A Travel Essay from the Inner Journey

I have spent the last couple of weeks preparing myself to enter the Venus Sequence as part of the Sage’s Golden Path Retreat. The Venus Sequence or Stream is the central journey of your Gene Keys Golden Path. There’s a wonderful video called the Law of Unseen Grace, where Richard Rudd explains in a really simple way just what this part of the journey is all about. From the transcript on YouTube …

Once you know your own Venus sequence, you have the map in your hands. It's a sequence, and we have to travel back in that sequence to understand how we shut down when we feel threatened.
And as we understand each step of our sequence, so we learn to disarm that pain and gently coax our heart back to life again.
It’s a journey of self-awareness.
Once you can see your pattern at work, it's hard for that pattern to run your life anymore.
It is a journey. You should draw a deep breath because it's a journey for spiritual warriors.
The Venus Sequence is a deep dive into love, into who you truly are, behind this mask, behind this story, behind this body.
Because at the end, there's no wound, no matter what it is, that cannot be healed by love.

Right in the middle of this Venus preparation, Meghan and I were recording a Conversations With A Couple Of Crones Podcast with our very good friend, Esther Vis, where we were diving into the Dream Arc. Meghan set us all a task, a quest to prepare us for this episode … we were to consult the Dream Arc Oracle on a question or issue that we are currently contemplating, and then spend the week prior to recording, in contemplation of the Dream Arc creature that the Oracle gave each of us.

I asked the Dream Arc Oracle for guidance around my fear of ageing and dying … this has been a fear that has been on my mind a lot lately, especially in the last few months, when I’ve been experiencing a lot of joint pain and a lot of tiredness.

I got Toad. Toad is a Changer, and it is the Fear Key of Gene Key 57. Toad represents The Fear of the Unknown! Is there anything more frightening than the fear of the unknown that is our own death?

This is Intense and Not for the Faint of Heart

Toad says that “only the inwardly strong may work with me”!

Well, I know that I am inwardly strong. My Interiority and my Affinity have prepared me for this journey. Oh, perhaps this whole inner journey is preparing me for death? Perhaps that is one of the main reasons I have been called to do this work … to prepare me for death by making me live fully.

To learn toad medicine is to live intensely. We do not waste or fritter away our precious life force. We do not spend a lifetime worrying or stressing or labouring under a self-imposed pressure.

And isn’t this exactly what I have been saying I want for the last three and a half years of working with my Gene Keys … to live intensely, to suck the marrow out of life, to not waste one drop of my precious life force. Look at how much life force I fritter away by fearing ageing and dying, which are inevitable for humans (unless I die young, which I definitely don’t want to do!). Worrying about ageing and dying is definitely a self-imposed pressure. Worrying about dying is as futile as trying to stop the tide or stop the sun from rising or setting. It is an inevitable part of the human journey. Why am I wasting the precious life force I have now, worrying about what is going to happen in the future?!

Toads Spend a Great Deal of Time in Stillness

When I read that toads spend a great deal of time in stillness, it was as if the Dream Arc Oracle had read my mind! I chose stillness as a word to accompany me on the Sage’s journey, which I began in January, and yet, despite all the inner work I have done, the hours and hours of contemplation, I have not been very still so far this year. I feel as if Toad is giving me an opportunity to reassess.

How perfect that Toad hopped into my life right now, as I am about to embark upon the Venus Stream.

This Venus Sequence is deep inner work. I need to cultivate stillness in order to allow myself to drop deeply into it. Healing comes in stillness. Clarity comes in stillness. I am thinking of Sogyal Rinpoche’s glass of muddy water, that I learned about in a meditation retreat almost thirty years ago, and which has never left me … let the glass be still, and the mud will settle and you will be able to see through the clear water.

We listen. We see. We wait. We look deeply into the very nature of reality.

Isn’t this exactly what I am trying to do with this inner work? Am I not trying to listen to my inner voice; to see the truth that lies beneath the layers of obfuscation that life places upon me? Am I not trying to wait patiently to allow the very nature of life to make itself clear to me?

Those are the very energies I want in my life. Those are the very character traits I am trying to embody and cultivate.

