Join Katalin Koda and ceremonialists bringing love, beauty and sanctity to honor the power of Self~Marriage. Last fall Katalin journeyed to east India to commit vows to herself and honor her path on earth in an Ancient Yogini~Dakini Temple. From this experience came an even deeper connection to her work with Fire of the Goddess and the Sacred Feminine.

This is the launch and first public screening of Katalin’s ten minute short documentary, Fire of the Goddess: A Ceremony of Self~Marriage. The night willalso include a short presentation on ‘Why Self-Marriage?’ and the Dakini, an ancient sacred feminine goddess form.

Attending this event is an opportunity for you to experience what Katalin holds most dear about Mother India: the merging of art~sacred~ceremony with the everyday~ mundane~ordinary. Katalin and the extraordinary Dakini goddesses, dancers, singers and musicians are creating a space that connects us to the ancient Dakini~Yogini temple, to forge a bridge between a time of honoring the Goddess, the sacred feminine and now, a time of full Rebirth.

Here you will be able to make offerings from your heart, experience sacred chanting, participate in ceremonial expression and beauty and find the quality of transcendence in creating and stating your own personal self~marriage vows.

featured:

~Interactive Dakini Goddesses
~Tribal Fusion Bellydancers: Starfire Flame Sisters
~Kirtan with Robinette & Friends
~Inner Shrine to Write, Speak Vows to Self
~Indian Delights Including Raw Foods, Elixirs and Chai

Saturday, April 27th, 7 PM, $10
at 12 MileMarker, Route 130,
Pahoa, Big Island HAWAII

www.katalinkoda.com
www.earthweaver.blogspot.com

Fire of the Goddess celebrates Summer Solstice on the Big Island of Hawaii

Join us in this special women’s retreat to honor Midsummer, a time of celebration, joy and activation.  On the Big Island, we are ignited by the power and magic of Pele, the goddess of fire and the volcano.  As the year turns toward the dark, this is the moment to take a leap of faith into the unknown and find our wildest potential, supported by love, beauty and strength in a circle of women.

Summer Solstice is the moment when the sun reaches its furthest point from the equator and is the longest day of the year in the Northern Hemisphere.  This is considered a potent magical time to assist us on our life’s paths.

This course is appropriate for any woman who is yearning to activate and deepen her connection to her own infinite potential.  

Fire of the Goddess uses the sacred art of circling and ceremony, explorations of goddess mythology and the ancient practice of Yoga to connect deeply with our inner love, power and wisdom.  Anusara, flowing with Grace,  Yoga aligns us directly with the divine and empowers us as women to embody our divinity in feminine form.  Inspired by the Big Island’s natural landscapes of ocean, volcano, caves and jungles we integrate the wonder of nature and transform our lives into wholeness and fulfillment.

Fire of the Goddess:  Celebrate Summer Solstice includes:

~Daily Anusara Yoga and Women’s Circles

~Goddess Mythology

~Shamanic Journeywork

~Healing Practices and Sacred Space Work

~Initiations into Personal Power

~Bonfire Ceremony

~Opportunities to Explore the Coast of the Big Island

Fire of the Goddess retreat is located at Kalani Honua on the Big Island of Hawaii.  Check out more here! This special Summer Solstice retreat will be held at the Ocean Cottages, a secluded area of Kalani’s grounds giving us the quiet serenity to dive deep into our work with the sacred feminine.  Accommodation at Kalani is eco-village style, simple and comfortable with low impact living.  Cost includes three gourmet meals a day on the open air lanai and access to all of Kalani facilities. There will be free time to use the services including the pool, sauna, jacuzzi, traditional Hawaiian massage and various healing treatments.

Reserve your space now, email Katalin at katalinkoda@gmail.com

Pele, the fire goddess that dwells on the Big Island of Hawai’i is back in action, once again.  Check out this video for latest incredible lava

Fire of the Goddess

flows!  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1eOPLYa7hng

Below is the myth of how Pele came to live on the island, adapted from Linda Ching’s Hawaiian Goddesses and retold in my book, Fire of the Goddess published by Llewellyn Worldwide, July 2011.

How Pele Came to Live on Hawai’i

Pele was born with long flowing red hair, different from all the rest of her brothers and sisters.  Her temper was quite fierce, another trait that set her apart from her family.  Pele’s mother was the Earth Goddess Haumea and her father, Wākea, ruler of the sky. She had many brothers and sisters, all who are guardians of the elements of nature.  Pele inspired love and devotion in all of her family except for one sister, Nāmakaokaha’i, or Nāmaka, the goddess of water who was threatened by Pele’s fiery nature.

As a child, Pele loved to lick the fire and dance with the flames.  This sickened her sister, Nāmaka who would watch from the outskirts as Pele’s scarlet hair caught fire and she inhaled cinders delightedly.  Nāmakaokaha’i knew Pele carried immense power, holding the potential to burn bigger and brighter than any fire.  Once, when Pele realized Nāmaka was watching her, Pele shrugged and said it was merely child’s play, but Nāmaka knew better.  The two sisters stared at each other with an intense dislike until the moment was broken by Hi’iaka, Pele’s favorite sister.

Hi’iaka was the youngest and most loved of Pele’s family and would soon join Pele on her journey.  Hi’iaka was born in a special way, in the form of an egg and was nurtured by Pele until she became a goddess.  Together, the two formed a deep, loving friendship and sisterhood.

One day, Nāmaka returned from her travels through the waters of nearby islands.  When she arrived home, she found much of the land burned and scalded by Pele’s searing fiery work.  Because of Pele’s unquenchable desire and formidable power to change the land, Nāmaka convinced their mother, Haumea that Pele should be banished from the homeland.  Haumea, earth mother and guardian of the sacred homeland, listened closely to Nāmaka.  Finally, her heart heavy with sorrow, she decided that Nāmaka was right, that Pele must find a new place to work her powerful magic, one that would not destroy their home or ohana (family).

