The Popcorn and M&Ms Ceremony

We are often reminded that “It’s all sacred” and this small but very powerful ceremony certainly gave credence to that statement recently.

For several weeks I had been doing some energetic housecleaning and was working (yes, in the truest sense) at releasing some of the limitations I’ve been carrying around for over half a century. I was getting tired of bouncing off the same force fields time and time again. It was time to let this junk go!

Now, it’s not like I haven’t tried before. We all know what that’s like. We release one thing and it just shows back up in a slightly different form – so we rationalize that we’ve let one go and this is a new road block. So, I informed my guides that I wanted these gone for once and for all. And, I asked for help.

Well, after a few nights of strange dreams, that weren’t so strange once I really looked at them, I did some housecleaning in my chakras. Like with housecleaning, the first thing that needs to be done is things need to be picked up. So, like diligent homemakers, my guides paid a visit to my solar plexus area with their trash bags and begin cleaning up the junk I had collected over the years. But, instead of disposing of it, they handed me a trash bag full of stuff for me to take care of.

Of course, being the rebel I am, I asked what I was suppose to do with the trash. Their reply was a vision of popcorn popping. Okay, that’s great, but maybe I’m a little obtuse. Eventually I got it.

Later in this growth expedition, I was shown a red M&M connected to my root chakra. Hmm… maybe I’m just hungry.

Well soon it all came clear and I had my marching orders. The next night was the full moon and the simple ceremony was laid out.

That evening I built a fire in the back yard in our medicine wheel fire pit. It was nice to have company that evening for the ceremony. I had forgotten a friend was coming in from the Tucson area for the night. She was also on a healing journey that day, so we shared the ceremony and bore witness to each other’s process.

Once some nice coals developed the ceremony began. I took my red M&M from the bowl and cracked the hard shell gently between my fingers. This was that shell that I had carried – the boundaries that I kept in place that held me in and kept me from expanding. Once this shell was cracked, it allowed room for movement and exposed the sweetness and richness within. Now mind you, we didn’t remove the shell or destroy it, as some boundaries are necessary, we just wanted and needed more expansion room. After saying our blessings and thanks, we both tossed our M&Ms into the fire.

Next it was popcorn time. We each took our first handful of popcorn. This represented all the limitations that others had offered us over time that we accepted as our own. With blessings, we thanked them and released them to the fire. The second handful represented all our own limits, the ones that we place on our self as we go through life, the certainties of our own inadequacies. Again, with blessings and thanks they were released to the fire.

We then stood back and watched, as the corn began to pop. Some of the kernels didn’t pop. They were simply consumed by the fire, these were those things that probably should have been left by the wayside many years or life times ago. Ideas that were spoiled and had no life. Others broke free and popped their way across the fire pit with great exuberance – bursting free of the limits of the shell and transforming into something totally new and digestible for the souls we are becoming.

When the excitement settled, we thanked Grandmother Moon for holding space for us and witnessing our journey. It was a fulfilling and powerful ceremony. The results are just beginning to unfold for me and there is a tremendous feeling of freedom (as well as a tad of fear) having been released from the limits I have carried for so many years.

Ceremonies can be big and elaborate or as simple as a fire and popcorn and M&Ms. It's all about what works for you. But, never underestimate the power of the mundane things in life when it comes to ceremony, they can often be the greatest tools for transformation.

Until next time --

Mitakuye Oyasin ( A Lakota prayer as a reminder that we are all related),
Debbie