Columns by Seena Frost - 2003-2004

The One and the Many and the Source Card - December, 2004

Welcome to the SoulCollage website whether you are new to us, or returning.

I’m going to write, in this column, about a foundation principle underlying the SoulCollage practice, the principle of The One and the Many and the symbolism and importance of the Source Card. In my book I was brief about these key issues, and even here I can barely begin to touch on ideas mystics and philosophers have pondered for centuries.

In brief, here is my position and the one on which I have built the SoulCollage practice: I am one whole, unique person and, at the same time, I am made up of many parts. You are the same. Your family is many and yet one family. So also is our nation, our planet, our solar system, our universe. All life, and indeed all that exists, is nested into Oneness, like those little Russian nesting dolls. Beings emerge in individuated forms out of this Oneness or Ground of Being, and remain forever held and sustained by it…whether they are conscious of it or not. Humans sometimes do become conscious of it. There seems to be in human beings what I call “a spark of conscious spirit”. That spark, in some, awakens and yearns to rise and shake off the sense of separateness and the busyness of its mind. It wants to know the Oneness, to merge its spark of spirit with Spirit. For most it takes discipline and long practice to still the mind and body enough to experience this blissful unity. Some just happen upon it suddenly, as on a walk in nature, and then yearn forever to go there again. It is a place of peace and calmness and joy. Many have called it union with God.

In SoulCollage we create one card that symbolizes this Spirit, this Oneness, this Ground of Being, this Mystery. I call it the Source, and the card symbolizing it is the Source card. In truth, there can be no image for the Source because it is beyond form, beyond being. It is the source of all beings, all forms, all personalities, visible and invisible, mortal and immortal. I hesitate to call it God because God, in most religions, is a Being with a name like Yahweh, or Father or Mother or Vishnu or Allah. These Divine Beings are revealed to have personalities, and they relate with chosen humans, and speak words and intervene in history. Hence, in SoulCollage, they would be found in the suit of the Council or the archetypes. Cards can be created for them representing the various manifestations by which each person knows and follows them. I will discuss that suit in a few months, and it is discussed fairly fully in the book.

The Source Card, when created, is placed in the center of a SoulCollage reading to symbolize the oneness of all the guides and challengers represented on the other cards in a deck. The Source Card does not have a voice itself, so it isn’t questioned or consulted. Its reality is known through the voices of all the other guides and allies represented in a person’s SoulCollage deck.

While our spirit may, at times, yearn to rise and merge with Source, it is our soul that loves the many! The soul wants to stay grounded in the beauty and the muck, in the dance of the particulars, creating and loving and fighting for causes. It is soul that is heart and compassion and will take the risk of making mistakes and looking a fool and feeling harried, all in the name of being alive and vibrant. Down here is the Land of the Many, of the particular, of the complex. We could call it Soul-Land. I am not the first to make this distinction between spirit and soul. James Hillman also does, as do others.

Often in books by ardent advocates of the nondual position, the many of people’s particularities and unique characters, including their egos, is given short shrift. Ego is seen as negative, a limiting thing in the upward thrust towards Oneness. Not so in the SoulCollage practice. Here ego is accepted as one part of soul, perhaps a limiting, restraining part but still an essential part of personality. Here in soul are the workers, the lovers, the caretakers, the creators, the dancers. Also here are the ragers, the whiners, the procrastinators and the critics. These are all soul parts of us, and our Council archetypes work through them to evolve the planet.

Ken Wilber has a very interesting take on this difference between spirit and soul. He sees the upwards thrust of spirit as masculine and he names it Eros. On the other hand, he uses the name Agape for the descending, all embracing “face of spirit” (which I call soul) and sees it as feminine. Here’s a short quote: “Where Eros strives for the Good of the One in transcendental wisdom, Agape embraces the Many with Goodness and immanent care.” ( p. 284 in A Brief History of Everything and p. 81 in The Simple Feeling of Being.) For me that is good food for thought!

Next year, I will write a column first on collage, it’s power and symbolism, and why we are not ashamed to use it as our media of creativity in SoulCollage. After that I will write about each of the suits in turn and the experience that others and I are having with them. I am truly astounded by the emails I receive telling of people’s experiences with their cards. Some of you are delving into the process so deeply, and having such transformative results. Keep going!

Often in books by ardent advocates of the nondual position, the many of people’s particularities and unique characters, including their egos, is given short shrift. Ego is seen as negative, a limiting thing in the upward thrust towards Oneness. Not so in the SoulCollage practice. Here ego is accepted as one part of soul, perhaps a limiting, restraining part but still an essential part of personality. Here in soul are the workers, the lovers, the caretakers, the creators, the dancers. Also here are the ragers, the whiners, the procrastinators and the critics. These are all soul parts of us, and our Council archetypes work through them to evolve the planet.

