Beltaine 2010: A Pagan Odyssey in Oxford, CT: Part 2: An Afternoon with Queen Donna Henes

Everyone who studies about the Goddess knows the idea of the three-fold Goddess: the Maiden, the Mother and the Crone. Queen Mama Donna Henes has found a few problems with this age old idea. If women are now living into their 80s on a regular basis and some into their 100s, then every woman from her entrance into menopause until her death is regarded as a Crone. That's over 60 million Crones in the US alone says Donna Henes. According to the old three-fold Goddess idea, a woman would be a Maiden for the first 20 or so years if her life, a Mother for the next 25-30 and a Crone for the next 30-50 years. That's a long time to be a Crone! Something is definitely missing or out of balance.

Donna Henes has added a fourth stage to her visualization of a woman's life and she has called that the "Queen." In a truly ground-breaking book entitled, The Queen of Myself. Donna has described this fourth phase of a woman's life and subtitled her wonderful creation "Stepping into Sovereignty in Midlife." She sees this fourth state as equivalent to the Autumn of a woman's life, but not yet the Winter or the Crone time. She breaks her four phases of womanhood up this way:

1. Maiden-Spring-Waxing Moon-Water-East-Dawn
2. Mother-Summer-Full Moon-Earth-South-Noon
3. Queen-Autumn-Waning Moon-Fire-West-Sunset
4. Crone-Winter-Dark Moon-Air-North-Midnight 

Donna Henes likens the idea of the Waning Moon and Autumn to the condensing and refinement of a good broth and not as the lessening of strength or decline. She talks about hot and juicy women in their age of Queendom.  What is a woman at this time of her life if she is not fire?  It is like an old saying, "When a woman loses her blood, she gains her voice." She is stronger and less willing to step down or back from what she believes. At this point in their life, Donna says, she hears women repeatedly using this phrase, "I don't have time for this bullshit." As she reaches ever closer to the Winter of her life, she is still the Queen, active, juicy, hotter than ever and not ready for death. She has a lot she still wishes to accomplish and she doesn't have the time or patience to wait for it any longer.   

Mother Earth can be likened to a woman during this stage of her life. "Mother Earth is pissed," says Donna. And her upset is evident everywhere. Coal mines are exploding, volcanoes are erupting, tornadoes and hurricanes are blowing, tsunamis and heavy rains are flooding. "The empowerment of the matriarch or Queen is the missing link," says Donna. True leadership and empowerment are missing; life is in transition all around us. The world cries out for the Queen. Friends die; we realize that we, ourselves, are less than immortal. Our parents die. We carry on. We gain SELF. We push through the storms and emerge as whole individuals, queens of ourselves.

This past Friday, April 30, 2010, at the first of her three workshops at “Beltaine 2010: A Pagan Odyssey in Oxford, CT,” Donna was incredible. She embodied the works of which she spoke. Her book is thought-provoking, life-transforming and it's time is past due. Donna's website, her newsletter and her other books are all well worth reading as is tracking down her next workshop or seminar.

In her own words, Donna Henes states:

Sacred Seclusion: A Meditation on My Self
"Certainly the most crucial step toward personal sovereignty is to know our Selves. After all our years as mothers and others, we need to reestablish who we are as individuals, separate and distinct from our relationships with those around us. Who am I if I am not a mother, a daughter, a lover, a wife, a friend, a partner, a teacher, a student, a boss, or an employee? Who am I if I am not associated with some undertaking, enterprise, creation, project, product, or service? Who am I, in fact, if I just am?"

Empress Energy: Extending Our Influence Out Into the World
"The Queen is a mature woman who has conquered the challenges in Her life and claimed Her own royal power....Now that She is firmly rooted in Her best Self and acting for Her own benefit, She is free to reach out in ever increasing concentric circles and offer Her compassion, expertise, time, and money to people and causes that call to Her sense of response-ability."

This book and any of Donna's publications, forums or workshops are highly recommended, not just for those 60 million of us who are seaching for an archtype that fits, but for us all. 

Queen Mama Donna Henes, Urban Shaman