The Intuitive Call of Water

"At my best moments, I understand I’m merely a vessel and the writing is like water, moving through me."

This morning, I write alongside rose quartz in the bottom of my grandmother’s candy dish filled with jasmine-infused water. The candle is lavender in soy wax.

It’s been a rough fall. I want to acknowledge this before I get to this month’s writing ritual. During this dark time of year, I’m lighting candles for all those I personally know who are hurting (and saying their names) and for all of humanity.

I recently spent a few days with my family at a rented cottage on the shores of Lake Superior and woke today thinking about how beautifully water compliments ritual work. This inorganic compound is perfectly malleable, taking the shape of whatever vessel, large or small, it fills. It carries the memory of place and time, the wounds of history, and the hope for reclamation and healing. Water is endlessly receptive. It can be infused with flavor, color, and energy. I believe that writing near water makes me likewise more receptive. At my best moments, I understand I’m merely a vessel and the writing is like water, moving through me.

A July-born Cancer, a water sign, I welcome every opportunity to write near water. At the end of a solo writing retreat by Lake Superior a few years back, I was grieved to leave “my lake.” That last morning communing with her, I asked Lake Superior for some of her waters to bring home. The only vessel I had on hand was an empty iced tea bottle my husband had tossed in the recycling bin when he’d visited a few days earlier. I filled the bottle with Lake Superior water and a few stones (so no one would drink it accidentally). I thanked the water for this gift and promised that, when the time came, I’d return the water to its natural cycle.

A recent morning sunrise captured over Lake Superior.

Once home, I placed this—now sacred—vessel of water on my writing desk. Because I often write (on laptop or notebook) at locations all over my house, I would take Lake Superior’s intuitive wisdom with me wherever I wrote. I liked holding the bottle in my hands, sometimes tipping it up and down or shaking it, at the beginning of a writing session. It helped unleash the creative flow.

Sometimes, I’d speak words like:

Great waters that give life, I invite your wisdom and intuition into my writing practice today.

When the water began to look less vibrant (about a half year later), I ceremoniously poured it out onto a paper birch. A few months later, I took a clean canning jar along on a trip to an ancestral family cabin that, unfortunately, no longer belongs to my immediate family. In the jar, I collected water from the lake next to the cabin. Over the next few months, I wrote with this water nearby. The memories this water holds.

If you haven’t yet summoned the wisdom of water to your writing practice, I invite you to give it a try during the month ahead.

If you’re unable to collect water from a special body of water (winter is on the rise where I live), you can work with tap water, saying blessings over your vessel of water, or “charging it up” on a windowsill overnight under the light of the moon, or by placing a few special stones (even a few grains of salt) in it. Herbs and/or flowers will work beautifully too. Let this now-sacred water accompany your writing practice for however long feels right.

If you’d like to read writings infused with the intuitive call of water, I recommend checking out the growing body of work written by my friend, author Heidi Barr, who lives and writes from a lake about an hour north of where I live. Her books, especially her books of poetry, reflect the kind of deep soul writing that comes from living close to land and water, and treating both with gratitude, honor, and respect.

I wish for you a beautiful solstice and holiday season (if you celebrate). I wish for peace on earth for all.

Thanks for reading! If you enjoyed this post, please share it with others and visit my website at www.heidifettigparton.com to find more of my writing.

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