Asteroid Goddesses - the undistorted Natural/Divine Feminine

[Kristin]

Hi Rav & All,

A key piece in your post where you included the Daemon Soul typing.

Rav wrote:

She had a natural and deep understanding of the Daemon archetype and with Ceres in 6th house Scorpio in conjunction with her Pluto; she was never going to abandon the animals, even to save herself! With her skipped steps resolution node being the NN of the Moon in the 6th house Libra, she was always going to include animals (6th house).

There is an asteroid that we use in EA for the Daemon archetype referred to as Damiian.
We have used this asteroid symbol in looking at various charts for the Daemon Soul to verify its significance and it aligns to reflect the individual story.

Here are Anastasiia's Damiian placements.

29 cn  5 Rx   n.node 16 sc 33    s.node 6 ar 55 


We have discussed the 4 planets in Capricorn squaring her Nodal Axis, but it hit me, in actuality, if you include the 2 asteroids Amazone and Damiian, as well as the Nodes of planets, there are at least 10 symbols squaring her Nodes. (Sn 23 Aries/NN 23 Libra)

Mars 24 Capricorn
Neptune 24 Capricorn
Uranus 29 Capricorn
Mercury 29 Capricorn
South Node of Pluto 19 Capricorn
South Node of Saturn 22 Capricorn
North Node 28 Mercury
&
Amazone 24 Capricorn

In addition:

North Node of Pluto 20 Cancer Rx
North Node of Saturn 25 Cancer Rx

Asteroid Damiian  29 Cancer Rx

Something here about the theme of RECOVERY, in these retrogrades.

Anastasiia's Damiian is 29 Cancer Rx,  a Skipped Step as well, and the most sacred piece of all. The animals = FAMILY.

This Damiian position is also EXACTLY opposing Uranus and Mercury in Capricorn, remembering how critical this 29 degree marker is, reflecting the long journey of trauma back to her Daemon nature at all costs, in her efforts to be a balancing force to preserve what is natural.

Her SN of Damiian is 6 Aries in the 11th squaring her Sun in Capricorn and her SN of Jupiter in Capricorn in the 9th, re-stating the trauma to the natural world, in her case, to the animals and to her nature in the past.

Her NN of Damiian is 16 Scorpio in the 6th, conjunct Ceres, a recovery of her inherent essence, in a Virgo house, an integral contributor of the Daemon mutable square, and her being willing to put it all on the line (Scorpio) in the animals defense. Her NN of Damiian in Scorpio is the Great Protector and Provider of Animals. This symbol is also squaring her Venus in Aquarius reflecting the sudden death as a result of her instinct to risk 'it all' for them.

I do not ever remember seeing so many symbols involved in a skipped steps story such as this. These are truly astonishing, and now adding the Soul typing of Daemon and seeing this asteroid symbol so clearly in the line of fire. It is not surprising and yet mind blowing.

EA, yet again, never ceases to amaze!

Goddess Bless the Animals and this Daemon Soul A,
Kristin

[Rad]

Hi All,

Here is the chart of Olena Bilozerska who joined the Ukrainian Army to help defend her country against the evil of Pig Putin.

                                                                          *****************

CUT DOWN Moment 'hero' female Ukrainian sniper shoots Russian separatists dead – as she vows to 'kill again' if Putin invades

Nick Parker, Chief Foreign Correspondent
Sun
2/4/2022   

A WOMAN sniper in the Ukraine army has become a national hero after chilling footage was posted showing her killing two Russian soldiers.

Femme fatale Olena Bilozerska, 42, was filmed on the frontline using a night vision scope to hunt down Russian separatists.

Three cracks of outgoing fire from volunteer fighter Olena's Zbroyar Z-10 sniper rifle can be heard as her victim collapses with fatal wounds.

She then fixes her crosshairs on a comrade rushing to his aid - and wounds him with more shots before hitting a third soldier whose lifeless body crumples back into the trench.

The harrowing footage lays bare the daily horror in the 250 miles of World War I-style trenches around the Donbas war zone captured by Russian-backed separatists in 2014.

But veteran army volunteer Olena - credited with at least 10 confirmed kills - told The Sun she would not hesitate to kill again if Vladimir Putin's force invades - and feels no remorse.

Footage shot using her thermal imaging night sight after an attack in 2017 - which is not for the faint-hearted - has gone viral as Ukraine musters thousands of volunteer defenders.

A bird can be heard fluttering above the silent wasteland moments before the strawberry blonde assassin detects the moving heat signature of her enemy emerging from a trench 200m away.

Olena said yesterday: "'It was the night of Ukrainian Independence Day anniversary in August 2017 and these Cossacks must have assumed we were lying drunk in our trenches celebrating.

"They started getting out of a trench and passing weapons to each other."

The heat signature of an enemy soldier - glowing white in the flickering gloom - is then seen crawling straight into the crosshairs of Olena's rifle.

Taking aim, she whispers: "Ah, he got out! Look, look, look, look - crawling!  Bastard."

The staccato crack of her first shot is heard 20 seconds later followed by two more fired at the soldier's torso.

Her gun's muzzle flash blurs the image before another soldier is seen leaning over his comrade and is picked off by two more shots.

A third Russian drawn into the rescue attempt is then felled by another single shot and appears to fall dead back into the trench.

Olenna said two of her three victims that night were "cargo 200" - a Soviet army term for dead from the labels once put on coffins - while the third was "cargo 300", meaning wounded.

Olena was a volunteer fighter when the attack was filmed but later joined the Ukrainian Marine Corps.

    When the enemy crawls towards our position to kill me, does he think if I have a husband, parents, or kids? - of course not.
    Olena Bilozerska

But she feels no remorse, insisting her enemies deserve to die if they dare to attack her homeland.

She said: "Moral anguish about the murder of a human was invented by people far from the war. An armed enemy is not a person, but a target.

"You take up a weapon against my country - that's it, you're a target. If you don't take him out in time, he might kill you or one of your comrades.

"If I didn't shoot in time and the target hid, that's when I feel angry at myself for missing my chance. And if the target is hit, I feel the pleasure of a job well done.

"When the enemy crawls towards our position to kill me, does he think if I have a husband, parents, or kids? - of course not.

"That stuff is for books and movies. Anyone who thinks along those lines in battle is already as good as dead."

Olena - left with paralysis in her right cheek when a machine gun bullet grazed her face during a firefight - blasted the Hollywood depiction of the sniper's role.

She said: "In the movies, it looks as if a sniper sees the eyes of a living human.  But you cannot see the eyes.

"You just see a silhouette of an armed person and you fire at it. That's all... if you miss, you will feel as if you've lost."

Olena's husband Valeriy Voronov - a regular soldier who was beside her in the trench - collected the cartridge casings which fell as she pulled off her double kill.

And he later made a silver ring with the bottom of a bullet cartridge mounted into it for her following a sniper tradition dating back to World War I.

