The Goddess returns: Restoring Her as a metaphysical truth (transcript)

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Episode Transcript:

Lian (00:00)

Hello, my beautiful mythical old souls and a huge warm welcome back. Could the forgotten face of God be the one we most need to remember? In this conversation, I'm joined once again by the wonderful Mike Bias.

Mike is my very own Kabbalah teacher as well as a physiotherapist, counselor, university lecturer, author and trained priest. His work spans the Atollodano Kabbalah,the esoteric Christian tradition called the ASA and round table work based on Arthurian legends.

Together we explore the sacred return of the goddess as both a universal principle and living presence.

We journey through ancient traditions that once honored her, the distortions that led to her exile, the path of remembrance now unfolding within us, around us and through us. This conversation reaches far beyond metaphor or story into the very structure of creation itself. At the heart of this conversation is a remembering she is never left. She is the fertile earth beneath our feet, the womb of every form, the shimmering thread of divinity closed in matter. What has been forgotten is not her presence, but our ability to see her. This episode is an invitation to reawaken that vision and to live as if she truly is the body of the world.

And before we jump into all of that good stuff, if you're struggling with the challenges of walking your soul path in this crazy modern world,and with benefit from guidance, kinship and support, come join our Academy of the Soul, UNIO. You can find out more and join us by hopping on over to BeMythical.com slash UNIO or click the link in the description.

And now back to this week's episode, let's dive in.

Lian (01:54)

Hello Mike, welcome back to the show for the fourth time maybe, third time, I don't know. It's a few times.

Mike (02:00)

Yeah, I think so.

At least I think. Yeah. Yeah. Thank you, Lian. Yeah. It's good to be here again and to do another podcast. So thank you.

Lian (02:04)

Hmm.

Well, this episode kind of emerged quite spontaneously from a conversation we're having a week ago. And then it was like, huh, this is a conversation actually that belongs on the show. So we kind of, we spoke about it a bit and then kind of like held it ready to birth into this conversation. I've been... ⁓

I've been pregnant with it all week, actually, is probably a good way of saying it. And it really does feel like a very timely and beautiful conversation to be having and especially with you coming to which would like to actually start there in that the, reason you feel like the perfect person to have this conversation with is twofold.

The first is your understanding of both kind of you could say metaphysical truth of the goddess, but then also the kind of gets more mythical ways that we might experience her. ⁓ And so that's something I certainly know that we'll get into as we talk. However, the other reason it really feels good that it's you that I'm this conversation with.

is I know that you like me have a kind of almost, you might say a sort of personal mission or devotion to the restoration of the goddess. And I remember it really touched me. We were talking about your work with the ASA as a priest. And as you were talking about that and you were saying that in your, I hope it's okay for me to share this story that you told me.

Mike (03:56)

of course, anything,

yeah.

Lian (03:58)

You don't know what I'm about to say. You were sharing with me that in your lifetime you want to, you've ordained I think a couple of other priests, but in your lifetime you want to ordain at least one woman ⁓ into that tradition, if I have that right. And when you shared that with me and your reasons for doing that, it really, it really touched me.

Mike (04:01)

Yeah, but I trust it will be fine.

Yep.

Lian (04:28)

And I could really feel your devotion to that restoration of the feminine to the goddess. that just again made this conversation with you in particular, feel like the, the lined one to have. So firstly, thank you for that devotion. It really means a lot to me that you feel that way. ⁓ but that's where I'd like to start kind of your own senses to the, why is this something that's important to you?

Mike (04:50)

⁓ yeah.

Hmm.

Yeah, so for me, everything starts at the core of everything. And whether we talk about the ASA or another of the traditions that I follow, that I teach, behind me we see the Tree of Life. So that's the Kabbalistic Tree of Life, which is also actually a part of the ASA. There, everything starts from a transcendent reality, which is neither male or female. which creates existence and the first world within existence is the world of unity. It's still neither male or female, but both exist within potential there. And to become something, that one thing needs to ⁓ come into time and space and it has to become something of dual order. It has to become a manifestation in polarity. at least in principle at first in creation. And that becomes, if you like, the divine, creative, masculine and feminine, sometimes being said all force, all form, life force, life structure. ⁓ so the universe creation itself, not just a long time ago, but everything right now unfolding in this podcast is being based upon that foundation of the all-giving and receiving father and mother of existence, of the creation. So let's say a bit of the metaphysical, simply put, metaphysical background, which is more like logic or mathematics almost, so it doesn't really directly say something about the heart or the feeling, the sentiment behind it.

