? What parts of you are afraid to be vulnerable and seen by the Unknown? I want to hear from you! Let me know your answers to these questions, AND, have you had a magical connection with a guide from the animal or plant kingdoms? How did it show up, and how did it impact your life?

Please leave your comments here, and . . .

stay tuned for next week’s Head’s Up for inviting more of the Divine into your Life and Thriving Outside the Box!
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Fox Hat

1 Comment

  1. Aimee McDonald on July 25, 2013 at 11:16 pm

    Beautiful share, I feel that crow medicine is at work in my life.
    I’m doing deep work around ancestors and relationships. I love your blog posts.
    Inspire me to start writing about my experiences.

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