A PSA From the Goddess

I remember once –
Sitting naked in a hot tub across from a powerful spiritual man I had put on a pedestal.
I had summoned all my courage to say to him:

Maybe you have something to learn from me.

Turns out you learn a lot about people based on how they receive you in your raw.
How others handle and hold your truth reveals them too.
I will never forget his response to me that day.

He looked me in the eyes and said:
That’s nice, but I think I have a lot to teach women about the goddess.

The following year, a mentor asked me to help steward the goddess temple for our Burning Man camp.
Several goddesses and I met for months to put our proposal together.
We envisioned a space where the goddess could come to rest and replenish.
A space to honor and exalt her.

But when I sent the proposal to him, he trashed it.
To summarize his feedback: I didn’t understand the goddess temple.

What he envisioned was better.

He wanted a place for people to come and taste the goddess essence.
He wanted a place where the goddess could serve the starving masses.
But this idea felt like a bootcamp to me.
A place where others could feed off her energy.

Same story but different.

•

Turns out I was supposed to bring my own vision — and I did.
But that isn’t the point of this story.

The point is –
I started to notice a larger pattern.
All these men who wandered into my orbit, claiming service in her name.
While simultaneously — so easily! — spitting in her face.

I couldn’t help but wonder at these strange dots on my map.
They stuck out.
They set tiny, terrible fires in my soul.

And let me be clear before I go any further:
I am not angry at men so much as the MASCULINE EXTRACTION of GODDESS ESSENCE.

I am not angry at men so much as the PATRIARCHAL CONSTRUCTS that attempt to suppress, diminish, control, or deny her ENORMOUS INFLUENCE.

In other words:
How does it serve me when you tell me who the goddess gets to be in this world?

As someone intimately connected with the destroyer gods,
As a devoted child of Kali and Sekhmet and Isis,
As a warrior of the Queen of Swords –
I know her rage.

I am her rage at being used as a weapon of patriarchal oppression.
I am her rage at being suppressed and exploited in service of some broke-ass spiritual agenda.
I am her rage at being simultaneously fetishized and profaned.
I am her vast, ancient rage calling forward false myths that have colonized our consciousness about

WHO THE FUCK THE GODDESS REALLY IS.

And truth be told, honoring this rage has led me to some most holy places.

•

Lately, the goddess has been taking me over as I walk in the woods.
Her transmissions slice open my heart and bring me to my knees.
Maybe because she won’t let me look away from places where I allowed her power to be castrated.

This is what she told me.

WHEN YOU DECLARE YOUR SERVICE TO THE GODDESS, KNOW THIS:

The goddess has a postpartum belly.
The goddess is exhausted from working the night shift.
The goddess is the tired arms of your mother.
The goddess is the hidden tears of your brother.

The goddess has forgotten her mother tongue.
The goddess sometimes can’t look at herself in the mirror.
The goddess has been raped, betrayed, bloodied, beheaded.
The goddess is a gas station attendant.

The goddess has gone missing in the military barracks.
The goddess has a name you can’t pronounce.
The goddess cannot afford Free People.
The goddess is in a boat that has been denied safe port.

The goddess has one tit.
The goddess is neuro-divergent.
The goddess is 40 pounds overweight.
The goddess is more than a she or a they.

The goddess has back acne.
The goddess has chronic illness.
The goddess works in a cubicle.
The goddess is serving you overpriced tacos in Tulum.

The goddess is bathing in a putrid, polluted river.
The goddess is unhoused with four children.
The goddess lives in a suburb in Kansas.
The goddess does not feel safe in her home.

The goddess is in rehab.
The goddess wants her land back.
The goddess is living through wartime.
And for everyone who forgot (again) –

The goddess most certainly isn’t a SPIRITUAL COSTUME.

The goddess is absolute.
Above, behind, and outside all you know to be true.

•

It’s funny to me now.
This man wasn’t wrong so much as he needed to be right.
In responding in the way he did, I watched him play into the exact power dynamic I was attempting to rewrite.
I was tired of men telling me who I get to be.
I was tired of men trying to use her power against me.
I wanted someone to really listen.

IN SERVICE OF ALL THAT IS GOOD FOR THE GODDESS.

•

Because I, you, we, are SHE.
And she is everything.
Even the men who want so badly to teach me about her.
She is in them.
And so I forgive them.
I forgive them again and again.
I forgive men.
I want so deeply to respect them.

Because all men are descendants of the goddess.
She is our shared lifeblood.
We came alive in her body, all of us.

And MEN, I love you enough to say NOT ON MY FUCKING WATCH.

Because I am not available for superficial prostrations in the name of the goddess.
The goddess is not impressed with your repurposed paradigms or luxury Jesus outfit.
Besides — isn’t it HIGH TIME we evolved past power hierarchies and false icons?

I didn’t come here to trash on men, not at all.
My apologies to those who became my examples of the masculine supremacy that has become INTOLERABLE.

I am aware that this is all of our prayer on some level.

But I did come here to remind you that in a world absolutely dripping with limiting definitions and delicious distractions and lurid distortions, your unconditional protection of the goddess in every form is what constitutes TRUE WARRIORSHIP.

What I mean is:
There is no real or sustained evolution where spiritual elitism exists.

This reality is in direct opposition to the true form of the goddess.
Because the goddess is life-giving, LIFEGIVER.

Precious beyond measure.

Ancient and alive outside all egoic structures.
Messy, infinite existence in every permutation.
The good, the bad, the ugly, the breathtaking.
The goddess is ALL OF IT.
How glorious.

And when you see everyone as an extension of you, you will know her.

Because if you are a safe space for the true face of the goddess, you won’t need to own her.

She will bloom freely in you and all you do.

But until you see the divine beloved in everyone and everything…
You have not served her fully.

🔺

Katharine Hargreaves is a spiritual mentor, transformational facilitator, ceremonial guide, and initiated medicine womxn. Her first book, The Art of the Experiment, is a transformational manual for people who want to change their life but don’t know where to start. For more information on Katharine and how to work with her, visit her website.