But I think it's very important to say something about it because that means that all traditions, whether it be religious or spiritual, metaphysical, should be based upon the principle of the one thing. And then there should be something within their liturgy and their creed in their temples ⁓ that testify of the presence of the male and the female, the masculine, the feminine within creation. And if that's not there, then you have a religion, or you have a liturgy or a certain ideology maybe even, which is based in a kind of disbalance to each other. And that's often the problem. So I see it as my work through Kabbalah, the ASA and even roundtable work to

Lian (07:46)

Hmm.

Mike (07:53)

I don't like the word to restore, but anyway, I'll use it anyway, to restore or to bring back the presence of the divine ⁓ feminine or the goddess, as she is also being called, back to her rightful place. And of course, her place is always there. We can't undo her from existence. We can just undo her from, you know, our church or our temple or our books.

Lian (08:13)

Mmm.

Mike (08:22)

for that matter, but yeah, to give her the rightful place that she has within the world of the psyche and eventually also within the world of today, so in the world of physical manifestation and our actions.

Lian (08:38)

Mm. So.

Mike (08:39)

And of course that's been going on already, but still a lot of work has to be done.

Lian (08:45)

Yes, absolutely. So I love that you've kind of outlined and your ability to make somewhat complex metaphysics clear. I think you're so good at that and I think this is a really good place to start. And yet I feel like I'm longing for more of a sense of Why is this important for you personally? Like that's where I really was getting at my question. Like, why is this important to you personally as Mike?

Mike (09:22)

Yeah, well that's more the sentimental emotional part of the whole thing. ⁓ They have a very strong ⁓ connection to the Mother Goddess, which for example the expression in nature, so everything of the natural world and the earth is extremely dear to me and I think it's a miracle where we are living upon. and within, mean, including our own physical body. I see that as a direct expression of the mother goddess. ⁓ And that really touches me all the time. She is the manifestation of the miracle. ⁓ mean, the power within it is the father, so to speak, but she is in there and that it doesn't stop ⁓ amazing me all the time. And that wonder, that awe, that's really for me, that's the...

Lian (10:00)

Hmm.

Mike (10:19)

the goddess, directly. So, yeah, for example, Lian, within the stories of the Kabbalah, ⁓ they talk about the Shekhinah, which is then the feminine presence of the divine within manifestation. And those stories are so enormously touching, I think, because she is in exile, she is within matter. ⁓

Lian (10:20)

Mmm.

Yeah.

Mike (10:47)

which for me is extremely relevant within mysticism because God is not somewhere else, the transcendent, it is imminent and it's right here. So she has clothed herself within creation, like in garments, and she is present within everything. So the Goddess is the principle that could bring us back to something that unites us all, or as a humanity, something that we really need.

Lian (10:53)

Mmm.

Mmm.

Mike (11:17)

I'm not talking just about the metaphysical principle here, it's really something personal for me that is really ⁓ moving me all the time. She is the evidence of the divine within matter, within creation itself.

Lian (11:27)

That's what I wanted to hear Mike.

Yeah. So let's, let's begin at the beginning, or at least kind of what we know as the beginning. As you were saying earlier, and I think this is a really important point to make, it's kind of obvious, but also something I think worth keep reminding ourselves. It's not that the goddess has actually gone anywhere. She's just gone from our awareness, she's gone from our scriptures, she's gone from our spiritual traditions and religions to a very large extent.

But of course she hasn't actually gone anywhere. But when we look at, say for example, Indigenous spiritual understanding, when we look at some of the most ancient spiritual traditions, she isn't missing. She's there, as I was saying just before we started recording.

I'm not saying there is no indigenous spiritual understanding of the world in which there isn't. I'm confused myself now the way I'm saying this is like a double negative. As far as I'm aware, almost all of them contain a god and goddess, mother, father, as part of their creation stories. It would certainly be, I'd say, rare case where that isn't included, she isn't included. And so,

We began with that understanding. I'd love to hear your sense of that because that's what really strikes me is this isn't something that kind of we are only discovering now. We actually once knew this. We knew her. We remembered her.

Mike (13:15)

Yeah, no, definitely I mean, there's nothing new under the sun, especially all the, let's say the ancient animistic, pantheistic, panantistic, polytheistic cultures all over the world. know, the classical cultures of the West, of the Occident or of the Orient, they all testify to the same thing. They have a whole pantheon of gods and goddesses and they're all brothers and sisters or

Lian (13:19)

Mm-hmm.