Olena, from Kiev, has won celebrity status in Ukraine after writing a best-selling book called "Diary of an Illegal Soldier" about her action in the trenches.

She chose the title because all volunteers who fought at the time were considered illegal.

She and her husband are both members of Ukraine's Territorial Defence Services on standby to deploy immediately if the 200,000-strong Russian force ringing Ukraine attacks.

And she practises regularly with the trusty sniper rifle she has given the traditional Ukrainian girl's name "Halia".

Olena said: "The rifle is always being cleaned and adjusted and looked after like a spoilt child.

"She does what I ask her to do, and if the Russians decide to come, I'll be only too happy to introduce them to Halia."

More: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3od0AKb4z1U and  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hZfHETJ3ZhQ

Here is the original article that has the video of her shooting: https://www.the-sun.com/news/4613225/moment-hero-female-ukrainian-sniper-shoots-russian-separatists-dead/

Here natal Lilith is 1 Virgo, N.Node 3 Sagittarius, S.Node 6 Cancer. Her natal Amazon is 8 Taurus, N.Node 9 Gemini, and the S.Node is 8 Scorpio.

Please feel free to comment or ask questions.

Goddess Bless, Rad

[Rav]

Hello all,

I have amended my original analysis from this morning (I am in London!) as I didn't realise Oliwia Dabrowska's time of birth is unknown, therefore we won't use the house placements in the analysis. Please see my comments below, if you have any questions please let me know. 

We have a Soul who is in the process of recovering/repeating/redoing lessons in regards to her Pluto Rx in the Scorpio. This is a Soul who will be curious about the environment she is in, where the key goal is for her to submerge herself intellectually into her surroundings in order to understand her life. With Scorpio it's around power/powerlessness so she can evolve beyond her personal limitations. The Rx position of Pluto again show's us that she has worked on this Soul lesson before.

We can also see that she has her natal Lilith Rx conjunct her Pluto Rx in Scorpio in a new phase, so she has started a new evolutionary journey in understand her own natural power. We know that Lilith indicates where our original wound originated and with Oliwia's being in Scorpio; her wound will have been around the power she has and hasn't had. We can see her Soul has experienced power/powerlessness, abandonment, lost and betrayal when she has spoken out in the past. With Lilith also opposing Ceres in the Taurus, we can see a conflict that has arisen in her value system in the past, which the Soul desires to resolve. Her natural nature is most likely one of sharing/caring/inclusion as her SN of Ceres Rx is in Sagittarius. With her PPP also being conjunct Ceres, a goal for her in this incarnation is to nurture others who have been abandoned.

We can see that the small but impactful role she played in Schindler's list was a pivotal role that woke the main character up in wanting to help save others. But she herself has admitted that she has only seen the movie once as she couldn't bear to watch the film and she knew then that she would never watch it again in her life. It will have taken her a lot of courage to step into her power but being a sensitive Soul, with her natal Moon in Pisces trine Pluto Rx in a First Quarter phase, she would not have been able to stand back and watch people suffer. She has 5 planets in an Rx motion, showing us the accelerated evolution her Soul has chosen in this lifetime, by inducing a natural rebellion within her to find the voice she has lost before.

A final point is the fact that the nodes of the Moon are at 29 degrees and at a stationary point which is a magnifying force, she has just recently come into a new cycle of Soul development where her Soul is working on resolving past life issues where she has most likely felt disillusioned about her own creative power therefore losing herself in the process (SN of the Moon in Leo) and the focus for her now is to be of service in a way that allows her to liberate herself by focusing on work that is meaningful where she could speak her truth (NN of the Moon Aquarius and the ruler of her Sun being Mercury Rx in Gemini). We can see that she has stepped into her PPP in Taurus, as she helps the victims of Ukraine and she also volunteer's at a dog rescue organisation. She was interviewed in the Independent Newspaper and she; "It's hard for say something about myself. I can tell you facts but facts don't describe me. I cannot judge myself. I hope I'm a good person. That's all I can say." With the way she is volunteering and helping the Ukrainian refugees, she really is a symbol and advocate of hope and peace.

Namaste,

Rav.

[Rad]

Hi Rav,

Thanks for taking the time to do an EA analysis of some of her core dynamics. It's another example of what can be seen and understood even when we don't have a birth time for someone.

What you have shared and presented so far is excellent: spot on.

God Bless, Rad

[Rav]

Hi Rav,

Thanks for taking the time to do an EA analysis of some of her core dynamics. It's another example of what can be seen and understood even when we don't have a birth time for someone.

What you have shared and presented so far is excellent: spot on.

God Bless, Rad

Hi Rad,

Thank you! I completely agree about how even without a time for an individual we can still decipher a lot about their life story. This is one of the reasons why I love EA! 

Namaste,

Rav

[Darja]

HI All,

This week I want to post the below story of a 77yr old women in Ukraine who has saved hundreds of dogs, cats, and one lion in the face of the Russian invasion of that country. There is not birth day that can be found, but I thought this story symbolizes the essence of the Goddess archetype, and feel her story needs to be shared.

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Europe: A shelter in Ukraine saved hundreds of cats and dogs — and a lion

WA Post
April 30, 2022 at 12:03 p.m. EDT

HOSTOMEL, Ukraine — As Russian tanks neared Kyiv earlier this year, the capital's suburbs were emptying fast. Terrified residents poured out; roads were gridlocked.

Asya Serpinska walked the other way.

The 77-year-old had spent two decades keeping her animal shelter going in Hostomel, a town northwest of Kyiv. With the threat of Russian occupation now looming, she thought, there was no place in Ukraine that needed her more.

Shelling boomed out as she arrived at the shelter. Through the gate she recognized the howling and whimpering of various animals.

"I knew it was my responsibility to look after them," Serpinska recalled.

With three colleagues, she kept most of the 700 dogs and 100 cats alive — and even rescued a lion — as Russian and Ukrainian forces exchanged shelling overhead, and as Russian forces repeatedly entered the property and threatened their lives.

Slight of build with soft gray hair, Serpinska says she was born stubborn. She says her marriage is a testament to that. She met Valentyn at 18, and although her parents didn't approve, she went ahead with the marriage anyway.

With Russian forces on all sides of Hostomel, Valentyn, 78 and fighting Stage 4 cancer, drove through the night and hostile checkpoints to bring her a generator that saved the shelter.

Serpinska grew up with animals. Later, when she was a math professor, she volunteered with animal rescue groups in her spare time. After retiring from the university 22 years ago, she founded her shelter, and four-legged creatures began pouring in.

Her favorite was Gina, a glossy black dog with mismatched eyes.
Cats look out an office window as dogs lounge outside the shelter in Hostomel. (Heidi Levine for The Washington Post).

Russia's Feb. 24 invasion of Ukraine upended lives across the country. As Russian forces moved toward Kyiv, officials predicted the city could be seized within weeks.

When Valentyn woke Serpinska at 7 a.m. that day, he told her it was beginning.

