Create Art with Soul: Free SoulCollage® Instructions
Collaging with Cancer: A SoulCollage® Journey
Chapter 7: Stay Away
By Anne Marie Bennett | Posted 6/1/12 | Updated 9/10/20
I originally made this SoulCollage® card in the spring of 2011, just a few months before my diagnosis of secondary angiosarcoma of my left breast (NOT breast cancer). I wasn’t sure what the woman on the card was saying, but the energy of the card felt strong and protective to me.
That July, when I found out I was going to have a mastectomy, I happened to draw this card in one of the short readings I do with my SoulCollage® deck every other day. At that time, she was saying to me:
I Am the One Who is keeping away anything and anybody who is not conducive to your highest and best healing. I Am the One Who is giving you PERMISSION to say no to anything that doesn’t help you to feel good, to feel better, to heal. My gift to you is protection. I give you the knowing that you are worth protecting and worth healing and that you can raise your own hand (literal, metaphoric, it doesn’t matter) to keep away that which doesn’t belong in your own precious life.
Then, several months later, I drew this card again in one of my random short readings. And she had something more to tell me. For the first time, I noticed that the background actually LOOKED like a round breast and a flat scar where a breast would be. The background, even though it was obviously taken from images of the Universe, was actually a representation of my own chest.
I Am the One Who is standing in front of the Universe. I Am the One Who is holding up my hand so no one will come near/intrude.
I Am the One Who is standing in front of my own body, my own chest. The left breast is now gone, a bright, illuminated scar in its place. My right breast, created anew by my beloved plastic surgeon, is now shiny and new, in perfect proportion to the rest of me.
I Am the One Who is saying ENOUGH! NO MORE SURGERY! Not now, anyway. Not at this time. I am not ready for my body to be scarred yet again. Not now. Maybe another year, but NOT NOW.
I Am the One Who is protecting you from any more physical changes of the surgical kind. Before/after your mastectomy, I was giving you wisdom and advice about staying away from anything that was not healing for you, to protect your boundaries and I am still saying that to you. And now, my meaning, my message, has increased, widened, deepened.
This is a powerful example of how the practice of SoulCollage® can guide us through absolutely anything. At the time I drew this card for the second time, I had been contemplating having reconstruction surgery on my left side, but this card tenderly touched on exactly what I needed right then, which was no more surgery!
©2012 Anne Marie Bennett. All rights reserved.
Next: Chapter 8: Celebrating Life
Anne Marie Bennett is a published author, self-taught artist, and SoulCollage® Facilitator. more
Goddess of Peace and Mindfulness
Learn more about the origins and techniques of SoulCollage® in the book Soulcollage: An Intuitive Collage Process for Individuals and Groups by Seena B. Frost