by Chase Buttice
I recently had a recurring dream come to me again in the wee late night hours.
The scene was always the same; I had done something terribly wrong and was going to be put in prison.
This time, I had exhausted myself with every option of escape. I had evaded, hidden, and disguised myself as much as I could but to no avail.
I was found, shackled, and on my way to a large concrete box. What is funny is that both of the recurring dreams were the same, I had this deep feeling of dread for being caught.
Prison was just about the worst thing I could ever imagine for myself. Yet the same thing always happened, as I entered the prison, a huge feeling of relief came upon me.
It was like having this structured environment where every single thing was decided for me gave me this giant sense of relief.
I remember thinking to myself, “Now I will be able to focus on myself.” Weird, huh?
As a dream-walker, astrologer, and shadow worker I sat with this dream for awhile, prayed on it and asked for guidance.
What came to me was the realization that my soul was craving deeper structure, the kind of structure I have always dreaded.
2020 is the year I am reconciling this dread with action.
In a patriarchal world culture based on striving, rationality, control, and greed amongst so many other things it has been my own little bit of personal rebellion to live my life guided by my intuition, in the flow, and allowing my body and spirit to wander wildly.
The Divine Feminine has been so undermined for so many eons and as a self proclaimed warrior of the Divine Feminine, I consciously chose to live my life guided by a different tune.
This led me on countless adventures from living in a small village in Morocco for nearly 2.5 years, to sleeping in a literal mango tree house in Maui, to living alone in the woods in rural Alaska where I actually went a little crazy.
The wild Spirit of the Divine was my guide, despite how outlandish the guidance was, I chose to follow it.
Having grown up in a house with all women, and wild women at that, rules were never really a thing.
And any time any man tried to put rules on me, I automatically resented them and refused to even give them the quality of my time or attention. No one could take my freedom.
I grew up resenting men, as I always felt they were putting a rigid kind of oppressive structure on me.
They asked me to abide by certain rules, and wanted me to be accountable, all things my wild mother herself resented.
This resentment of rules placed on me has continued into my adult life, and I have found myself very resentful of my own boyfriends and friends’ boyfriends that ask for accountability and place rules on me, to the point of pure rage.
The rage was so deep and so visceral, that I needed to start boxing as a true outlet.
Upon deeper inquiry, the rage was just an extension of my deep need to hold onto the feminine energy that I had spent so much time protecting, cultivating, and shielding against the constant onslaught and mechanization of all mystery and enchantment.
It was a deep guttural reaction to those eons of the feminine power and energy getting taken, molested, and abused.
That rage was self-preservation as far as I could see it and the strongest form of rebellion that I could open up to.
I am a self made woman with a successful spiritual consulting practice in Los Angeles, California yet this dream has illuminated the truth, I am craving a deeper structure in my life.
Both of these dreams had come to me after I remember seeing a book at a friend’s house.
The book was called, “Discipline Equals Freedom” and as a seeker of truth and freedom my entire life, the unique juxtaposition of these words intrigued me.
This was an oxymoron! Discipline and freedom in the same sentence!
Yet after staying up late reading almost the entire book, I had the first of the prison dreams. It was true, there was something there my soul was called towards.
Being an empath, intuitive, and healer, my entire life has been in sync with the feelings of every living thing around me.
I do whatever I can do to assist and ease the suffering of those around me which makes me very sensitive.
On the other hand, I am a strong and opinionated half Italian woman so I have that going for me as well, I’m not a dainty wallflower.
But because of that deep intuitive feeling, I have found myself time and time again aquiescing to things I may not have wanted to do, putting my needs last to accommodate others, and not fully speaking up for what I needed.
I was so in the feminine ‘flow’ that I wasn’t able to place strong enough structure around even myself. In other words, I was masculine deficient.
I have a masters degree in Sustainable Communities. I actually went to graduate school to try and understand how and why humans are destroying the earth and to try and find a way to assist and heal that reason.
After going mad inside of the deep patriarchal structure that is graduate school, what I came out with was a thesis on how to re-wild the soul and a deep realization that in order for this planet to heal, every single one of us must reconcile and balance the masculine and feminine energies within us.
For most, that means learning how to open to their feminine nature, the nature of allowing, flow, presence, and intuition.
For some (and if you are an empath reading this, I bet this means you) it means increasing the masculine energy in your being, meaning creating more structure, discipline, work-ethic, and responsibility.
This is something I have been evading and avoiding my entire life, so much so that I saw it as a literal prison. The prison of discipline.
Yet, here and now at age 36, on the brink of such immense and powerful eclipses and astrological aspects, there is no greater or more powerful a time to turn and face the thing that I have been resisting my entire life.
Opening to the deep and hidden shadow truth: that my soul craves more discipline is in fact incredibly liberating to say and realize.
Nothing feels better than bringing to light the deepest most hidden aspects of ourselves, the things we have hidden from and evaded our entire life and turning to face it.
There is nothing that feels better than this, nothing.
This is the alchemy of transformation and the moment a person becomes a true spiritual warrior.
The more we open to face the things that have held us captive, the stronger, more powerful and incredibly courageous and resilient we become.
The empaths of the world are the wild witches that are going to be midwifing the era of the Divine Feminine.
In order to be able to carry this weight and hold this power, we must have the feminine and masculine energies in balance so that we can put form to our vision.
I challenge you for 2020 to examine in your life where you are denying your truth, or evading the thing that your soul desperately craves. Is it structure or is it spirit?
IN CONCLUSION
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About the Author:
Chase Buttice is a Wild Witch with a psychospiritual consulting practice in West Hollywood, California. She is the founder of the Witchy Bitch Program, a 7-week program aimed at empowering and transforming the soul so that the participants may become even more of themselves in this lifetime. She does shadow work, rewilding, and astrology readings to assist and empower her clients. She is a firm believer that accessing ones darkness truly brightens ones light and works with her clients to empower, enliven, and awaken their consciousness so that they may begin to live a life in full joy, abundance, feeling, intuition, and power.
featured image via Unsplash