"The first thought that crossed my mind was that I had to run to the shelter," she recalled. "I was consciously going to war. My people were here, my dogs were here."

For some shelters, the invasion spelled tragedy. In the Kyiv suburb of Bordyanka, the owner of a government-run sanctuary left the animals in their cages and fled. Without food and water, 335 of the almost 500 dogs died.

When asked why no one evacuated the animals, Natalia Mazur, the shelter's director, asked why people hadn't been evacuated.

Serpinska was devastated when she saw photos of the animals' emaciated bodies. When she arrived at her shelter in Hostomel on Feb. 24, the first thing she did was open all the cages so the animals could roam free.

"Why didn't they open the cages there, too," she said. "It would have been so easy."
Serpinska visits puppies that were born at her shelter during the Russian invasion. (Heidi Levine for The Washington Post).

As shelling continued over Hostomel, the shelter's staff kept order, no matter what was happening outside the gates. Feeding times remained 6 a.m. and 6 p.m. The rest of the day, they cleaned and watched the animals, and at night, at least 10 of the dogs huddled under Serpinska's blankets. "They thought I could protect them," she said.

Friends and family begged her to leave, but she refused. "My place is here," she told them.

She affixed a golden icon to the shelter's front door to scare away God-fearing soldiers. They entered anyway, and often terrorized the staff.

Once, as two soldiers — "dressed like Terminators," Serpinska remembered — marched toward the shelter's front gate, some of the dogs surged ahead to protect her. A Russian soldier raised his gun and shot Gina through the fence.

She had been running the fastest.

"Why are you shooting? They're good and kind," Serpinska screamed at him as her dog lay dead.

"Well, why are they barking at me?" came the reply.

Amid the chaos of the fighting, the dogs grew so scared that some dug holes meters deep in the earth. Several were killed in the bombardment.

When a shell landed on a nearby private zoo that housed exotic animals, Serpinska watched in horror as flames engulfed the building. Its owners had abandoned it, so her team battled through the smoke, rescuing peacocks and turtles.

"Only the lion got left behind," she remembered, with a frown. "For five weeks, we would go there under shelling and bullets to feed that lion, because it had been locked in a cage and we didn't have the keys."

One day, Russian soldiers placed a mine outside the cage, she said. Serpinska began negotiations.

"We said to them: 'Here's some water in the bucket, here's some food. Please feed the lion.' "

The men didn't budge, so she handed over two packets of cigarettes.

"Step back 10 meters and put them on the ground, then leave," a soldier told her.

He stooped down to grab the spoils, then detonated the mine. "It was quite an explosion," Serpinska remembered. But the lion was safe — she fed the big cat daily until Ukrainian forces reclaimed the town in early April.

Hostomel is quiet now. Homes are still deserted. Many are burned or in ruins. Driving through the town's streets, Serpinska has been reduced to tears.

But she is rebuilding.

"My parents were terrorized by the Soviets, and so were their parents before them," she said as she approached the shelter. "Our generation must resist them."

When she enters the shelter's yard, the dogs swarm her and their tails wag as they bark in a chorus.

The shelter's electricity has yet to be fixed, but the animals seem happy nonetheless. A rescued peacock ambled in a patch of sunlight from a hole in the roof. The cats were all in their bunk beds, each enclosure warmed by a little coal chimney.

"We have a saying, and it's important," Serpinska said, as she watched them. "For us, to save animals is to be human."

Watch: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pgYxDQBTNDA

[Helena]

Hi Mary, Rad and All,

Lilith in her primal state represents the totality of the asteroid goddesses combined. She is the root at ground zero. The other goddesses represent aspects of her nature that have become splintered off as a function of involutionary forces when she separates from the Mother/Source. The goddesses manifest as projections of the unconscious, through which Lilith discovers herself and her inherently divine nature.

Ceres through her sacred daughters signifies her aspect of maternal Soul nurturance through which the cycles for Her transformation mystery are tended and cultivated to advance evolutionary growth. Ceres and her sacred daughters also symbolize the eternal rounds between Soul and Source, in general, and that more specifically for sacred human daughter and Divine Mother, where Her powers that tend and cultivate evolutionary growth are transferred to womankind, blessing them with faculties to help them guide and keep humankind's way.

This is such an important start focus point whenever Lilith and Ceres teachings are concerned and seminal work offered here at MB too with regards the teachings off astrology meeting real and true women issues. I have been reading it and reflecting upon it, but the first time I read it It came to mind the image of the hindu goddesses with many arms. I never thought about how much it syncs with the asteroid goddesses teachings, and by no means have great knowledge of the hindu goddesses, but I'm sure it does help to view them as an additional hand and faculty given by the God/dess so that women can, in their natural expressions, be secure from within themselves of their own value and gifts to share with others from a point of view of being a differentiated equal.
I was thinking this is so interesting to see in the perspective the current transit of Lilith in gemini ruled by mercury in gemini :-) (and also ceres in gemini too)

One other thing I am contemplating relative to both ceres and lilith is that they both carry seed and cycle issues, with lilith's greatest challenge, to be able to affirm herself (the north node) over and over again as she NATURALLY IS. With this, both Ceres and Lilith also carry the themes of progeny and dealing with the pain of their children (their future) to be "abducted" by patriarchy. So much so is that Lilith, in the original distortions of Her own nature through the Judeo-Christian man made beliefs, was portrayed essentially as a muderer of babies and as a demon that would take away children, exposing the projected fears of patriarchal rulers of the powers of women's real nature creating then myths to scare them at birth. (Which in reality, through the lens of their undistorted nature, also tells us of the very close links between so many souls and specifically women who are very much aligned with their natural liliths to be also daemon souls, as the many examples Rad shows here every week. If we think the original woman was an outcast that had to flee to save her dignity, it is only natural that she would have felt embraced, loved and understood only by nature and animals, who will not judge her for what she is).
So was thinking that it makes perfect sense to look at the north node of Lilith conjunct the south node of ceres as the necessary path for Lilith to recover her natural dignity (NN's in Sagitarius and Capricorn) through recovering the themes of progeny, creativity, spring, and the ever new cycles of becoming nature offers us over and over again. But personally still feel I need to work it through some real life example charts to natural have it come together in chart analysis, so Mary your teachings are very helpful, thank you very much for that.

On the current events, I think it's really important to mention Nancy Pelosi visit to Kiyv/Ukraine to meet president Zelensky and say she won't be backing down to bullies (reference o Putin off course). We have analysed her lilith a few years ago in this thread (page 17) and she has of course, natal Lilith in Cancer closely conjunct Pluto, moon in scorpio sun in aries. What a force to be reckon with! She truly is showing us what natural Lilith is about.

