Magical Messenger {excerpt}*
I was in London a month after Princess Diana’s funeral service in 1997. Wherever I visited, everyone spoke of the strangely unsettling week between Diana’s death and the televised service in Westminster Abbey. They had never felt the city so still. The few people who were on the streets were quiet, reverent, as though in a daze. Some people were openly emotional, expressing deep sorrow even though they had not been a fan of the princess. Such open emotion was not typical for the British, I was told, but then other mysteries were emerging as well. “We had never seen anything like this, we had never been like this,” writer Beatrix Campbell reported. “Or rather we didn’t know that we had been like this before.”
Diana in death seemed to be leading people through the depths of a powerful rite of passage; transmuting their once “unmourned” grief into heart-opening energy as they let go of the heavy weight of old despair, an inheritance of sorrow and karmic regrets — like a spiritual cleansing down to the bone. Yet there were many who considered the outpouring of grief at the shock of her death just more of the “Diana hysteria” they had witnessed during her lifetime. Looking back, in the wake of such transformation, no one was untouched by those rigid barriers falling and a new consciousness rising. That breathtaking week between her death and memorial service seemed to be a time of readying — preparing the world for major transitions. As Simone Simmons said so prophetically in her biography of Diana published soon after her friend’s death: “The tragedy will prove to be as valuable as her life….”
Diana was eulogized by the Dean of Westminster as “someone for whom from afar we all dared to feel affection, and by whom we were all intrigued.” “Intrigued” — a word conjuring up a sense of mystery, fascination, even mischief and magic. Who was this magical messenger that captured the world’s attention and left it raw with feeling at her death? Looking into the big picture of Diana’s life and its purpose, there was something inescapable, and yes, intriguing, about its feminine heart.
I followed my curiosity with the word “intrigue” and how it seemed interwoven with the complexities of Diana’s life — its feminine, interrelated, captivating qualities. Without irony, I learned the etymology of “intrigue” when researching the ancient history of weaving. (And discovered, to no surprise, that women were the first weavers, inventing the fiber arts twenty thousand or so years ago.) The word intrigue, “originating in the fourteenth century, derived from the Latin word ‘intricare,’ meaning ‘to entangle’ or ‘to perplex’” — very Diana-esque. “It entered the English language via the Old French term entriegue and originally referred to the actions of weaving or knotting together. Over time, the meaning of ‘intrigue’ evolved to encompass the idea of creating a complex or mysterious situation, often with the intent of deception or manipulation.” [1] Diana and “intrigue” eternally interwoven! To have her voice heard, Diana, like thousands of women before her, often found she had to “deceive and manipulate” a patriarchal system designed to keep her quiet and in her place. Her mission, even if it required a bit of mischief, was to shake up an out of touch institution in the name of all women. To do so she needed to capture our attention so we wouldn’t look away, then crack open our hearts, tenderizing us for a world changing course as it began leaning toward connection and relatedness.
Metaphysics weighs in. Diana’s time in the world spotlight in the last two decades of the twentieth century paralleled changes in universal consciousness that was developing in the background — cosmic signs pointing to the end of a long, strife-filled era and the opening of deeply felt heart energies. In zodiacal terms, the Piscean Age, a time of patriarchal duality, was ending and the Aquarian Age, an era said to bring the feminine value of cooperation and relationship, was beginning. In the language of quantum physics, Dr. Carl J. Calleman writes how, during this time, the effects of the approaching “Eighth wave of Creation in human evolution” with its feminine-focused powers were being experienced. This energetic wave, Calleman explained, “caused a shift to holistic thinking and the honoring of the more feminine qualities of both genders” — which gave rise to what he calls “feminine spirituality.” Stirred by the changes these energies generated, the Women’s Movement grew around the globe, and women began to find their stride as well as their voices.
It’s a poignant reminder that on the approach of a new millennium with its swirling feminine energies, we see how the shock of Diana’s death in 1997 was an integral force in opening the dynamics of this new era — global, transformative and heart-centered. Out of this opening, we see a newfound wisdom emerging in all aspects of life on the planet, with the flavor of something from long ago yet new and vibrant. “We live in a time of the re-emergence of ancient spiritual sciences,” Martha Caldwell explained about that era. “The great truths of our existence long buried in the ruins of ancient, lost civilizations are surfacing once again.” [2] These “great truths” come from a universal heart and, circling back to the query of Diana’s spiritual mission, we hear the words of Gandhi: “What barrier is there that love cannot break?”
“There is no doubt that there was something archetypal in our collective experience of Diana,” astrologer Steffan G. Vanel wrote, “something involving a Princess, being royal, and thus something elevated or potentially attuned to higher spiritual forces, with divine feminine qualities.” [3]
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Indeed, as if by divine intervention, that young, feminine, vulnerable, “princess bride” drew people into her world, capturing something of their hearts and, with a big dose of “intrigue,” made sure they paid close attention so not to miss the deeper messages for those willing to truly hear and see. Looking beyond the glitter, drama and angst, we see into the background of Diana’s life into what’s real and genuine and feel the emergence of the heart. And there, what was really happening over Diana’s short lifetime comes out of the shadows. “In the stark and strangely beautiful reality of death,” spiritual teacher Patricia Albere wrote, “what matters about life is vivid and undeniable…love matters.” [4]
“Diana’s death created a spontaneous flood of feeling…[that] came from a place possibly far beyond our personal ability to comprehend,” Stewart Pearce wrote about the powerful force that “arose from our collective mourning” of Diana at that time. “Like prayers, incantations and anthems” have, throughout history, freed our minds and lifted us into something sacred, “this awakening became a conduit that centered billions of people into ‘wholeness’…startling our cells.” Yes, love matters.
In memory, Diana’s life became something even more far-reaching, her love-centered mission touched with the divine, echoing messages back to us. Messages not from the past, but from a future called forth by love. In this way, the lives of spiritual messengers like Diana can touch the intimacies of our life, reveal our own potential, our own promise of some exquisite possibility fulfilled. Our job is to notice and listen. Take a deep, slow breath, then another. Stay open, curious, and grateful. And then, with an inner knowing like a certain princess had that her messy, imperfect life was for a larger purpose — we take the first heroic step. ~
*{excerpt from book-in-progress, The Spiritual Mission of a Princess: Feminine Wisdom Rising & the Return of the Heart}
[1] EtymologyWorld.com
[2] Foreword, Charles and Diana: The Inside Story, 2008, Steffan Vanel, pg. 10.
[3] Oracle 20/20 magazine, 2008.
[4] Evolutionary Collective, Patricia Albere