Sheesh! There’s a lot of “trying” there! Surely, if I am still, truly still, then trying falls away and being reigns.

Looking into the very nature of reality is what I am doing when I am contemplating. It is my self-imposed quest … to dive deep into myself and see the truth of who I am.

Isn’t that the whole point of this journey? Isn’t that the whole reason I continue to do this work year after year? To dive deeper and deeper still. To pull back more and more layers.

Stillness is the missing ingredient.

Toad is Ruthless in its Clean Clarity

The message of Toad is about purifying your thoughts. It invites us to drive out our negative thought patterns and our emotional excesses.

I hear this as a clear instruction. Not only in how I let go of these fears around ageing and dying, that I asked for guidance on; but also about how I move into and through the Venus Sequence. I must release all excess. That means excesses of self-pity and victimisation, excesses of self-flagellation and of that fear about the future which only lead to more stress and anxiety.

I cannot have clarity if I have all these thoughts and emotions and fears roiling inside me. I must allow the fear to pass through me. I must allow the fear to be there without hooking into me and taking me under.

I must be still and allow clarity to settle upon me.

Toad is not concerned with appearances. “What a thing or person looks like on the surface rarely reflects what is hidden beneath”.

Toad doesn’t care what I look like. Toad only cares about what is underneath.

I know that Surface Level Lizzie, no matter what I might think of myself, is the least interesting part of me. It’s all the subtle layers below the surface that are important, and interesting, and fun, and funny! The beauty of my inner world is what counts!

The truth.

The authenticity.

The love.

All the love I have inside me is the most attractive thing about me. The joy. The inner strength.

My Resourcefulness, which is the Gift of my Purpose Gene Key, is my beauty.

My devotion to this work is my sublime comeliness.

What is the Nature of Fear

Toad teaches us what fear is; it teaches us how fear drives the immune system, as well as the mental and emotional body.

As I read Toad’s wisdom, I realised that fear of ageing is ageing me!! Fear of death only serves to bring it closer! Shit! The very thing I am terrified of is exacerbated and brought closer by the fear itself!

How would my body feel if I were to let go of those fears and live in every moment?! What a glorious question to contemplate.

Fear is what ages me, because it tears at my immune system, it frays the edges of my nervous system. It stops me sleeping and being still. It crams food into me to make the fear disappear under a mountain of sugar and fat.

Fear is a virus that feeds off of itself. The more I fear, the more I mistreat my body, with stress, with “comfort” eating that is no comfort at all. Keeping myself busy to try to outrun the fear.

When what I need is stillness.

What I need is quietude.

Calm.

Space.

Stillness.

Toad would not like this rampant consumerism that we now live with, this world of instant gratification and overnight shipping, and information … too much bloody information … at our fingertips. I am trying already to simplify my life. To not keep buying stuff. To make do. To mend. To slow the fuck down.

I do not buy from massive corporations, if I can possibly avoid it. I want to shop with the people who make the things I need. I want to learn to be patient and not expect next day delivery. I want to unplug from devices instead of constantly getting sucked into doomscrolling. My current doom of choice is AI and it’s making me so depressed. I want a world where I can believe what I see, and feel, and think. I want a visceral world, not a virtual one. I want a world of real connection, of slow conversations, of silence, of gaps.

I want a world of stillness.

I want to unplug from the online world of other people’s opinions. I want to seek knowledge and learning from tribal elders, from creatives, from critical thinkers.

I want simplicity.

I want clarity.

I want stillness.

Toad is Only Concerned with What Lies Beneath

This is one of those messages that wants me to put my money where my mouth is!! I say that I am only concerned with what lies beneath; I write about how the beauty of my inner world is what is important and meaningful to me; I say that I don’t care what my external being looks like … but is it true? Do I really value the beauty of my inner self over what my external self looks like?

Can I face the world, day after day, naked skinned, utterly myself, my ordinary, authentic self? 

Can I truly value the inner world over the outer?

I think that I am definitely getting better at this!

But Toad is asking more. Toad is asking me to be 100% authentic all of the time!