Many Blessings at this solar eclipse,
Helena

P.S. In the spirit of Lilith transit in gemini I leave image of Goddess Saraswati

[blue]

Greetings to Helena and all,

Thank you for your kind words and to Rav for hers in a previous post. Each of you consistently offer wisdom and insights that deepen and broaden understanding for these archetypes, all precious, like lost puzzle pieces falling back into place. I think all would agree that your posts ever so gracefully articulate the essence behind the symbols on this thread - the living heart of the sacred feminine. Wonderful!

Helena - I loved the connection you made between Gemini, Lilith, and the many-armed goddesses of ancient India including the image of Saraswati. Given a woman's capacity to do ten things at once, it occurred to me how alike women really are to those many armed goddesses! Goddess knows, for any of us who have had the privilege and honor caretaking children, one had to be functional on many planes of consciousness at once in order to do just that! And who better than Lilith and Ceres in Gemini to appreciate that!

By itself, woman's capacity to do many things at once is just one of many "differentiated" attributes specific to women, whose value has been underrated because of patriarchal posturing. And to take that point one step further, does not the Mother of us all do the very same thing, ie. Do many things at once? There is no question that every woman is a 'true" image of the Mother herself, just as that example plainly demonstrates. The Mother's faculties are a woman's own, which is exactly what I perceive original Lilith evolving towards within every woman as the means to actualize her wholeness/holiness.

And segueing to your point about the need for women to feel inwardly secure "of their own value and gifts to share with others from a point of view of being a differentiated equal" your words are spot on. They capture for me Lilith's essence and need to feel inwardly grounded, openly curious, and confident (South Nodes) in her unconditioned approach to reality, and to feel empowered and authenticated from knowing her physical, intellectual, emotional, intuitive and spiritual gifts are once again fully appreciated and respected by all members of the group to which she belongs (North Nodes). That's a future all women can hope to look forward to. But from where does this all arise? I would offer that its most potent form comes from her living and breathing Soul connection to the Mother of us all. After all, Lilith evolves within us to manifest as a modern day embodiment of shamanic consciousness. She is our link and recovery to that lost dimension, one that emanates from Source as our teacher and guide - the sacred goddess of phenomena, Mother Nature/Mother Earth.

That is her root and anchor, where her natural consciousness pivots and navigates about temporal reality in its most dynamic form. From this connection, a woman or man experiences one the most exquisite powers of the sacred feminine - as union or reabsorption (yin) to that which created its Soul, the Source. Its intelligence, whose life principles and practices are defined by Natural Law, naturally infuses and opens consciousness to guide humankind's way through intuitive Soul perceptions.

Since it is primal, it is fully unconditioned by space/time reality. Thus this archetype is known for its rebelliousness against any restriction imposed upon itself by conditioning factors operating in space/time reality, ie, the patriarchal nonsense perverting and violating Natural Laws. Hence, the rage associated with Lilith, and necessarily so, which erupts to challenge and overturn the degenerative practices and beliefs that populate the world she finds herself facing.

One of the Mother's other faculties that women possess is to give birth to new life and regenerate its renewal - not only physically, but spiritually/soulfully. The goddess Ceres  and her transformation mysteries that manifest through Lilith's unconscious represents this particular faculty. Having given a lot of thought to the connection between Ceres and Lilith with respect to their nodes, it is my feeling that Ceres comes into the picture so prominently now alongside Lilith to facilitate its recovery, specifically to help humans reconnect to Soul and Source, ie their shamanic consciousness. Ceres' natal placement and nodes symbolize how the Soul operating on the physical plane through largely involutionary forces has cultivated itself in order to attempt to regenerate itself and lost connection to Source in this way.

This reconnection to Source is essential in humankind's collective journey where knowledge of its spiritual nature is being reawakened. Here the powers of the sacred feminine are reborn that are crucial to this process. In fact, its vital importance is being out-pictured in phenomenal reality as humankind's survival need (Taurus, with Uranus now transiting) to rediscover how to cultivate, regenerate and sustain Mother Earth's (Ceres) physical abundance by honoring Nature's regenerative practices and cycles in a balanced, reciprocal way according to Natural Laws. Humans are currently reaching out to indigenous peoples for this very Earth wisdom.

Thus, in order for humans to survive as spiritual beings in physical bodies, the principle for one applies to the other: As above, so below. In both spiritual and physical worlds, each must recover and cultivate their Soul's connection to Source by honoring the cycles by which both its inner and outer abundance are regenerated. Herein is the Mother's teaching behind these two archetypes interacting in the ways that they do. Their connection highlights the fact that both practices are interconnected and essential to our survival.

In addition, essential to this teaching are practices that extend beyond human needs and concerns to embrace all of the natural world. This faculty of maternal/soul nurturance is not only that expressed between human mother and child by way of the limited patriarchal view, but is universal in application, just as the Mother is. For instance, every human has a sacred obligation as guardians/stewards of the Earth.  This is one of Lilith/Ceres' manifestations as goddess. Every human has a sacred obligation to nurture and care for one another, regardless of ethnicity, sexual preference, color, religion, etc. This is another manifestation. Every human has a sacred obligation to nurture and care for all living creatures to ensure their regeneration from one cycle to another. This is another. The list goes on and on.....

Involutionary forces work through all nuances of space/time reality largely as matter consciousness in this part of the world cycle. This is Ceres' realm, matter bound, involutionary consciousness, where her natal placement and nodes will operate. In contrast Lilith is Soul, primal, spiritual/shamanistic evolutionary consciousness, wholly intuitive, aligned to Natural Laws, coming through as long term memory (Uranus) from the inner dimension of consciousness. It is through the wisdom gained through Ceres' archetypal experience as Kore to Persephone that will help the primal Lilith integrate into and navigate through this existing degenerative world, and as you cite "to be able to affirm herself...as she NATURALLY IS."

As for the "themes of progeny and dealing with the pain of children", this is an interesting parallel you draw between the two. The Ceres 'myth offers itself as allegory representing what happens to the sacred Mother's daughters in a patriarchal controlled world - the heartache, longing, loss of power, etc, and worst of all is the devaluation and desecration of her daughter's natural sexuality. This tears right to the heart of the pagan traditions that then existed, where the Mother's regenerative cycles and power reflected women's own. Honoring the power and cycles of both became the center of the pagan spiritual traditions upon which their lives/survival depended.

In the Judeo Christian narrative, Lilith's unconditioned, unconstrained sexual freedom is specifically the issue of contention. With respect to her reputation as being a murderer of babies, those same cries are being hurled at women today who seek abortions. In the USA yesterday, it was revealed that its highest court in the land is positioning itself to strip a women's right to abortion as a constitutional right. It will be up to each state to legislate for itself if abortions will be permitted. At the current count, the split is 50/50 for and against. 

We know ancient women had the capacity to abort pregnancies if they choose to do so. Back then as now, men were threatened by this because it usurped their control over patrilinear customs that guaranteed rights to their progeny. And this became one of the primary ways that men took power away from women in the ancient world, by shifting the political dynamics that were once based upon matrilinear succession to patrilinear succession. They infiltrated pagan tribes anyway they could to get just that.