Mike (13:42)

you know, spouses and children of each other. And they have these interrelated relationships that is actually like the constellations in the sky. They make up a network of intelligence. And most of time it's quite balanced between the masculine and the feminine partners there, because that is metaphysically how the universe works anyway. So

Lian (13:43)

Mmm.

Hmm.

Mike (14:11)

They somehow picked it up and have verbalized it and actually put it into ⁓ also in scriptures and in parable and drawings and those kind of things. Like the Egyptians on the pillars and whatever in hieroglyphs. Yeah, no, so it has been there forever.

Lian (14:26)

Mmm.

Hmm. And then what went wrong?

Mike (14:36)

And again, what went wrong? ⁓ well, probably one of the first examples that I can mention that I know of is in the Judaic tradition, where in the early temple tradition, you had ⁓ an obvious partnership, we are talking about an equal partnership of the god

Lian (14:40)

What went wrong?

Mike (15:06)

Yahweh, Yod Hevav He, and ⁓ the goddess which was then called the Asherah. And Asherah was depicted as a tree, like a tree of life within the temple. So she was like the fruit-giving, blossoming partner of the God who was the provider of energy and of the divine outpouring so to speak.

But somehow on the way, and it happened after that as well in Christianity, and I think in a sense also in Islam, but that's a bit of a different story. yeah, she was eventually being ⁓ gradually being dismissed from the temple, from a tree. She became actually, ⁓ it's a bit of a funny thing probably, but she became actually the object where the thurible for the incense was being hung on. So that was her representation in the temple. I mean, it's not completely unimportant, but she actually had to move away from an equal partnership in this kind of horizontal sense. And then Yahweh become on top and she became more more degraded and not even mentioned almost at all after that.

Lian (16:11)

Goodness.

Mmm.

Mike (16:32)

probably with the exception of King Solomon who wrote up Psalms and love songs to the Goddess, to the divine partnership. But apart from that, ⁓ yeah, there was this change ⁓ from an equality between God and Goddess into a kind of, yeah, God-oriented, male-oriented, ⁓ yeah, development.

Lian (16:32)

Mm-hmm.

Mike (17:00)

And course what you see happening there in whatever tradition is that you get the priest class who are then dominantly male, who take over the authority of how to get to or how to worship the God in that particular temple.

Lian (17:01)

Mmm.

Hmm. It's interesting to me that it's with most of the traditions we're talking about. isn't that, I don't want to kind of focus too much on, the Kabbalah in this conversation. Cause I think we will certainly talk about it, but I don't want to constantly come back to that. Otherwise it's going to get confusing for people that aren't familiar with it. But if we were to look at it in,

Mike (17:41)

Yeah.

Lian (17:50)

Kabbalah terms and we were to say, you know, Bina and Chokmah, but we could be talking about it in other ways where we have this understanding of there's both God and Goddess that are kind of a sort of product, a product of this kind of unified consciousness, undivided consciousness. In the examples you're giving, it's not as though both the God and the Goddess

become dismissed and then we're looking directly at kind of Ketair, we're looking directly at this unified consciousness. It is as you're saying, that would kind of make more sense, but what actually happens is you say is the goddess that is degraded, is the goddess that is removed and know, Hukmer, the god, the dimasculine that is ⁓ revered as if that he can exist alone.

And I find that... ⁓

It's an interesting thing that that is what's happened rather than the say it's kind of, but they're both removed and we kind of look directly at this kind of notion of oneness. So what's your sense as to why it happened that way? Why was it the goddess that was removed from these scriptures?

Mike (18:56)

Hmm

I think it is because this, what I just mentioned, the problem of the priest class that came into the whole equation, the Levites, that had a certain take on the scriptures of the Torah, what we now would call in the Christian tradition the five first book of the Old Testament. And they started to look at Yahweh. as the supreme God. So in Kabbalistic terms, the God went from Chokmah actually to Keter. So it became the supreme one thing. But originally that was not the case. And that was the interpretation, I think, of the priest class there. And probably to emphasise their own maleness and that kind of papacy outlook on life.

Lian (19:45)

Hmm.

Mike (20:04)

where of course the Edenic first story of Genesis was being interpreted, it's not the story itself, but it's being interpreted as ⁓ the male being subject to the decisions of the female, and it was taken literally, not as a mythological or even a cosmological development, Genesis, because it's a creation story, but it was taken literally. So it was taken as male and female, not as...

Lian (20:04)

Hmm

Mmm.

