I vow to guard the wholeness of birth -- to guide gently... No cutting of flesh; it is never necessary in my experience of the sacredness of birth. It is out of the fear of death that midwives cut our own. The sado-ritual of circumcision is cut of the same fabricated fear of the flesh. My GOD! If birth isn't worship of embodiment, what else is? Birth is holy, whole, only if the violence of the mental knife and scissors is abandoned. We have slain long enough! Let us birth peace on this earth wholly -- and let this birth begin with YOU.

The Lotus Birth brings heaven into the home. It is supreme worship of the holiness of birth. Lotus Birth is whole birth, and, in this wholeness the family is blessed. All related to the new, lotus-born babies feel bliss. Full respect of the attachment to mother that babies originally have is expressed in the Lotus Birth. No acts to separate this primal unit will bring about a less violent world. Most of us connect "Mother" to "Earth" and to "matter." Trusting that the baby's first "Mother" (grounding) is the placenta, is basic. Respect for the "Mother's" innate timing to let go will transform our relationship with the material ("material" comes from the Latin, "mater," or "mother") world. Our attachments to attachment will eventually fall away on their own. We needn't be heroic and use the metal sword to cut us away -- away from the "organ," or "original nourishment," our placenta.

In Lotus Birthing, our attachments are honored. The first precept of yoga is experienced. Patiently, attachment is allowed to dry and wither away on its own ac/cord, naturally. The first meaning of "organic" is synonymous with Lotus Birth.

Actually, the placenta is "grandmother," and grandmother's name is "freedom." This herstory shows us how the mother and daughter are one -- but, for the sake of discussion, the placenta is grandmother, and the mother is mama. Why do we have such urgency to cut our newest ones away from freedom? What is the hurry to cut away the one who first cared for the baby?

The placenta is a being. It is of its own ac/cord. The placenta would have a related (but not identical) aura to the mama and the baby. Why do we want to cut and get rid of the placenta? It is as alive as the baby is at birth. It is not just an afterbirth. Again, it is a "being," with its own integrity. How we treat it and its cord will affect the baby and the mother. This has been amply demonstrated the entire world over.
The reason, in part, most want to dispose so rapidly of the placenta is the simple fact that it is dying. It's hard to watch a being die. As you watch the newborn lotus babe come fully into life, the placenta goes fully into death. We appreciated watching the old ones pass on as the new ones come in -- such perfect balance. As all living things die, the placenta reminds us so obviously. We are becoming ap/parents ourselves; we want life affirmed, now that we have just opened birth's door. New lotus babies do this wonderfully.

Witnessing the natural death process of the placenta deepends our wonder-full experience of life's greatest affirmation -- our new holy, whole baby.

On Being a Spiritual Midwife

I support life -- life coming into the body, and our world. From the soul's point of view, coming in and going out are of equal importance; both rites of passage are sacred. These are my basic beliefs.

And so, as Psyche's midwife, addressing the "spiritual" aspects of my birth, my perspective will cover a lot of ground. In the moment of birth, there is only One Way. Yet, to come to that moment, many different ways will be explored.

Not much "either/or," "good vs. bad," or "spirit vs. matter" dialogue serves the version of the truth which claims my work. Spiritual midwifery can sometimes be based on a dualistic definition, such as "non-medical." That is defining what spiritual midwives do (or don't do!) in opposition, or, at best, reflection to what doctors do (or don't do). This perspective is losing passion in my own practice.

Birth is the most obvious (a-parent) expression (secretion) of "what -is" that we can experience. And, when I write "we," I mean "women." Otherwise, "men" means men, with "he" denoting such. For a conscious woman, childbirth is self-evidently holy. A spiritual midwife makes the full agreement to support the innate holiness of birth. It is as simple as this: anyone being with woman giving birth who worships, attends closely and invisibly, follows true, and opens hearts (as well as wombs) is a spiritual midwife.

I love babies. Babies are pure love. A spiritual midwife vows to welcome all babies gently. Honesty and harmlessness are her way -- and guiding secrets. She is a guardian for babies, and does all she can to end oppression and suffering by sado-medical rituals of O.B./pediatric religions. In their passion to know, medical rituals violate the Mystery -- the MsStory, the style and rhythm and pace of each unique woman telling her story, telling her baby into existence. Who are we to judge any woman's story about birth, or even to claim to try to categorize such, or put it on a graph, or into some box of statistics?

