Where a creativity exercise can take you

Teri Degler • August 31, 2021

Below is a piece of creative writing that was triggered when I did the creativity exercise in my Spring 2019 Feminine Fire Newsletter, Jack, the Beanstalk, and the Power of the Feminine. The creativity exercise focuses on selecting an object from your past that — like Jack’s beans — seemed worthless to others. My object was a tawdry, garish pink, plastic crucifix with a silver Jesus on it that I won on the midway at the county fair when I was a child. I thought it was absolutely beautiful. My status conscious mother was horrified when I hung it on the wall above my bed. Quite without warning, the exercise catapulted me into the scene and character below:


Today is the first day of the rest of my spiritual journey. Today is the day I begin my worship of Sarasvati – the goddess of wisdom and learning, poetry and speech, art and music. Today is the day I eschew the worship of that Man-God; the one who hangs on crosses and hangs on each of my four walls. The largest one of all hangs above the head of my narrow bed. This is the second to last one I take down. I stand on my bed, one foot balancing on my rock-hard pillow, and strain and twist and lift to unhook it from its nail. It is heavy and wooden, passed down to me by my great grandmother and said to have been hand-carved by her brother, a master craftsman. Sculpted out of walnut, it was left unpainted to show the beauty of the wood. All, that is, but the tiny drops of red that drip from his crown of thorns.


When I have finally wrenched it down, I shove it unceremoniously under my bed and turn to take down the one on the wall opposite. This is my very favorite. It is the one I won at the ring and bottle toss at the county fair when I was eight. I have taken a good deal of teasing from the others over the years about it. It is made of plastic. Admittedly garish, pink plastic. Not Him, of course, just the crucifix itself; He is painted silver. He is chipped here and there, but still, the silver glistens and gleams when the light hits it just right.



It pains me to take it down, but I steel myself, and I do it. Then I shove it under my bed with all the others and gently take out the box that contains my Saraswati. I place her on the little corner stand I have readied with a lace cloth and candles. Oh, my! How beautiful she is. Palms together and elbows akimbo, I bow before her. She sits on a lotus flower and has a swan carved at her feet. She is draped with garlands and wears a golden crown. She has four arms. Four! Two of her hands hold and strum a lute; another holds a book; the other, a rosary. A rosary! Surely, surely that will appease Mother Superior.

Perhaps she’ll even let me treat myself to a softer pillow.

New book on Gopi Krishna launched

By Teri Degler • June 21, 2023
Gopi Krishna—A Biography: Kundalini, Consciousness and Our Evolution to Enlightenment

Blast the Rubble

By Teri Degler • July 27, 2022
Blast the Rubble from the Pathway to Joy Yesterday a young woman was talking to me about her boyfriend breaking up with her. She was hurt and sad about the break-up but it seemed to me she was even sadder about how this was going to affect her in the future. “I’m afraid,” she said, “that I am going to start putting up walls.” Up to this point in her life she said, “I have gone into every relationship with a completely open heart – no holds barred; just absolutely open to exploring all the possibilities….” She was not, she thought, going to be able to do that anymore. “That’s what happens, you know,” she said as only a 20-something can say to a seemingly clueless 60-something, “people reach a point where they put up walls. They do it to protect themselves.” This probably doesn’t seem to be a particularly startling insight to most of us. But what I think was truly insightful about this young woman’s observation was that she was truly and deeply lamenting it. These carefully constructed, impenetrable rock and mortar constructions were going to limit her: close off her openness; curtail her spontaneous joy. As long as these walls existed she would not be able to feel love, to experience it, to be awash in it the way she once had. And even if a time might come when she’d feel safe enough to tear them down, she would find rubble strewn over pathways that once would have been free and easy traveling… We all know that erecting walls doesn’t just keep us from feeling hurt; it does to our emotions exactly what chopping off the red from one end of a rainbow and violet from the other would do to our vision. But we might not think about the fact that it also restricts our creative ability. It’s like one of those laws you had to memorize in high school chemistry class: The degree to which you suppress your emotions is inversely proportional to the degree to which you are able to express yourself. In my workshops I sometimes say, “There’s no art without heart”. Corny as this saying may be, it remains true. So let us examine ourselves. Ask a hard question: “Do I truly feel with the intensity that I once did?” If the answer is no, be brave, seek out old hidden walls, tear them down, and clear the rubble from the pathways to your heart. Then take up paintbrush, pen, drum, or dancing shoes and express your Self.

Body Love

By Teri Degler • July 27, 2022
Body Love, Oh Body Love I’ve been going to the same gym for many, many years. In the women’s section there is a large, wide-rimmed whirlpool. Women loll about, stretch out, submerge themselves, or just dangle their feet in the hot, bubbling water. Almost everyone is naked. Some are towel-less; some are towel-wrapped. This distinction does not blur over time. The women who are happy naked, remain happily naked. The women who are not, are not. I am among the latter. For many women there is not any great significance to being in this group. Some are just naturally modest; for others it’s cultural or just a way of being raised. There is, however, a great significance to being in the other group. All of these women are, to one degree or another, comfortable with their bodies. Some are trim, fit, and slim. There are even a few who preen a bit – not in any sexual way – but as if to say, “Hey, I’ve busted my butt to get this butt, and I’m proud of it!” Others are frankly, honestly, openly, unashamedly obese – and, as I slip up my towel and slide my body down in a move so carefully orchestrated that it leaves not an inch of naked flesh exposed – how I envy them. Once submerged, the tune of that old Supreme’s song “Baby Love” often comes to me. Only the words aren’t baby love; they are body love, oh body love, I need you, oh how I need you. The irony of the fact that I still don’t completely accept my physical self is that I have spent the last three decades of my life working at being in my body. The idea that the body is a temple is fundamental to my spiritual practice. It is based on the ancient yoga philosophy that says the human body is a microcosm of the cosmos and, as such, is being propelled along its spiritual path by the Divine – known, in this tradition, as Shakti. The human body is, in this sense, a container for creative force of the cosmos. A spiritual path like this shouts out the need for being able to be in and thus experience the body. I have come to believe that this is true, not just for my path, but for all spiritual paths. Elements of Christianity, Judaism, and many other traditions teach the idea that the Holy Spirit – call it prāna, chi, ruach ha-kodesh – is the power of the divine that is with us, the power that calls us, moves us…. Clearly the more comfortable we are with our bodies, the more easily we can be in them – feeling and responding to this holy force.
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