Pele did not fight against her dear mother’s wishes.  She took only two things with her:
her magic firestick which enabled her to connect with the inner fire of the land, and her beloved sister Hi’iaka. Other loyal attendants joined them including several brothers and sisters who decided they wanted to live with Pele once she found a suitable place to reside.  The group left their homeland, in a sacred canoe and followed the stars across the Pacific.

Finally she reached the chain of Hawai’ian islands.  But the first island in the chain was still too close to the water and Nāmaka’s wrath.  Similarly her fire was too close to the water on the island of O’ahu.  She moved on to Maui, leaving behind a trail of smoke and volcanic glow that rose up from the craters.  This infuriated Nāmaka who set out to destroy Pele once and for all.   Before they fought, Pele made a deal with Nāmaka, that they would fight on their own terms, using their personal powers.

The destructive, wrathful fires of Pele rose up to meet the powerful waves of Nāmaka.  They fought an entire day, masses of steam rising up between the wall of water and fountain of fire.  Finally, Nāmaka, in her weariness, dishonored the fight and called Haui, the sea serpent to her.  Reinforced by his strength, Nāmaka and Haui defeated Pele and tore her body apart, scattering her bones on the island of Maui.  Nāmaka gloated to the others of her victory for a short time, before one of the gods, Kāne, pointed to the sky above Hawai’i.  There, over Mauna Loa and Mauna Kea, the mountains on Hawai’i, the heavens were ablaze as if they had been set on fire.  The spirit of Pele glowed in the skies, reborn in the ethers.

Pele again assumed human form and reunited with her family.  They sailed to Hawai’i, the last island on the chain.  As she climbed upon the new land, she felt a shudder of beauty and feeling of home move through her.  She climbed up Kilauea and struck the earth a final time with her firestick.  At that moment, she heard the ‘elepaio bird sing and felt it was a favorable omen.  She laughed with delight as she realized the site was perfect, far enough away from the wrath of Nāmaka.  Pele worked with her stick, forming the crater and filling it with the boiling, molten lava and joyfully sending it down the slope, into the sea.  The work of the Fire Bearer could finally flourish.  There, at the pit of Halema’uma’u, Pele took up residence with her family.  She can be seen there to this day, still happily sending fiery lava destroying and creating land as is her wondrous passion.  Pele brought her power of fire to the islands, a gift that reminds of continuous creation and destruction and inspires us to seek our own Fire Bearer within.

>In Hawai’i, I am finding that we are exposed to a variety of teachers and masters who come through to give offerings to Pele of Hawai’i and share their wisdom with locals and guests alike. This past weekend I received a wonderful healing and blessing from two Inkan Master Healers in the south district of Ka’u on the Big Island, Hawai’i.

I drove down with a friend and Yoko, leaving the lush, humid Puna coast, climbing up Kilauea mountain where the active volcano is continuously pouring lava out onto the mountain, down the slopes into the sea. This island is famous for its micro climates and it really is stunning how you can flow from wet to dry, lush to desolate, ocean to mountaintop in a matter of minutes.

We stopped at Punalu’u beach where sea turtles, or Honu, make their home munching endlessly on the tasty seaweed that grows on black lava rocks. The black sand is hot and clings to your skin here, shining in the sun as the locals swim in the freezing cold Pacific indigo water, counting turles. Yoko hopped around amongst yellow sea butterflies, digging trails in the sand. Seeing the massive turtles pull themselves up onto the beach is amazing to me, even if it is commonplace for Hawai’i!

Anyway, we arrived in at the orchards where the ceremony was held, a despacho or offering, made to Mother Earth known as Panchamama by these extraordinary Master Healers. They came from the Andes mountains in Peru, brought by their faithful student who resides in Hawai’i, to share their knowledge with others and co-mingle spiritual energy with Hawai’i. The couple, who have been together for over fifty years, practicing healing and spiritual work, hail from the Q’ero Nation of Peru, some of the last pure descendants of the Inkan people. Their village is only 400 people and we were told that these two, who must be in their 70s, are of the last of the elders still living!

Indeed, I felt very blessed to be a part of the ceremony. We were given cocoa leaves while the couple built a beautiful mandala-like offering with flowers, candles, seeds, leaves, grain and candies, blowing their spirit breath continously into the offerings. Several pairs of red and white objects were laid into the despacho, the red symbolizing Mother Earth, Panchamama and her Spirit and the white symbolizing the Masculine, male spirits of the Mountains. They were assisted by two Hawai’ians, one woman and one man, effectively weaving the traditional flowers of this place and the colors of the two countries flags together. This was moving, to say the least. After we blew our own dedication to Mother Earth into the cocoa leaves, we gave them to the Healers to put in the offering. We were then given maize to blow our desires or wishes and put them ourselves into the despacho, alongside two crisp hundred dollar bills. Practical wishes of business going well, along with the spiritual, amused me and seemed just right!

Finally, after an hour or more of this, with lots of breath and connectedness, the despacho was filled. Yoko had fallen completely asleep and I carried her to the fire that was made to receive the offering. As it was thrown in and burning, our circle of people, mostly from Ka’u, I suppose, and the Peruvian couple hugged one another other in joy. He played the flute and the Hawai’ian man played the conch shell as we let our offering sing itself back to Mother Earth.

I am so thankful to be living in this incredibly rich, interesting place, a place abundant with beautiful nature and wondrous people drifting onto and off this magical island. If you want to know more about these lovely Peruvians and their work, please visit
http://www.inka-online.com/

Aloha…