The image of Mother Mary can provoke many things for many people, she holds a big space for people's projection. I personally adore the image of her, even though there are parts of her I would love to change like the colour of her skin! But the symbol of her, the image of her is very powerful for me and others in our collective consciousness. Her image has passed through centuries, in paintings, statues, sculptures, art and many people have worshipped this image for many reasons. Most people associate the image of Mary with Religion and more recently many spiritual women are connecting to her through a spiritual, feminine, mystical lens. What we can all admit that she appears in our collective consciousness for a reason. Personally, I wanted to explore why she appeared so strongly to me in my journey of life. 

 

This image of a woman in a robe usually of blue, though red, white, gold, pink and green are common, Her hands held in prayer or other gestures,  a rounded belly suggesting the immaculate conception or with a child in her arms or on her knee, however, she appears she is a totem of deep symbology.  Symbology enters our consciousness differently, to one the colour of mother Mary’s blue robes may mean royalty,  in  Catholicism it symbolizes eternity and immortality. Renaissance painters used it because it was the most expensive of paints and was known as ‘ultramarine’, even earlier than that lapis lazuli was used to depict luxury, expensiveness, and used only for paintings that warranted such expense. Her skin colour is white in the majority of paintings even though Mary was born in Isreal!  This in itself is deeply symbolic. I could feed your mind with the symbology but it would be rather more powerful for you to go through what the image of her holds for you symbolically if you are drawn to her,  scan her image and write down what it all symbolizes and you will get an idea of why you are drawn to her. 

 

This is why adore the image of her, it is all open to interpretation, it is a personal experience. Personally, for me, my own projections on this image are one of an everyday woman, a woman with mystical powers, who worked as a sacred priestess in the lineage of the Rose. Devoted her life to worship God and serve humanity. Her training enabled her to work with the alchemy of the womb in order to immaculately conceive a child that had an important role in manifesting as a child of God,  to deliver some very important messages for humanity.  Her skin has been whitened over time as we have weakened the image of her, diluted her beautiful dark skin ( as I believe we also originate from the mitochondrial eve – or black eve) as we have moved away from the very origin of ourselves and our original mother.  Her story shows us all the nature of love, the nature of sacrifice, devotion, strength, and courage, and of our will to power and indeed God's will.   This has moved away from my earlier notions that I was ‘told and taught in school, Sunday school and at church as a child. 

 

Working with Jungian psychology I have been able to see the symbols she holds for me, but also see what I project on her because of my own culture, upbringing, belief systems, nurturing, imprints from parents and educators, all structures and situations in my life that impacts how I see it and others. As I unpick these projections and the symbology that she represents FOR ME! I go deeper into my psyche and why she is such an important symbol in my life  

 

I remember someone seeing the images of Mary around my home and saying ‘ oh you’re a catholic… you’re religious’ and when I told them I was not a catholic nor was I religious they looked at me blankly. This is a great example of projection, they had projected upon me what they held in the symbology of Mary, and it was not mine. 

 

What do you project onto Mother Mary that may be worthy of some deeper exploration? What deeper symbology does she hold for you?

 

An image of Mary as a ’super woman’ was shared with me this week and I loved it, it brought another projection for me to work on, it brought another facet of her for me to explore, and another picture for me to display on my wall. This woman inspires me, she holds many keys for the mystical woman, the everyday woman, the devoted woman, the mother, but mostly a woman who sought and attained atonement with our creator.

 

 

Collette 

 

 

Join me Monday 2Oth September at 21:00 Paris time for my MOTHER MARY TRANSMISSION to explore much of what I share above. The recording will also be downloadable after.