Each birth is a ceremony for all time. When we attend a birth without making a claim, we are healed. Medical ways are to claim knowledge about birth, but, in truth, they know nothing. No one does, except the Goddess (or whatever image you have about a personalized form of Spirit). The birthing mother comes closest to this (usually, precluding couvade) as best carrier of the archetype, the One Who Knows. So rather than ask the doctor or midwife about what is going on at birthings, ask the mama; and, ask her to ask the baby, if she doesn't get a direct answer. This is the maiutic way (Greek for "in the manner of a midwife) -- knowing when to ask the right question at the right time, so that the birthing mother will deliver the truth unto herself.

This is High Technique, this art of council, of womantalk, of being with women giving birth, purely, without any claims (be it the need to control her experience, or another statistic).
Spiritual midwives also believe the Ten Commandments. Psyche's midwife receives this issuing forth of the Way Things Work, knowing how applicable the Ten Commandments are to birth itself. If God were a mother, the ten rules would focus the energy like this:

1. THOU SHALT HAVE NO OTHER BIRTHS BEFORE ME.
There are no surprises. If a midwife promises to attend a woman's birth, and then is at another birth instead, how would you feel? (see the 11th com-mandment for more info.) Missing births is like missing your period -- the nostalgia doesn't help.

2. THOU SHALT NOT WORSHIP ANY FALSE DEITY OR GRAVEN IMAGE.
An example of a false deity is an abstract concept about "normal birth," and holding on to that textbook idea, instead of being fully present with whatever presents. A graven image moves the soul towards death, not life -- the final and grave (serious) print-out sheet of the fetal monitor -- (Imagine watching a graph from a machine come out, instead of the baby from the mama!!}

3. THOU SHALT NOT TAKE MY NAME IN VAIN.
I have delivered four babies, our own children (although we know no one owns children). In all other births, the woman delivers the babies. It is vanity on the part of any midwife to say how many babies she delivered in her practice. That may be accurate, but not truth -- therefore, claiming birth is not a spiritual practice.

4. REMEMBER THE SABBATH. KEEP IT A HOLY DAY.
As Sabbath means "rest," we are best at births fresh and rested. Assembly line hospital births do not allow the babies to see us as fresh as we are, and we are not refreshed by attending too many births. Each spiritual midwife defines "too many" for herself, only. In order to keep each birth day a holy day, a Sabbath, we see it as enlightenment, Sunday, and help the family rest, and give thanks, and adore one another in the glow of deliver- ance.

5. HONOR THY FATHER AND MOTHER.
This one is self-explanatory. It means a spiritual midwife honors the parents first. I would add grandparents next, as well as all the kin, then the laws of the land.

6. THOU SHALT NOT KILL.
Spiritual midwifery expands this rule to include the vow of non-violence. But it is also taken literally, and abortion and contraception (which is really abortion) are seen as killing. A spiritual midwife needs integrity in her personal accept- ance of when babies come. If inwardly one is denying babies coming, the external experience tends to match the energy, and birthings are trickier. Open acceptance to what comes is mandatory! Killing can come only from denial of life-force.

7. THOU SHALT NOT COMMIT ADULTERY.
Childbirth is an expression of woman's sexuality. Every birth is the matching energy to the conception dance, and there are only one woman and one man in the world at birth as partners -- the papa and the mama of the baby coming. A spiritual midwife, therefore, does not cut in. Allowing birth to be fully sexual is only possible when the spiritual midwife is content and complete about her own sexual experience of birth. Otherwise, there is a subtle "rip-off" of energy, perhaps first experienced as "kinks" in the birthing energy. The sexual cording within the birthing family must be kept free of entanglements. I believe that not severing the umbilical cord nourishes the connection until it organically is ready to fall away. This breaking forth occurs in its own time, not corrupted (Latin root of adulterate) by the midwife's severance of the baby's cord.

8. THOU SHALT NOT STEAL.
A spiritual midwife is not the high priestess at the ceremony called birth. The birthing family are the ones whom we serve, humbly. At the Blessing Way ritual (to prepare the way for the baby coming) the spiritual midwife washed the mama's feet, showing her position as lower, and as servant. And, as soon as the baby emerges, a spiritual midwife aids the mama and family in holding their own. She does not steal the baby for any sado-medical rituals of greeting.

9. THOU SHALT NOT BEAR FALSE WITNESS AGAINST THY NEIGHBOR.
The witness sees dispassionately what is. We will not, as spiritual midwives, labor under slander and superstition about being witches and charlatans. We help women to deliver truth unto themselves, and what issues forth from our practice will give testimony empirically. Spiritual midwives are birthing a new community of kinder and gentler neighbors. These new home-born babes are celebrated as holy children -- and that is the truth; a spiritual midwife wholist- ically attends birth within the context of community, home.