Remember the myths interpreted by Robert Graves in the book "The Golden Bough" ? He describes tribes (in the Mediterranean region) ruled by women that had men anointed as kings for only one year. After that another successor was appointed to stalk its predecessor and either kill him and become the new yearly king, or be killed itself.  In my mind, these tactics were one of probably many created by these pagan tribes to avert the patriarchal threat that could be seen everywhere destroying the Goddess communities of the ancient world.

For those tribes overtaken by the patriarchy, beyond the issue of patrilinear succession, controlling women's reproduction also ensured the replenishment of bodies to fight men's wars, where populations numbers (especially males) were often severely decimated, such as in places like early Greece. This is in fact an issue not lost sight of by women of color in today's world, who are those being unfairly targeted by abortion restrictions, compared to their white sisters. What could be the true agenda behind all this, but to foment divisiveness through social injustice and inequality.

Which brings me to the next point, which is Lilith's aspect as demoness. This again connects to her shamanic consciousness and function as tribal shamaness. Since her job was as protectress to keep the balance between humans and Nature and protect them and their way of life from evil forces, she was the spiritual authority for the pagan tribes. To ward off evil, it is a common practice for shamans to wear costumes, particularly masks that are grotesque and fearsome in nature for this purpose. Hence, the characterization of Lilith as demoness.

This same attribute as protectress can be seen in a number of ancient goddesses for the same reason - Hindu goddess Kali and even the Greek goddess Pallas Athene. Pallas Athene wears a breastplate bearing the features of a gorgon, while Kali's face in her fearsome aspect is that of a gorgon itself. Both symbolize this archetype's intolerance for the profane by their wrathful and threatening facial features - large glaring eyes, flared nostrils with a lolling tongue between tusks, and writhing serpent-like hair. Their determination, fearlessness and bravery is demonstrated by their imposing warrior-like stances.

Images of gorgons goes way back in time to around 6,000 BC. They were said to protect oracles at the earliest shrines and/or temples and continue to do so even today. Given that the patriarchy emerged around 7,200 BC, their appearance during that time speaks for itself.

This same archetype of protectress connects to Amazon women, whose warrior goddesses of the ancient world included Pallas Athene and the Egyptian goddess Neith, among others. All goddesses wore protective armor to signify their attribute as fierce warrioresses, guiding and protecting their people against the powerful threats that were emerging and growing.

As for women returning to Nature as a means of solace and affirmation for who they truly are after having everything taken from them by the patriarchy, this is definitely true. Given that Lilith's native consciousness is shamanic at its root, where else would she feel more at home!
For this aspect of Lilith, the goddess Artemis comes to mind.

Goddess blessings,
Mary

[blue]

Greetings to Helena and all,

I wanted to clarify something from my last post. The actual author for the book "The Golden Bough" is James Frazer, not Robert Graves as inferred. Robert Graves is the author of "The White Goddess", who offered commentaries on Frazer's work, especially with respect to the myth cited (the succession of priest/king at Diana's sacred shrine at Lake Nemi). There is a lot of back and forth about this myth, its origins, practices, etc, and in particular its "barbarism", although none seem to capture the essence behind this particular one in my view.

It appears to be a fusion of earlier pagan rites with later patriarchal ones, and while its true nature may never be known, the point trying to be made was that certain tactics were adopted by our pagan ancestors that were purposeful in their fearsomeness. They were designed to deter territorial encroachment from patriarchal marauders through stories or shrines having gruesome attributes. These things convey clear messages: Stay away or else! This same approach applies to the use of such images as the gorgon itself, reflecting the archetype of Lilith as shamaness and protectress of her people, which is instead falsely portrayed by the patriarchy as a demoness.

Sorry for any confusion. If there are any questions or thoughts to share, please feel free.

Goddess blessings,
Mary

[Helena]

Hi Mary and All,

It is such a joy to have your offers here at the MB. Real grounding wisdom you offer to all of us.
When I mentioned the Goddesses with many arms, the image that came to mind reading your words, it was also because of the allegory that each of the asteroid Goddesses can be portrayed as each of these arms coming down to the whole Lilith body. Each carrying a bit of the wisdom, a bit of Her story. So nice :-)
Of course Lilith and Ceres share that special connection through Mother Nature. I remember some time ago, I think when there was all this fuss about billionaires trying to go to space, I had a dream when I was being guided to the most beautiful green landscape one can imagine by two women, maybe not Goddesses but certainly wise women, and remember thinking in the dream, 'why go to space when it's all here'... That's not to say our evolution won't pass by space travel but that one of the biggest self-limiting beliefs of the patriarchal model is the idea of a certain kind of transcendence (specially of the body) that is in my view a big evolutionary attempt to skip steps in personal and collective evolution. When we know higher planes are for those who made the effort to evolve into the last evolutionary states, surely not skipping the reality of this plane and intrinsically connecting to Mother Nature. So the perspective you bring of shamanistic grounding as our collective need is certainly what natural Lilith is all about. Of course, there is a all new take of the patriarchal commercial profit model on the shamanic essence and peoples by the "white man" that worries me as to the destruction of the most sacred. But that is an all other issue...
Thank you also for the perspective you bring of the original connection of Lilith to the idea of a fearsome demon for the message of "Stay away or else" it's surely stems from the original woman voice and need for core survival. I will look at the book you mention.

There is one think I'd like to mention relative to the asteroid Psyche, is that to me there is a strong relationship with Psyche, Corse and Persephone. I tend to see Psyche's journey, in it's four stages, two plus two, as a blend of the evolution of women's psyche going down and up the daughters journey. She also evoques an idea of Eros that would come first from herself, with her journey starting with the mistaken idea she would enter the underworld in order to sacrifice herself to a beloved she had hardly knew, to a mature idea of the need to come out as having made the journey for her own evolution, bringing herself to the world as whole, not in in need of the other. Of course in this journey she is greatly help by nature spirits and animals and I have a special appreciation for psyche and how she can help women's soul journey with her story. Would you agree? One interesting thing for us to consider is that in this solar eclipse just passed, eros is conjunct the eclipse degree in taurus, trine psyche in virgo, which is a very interesting theme of soul healing.

Once again, thank you very much for your offerings Mary,
Helena

P.S.  I would like lo share an image I just caught by accident as I was looking for something else, that is an add for vintage gold tone letters  EA truly is gold

[Rad]

Hi All,

Here is the story of Sofia Sapega. She was born February 10th, 1998. The chart below is a noon chart.

                                                         ******************

Belarus plane arrest activist Sofia Sapega sentenced to six years

Russian citizen held along with boyfriend a year ago when flight she was on was forced to land

Guardian
Fri 6 May 2022 14.22 BST

A woman who ran a Belarusian opposition messaging app channel and was arrested along with her activist boyfriend when an airliner they were on was forced to land in Belarus has been convicted of charges that included inciting social hatred.