Mike (20:33)

masculine and feminine divine principles. And there of course

Lian (20:36)

Hmm. There's actually, I'll make a note now. I did an episode, I don't know, about six months ago, talking directly about this, this sort notion of reclaiming Eve ⁓ and understanding that and her in the rightful way. So we'll make sure that's linked in the show notes because we kind of really focused in on that in particular. But yes, but please, please do go on.

Mike (21:01)

yeah, good. Yeah.

Yeah, so I think that is a problem of interpretation where it went wrong. Metaphysically, whether you look at the tree Kabbalistically or any other metaphysical system, when the goddess comes into existence, her role is to ⁓ create duality. So from her, life is born and because of the birth of life, death is instantly there.

Lian (21:34)

Hmm.

Mike (21:34)

So she is the manifestation of structure and of ⁓ this evidence of dualistic ⁓ experience within the universe. She is the one and the other, and that's the gift of the goddess. So it had to be Eve who made the choice, because through her, the divine could exist, but also relative existence could come into being.

Lian (21:45)

Hmm.

Hmm.

Mike (22:02)

it's a cosmic development rather than a fairy tale kind of ⁓ personal or even worse, a historical development. And so that's the thing I mean, it's not mentioned, but of course, the first wife of Adam was Lilith and she was dismissed from the story because she was too independent.

Lian (22:12)

Hmm.

Mike (22:27)

You can also see that story as this bad woman who went against creation, against Adam. But that also is a cosmic development. She is like the dark side of Eve, as Eve is the power of growth and fertility. She is exactly the other side. She's the decay and the rotting process within creation on whatever level, which is necessary.

Lian (22:40)

Hmm

Mmm, yes.

Mike (22:56)

the universe to exist and to develop. But these entities, so to speak, these expressions of the goddess have been qualified, I think, in a very different way. And we are stuck with the problem. And that's why she's being thrown out from her rightful position next to the god, you know, on an equal throne.

Lian (23:08)

Hmm.

Hmm. It's so interesting, isn't it? How it then has this compounding effect in that the more women are associated with those threatening aspects of the goddess, the more women can't be allowed to have power, especially spiritual power. And then the more that the God is associated with men, the more

Mike (23:34)

Yeah.

Lian (23:47)

power and again, especially spiritual power, it would have made sense for men to have. And then of course that's just compounded and compounded to where we've been for the last ⁓ couple of thousand years.

Mike (24:00)

Yes, exactly. Yeah. And the other thing is that's also a matter of interpretation, of course, that the feminine, Eve for example, in this case, she is the principle of duality. So with her comes choice and also the possibility of sin. You can make a mistake with your choices or miss the mark, as they sometimes say. And she's also the principle of receptivity. So for the

Lian (24:01)

Hmm

Hmm.

Mm-hmm.

Mike (24:28)

The serpent in the garden who actually gave the choice, ⁓ you know, or the temptation to choose for knowledge, the knowledge of good and evil, which is actually the ⁓ movement into relative existence or our incarnation. It has to be her because she's the bringer of structure and birth and she is the receptive part of the God-Goddess relationship.

Lian (24:50)

Mmm.

Mike (24:58)

So in a cosmic metaphysical way it makes perfect sense. But she should have stayed on the same equal level as the God. And the same happened later on with the coming of the Protestantism with Luther, who also by interpreting mainly the Old Testament ⁓ throughout Mary of the Church, or at least gave her a different position

Lian (25:03)

Hmm.

Mike (25:28)

in regard to Yahweh, the great God.

Lian (25:28)

Hmm. ⁓

Hmm. It's, ⁓ I-

Mike (25:35)

And that was originally definitely

not what it was all about. ⁓

Lian (25:40)

Yes, it's actually, it's funny because it was only, I mentioned I'd just received ⁓ a book which I don't think, I do have it here,I didn't know I had this behind me when I said it, so for those listening rather than watching, I have the book The Forgotten Feminine Face of God by Anne Baring, it's got beautiful. ⁓

Mike (26:04)

Yeah.

Lian (26:04)

Rose. ⁓Jonathan bought it for me and sent it to me last week as a present. It was that that actually kind of instigated our original conversation. So I'm glad I had the opportunity to reference this. But what really struck me was that I think once you've been in this way of understanding the goddess for a period of time, you forget how you saw the world before that. As in, it's so long now that there's been this sort of intentional restoration of the goddess within my own psyche and my own life and my own body and my own world. It's actually quite hard to remember back before that was the case. But of course, most of us, most of our culture,

Mike (26:56)

Mm-hmm. Yep.

