Motherhood is a hot topic. One that many people have a hard time recognizing as a sacred and high spiritual calling. Societies everywhere sing praises to the role of motherhood while ignoring the fact that praising deflects from the Truth that this vital service to humankind also needs to be supported by society with available child care benefits.
It’s not motherhood that is the issue but the basic assumption that has been presented that motherhood has been seen as a reason to exclude women from advancing in the secular world as well as from being admitted into the “Eastern and Western religious traditions.”
But lets dive deeper into this:
Gangaji, in her usual cut to the heart of the matter, addresses how motherhood can be seen as a spiritual practice in her book You Are That.
Question: I’ve believed my child to be the one obstacle between freedom and myself. It feels like I can’t be free and responsible.
Gangaji: This is the great fear of a parent. Isn’t it a joke? We have considered freedom to be freedom of the body, and we imagine freedom of the body as the following of the desires of the body. Yet we know that following personal desires is very often narcissistic indulgence. As you know, bondage to personal desires causes enormous suffering.
What is inherently free is who you are. Who you are does not become free. It is free. In recognizing this, there is the natural ability to respond. Before that, responsibility is a concept of duty or of something to be shouldered. It may be tempered with love and care, but it is also something to be born. Therefore, your child becomes an objectification, a separation between you and that which you really are. This is a deadly joke! You are this very child. Recognize this and you are not searching around for personal freedom. Then nothing can be an intrusion.
Motherhood teaches us to discover who we really are, beneath the role of motherhood that we play. What is beneath motherhood? It is the idea of being gentle with oneself with each other. Nurturing, caring, serving spirit, serving one another, serving and caring for life.
On this Rock of Service and Love, Compassion and Kindness let us build our Consciousness for that is the Mother Church.
Happy Mother’s Day,
Rev Janice