Ken Wilber has a very interesting take on this difference between spirit and soul. He sees the upwards thrust of spirit as masculine and he names it Eros. On the other hand, he uses the name Agape for the descending, all embracing “face of spirit” (which I call soul) and sees it as feminine. Here’s a short quote: “Where Eros strives for the Good of the One in transcendental wisdom, Agape embraces the Many with Goodness and immanent care.” ( p. 284 in A Brief History of Everything and p. 81 in The Simple Feeling of Being.) For me that is good food for thought!

Next year, I will write a column first on collage, it’s power and symbolism, and why we are not ashamed to use it as our media of creativity in SoulCollage. After that I will write about each of the suits in turn and the experience that others and I are having with them. I am truly astounded by the emails I receive telling of people’s experiences with their cards. Some of you are delving into the process so deeply, and having such transformative results. Keep going!

Archetype of the Singer - November, 2004

Hello and welcome to all who are browsing this website for the first time. Enjoy looking through the gallery of cards, and then consider beginning your personal creative journey with SoulCollage. Greetings as well to the many SoulCollagers who have trained as facilitators, and who are checking in here for thoughts about how to introduce this work to their communities.

Today I want you to remember the archetype called by some The Singer Over the Bones. Surely this Singer is the archetype who is urging so many of us to do this deep soul-work with images. I created a Council card for the Singer several years ago, after reading the La Loba story found in Clarissa Pinkola Estés’ marvelous book, Women Who Run With the Wolves. You may remember the story, and even if you do, find your copy and reread the book’s first chapter. As you do this, think about the SoulCollage process of gathering and cutting out powerful images, and then of collaging them on to cards that reflect our many inner selves, our guiding archetypes, and our one Soul Source. Estés tells of La Loba, an ancient Indian woman, who painstakingly gathers all the scattered bones of a long dead wolf from the desert floor. She places them, slowly, carefully, on the floor of her cave until every bone is there. Then she sings and sings over them, until the wolf bones take on flesh and blood again, and new life. As the wolf jumps up and runs away into the desert, it turns into a wild and laughing woman. A woman vibrant with life and joy and purpose.

Don’t we all often feel our lives fragmented and scattered like the bones of this wolf? Don’t we yearn for a sense of wholeness, of vibrancy, of knowing who we deeply are and who we are becoming? In SoulCollage, we follow the urging of the Singer, La Loba, the wise woman within, and gather images that powerfully speak about our selves. And we piece them together on to cards, and lay them out to love and honor. Then we share them with others. This honoring and sharing is our form of “singing over our bones” and bringing ourselves back to awakeness, to wholeness, and to joy. One caution with this metaphor of the Singer: SoulCollage envisions a dynamic, never-ending gathering of our pieces, and we begin our singing as soon as we have made the first cards. There is never one last piece waiting to be found, nor is there ever an end to our singing. It is a practice, a way of life.

There is more in the first chapter of Estés’ book that gives words to what we are doing. If you have her audiotapes, you can listen to them as well, to recall many of these words. Interestingly, on the audiotapes Estés changes La Loba to an ancient Indian man. He becomes the wise old man within us, the one who knows. So take your pick. Perhaps you will want to make a SoulCollage card for this archetype, The Singer. You can check my card in the Website Gallery under Council cards. Jennifer Colby also has a Singer card in the Gallery.

I plan to begin a series here in this column space, beginning next month, around the middle of December. I’ll start with the Source card and the concept of the One and the Many, which is basic to SoulCollage. Then in January I will begin to discuss each of the suits, one at a time, beginning with the Committee. I will talk mainly about my personal experiences with each suit over the fifteen years I have been working with my cards, and I will try to answer some of the common questions people ask.
Blessings to you all, and try your best to call Gratefulness into your hearts this Thanksgiving season. Make a card for this archetype. She is present in the depths of all of us… no matter who we voted for.

Distinctions between the SoulCollage® Suits - July 2004

Hi good friends… Whether you are a new person browsing the web or a returning SoulCollager…Welcome. It’s been too long since I updated this column and I will try to do better in the future.

These past months have been exciting for me as more and more people are finding the SoulCollage website, and emailing with their delight and enthusiasm. You wouldn’t believe how many closet ‘collagers’ there are out there, people with files of images they have been collecting for years and keeping for some mysterious future purpose. SoulCollage appears to be that long awaited purpose! Over and over I am hearing how people are using their images to create cards to explore themselves, and also to share with their communities. It seems that these powerful images are proving a valuable way to share soul and, at the same time, touch in with the souls of others. Great! Keep creating and keep experimenting. Many find that creating even a few SoulCollage cards releases a wellspring of creative imagination that transforms stuck places in other parts of life. Let me know if that happens for you.