Lian (27:01)

are still in that kind of pre-goddess place. And so that's what instigated the conversation that it was kind of like for me, at this point is that of course, you know, there is a forgotten, going back to the title of this book, of course there's a forgotten feminine face of God. But it was actually, and again, this is why I was like, huh, this is a conversation really worth having because most of the world isn't recognising there is a forgotten feminine face of God to be remembered. And I think it's helpful to recognise that because it can seem as though, and I think to a larger extent, we probably are with this episode, we're probably pre-tuned to the converted. And yet my hope is there's still some aspects of this conversation that will be ⁓ useful, inspiring, catalyzing for those listening. So where I'd like to go now is my own experience, and this is both personally, but also kind of being in the circles I'm in and teaching the kind of people that I do is we often first start to have the the feminine speak to us in different ways that we probably have no clue about metaphysically, but we're receiving her in symbols, in stories, somantically. We start to have this way that we've been called back to her and ⁓ that comes with all kinds of shadows and pitfalls that I suspect we'll get into in a moment. But that's what I've noticed is it isn't often a kind of intellectual thing or isn't a kind of, ⁓ I've started to study the Kabbalah and all of a sudden, lo and behold, it turns out there is a, I notice it happens much more emergently. It happens in this way where we're called back to her, ⁓ seemingly organically.

which is a beautiful thing. So I'd love to start there and your own experience of that, whether that's firsthand or what you've noticed in others.

Mike (29:06)

Yeah, well again, like I said, the physical manifestation of what we are born in and the gift of this, let's say, biological machine is in part resonates with the earth and the plants and the stones and the animals. ⁓ But there's something very peculiar about it. ⁓ one can experience this deeply when one realises who is actually inhabiting the vehicle. So it is not just something to walk the earth, but it is as being described in many traditions, it is the traveling temple. it is the manifestation of the goddess is actually the body itself.

Lian (29:41)

Hmm.

Mike (30:01)

and she harbors or she carries the light like the Ark of the Covenant in the old Judeo-Christian stories. That's just one example. And I find that again very moving that whatever vehicle you see, you know, it could be a woodlouse or a bee or an oak tree. Those are all in the endless variety of this creation. That is a manifestation of the Goddess.

Lian (30:10)

Hmm.

Mmm.

Mike (30:31)

And also of the God, because that's the power within it, that's the energy within it, and every energy has this particular expression within creation. So the Goddess provides with this unique expression of this tree and this plant and this planet and from the highest, biggest structures to the lowest, tiniest molecules or electrons.

That's the expression of the goddess. Like in Egyptian mythology, you have a Nuit or knight and she is the expansion of the universe. ⁓ She is the womb, so to speak, of creation. Yeah, for me, that's fascinating, really. And it returns everywhere. And you can take this actually further. If you look at the male and female within art,

Lian (31:20)

Hmm

Mike (31:30)

gender ⁓ relationships. Of course as a woman you have the privilege of giving physically birth, can birth children, but symbolically and metaphysically a man can also function as a womb to give birth to ⁓ manifestations of the divine. More in ideas or an expression of something else, not literally a birth, but we can all function as a womb if you know what I mean with this.

Lian (32:01)

Hmm. I feel like you didn't quite answer my question. So I'm just going cause I, feels as though there's the last time when I kind of went back and asked again, I love what you said. So I'm going to trust that there's a reason I'm wanting to have your direct answer to this. Um, so I'd love to know how you, or maybe that is your answers in you talking more personally, but what you witnessed in other people kind of spontaneously starting to.

Mike (32:04)

And yeah.

Lian (32:30)

recall the goddess through, you know, again, it could be through story, could be through dreams, it could be through symbols. Yeah, so that's what I'm asking. It's like the way that without knowing this, this does actually have metaphysical truth, the way we call back to her, she speaks to us, and we have this and again, we can, get into this in a moment, the way we can kind of over personalise this. But I would love to, if you could share some stories of, again, perhaps

Mike (32:38)

yeah. ⁓

Lian (33:00)

other people, you know, you've had tons of students over the years, the way that she's, she's called them back. Does that make sense?

Mike (33:09)

Yeah, no, it makes sense. mean, there are many examples and then I first of all, I will go back to what I said about myself. It's what this is what I heard from a lot of people so that they also see, I don't know, within the sea and in the mountains, they see the goddess that she appears like the physical manifestation upon the planet. you know, I remember this lady who said ⁓ first,

I just saw nature and it was beautiful and then I saw the appearance of the goddess. So that's very, yeah, you can't beat it. On the other hand, ⁓ also

Lian (33:45)

Hmm.