10. THOU SHALT NOT COVET.
Thou shalt not covet any birth experience other than one's own. Desire comes from the Latin, "de-sire," or, "from the father." Desire, therefore, is a fatherly feeling at birth; more appropriate for a mother is an attitude of giving. After all, she is "giving" birth. Desiring only brings something other that what-is into the moment we call birth. To have a truly holy birth experience, there is surrender, not coveting (that eager desire is more appropriate for Cupid's ceremonies). We worship a different Goddess at birth.

Spiritual midwives know the Goddess as a being, and a personal being as well, with each birth attended to consciously. I love Elitheia with all my heart, and it is she who actually delivered my own four babies. Yet Psyche's midwife says we may worship a Greek Goddess of birth and then the Changing Woman, a native Goddess. Wherever we can receive inspiration to do our best as midwives, as we pour medical drugs alongside with more traditional birthing remedies into the melting pot/cauldron. When we begin to pray, we call upon whoever is on call any particular birthing night, be she "Ix Meklah Oyte," or Florence Nightengale. A spiritual midwife accepts divine energy from any place.

My practice has been called spiritual, as well as radical. The psyche delivers questions as offerings to the Mystery called birth. The midwifery rituals are grounded in the above ten commandments. The root of it all ("radix" is the Greek word forming "radical," which means "root") is love -- radical love which is healing. For this is the most specific calling to my midwifery practice -- to attend birth as a healer.

A full spiritual midwife is a healer. She brings a commitment to maintain the wholeness of the birth experience, to keep it holy. She does no harm. In any effort to "save life," she will do no harm, create no extra karma. Medical heroic efforts to save a baby sometimes in its savior/suffering fervor, actually may kill or hurt the baby. Life is deemed our priority -- at any cost. Death is the enemy, and we have a religious war on our hands. Many doctors attend so as to share the burden of responsibility. Midwives, having not made death the enemy, haven't as much blood on their hands, so their passing of the buck isn't as noticeable.

And, as long as we are mentioning money, a spiritual midwife may or may not accept money for her service. A healer isn't attached to being paid for healing, but the births go better when that is clear amongst all in attendance. After all, the first chakra, earth element of the yogic subtle body, is linked to money. Ever watch a "tight ass" about acknowledgment and value have a soft perineum and easy birth opening? A healer sees the connection between cash flow and dilation, between sharing and a flowing deliverance, and works to bring unity, wholeness back into one's life when necessary.

As above, so below, so to speak of healing birth in our culture, we must befriend the whole natural cycle and accept death. A spiritual midwife, therefore, heals by bringing balance back to our pain and death phobic culture, recognizing that during pain, birth, and psycho-analytic therapy, humans may re-program themselves into playing planetside with more consciousness. Birth is our sacred experience. Consciously accepting what birth brings can enlighten.

Healing the splits a family may incur can be the grounding necessary for all to know the fullness of joy of birth. What may grow from a shared and conscious birth at home can heal a family for eternity. It is a good practice to see each baby as the Christ-child, or any inspiring and healing avatar or your liking. The mother becomes the Madonna, or any blessed Mother of God. Prenatals become worship services, and postpartum visits, the adoration.

I once heard that the Eleventh Commandment is: YOU DO, TOO, KNOW WHAT I MEAN! When someone at a birthing wants to know about "progress," I might refer the question back to the One Who Knows, the laboring mama. So I ask her how she is, how her baby is, and where the baby is. If she answers, "I don't know," I will then ask, "If you did know, what would the answer be?" That question is repeated to each "I don't know." Eventually, I might say, "Go ahead and guess -- you don't have to be accurate." I find the "guess" is usually the truth -- perhaps not accurate, but the truth. We always know what's happening all the time, at birth.

If I think that I don't know, I might consult the I Ching, or Tarot, or meditate alone. That is my total medical back-up. A spiritual midwife doesn't pass the buck, and is fully responsible for keeping the eleven commandments. She knows what to do because that is whatever will feel right ultimately. This feeling will change within the context of each community and each family. What always feels best, however, is full understanding of whatever expression the laboring mama gives, or the baby gives, during birth. To be able to support (stand under) the laboring mother is acting like her bridge -- a spiritual midwife is that grounded being who nurtures the passage. As Psyche's midwife, she is the psychopomps -- the guide of souls. She can speak any language, but especially the language of birth. She does, too, know what you mean, for a spiritual midwife has a compassionate tongue. She gives the word medicine. And she understands; she knows how it feels, now, and ultimately.