Following her conviction, Sofia Sapega was sentenced to six years in prison. Sapega is a Russian citizen, and her lawyer, Anton Gashinsky, said she would appeal to the Russian president, Vladimir Putin, to intervene.

Sapega and Roman Protasevich were flying from Athens to Vilnius, Lithuania, a year ago when their plane was ordered to land in Belarus accompanied by a fighter jet because of an alleged bomb threat.

Protasevich was the editor of Nexta, a popular channel on the Telegram messaging app that was used to help organise protests in Belarus after the president, Alexander Lukashenko, won a disputed sixth term in August 2020.

Sapega ran another Telegram channel that published the personal data of civil servants and military personnel who took part in mass repressions of the protests.

Western countries denounced the plane diversion as tantamount to air piracy by Belarus. The European Union banned Belarusian airlines from its air space and airports as part of sanctions against the country.

"I am sorry for Sofia and her family. No one should suffer from dictatorship," the exiled Belarus opposition leader Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya wrote on Twitter after Friday's verdict.

The Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Sapega would get assistance, but declined to comment on the sentence itself.

"She is a citizen of Russia, so in any case, through our diplomats and other channels, we will continue to protect her legitimate interests," he told reporters on a conference call.

Asked, whether he thought the verdict was fair, Peskov said: "We greatly dislike it when someone comments on the decisions of our courts, so we will not comment the decision of the court in friendly Belarus."

The post-election protests were the most serious challenge to Lukashenko's authoritarian rule since he first took office in 1994.

The protests attracted as many as 200,000 people in the capital of Belarus on some days and persisted for several months. Authorities responded with a severe crackdown in which police arrested more than 35,000 people and thousands were beaten. Leading opposition figures have been imprisoned or forced into exile.

                                                                **************

'They will kill me': Belarusian blogger's descent into horror

Roman Protasevich had told friends he was being followed in Athens. Hours later he was escorted away at Minsk airport

by Andrew Roth in Moscow and Helena Smith in Athens
Mon 24 May 2021 14.10 BST

As Roman Protasevich's Ryanair flight began descending towards Minsk, the 26-year-old Belarusian opposition blogger grew frantic, giving his phone and laptop to his girlfriend and pleading with a flight attendant to stop the plane from landing.

"Don't do this, they will kill me, I am a refugee," a fellow passenger described him as saying. "We must, we have no choice," the attendant reportedly replied.

Soon, a visibly trembling Protasevich, who had spent much of last summer managing Telegram channels broadcasting mass protests against the Belarus leader, Alexander Lukashenko, was led away as the plane stood on the tarmac. "I'm facing the death penalty here," he said. His girlfriend, Sofia Sapega, was also detained.

Before boarding the flight from Greece to Lithuania, where the blogger lives in exile, Protasevich had told friends he was being shadowed at Athens airport by a bald man with a leather suitcase speaking Russian.

"Lol, it seems that the [security services] were following me at the airport," he texted one friend in Russian. "And even tried to photograph my documents. It's not certain. But in any case that's some suspicious shit."

At that stage there was little suggestion of the extraordinary and historic events that were about to take place. In behaviour that bore the hallmarks of a pariah state, Belarusian authorities forced Protasevich's plane to divert by calling in a bomb threat then scrambled a MiG-29 to escort it down to Minsk airport.

Four more people deplaned in the Belarusian capital, suggesting Protasevich's hunch that he was being tailed by the local KGB was correct. "[Lukashenko] carried it off beautifully," wrote Margarita Simonyan, the head of the Russian state-financed RT.

Often referred to as Europe's last dictator, Lukashenko brutally suppressed last year's protests, prompting sanctions against his regime. Now, as Europe's leaders meet to discuss their response to what the Ryanair CEO, Michael O'Leary, called a "state-sponsored hijacking", he faces the prospect of having air links to his country suspended altogether.

Protasevich had been in Greece to cover a speech at the Delphi Economic Forum by Svetlana Tikhanovskaya, the Belarusian opposition leader in exile, and then spent time a few days on holiday before boarding his flight back to Vilnius, where he lives. Tikhanovskaya and an aide, Franak Via?orka, had taken the same flight over Belarus a week earlier without incident.

Passengers onboard the flight on Sunday described a slow descent into horror as Protasevich, who fled Belarus fearing for his life in 2019, realised he would be landing in a country that has charged him with terrorism and inciting mass riots.

The plane was closer to Vilnius than Minsk when, at about 12.50pm local time, an emergency signal was activated. Belarus claims the pilot chose to land in Minsk, but Ryanair said the decision came from Belarusian air traffic controllers.

"When it was announced that the plane was returning to Belarus, I saw his reaction," Nikos Petalis, a Greek passenger who runs a fast food business in Lithuania, told Mega TV on Monday. "He started grabbing his head as if something bad was going to happen. He seemed scared ... You looked at him and thought: 'Something is going on with him.'"

"It looked like if the window had been open, he would have jumped out of it," another passenger, Edvinas Dimsa, told Agence France-Presse.

During the descent, Protasevich, dressed in a hoodie, black cap and face mask, began preparing for his arrest. "He got up and grabbed his bag and started passing his computer and telephone and some things to his girlfriend and hide some information," said a passenger seated several seats behind Protasevich.

Passengers were kept in the dark while Belarusian fighter jets flanked the plane on its approach to an emergency landing in Minsk. "The company kept sending us text messages but no explanation was ever made by the pilot as to why the plane made the emergency landing," said Petalis.

Once the Boeing 737-800 landed in Minsk, passengers were kept onboard for an hour while patrol guards with dogs assembled outside. Guard dogs were brought onboard for a security check and then the passengers were escorted to a waiting room where they were "weren't allowed to move, even go to the loo", Petalis said.

Another passenger said they were stripped down and forced to undergo body searches. "It was the old tradition of the Russian, Soviet services," he said, describing being stripped of his boots and searched "all over" by hand. "It was very unpleasant."

Before that, security officials approached Protasevich and searched him separately as his fellow passengers watched. Then, with little explanation, he was led away.

"It was straight out of a film, a horror film," said Petalis.

The whereabouts of Protasevich and Sapega are still unknown.

And: https://edition.cnn.com/2021/05/26/europe/belarus-sofia-sapega-roman-protasevich-ryanair-hijack-intl/index.html

                                                                ****************

Her natal Lilith is 8 Sagittarius, N.Node 4 Capricorn, S.Node 23 Taurus. Her natal Amazon is 11 Gemini, N.Node 4 Taurus, and the S.Node is 9 Sagittarius.

Please feel free to comment or ask questions.

Goddess Bless, Rad

[blue]

Greetings Helena and to all,

Thanks for your post sharing your precious woman wisdom. With respect to the Goddesses with many arms, so true. That's an intriguing way to now perceive Lilith, where each goddess operates like one of her arms. Wonderful! As for the patriarchal shortcomings you cite, such as"billionaires trying to go to space", bodily "transcendence" and "patriarchal commercial profit models", you are absolutely right. All emanate from the same distorted root - the separation of Flesh from Spirit, which JWG emphasized the universal significance of in his teachings through the Garden of Eden myth being that which poisons all branches on the tree.