Toad is asking me to care more for what is under the surface of my relationships too.

This is what I want! This is why I have called Toad to me now … so that I might look deeply into the nature of this fear of ageing and dying, which has, once more, reared its head. This fear has been stalking my days for so much of life. I think it started in earnest when I had my son nearly thirty years ago, and suddenly felt this deep need to keep living for his sake. Before that, I had told myself I was ambivalent to death.  I wonder, is that true, or was that an excuse, another way to hide from the fear?

Fear too often … stalks you in your relationships.

Oh, I know this to be true. I have lived most of my life in fear, and until very recently, it was the basis and currency of most (all?) of my relationships. Fear of not being loved; fear of being loved and then found to be not good enough. Fear of rejection, abandonment. Fear that relationships would end. Fear that they would never end, and I’d be trapped in them forever. Fear of not being good enough … at anything.

Fear of death and fear of living.

Working with Toad Means to Follow Your Intuition without Hesitation

Oh, and here is where the trust must come to the fore. For in order to follow my intuition without hesitation, I must first trust that intuition. I must trust myself to always come to the right conclusion at the right time, even when the evidence doesn’t back it up. Intuition says, leap off the cliff, your wings will appear. Trust says, wheeeee! There are my wings!!!

Following my intuition is following my heart. To follow my intuition is to let the heart lead, with the head getting into step behind her, no questions asked, no doubts held. Just pure, unadulterated trust that my heart knows the way.

Oh my goodness! There is statement in Toad’s wisdom, where she is telling us that we are to be still and “wait for your moment to sing”!! I don’t need to rush to find my song. I don’t need to panic and stress about running out of time before my song is ready to be sung. For I know, with my heart, that I will sing the right song at the right time, and it will be beautiful. I’m already humming the tune. It needs to brew, it needs to steep like a fragrant tea.

And less is more in this brewing! Less activity, more conserving of energy. Less frenzy, more patience. Less movement, more stillness.

For in the stillness, the brew will reach its flavoursome best, and when its taste touches my tongue, it will release a song the likes of which has never been sung before. Because it will be my song, my words, my tune, my voice, my truth.

I need to just be still, to fill my lungs with air so that they can send my song out into the ether. I must save my energy, I must build my power, I must be ready to burst into song when the time is ripe.

Self-discipline Leads to Breakthrough

Discipline, I know from my Radiance key, is a delicate balancing act. And I suddenly see, as I sit with this Toad energy, that self-discipline is not about strict rules and binding myself to the spot. Self-discipline is about stillness. It is about waiting patiently for the next step to unfold.

This is not about abdicating responsibility in some laissez faire, fatalistic approach. This is about waiting in the stillness of the void, knowing with absolute trust and certainty that the next step will become clear. 

If I am still, then I can attune my being to the smallest nuance of breakthrough, the microscopic shifts that gradually clear the water and allow me to see.

In stillness, obfuscation falls away and I can see more clearly. I can see myself more clearly. I see the parts of me that need care and nourishment.

My own stillness can become a healing balm for my soul. As the obfuscation melts away, so does the drama and the victimhood, and at last there is a possibility of compassion.

When the waters are muddy, you can’t see where to let your compassion rest. Stillness is the fertile ground for all that I want to grow in my life … the love, the understanding, the healing and the compassion.

Out of stillness, anything might grow.

Out of stillness, truth can emerge, wisdom can be born. Oh, I really feel as if I have hit upon a vein of pure gold here! It’s taken me five months, but I think I finally understand why “stillness” came as a word for the Sage.

Taking Away the Fear of Death

How perfect is it that I chose Toad, or Toad chose me! My question was about my fear of death and here is Toad telling me I will no longer fear death. Hayley Curtis, my friend, Guide and mentor, connected in my GK38 of Struggle, and said that what I am going through with all of this pain in my body is the perfect Evolution for me. I need to go through this struggle in order to get to the other side, to the place where I no longer fear death. And I can only reach it by being still, by being present.

My life is a quest to find out the truth of who I am and who I am meant to become. I cannot become that woman of Purpose, if I am dragging a fear of death with me like a millstone around my neck. So, it is perfect that I am choosing Toad as an ally (or rather, that Toad appears to be choosing me as its ally!).