A spiritual midwife is pure dispassion in the center. She sits with her legs open. She honors a family's expression of their own souls during parturition. She is the perfect witness, bearing truth within the neighborhood, the perfect inner view, the perfect servant waiting, not desiring, birth to bless us when She will, the perfect partner, faithful to birth and filled with divine trust. This perfection is freedom, and is graced by following the commandments. "Command," as Latin etymology reveals, means "together" and "to entrust to; to put in the hands of." A spiritual midwife feels commanded at birthings. Her only tools are her hands. What she handles in the above commandments clears the passage for the work at hand. The Ten Commandments are ten truths, the Tao, or the Way. The game rules of the epiphany are just the Way thing Work.

For a spiritual midwife, the uterus is the universe, the matrix of which the divine plan is spun. And its process of creation is called "information," the way things, or concepts (conceptions) are made into form. The greatest mystery is the creation of life. Watching the uterus so closely gives a window into the Universe. It is with the inner sight that we can see the mystery unfold, not with Superman's X-ray (and tetragenetic and carcinogenic) eyes. The Ten Commandments are Lila's scoreboard; but, who is counting anyway? Not I! Psyche's midwife loses precious moments of imaginal riches by the poverty of abstraction. Abstracting souls into numbers of births, pounds, inches, centimeters, grams, and graphs...

There are no test questions about midwifery as a spiritual practice. If your practice places economic and legal aspects as primary, there are medical schools wherein your tests will be the creation of abnormal births, for the benefit of the interns. The only exam for a spiritual midwife is a self-exam. The one who keeps score is the one who misses being fully present at a birth. Birth is not an abstract experience the way numbers are. I believe the numbers game has paved the way for the violence brought upon birth by scientific/statistical superstitions and sado-medical rituals. Of all the home births I have attended, none have been "normal." Not in the original meaning (Greek "norma" means a straight geometrical angle). Birth is not square -- it's part of the cycle, or circle. Each birth is unique, yet connected for all time with all births. But this cannot be measured. Each birth is sacred, not statistical.

A spiritual midwife attends to the spirit in birth. Some say the spirit dwells in the heart. So, a spiritual midwife attends to the heart at birthings. I believe that the desire to hear the baby's heart has good roots. Yet, the use of all that electronic gadgetry to hear the baby's heartbeat is cold.

Technologic/metal/hardware -- these are tools of another God, Apollo, the physician paradigm. His sister, Artemis, is the first midwife, of the Greeks, and she actually delivered him, being the first-born twin. She listens to the baby's heart, but not at a distance, like her brother. The amount of gadgetry equals the need to gain an objective, distant, apollonic relationship with the heart of the baby birthing, and the Spirit of Birth itself. Fetal heart monitors violate the mystery; they are blasphemous. The spiritual midwife hears the baby's heart as a prayer by placing her ear to birth's flesh. She bows to the mother, and listens directly to baby's heart -- to the new one's heart song. She is not necessarily listening to quantify, or to judge. An electronic device used to amplify the babe's hearttones is a false deity, a sin (missing the mark), and forfeits the wonderous experience of your ear on pregnant skin. Counting heartbeats may make you feel like it's under control. And it is, but not the spiritual midwife's personal control.

Agendas for birth, and "labor management techniques," violate a woman's family's experience of birth. The spiritual midwife is called to birth (be it by telephone, electronic beeper, dream, or vision) by her commitment and openness to let go of any personal or public concepts in order to participate in the fullness of each family's birthing experience. And goals? All things spiritual recognize and manifest their goals. Mine is to hope that each family that I attend eventually birth at home without me or any other being present whom they believe knew more about their births than themselves. My commitment to this is total. The best births are the ones in which the spiritual midwife leaves no memory. If a couple can conceive the baby without help, it matches that they could deliver the baby themselves. A spiritual midwife is, as well as healer, partner, servant, guide, and witness, a teacher. She is teacher of the way into self, into the deepest and softest tissues of the self. She teaches that the information known through the uterus is truth itself. And that truth is called "baby." The way out of that self is called "birth."

A few words on the despair which "mind-over-matter," "male-over-female," or "spirit-over-material" philosophies deal to humans: The split in our culture may be healed in natural home birth. It is the original rending of the one into two -- the beginnings of dualistic experience. The mama and the baby are One in purpose during birth, and the spiritual midwife helps everyone to remember that. The despair comes when all hopes to repair the split are gone. If you keep a newborn away from mama, apathy sets in, and out of that, violence may grow instead of trust and love. The spiritual midwife brings about the marriage between spirit and matter, whose baby's first breath celebrates that union. She knows that "having babies is having hope" -- and gives up the "struggle" to witness the miracle of creation.

Mind and matter are unified in a spiritual midwifery practice, as is male and female. This wholeness deepends the care given to the new one; and this care strengthens the baby's feelings of well-being. A person who starts out feeling good is not prone to dealing out violence to other humans. It is my contribution to a more peaceful world to heal birth in as many ways as possible -- as I can.