The Sacred Feminine's wisdom teaches that Flesh and Spirit are teachers of one for the other in their own ways - both sacred. This is a truth forming the foundation of a shamanistic consciousness like Lilith's. One of the ways that its Essence is naturally transmitted is simply by women through natural sexuality. Recovery of this wisdom, which is being championed by the resurgence now of the Sacred Feminine, has the potential to transform patriarchal ignorance and arrogance that influences and manifests in the ways you cited into appreciation about the preciousness and sanctity of all life, about humankind's need to own that if they wish to survive and evolve as a species.

With respect to your question about Psyche and her connection to Kore and Persephone,I agree totally. The journey into the underworld that the sacred daughters undertake is allegory for the human journey into the realm of the unconscious Soul. Spirit/Soul involutes into Flesh (to tie in the subject above) and through the teachings that the human receives in the Flesh, evolves back to Spirit/Soul as a function of Consciousness regenerating itself. Psyche's journey as laid out in your words is totally accurate, where the free-will desire of sacrificing herself for the sake of love unwittingly becomes the essence of the journey itself. And yes I agree as you intuit that Eros, representing archetypally love's desire, does come from within herself. In its purest form, Eros symbolizes the heart's initial thrust that originates within every Soul reflecting its primal desire to know and experience love.

Many reiterations of this original myth diversify to include the longing,passion and eroticism of human love-making as an aspect characterizing this desire of the Soul. This harks back to ancestral knowledge of natural sexuality's power to inwardly unify lovers through the Soul to the divine, the basis of pagan sexual rites. In later versions influenced by patriarchal thinking and lifestyles, it unsurprisingly devolved into lust. So Eros symbolizes this "love" that the Soul/Psyche desires to longingly possess with unrelenting determination and "know" as its very own.

This love with its desire that plays out in all forms in phenomenal reality is planted like a seed by the Mother/Source for its germination and ripening within every heart. It manifests as the vehicle through which every Soul's universal nature becomes realized, and the means through which its evolutionary journey unfolds and is measured. So it is huge.

The trials that Psyche undertakes designed by the goddess of love herself, Aphrodite, reveal the tremendous and seemingly impossible tasks and sacrifice, as you say, plus the odds stacked against her success, that are involved. And the beings that help, the nature spirits and animals that you mention, reminds me that life's magic through which this divine power manifests is universal, found everywhere and dwelling within all.This truth is reflected in Indigenous Earth wisdom that cautions one to respect all beings as sacred because one never knows where, when or how the Creator will manifest itself as divine love through any of them.

This archetype most definitely helps women recover Herself. This dimension of experiencing oneself as a divine lover to the Creatress or Source is a crucial aspect of every woman's journey to recover her wholeness, as you say, where she matures on the other side. She needs human and non-human relationships alike as children, partners, friends, family, community, nation, etc, serving as teachers to satisfy her Soul desire to know love in order to evolve and ultimately experience her wholeness through its wisdom.

The true love her Soul seeks in Eros is from the Source of life itself, where after all the turmoil and angst she undergoes to find it, will one day bear fruit satisfying all the longings (Eros) of her heart. She not only heals herself through the Consciousness that attends it, which now becomes her own, but can help heal others. This is Psyche's ascension into heaven, where she/the Soul reunites to Eros, symbolizing her Oneness with the Source of love itself, herself now a divine lover who has earned the privilege to dwell there eternally.

This all cycles back to Lilith herself within every women, where the recovery of her shamanistic root revolves around simply reopening her heart to Nature itself.

The symbols for the recent solar eclipse that you mention beautifully reflect this through the theme of Soul healing as you mention, planting the seed to validate, heal and own this space and need within every heart (Eros, Sun, Moon in Taurus trine Psyche in Virgo) whose purpose reflects the Soul's own root and primal desire as human (Psyche trine to Eros; Eros, Sun, Moon sextile to Mars in Pisces), including sexually through its lost,sacred use (Psyche opposition to Mars).

If there are any questions or thoughts to share, please feel free.

Goddess Blessings to you and to all,
Mary

[Helena]

Hi Mary and All,

Just wish to thank you for the wonderful gifts you share with us and for again taking the time to go deeper into this subjects. As usual, every time I read from what you share I found another layer of meaning. Personally I happen to have a psyche return transit that falls in my 12th house, so everything you wrote feels like all the pieces falling into place :-) It's a an asteroid I have a special appreciation for and I like specially the fact that you mention that we look at psyche has an allegory for the involutionary process. If we think about it that changes things a bit for the mortal human because we always instinctively look (and instinctively know) at the involutionary process as being something less than, but looking at it through the psyche experience there is an immediate empathy, compassion and love, in reality for our human existence (of course, this is a psyche virgo sentence ). Which is in itself healing.
So thank you again for broadening that overall meaning.

Many blessings,
Helena

[Rad]

Hi All,

Here is the chart for Maria Alyokhina of Pussy Riot who recently escaped from Russia. This is a noon chart for her. Here is her story.

                                                                        *************

Leader of Pussy Riot Band Escapes Russia, With Help From Friends

After more than a decade of activism, Maria Alyokhina disguised herself as a food courier to evade the police — and a widening crackdown by President Vladimir Putin.

By Valerie Hopkins and Misha Friedman
NY Times
5/10/2022

To hear more audio stories from publications like The New York Times, download Audm for iPhone or Android.

VILNIUS, Lithuania — Maria V. Alyokhina first came to the attention of the Russian authorities — and the world — when her punk band and performance art group Pussy Riot staged a protest against President Vladimir V. Putin in Moscow's Christ the Savior Cathedral.

For that act of rebellion in 2012, she was sentenced to two years in prison for "hooliganism." She remained determined to fight Mr. Putin's system of repression, even after being jailed six more times since last summer, each stint for 15 days, always on trumped-up charges aimed at stifling her political activism.

But in April, as Mr. Putin cracked down harder to snuff out any criticism of his war in Ukraine, the authorities announced that her effective house arrest would be converted to 21 days in a penal colony. She decided it was time to leave Russia — at least temporarily — and disguised herself as a food courier to evade the Moscow police who had been staking out the friend's apartment where she was staying. She left her cellphone behind as a decoy and to avoid being tracked.

A friend drove her to the border with Belarus, and it took her a week to cross into Lithuania. In a studio apartment in Vilnius, the Lithuanian capital, she agreed to an interview to describe a dissident's harrowing escape from Mr. Putin's Russia.

"I was happy that I made it, because it was an unpredictable and big" kiss-off to the Russian authorities, Ms. Alyokhina said, using a less polite term. "I still don't understand completely what I've done," she admitted, dressed in black except for a fanny pack with a rainbow belt.

