Becoming Spider Woman in the Utah Desert
I turned 50 last month.
It was not the birthday I had envisioned some years back. I didn’t dress up as that 50 year old SNL character. I wasn’t surrounded by friends wearing wigs, drinking cocktails and being outrageously funny.
Instead I was in the Utah desert. Alone. Sunburned, parched and enduring a howling, gritty, uncomfortably warm wind.
Some days before the momentous/not-momentous day, I set up camp in the Valley of the Gods on BLM land previously stewarded by the Navajo and other ancient peoples before them.
With adrenals exhausted from treating a chronic tick-borne infection, a bit of over-working and the early stages of divorce mediation, I needed a reset.
What I really wanted was a miracle. Or at least a mystical encounter with my beloved power animal, Snake.
I searched high and low for Snake. In all the shady red sandstone crevices I could find. I sat still. I meditated. I dozed. I walked the arroyo, eyes on the skies upstream, planning in advance where to exit the flash flood zone should rain clouds suddenly appear.
I sang to Snake, whispered to Snake, yet Snake did not appear.
What did appear was an intense longing for my (human) beloved. And heartache over the dissolution of my marriage.
And deeeeep questions to Spirit about what new silky skin was truly wanting to emerge when this interminably long round of shedding was complete. What would my life and next-level soul work look like? Where would I live? And seriously, how long will this process take?
Lizard, with a beautiful spotted neck, came to visit daily. Flies and wild bees of all kind buzzed merrily by. Venus shone overhead each night. Snake never came to visit but I did have a mystical encounter after all…
I never once saw her, but Spider made her unmistakable presence known. Each day I rose to find new bites on my body; hot, itchy and red; belly, ears, scalp and legs. 
The transformation was underway. I was becoming Spider Woman in the Utah desert.
According to Animal-Speak by Ted Andrews, Spider reminds you to ignite your creativity and weave your fate. The spider, with its two body segments and eight legs, is mystically associated with the figure 8 or the infinity symbol.
“Spider teaches you to maintain a balance – between past and future, physical and spiritual, male and female. Spider teaches you that everything you do now is weaving what you will encounter in the future.”
Spider’s silky yet strong web reminds us that the past always subtly influences the present and future. Think of that web, shaped like a spiral, a symbol associated with creation, expansion, growth and connection to All-That-Is.
According to Andrews, Spider expresses magic in three ways:
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The magic and energy of creation and creative power
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Spider keeps the (divine) feminine energies of creation alive
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The co-creative spiral web energy links the past to the future
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Spider Medicine, like Snake, is associated with death and rebirth. Spider Woman, the master weaver, appears in Greek mythology as Arachne, is responsible for creation in numerous Native American mythologies and is a Great Goddess in ancient Mexican civilization. She walks the threads with grace.
I, too, have long walked the threads, walked the razor’s edge. One foot in darkness, the other in light, managing to hold both simultaneously. To express an awakened vision of what’s possible, even as darkness consumes a dying world.
You, as well, hold the past and the future simultaneously. Weaving the threads of your life into the tapestry before you.
All of us weaving our destiny, either consciously or not. All of us dancing with creation and destruction in each moment. Building a beautiful new world out of the ashes of the old.
Spider whispers to you today: Are you expressing yourself creatively? Are you striking that mythical balance between past and future, your own divine masculine and feminine? Are you consciously weaving your destiny?
I’d love to hear how Spider Medicine has arrived in your experience.
Big, Spiraling, Infinite Love,
Anné
P.S. Perhaps mythical spider venom is the secret antidote to an anaplasma and bartonella bacterial infection. According to a recent biofeedback scan, my naturopath sees no sign of that decades-old infection. I can’t wait to see what my new marvel(ous) super powers will be… stay tuned.