Yeah, so just to, I just want to add this. think there is, it's almost like secretly encoded, even our modern understanding, there's like clues back to her. Like the fact that even the most material of people might say mother earth, you know, she's still there just kind of beneath the, just out of you, where it's kind of like instinctively people use words like that, even though they might

completely dismissed there being this kind of spiritual connotation. But yeah, so carry on. It just occurred to me that that was, ⁓ yeah, it's interesting that that's still there woven into our lexicon.

Mike (34:31)

Yeah, no, and at the same time as we can testify of ⁓ the last decades, there's a growing ⁓ consciousness and awareness about how to protect Mother Earth and ⁓ the climate and everything. And there are people very much in favor of this and fighting for it, and other people who completely dismiss the idea and say it's irrelevant or it's all nonsense. ⁓

Lian (34:46)

Hmm.

Hmm.

Mmm.

Mike (34:59)

So but that's definitely going on. ⁓ Another thing is within the Kabbalah and the round table there are many stories that hint back at the goddess. So you have again the Shekhinah in Kabbalah. There's a whole book about it about the lost princess and how to find her again. And I know that a lot of people have been moved by that story and used it as a means of meditation and contemplation how to

Lian (35:02)

Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm.

Mike (35:28)

Yeah, how to find her again. And it's a beautiful thing because the goddess wants to be found herself. That's also part of that story. ⁓ She's in grief. She's mourning because the seeker, we, not just men, but men and women, the soul, starts to realize that without her, ⁓ there's no real life. There's no real truth in existence.

Lian (35:38)

Hmm.

Mmm.

Mike (35:58)

and we need to find her again. And those are stories that I know people have been very moved and around table stories as well. The goddess or the feminine archetype ⁓ is just of vital importance to bring us back to the consciousness and the awareness of certain principles in life, like sovereignty and or things like grace and devotion.

Lian (36:05)

Hmm.

Yes, yes, absolutely. So something that you and I have spoken about several times ⁓ over time is the way that we can ⁓ kind of like personalise and take literally ways that we are experiencing, well, all sorts of things, but again, in this instance, the feminine, feminine figures, deities.

Mike (36:29)

Very particular things. ⁓

Lian (36:58)

And, you know, an example might be that we, you know, someone has a plant medicine ceremony and is shown that they're Mary Magdalene and then thinks they're literally this reincarnation of Mary Magdalene. And it feels, it feels important to me that we're able to kind of hold this in a way that we kind of recognise, we don't dismiss the ways that we're called back to the goddess. much of my own work, but also the work that I do with others and particularly women is to honor the way that she speaks to us and the particular faces of the goddess that we're called to. ⁓ just in the last week, I've had, ⁓ one student that's really cool to work with Freya and another one with Isis. ⁓ and there's going to be real meaning, depth, beauty, power.

that can come from honoring that, honoring that call, honoring how she's speaking. ⁓ And again, there is this shadow aspect where we can be, ⁓ take this too literally, too personally, and also simultaneously, and I know that you've seen this a lot, ⁓ kind of do the opposite, kind of like then want to dismiss the masculine, dismiss the God. and have this kind of overemphasis on the goddess. So I'd love to hear your experiences of that because I know it's something again that we've spoken about a lot over time.

Mike (38:38)

Yeah, yeah, no, it is very interesting and very important in esoteric work, serious spiritual work. ⁓ As we said that the cosmos testifies of this equal balance of the masculine feminine principles or archetypes. ⁓ so to work with both of these ⁓ archetypal structures and entities is very important within our own psyche because our psyche in our humanity rests upon those principles. So if we are not working with them in an equal manner, we also become disbalanced sooner or later. So it is definitely a very good thing that the goddess is being restored through stories and parables and in mythology and in the working with it, because we really need it.

Lian (39:20)

Mmm.

Mmm.

Mike (39:34)

Especially in this age of technology and ⁓ frontal lobe, cerebral ⁓ outlook on life with the internet and all these kind of things, with the chat GPT, there is almost nothing goddess-like about it. So that's in that sense not a very good development. So it's very good that there are people still working with her and bringing back ⁓ her essence and her… vitality into the human psyche. And we shouldn't forget that whatever we are doing as an individual eventually contributes to the psyche of the collective. But then for the individual, like you said, it's very important that we know that we are not it. So we're not the entity. It is a part of fragment of the totality of consciousness. And we should also be able to disengage with the archetype.