Ms. Alyokhina, 33, has spent her entire adult life fighting for her country to respect its own Constitution and the most basic human rights, like freedom of expression. After being freed early from prison in December 2013, she and another member of Pussy Riot founded Mediazona, an independent news outlet focused on crime and punishment in Russia.

She also wrote a memoir, "Riot Days," and traveled internationally performing a show based on the book. Though her dream was to tour with it in Russia, only three venues agreed to host the show, and all faced repercussions.

Ms. Alyokhina was committed to remaining in Russia despite regular surveillance and pressure from the authorities. But now she has joined the tens of thousands of Russians who have fled since the invasion of Ukraine.

Ms. Alyokhina, whose friends call her Masha, had bitten her nails down to stubs, and she puffed almost unceasingly on a vape or on Marlboro Lights. She made the journey in black, three-inch platform boots without laces — a nod to her many stints in jail, where shoelaces are confiscated.

In prison, she and others instead threaded moist towelettes through the eyelets of their shoes to keep them on. As a statement, she and other members of Pussy Riot will wear them while they perform during a tour, starting on May 12 in Berlin, to raise money for Ukraine.

When it first began more than a decade ago, Pussy Riot seemed as much publicity stunt as political activism. But if their protest in the Moscow cathedral — where they sang a "Punk Prayer" ridiculing the symbiosis that had developed between the Russian Orthodox Church and the Kremlin — seemed overwrought at the time, today it appears prescient.

The church's leader, Patriarch Kirill, recently blessed Russian troops going to Ukraine, and the European Union put his name on a proposed list of people to be sanctioned.

Exactly 10 years to the day after the cathedral protest, Mr. Putin delivered a ranting speech in which he called Ukraine a country "created by Russia," laying the groundwork for his invasion.

Ms. Alyokhina listened to the speech on the radio from a jail cell. The invasion, she said, had changed everything, not just for her, but for her country.

"I don't think Russia has a right to exist anymore," she said. "Even before, there were questions about how it is united, by what values it is united, and where it is going. But now I don't think that is a question anymore."

During the interview she was surrounded by other members of the group, now a collective with about a dozen members. Most of them had also recently fled Russia, including her girlfriend, Lucy Shtein.

Ms. Shtein had chosen to leave Russia a month before, also evading restrictions on her movement by sneaking out in a delivery-service uniform. Her decision came after someone posted a sign on the door of the apartment she shared with Ms. Alyokhina accusing them of being traitors.

Ms. Alyokhina and Ms. Shtein were once imprisoned for Instagram posts calling for the release of political prisoners in Russia. In February, Ms. Alyokhina was sentenced to 15 days for "propaganda of Nazi symbolism" over another Instagram post, this one from 2015, that criticized Mr. Putin's ally, the Belarusian dictator Aleksandr G. Lukashenko. Ms. Shtein was detained at the same time on similar charges.

"They are scared because they cannot control us," Ms. Alyokhina said.

By the time she arrived at Belarus's border with Lithuania, she had a Lithuanian visa that she tried to use with her Russian domestic I.D., as Russia had confiscated her passport. By then she had been placed on Russia's "wanted" list.

In her first attempt to cross, Ms. Alyokhina was held by Belarusian border guards for six hours before being sent back. On her second try, the incredulous officer on duty just sent her away.

Two countries inch closer to NATO. A day after Finland's leaders declared that the nation would move to join the alliance, Sweden announced it would follow suit. But their acceptance into the group might not be as swift as expected: President Recep Tayyip Erdogan of Turkey suggested that his country would be reluctant to openly welcome the two nations into NATO.

On the ground. Russia continued to bombard largely abandoned and devastated towns in the Luhansk and Donetsk regions of eastern Ukraine without making any major gains. Ukrainian forces have been driving Russians from the area to the north around the city of Kharkiv.

G7 meeting. Agricultural ministers from the Group of 7 major economies gathered in Germany, to discuss how to mitigate the broader costs of the war. Britain imposed new sanctions on Putin's inner circle, and the European Union said it would provide additional military support to Ukraine.

Civilian killings. The United Nations human rights chief said that the bodies of more than 1,000 civilians, including several hundred who were summarily executed, have been recovered in areas near Kyiv that were occupied by Russian forces in the early stages of the invasion.

But on the third try, she got through. Ms. Alyokhina had allies outside the country working to find her a path to freedom. One was the Icelandic performance artist Ragnar Kjartansson, a friend who convinced a European country to issue Ms. Alyokhina a travel document that essentially gave her the same status as an E.U. citizen. The country's officials asked that it not be named.

The document was smuggled into Belarus for Ms. Alyokhina to use. While there, she avoided hotels or anywhere she would need to show proof of identity, which could tip off the people searching for her.

Ms. Alyokhina eventually boarded a bus to Lithuania with the document in hand. She laughed when she described how much better she was treated by the border guards when they thought of her as a "European," rather than Russian.

"A lot of magic happened last week," she said. "It sounds like a spy novel."

The fact that she was able to get out of Russia and Belarus was a reflection, she said, of chaotic Russian law enforcement.

"From here it looks like a big demon, but it is very disorganized if you look from the inside," she said. "The right hand doesn't know what the left hand is doing."

Ms. Alyokhina says she hopes to return to Russia. But no one has any idea how that could happen, when even the most dedicated activists are imprisoned or forced into exile.

Every day in Vilnius, new members of the group were arriving, fleeing Russia and joining for rehearsals for the European tour.

After a few days, Ms. Alyokhina traveled to Iceland with some other group members to visit Mr. Kjartansson, who arranged for them to rehearse in the building that once housed the country's High Court.

Ms. Alyokhina asked Mr. Kjartansson and Bjork, a relative of his, to perform at events organized by pro-Ukrainian activists when Pussy Riot performs in Iceland. The answer, Mr. Kartjansson said, was a resounding "Yesss!"

In Vilnius, Ms. Alyokhina's phone buzzed with messages of support and relief that she was now "safe" after the weeklong journey. Ms. Alyokhina chafed at these well-intentioned expressions, which she said were off the mark.

"If your heart is free," she said, "it doesn't matter where you are."

**********

Her natal Lilith is 29 Leo, N.Node 23 Sagittarius, S.Node 19 Gemini. Her natal Amazon is 27 Virgo, N.Node 28 Taurus, and the S.Node is 13 Scorpio.

Please feel free to comment or ask questions.

Goddess Bless, Rad

[Helena]

Hi Mary, Rad, All,

I thought it's interesting to share this new exhibition from the British Museum, it is spot on in what we discussed earlier. It's definitely worth seeing for those who can visit.

https://www.britishmuseum.org/exhibitions/feminine-power-divine-demonic

https://www.theguardian.com/culture/2022/may/16/goddesses-marina-warner-volcanic-power-of-witches-she-devils-divinities-british-museum

Best to All,
Helena