I believe I got pregnant on the day of the Autumn Equinox of 2020 and thus the expected date of birth of our baby is around the Solstice of 2021. It’s an indescribable gift to be pregnant, as many know, it’s even more precious to me to be able to live this experience in the community of Damanhur. I am a citizen of the community since nine years now. I am Dutch from origin and I met my partner here in the community, who is Italian of birth. So we share the spiritual path and have lived this experience according to our philosophy.
A decision that involves the community
In Damanhur we never consider our path to be individual or separate from others, and this is also valid for the life of couples. Of course we have our private path, but we also search to put our relationship at service of the community and we study what our alchemy can bring to others. Just as individuals put their talents at service to others, we also do so as a couple. A first step for a couple in that direction is to choose a Damanhurian, civil, marriage.
The Damanhurian marriage is always agreed upon for a limited amount of time after which both partners evaluate and decide whether to renew their vows. In this marriage both partners write their intentions for the time they commit to. One of the desires we had for our marriage was to be able to welcome a new soul to incarnate as our child. A choice for a child starts with an individual choice and the choice of two people, but also in our philosophy, we relate to the group around us for this choice. We are part of a family, a nucleo, of 8 people in total with whom we have spoken about our desire, about a year ago. Nucleos, or families, are the foundation of our community, they are like the bricks of the house. And thus all important choices we make for our lives, we want to share with our families.
It’s a very precious process in which all can benefit from the point of view of the others. A choice made after a confrontation in the nucleo, has a higher value, I would say. It is more dense, it includes logics different from your own, a light has been shun on possible shadows that were part of the considerations you had before. The choice reaches a new level of justice.
When speaking about an important life event like having a child, we confront for instance about the quality of the couple, about ways how we imagine to educate the child together, practical aspects as how to create space for a new family member, and so on. We also involve other organs in the community, like the doctor, and also the department of education in order to gather as much insights as possibile with the aim to prepare a space for a child which is thought of, which has the density worthy of the nobility of a soul that chooses to start a new incarnation.
A pregnancy in Damanhur touches upon all aspects of the community. I already spoke of the social aspect, but apart from that there is also a ritual aspect, a magical, there are also economical support systems for future parents, and as you might know Damanhur has a vast gamma of spiritual healers of which many offer support in the process of pregnancy. Many of the spiritual research area’s touch also upon pregnancy, like: working with inner senses and the development of subtle organs, working with dreams, past lives research, the alchemy of vital forces, alchemy in couples, sound healing, communication with the plant world and the nature spirits… and there is much more! Sincerely, one blog isn’t enough to introduce the richness of this path in Damanhur.
Preparing for the birth in Damanhur
Even for pregnant Damanhurian women it isn’t possibile to benefit from all that Damanhur has to offer in this path, and all of us choose what we feel most attracted to and that which synchronically comes our way. There are some practices that we all follow and we are supported in that by the Damanhurian obstetricians who specialise in the process of creating a path for conscious birth and pregnancy. The connection with the Plant World is an important part of it. What I personally love the most of this path is the ‘Song of the Soul’. It combines the two biggest passions I have: Music and Nature Communication.
‘Song of the Soul’ and the importance of Trees
Since several years Damanhurians who choose to become parents include this practice of creating a ‘Song of the Soul’, which is inspired by traditions of other peoples who live in strong symbiosis with nature. Preferably before conception, a woman who desires a child, chooses a tree that she feels drawn to, or with whom she has cultivated a relationship, in order to channel a melody that will help connecting to a soul that wishes to incarnate as her child. As known in many traditions, trees are bridges to other dimensions, other worlds. Natural healers for example, such as shamans, connect to trees in order to contact the soul of plants, animals, entities or ancestors. The roots of the trees live in the dimension of – what they call – the ‘under world’, whereas the branches in the ‘upper world’.
Listen to the Song of the Soul written by Zigola and Assapan for their child
Also Damanhurians cultivate a special relationship with trees. All Damanhurians have a so called ‘personal tree’ that they share their live experiences with and with whom they create a bond which they believe goes further than this live or incarnation. Children who are born in Damanhur, start their lives also relating to a tree, for which new parents follow these indications of Falco, the spiritual founder of Damanhur.
Upon the birth of a child, it is a beautiful tradition to plant a tree; they can grow together like playmates, and help each other. The two of them will settle into a very special, direct relationship, tuning in together. They might even get sick at the same time, or have a crisis in the same period; but they will manage to help each other.
From the book Imparare a Morire (1978) / Learning to Die (2015) by Falco Tarassaco
In the period that I met my partner I went to a special tree for our community, Diamantel, to channel the ‘Song of the Soul’ for the child that we desired. Diamantel is the decan tree, or mother tree of the Sacred Woods of Damanhur. I taught this melody to my partner and he started to arrange a song with it on piano. We are both musicians, so we also worked on the song together and we sang it in the period when we were trying to conceive a child. Beautiful precious moments in which we searched contact in an intuitive and creative way, inviting the Soul to come closer to us. After I got pregnant we wrote a prayer, celebrating the event of the pregnancy, connecting us to joy, love and health. We play and dance this song frequently. The words are in Sacred Language, which is a Damanhurian archetypical language we use in ritual contexts and art, which can be spoken, sang, written and there is also a Sacred Dance that expresses this language. The song of each child is sang with the people of the community after birth and remains a song to speak and sing to the soul for inspiration during his or her life.
As I said, apart from music, another big passion for me is Nature Communication and in several occasions I have noticed that the Plants and Spirits of Nature are aware (of course!) of the growing life inside of me and there seems to be a special affinity with this new life, as its essence is so pure. Purity is an important element in nature; the absence of mental structures, ego identifications, egoistic goals… things that interfere with a transparent and crispy way to communicate with nature. I feel this soul in arrival, this growing child is being welcomed and celebrated by the plants in our garden, some of the main trees, even a different flower constellation seems to have sprouted this year, compared to last years. There was such an enormous abundance of primroses in the garden this year. And in this period of pregnancy, in which my perceptions seem to change – as if it’s not just me perceiving – I have noticed a particular connection to the underground reality in my garden, the roots and all that grows and lives below the surface.
Also in the meetings with the obstetricians there is a lot of attention for the connection to the trees, we do meditations with trees, as often as possible outside and sometimes also in visualisations and we visit our Sacred Forest as often as we can.
The realm of nature seems to be very near to the perception of children that are to be born. It’s also logical, considering that 99,7% of life on Earth is plant life! In our current culture we don’t live so much with that awareness, but it’s pretty logical that any new entry on the Planet notices the omnipresence of plant life and plant consciousness.
There are many of the wonders of pregnancy in Damanhur still left untouched in this blog, but then again it’s still a big mystery in any case. Something that is happening continuously around us, and is often considered to be very normal, mediocre even… women get pregnant, new children are born. And it’s likely that I have been more in awe about certain practices that one can study here at the Damanhurian University, like Contact with the Plant World, Past Lives research and more… However, I have gotten to realise that pregnancy is no less of science fiction, fantasy or magical for that matter. Hosting a growing child, an arriving soul with its own history and background, is one of the most magical and spiritual experiences I have ever witnessed in my life so far. And I’m looking forward for whatever may come next…
Zigola Pioppo
Thank you for this beauteful post!
Thank you Yulia!