Lian (40:06)

Hmm.

Mmm.

Mike (40:31)

and not completely identify with it, whether it be a god or a goddess by the way, and try to own it or it owns us and then we can you know become obsessed or even possessed by the entity or the archetype. ⁓ And that's something that I've seen quite a lot here and there. People think they are the reincarnation. I'm not saying it's not possible, but yeah it's ⁓

Lian (40:41)

Mmm.

Mm-hmm.

Mike (41:01)

It's something you should really be careful with when you say these kind of things.

Lian (41:06)

Yes, yeah,

mean, it may well be possible, but there'd be a lot of reincarnations of Mary Magdalene, for example, happening right now. Probably more than is probably possible.

Mike (41:18)

Yeah, that's bit fishy sometimes. Yeah, we could make a quiz out of it. ⁓ Made a real Mary Magdalene stand up now. Yeah, it's the same with Merlin from the Arthurian mythos, example. ⁓ So, ⁓ you know, for the mystic, what is important is that we are at the core of her being, are consciousness.

Lian (41:35)

Hmm.

Mmm.

Mike (41:48)

undifferentiated consciousness and on the screen of that consciousness certain appearances come ⁓ or they manifest and these are the gods and goddesses they are the direct interpretations of consciousness within existence and like masks it is a very healthy approach that you know how to put the mask on and off and to learn through them and to manifest their power.

Lian (42:05)

Hmm.

Mike (42:17)

within creation. And it doesn't have to be direct, a ⁓ goddess manifestation can also be a symbol, like a grail, a cup is a manifestation of the the goddess or certain aspect of her. But if you dismiss the cup from like the Eucharistic ritual, then you let it go. You have worked with it and then you let it go. And that, for me, should be the healthy approach.

Lian (42:19)

Hmm.

Mm-hmm.

Hmm

Mike (42:46)

and then let it integrate within your system.

Lian (42:52)

So we are almost up on time. And I feel like this is a nice time to bring it back to really where we began that I've certainly seen ⁓ for myself personally, but again, also in working with others, there's something incredibly profound, but also practical in being able to understand the goddess as a metaphysical principle. that kind of lies beyond these notions of kind of personal and these particular sort of visual representations we might have, these ideas of say, Aphrodite or you know, whichever goddess. There is definitely something I found incredibly helpful, recognising her as this metaphysical truth and yet similarly, ⁓ not dismissing these different faces of the goddess that we might be called to work with. And for me, that becomes more potent in that being able to kind of see both rather than either having to only see her as a metaphysical principle or ⁓ kind of only working with these kind of, again, these sort of over-identified sort of like, the goddess is Aphrodite and she's speaking to me specifically, and that's kind of where it starts and ends. So I'd love to, again, bring it back to this idea that the...

the truest really representation of or the restoration of the goddess is the restoration of her as a metaphysical principle. That's really what we're talking about.

Mike (44:27)

Yeah.all we do, well, yeah, again, I find that very important. You know, when I sometimes post something on social media and it's always something metaphysical, there's always something like a spiritual message there, and for example, when I post something to do with mystical Christian ⁓ messages like, you know, like Christ said, I and the Father are one.

Lian (44:34)

Mmm.

Mike (44:59)

⁓ Sometimes I get the question, where is the mother?

Good question. I normally I would answer something like it, like in the sense of ⁓ she is actually that she makes it possible that I and the father can have the experience of being one. So in other words, the father can only manifest, the gods can only manifest through the goddess because she is the womb of creation. So all the gods are the children.

Lian (45:20)

Mmm.

Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm.

Mike (45:34)

of the goddess, you see, and ⁓ the gods cannot manifest without the principle of the goddess. She is the eternal womb and we are eternally begotten through her beingness. So the seed of the god is necessary because otherwise the womb of the goddess is useless, but the seed has to go through the womb for the god to be born.

Lian (45:50)

Mm-hmm.

Mike (46:03)

That's the almost mystical paradox between the God and the Goddess and the eternal entanglement of them. And that's why you can't do, or you can dismiss one of the other from the equation of creation, you see.

Lian (46:20)

Hmm. It's a, I recall our last conversation kind of ended here where it's like, it's such a mystical paradox. It's something that ⁓ we will attempt to resolve with our human logic and kind of like, but how can that be true? And yet it really is an invitation to kind of, you know, like.

Mike (46:26)

Yeah.

Yeah.