What an invitation it is, to embrace all of these insecurities and uncomfortable fears within my body. It’s as if the universe is saying, you asked for answers to these fears … here they are … embrace them!!! Dive even deeper.

What a perfect invitation to receive at the beginning of the Venus Stream, a deep dive into the feminine mysteries of myself.

I feel as if I have chosen Toad for a reason. It’s not just the stillness. It’s not just the fear of the unknown. It is the willingness to dive deep into my own interior. Toad knows I am ready to go even deeper than I went before.

Isn’t this what I’ve been thinking?!

That I need to go even deeper?

Here is my ally and familiar to walk these inner paths with me.

Initiation into the Mystery of the Feminine

Interestingly, I have been drawn to stories of witches and women of power lately; it seems to be all I want to read. And here is Toad, telling me that if I choose to work with this Toad medicine, then I am being initiated into the mystery of the feminine.

I am feeling my way into my own crone years. My body is reminding me daily that I am already in my crone years. It’s scary, but in truth this time of my life is not to be feared … this is my ripening. This is my time to shine. This is my time to fully embrace my feminine nature and to dive into the womb of my own being. The answers aren’t coming from my mind, they are coming from deep inside my body, deep in the crucible of my belly.

The Venus Sequence is a deep dive into the feminine nature of life. What a perfect time for Grandmother Toad to hop into my consciousness! She invites me to sit still in the pond of my life. She invites me to rest.

I feel as if I want to welcome in the feminine more directly. I feel as if I want to find small rituals to bring Toad energy into my life. How can I do this? What totems and symbols can I bring into my space to remind me of Toad?

And how do I tap deeper into my own feminine nature?

By trusting my intuition. By trusting the voice inside me. By trusting that I already hold all the answers, right here, in the crucible of my own belly.

I must soften into this. It’s funny, I am sitting here, trying to come up with “ideas” about how to bring Toad medicine into my life. The medicine is not going to come from my mind; it’s going to come from my heart, from my belly, from my bones and my blood.

I need to feel Toad’s medicine in my body, in my bones. If I trust in the unknown and in the stillness, that is where I am going to find the Clarity I seek, and that is where I shall hear the voice of my intuition, rather than being deafened by my fears.

I will access this medicine by surrendering to what is, not by imposing ideas of what should be.

Toad is the still point I want to get to.

Toad is the softness of my belly when I am utterly at rest.

Toad is the darkness of my interior world.

Toad is all feminine energies, wrapped in a soft, still sheath. The initiation into this mystery of the feminine is to be completely still, with only my breath moving through me. And I must slow that right down.

I am Ready for this Quest Through the Venus Stream

Toad is the symbol of my deep feminine nature. She is the familiar who calls goddess energy to me. It is perfect that toad came to me now. She says, embrace your cronehood, embrace all that it means to be a wise old woman! Leaning into feminine energy means leaning into softness and gentleness. There is so much strength in softness, women know this instinctively.

Oh, to be still and soft and strong! That is the path that Toad invites us to walk … to trust our intuition; to listen with our bodies, not with our minds. Toad intuitively knows what is good for it.

For this coming journey of the Venus Stream, I will walk with Toad.

This is an invitation for those that are not faint of heart, and that is me! I am the woman who is willing to make the deeper journey into myself; I am willing to face the more intense fears that are available to us in this lifetime, when we choose this path of interiority.

I will sink into the still ponds to soak in the waters of my emotions.

I will rest on warm stones and let the sun heat my blood.

I will practice stillness every day.

I will practice gentleness with myself.

I will dive into the unknown and I will be unafraid, because Grandmother Toad is with me.

The photographs I used for this essay are a rather eclectic mix. Three of them are art journal cards I’ve made to accompany my contemplations on Toad. I learned this technique of art journaling from Meghan, in her Playful Pondering course in Gene Keys Unleashed. The others are photographs I curated as I sat with the concepts I was writing about. The general theme of these photographs is “stillness”.

You can see more of my photographs on my Flickr page.