One person recently asked me to clarify the distinctions between the suits, and particularly the difference between the Committee and the Council. You’ll have to read the book for the basics on the suits, but, for those who have read it, I agree that there is often an overlap in these two suits, and some cards may include images for both. There could be an image for an inner self part, like the inner artist, as well as the archetype that grabs and directs that part, like the Creator. There can be, perhaps, a sense of the hidden and mysterious force of the archetypal Creator present, even if not explicit or developed. A Council card actually created for the archetypal Creator will be more mysterious, the images more mythic or symbolic. There will be a sense of necessity and passion emanating from a cosmic, eternal, and unavoidable energy. Often a person does not know when they are creating a Council card; it simply has to be made. Thinking about it comes later. Usually with Committee cards we are more clear of who it is we are depicting. Some Council cards might have an image for the inner self (Committee) on it as well as the archetype. For example a Warrior card might have on it an image for the ‘political activist self’ who is grabbed by and driven by the passion of the Warrior archetype. The Council member image might be standing behind the Committee member image as if sending it out into the world to do its bidding. I could go on with other examples of this overlap, but I imagine you can fill in for yourselves.

I’m available for questions if the SoulCollage book doesn’t cover something you need help with, and, even more, I’m eager to learn of new ways you discover to adapt the process to fit your needs and that of different populations.

We have a third SoulCollage facilitator training coming up in September, and I will be sure to give you an update after that of the many new things people are bringing to the process from all over the United States, and even the world! Seena Frost

Holidays & SoulCollage® - November, 2003

It’s mid November as I write this! The holidays are upon us: Thanksgiving, Hanukkah, the Solstice, Christmas, a New Year beginning. It’s a busy, stressful time, but don’t let busyness stop you from nourishing your Soul with images and imagination. It’s a perfect time to gather a few good friends to sit for an afternoon and create SoulCollage cards to honor these wondrous archetypal events. Create a Gratefulness card or a Lightbearer card or a Divine Child card, all archetypes you might want for your Council suit. Have some fun identifying Committee members who come up for you in the holidays, and make cards for them: your “Hostess with the Mostest”… your “Holiday Child” who loves surprises… your “Shopper Self” who goes overboard… or even your “Scrooge” self who grumbles and complains, and wishes it were all over. And who else is there? And what other archetypes grab you with their passionate purpose during these weeks?

If you are reading this and have no idea what I am talking about, you might want to explore the book and the process called SoulCollage. Many people now are creating decks of personal cards using images that symbolize both the Oneness of Spirit and the many facets of Soul. It’s a process that is both creative and healing…and often surprising and transformative. It’s a process that can develop and last for a lifetime as you create and consult and share your SoulCollage cards. Read on in this website for more information and consider treating yourself and a friend to the book for a holiday gift.

I have just returned from teaching an introductory SoulCollage workshop in the Sacramento, California area. We were a varied group, gathered in a lovely high school library with lots of round tables on which to spread out our images. There were people attending who just happened in from seeing a flyer; there were two people who had attended the SoulCollage Facilitator Training last September and who are now teaching SoulCollage in their own communities, and there were at least three people there who are considering coming to the next Facilitator Training in June, 2004. We all loved sitting together on a rainy Saturday, sharing our stories, and, at day’s end, showing the SoulCollage cards each had created in just those few hours. It was truly amazing what each person “discovered” and then “collaged” to illustrate her life story. It always is at these workshops. Check the workshop list on this site, and the facilitator list, and perhaps there will be a workshop given close enough to you so you can come. But even if there is not, the book, SoulCollage, will give you all the information you need to begin your own set of cards.

We are now accepting cards from people to include in the gallery and the format is described on this website. I would love to see what you come up with as you consider archetypes and committee members who arise during these year-end holidays.

Come, Join the Dance! - September, 2003

We live in a time of awakening. All over the planet souls are yawning and stretching and rising up to join in a new dance. Soul ears are straining to hear the amazing music embedded in the universe, and are trying to dance to its rhythm, bowing, first to the selves within, and then to the many, diverse beings without. What was once the experience of a few, the mystics and poets, is now becoming the experience of the many. It is the experience that all life is Sacred, and all life is joined in dancing this One Dance.

The process of SoulCollage® is a creative and fun tool to help you learn your particular steps in this dance. First, it is a tool for self-exploration and self-acceptance. Second, the images can serve as reminders of who your allies and teachers are. Third, ‘reading’ the cards can give you access to your deeper, less conscious, wisdom.

The ingredients of SoulCollage can be expressed in three words beginning with “I”: Image, Imagination and Intuition. A few weeks ago I led an introduction to SoulCollage in Helena, Montana. As people entered the workshop I asked them to sort through a pile of images, magazine pages I had thrown into a box. My only instruction was “pick out one image that speaks to you. Let your intuition choose. Don’t try to figure out why you are drawn to it.” As we did introductions a few minutes later, people showed their images, and then I asked each person to speak from the image. Say, I Am One Who… and go on. (See page 75 in the book, SoulCollage, for this exercise.) Nearly everyone could do this little role-playing exercise, and the experience was profound. Intuitive words bubbled up through the images, and something deeply important about each person’s soul was revealed. As the workshop progressed, several people pasted these images on one of their first cards.

This “surprised by image” experience can happen over and over with the same image for years. I lead an on-going group, one that has met weekly for ten years, where people ask their cards personal questions. A card came up recently that had not been drawn for some months (this person has a deck of about ninety cards), and the image told a truth it had never spoken before. This was astonishing…but it is not unusual.