Lian (46:43)

all the great mystics that we know of, know, really allow this to do its work on us, allow that to breathe through us.

Mike (46:51)

That's it. And what I just said is one at least one interpretation of the virgin birth. This is the spiritual birth and when it happens to us then some realisation comes to us that what you are at the core is actually the child of the God and the goddess whether you call it Christ or Atman or the divine spark. It doesn't matter in the end but then you know

Lian (46:58)

Mmm.

Hmm

Mike (47:19)

And that's not the birth of the body, obviously.

Lian (47:22)

Hmm.

So bringing this to an end for the moment, Elise, I'm sure you and I, Elise, will have many more conversations about this, maybe on the show, but for the moment, what would you suggest to listeners that have heard something in this that's perhaps calling them again, I suspect to a large extent, we are preaching to the converted. ⁓ Imagine if someone even

Mike (47:39)

Mm-hmm.

Lian (47:54)

who is a listener or watcher of this show, a kind of, know, has some sense of what we're talking about. But if they're feeling that sense of, there is something ⁓ more here for me. And perhaps particularly when it comes to understanding this from the metaphysical aspect, what would your invitation be for them to go deeper with that, to work with that?

Mike (48:18)

Do you mean like literature or?

Lian (48:21)

anything. mean, again, one of things that we've spoken about a lot is the way that there are these different paths that we can take, you know, for example, contemplation. And so just some way that someone might kind of, ⁓ you know, devote to making this ⁓ manifest in their lives, this under this metaphysical understanding of the restoration of the goddess.

Mike (48:22)

Thank you.

Yeah.

Yeah, well, I will repeat the same thing is, you know, the closest to what we are when we were born is our physical body and physical nature around us. So to contemplate, to meditate upon that for me is the most direct way of returning to the Goddess. also ⁓ that what may come from it is ⁓

Lian (49:02)

Hmm.

Mike (49:11)

an enormous humbleness and gratefulness for creation itself. But yeah, we are surrounded by the miracle. Again, I will repeat it. So that would be for me the first contemplation. And literature, when it comes to what we were talking about, about biblical interpretations, about the Asherah, you know, and the dismissing of the Goddess, I think

Lian (49:17)

Mm-hmm.

Mmm.

Mike (49:39)

She's a scholar from the UK, Margaret Barker. She really did a lot of interesting scholarly work on this, explaining it, but she is definitely more than a scholar. She also has, I think, experienced this material that we are talking about. So she has a lot of books, but a few of them are really about this topic. I would really recommend that material. ⁓

Lian (49:56)

Mmm.

Wonderful. Thank you, Mike. And if listeners like to learn more about you and your work, which again, it very much includes so much of what we're talking about, where can they do that?

Mike (50:15)

Yeah, no, if you're interested in what I do then please have a look at my website or sites which is www.circleofavalon.nl, that's all in English, and kablamisticalschool.com and you can find me under my name Mike Bice on Facebook for example. ⁓ Yeah, you can see my books and some of my courses that I'm launching at the moment. One yesterday actually for the College of Psychic Studies in London, that will be an online event in July, that's a two-day workshop, two evenings actually. So ⁓ yeah.

Lian (50:58)

And just to say, one of the books that always exists so it's got this beautiful gold so it's shining. Yeah. So paths on the tree of wisdom. And so much of what we've been talking about from a metaphysical perspective is in this book. So highly recommend that and also highly recommend. Well,

Mike (51:02)

it. It's too shiny.

Lian (51:19)

Anything, anything anyone wants to do with you, I would say really follow that that nudge.

in fact, it was the College of Psychic Studies that we actually very first met, wasn't it? So I would very much recommend that ⁓ listeners sign up for that. When did you say that was?

Mike (51:38)

It's in July, two Thursday evenings and the first is on Thursday 24th of July and then a week after that on the 31st of July.

Lian (51:53)

Wonderful. We'll make sure a link to that is in the show notes too, because this will be out before that. So yeah, perfect timing. Well, thanks so much, Mike. As ever, this has been a true delight. Thank you.

Mike (51:57)

Thank you so much.

It was completely my pleasure. Yeah, as always.

Thank you so much, Lian.

Lian (52:10)

I very much hope you enjoyed watching that and if you did and you're not already subscribed then do hit that bell thingy and subscribe to automatically get each fresh new episode as it's released each week. If you'd like to find out more about the work we do at Be Mythical to guide and support old souls in this new world to live their own unique myth…

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Lots of love for now.

See you again next week.

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