Seducing Spring
Or, Why the Queen Bee Isn’t Actually in Charge
I don’t like to wait on Spring, March 21st is just too far away and down here in San Marcos, it will be warm any minute. The birds are back and soon, we will see the bees. Perhaps it is my “pollyanna” personality, but I am past making plans and am already living in my spring. I take the Minoan Bee Goddess as my divine model for spring. As a goddess, the Bee Goddess won’t wait for permission or for the vernal equinox, she brings spring on her wings.
Researching bees, however, I discovered that the individual bee that we call the Queen is anything but. We picture her with a little crown and a black and gold honeycomb robe with a dripping train, but we only call this largest of all bees in the hive the “queen” because we need hierarchy. The “queen” isn’t in charge of anything, she is basically a reproductive organ for the hive. The “queen” doesn’t make plans, that is a function of the hive mind, a disembodied intelligence created by synergy between all the bees in the hive, not executive function. This made me think of the illusion that “we” have that there is a “me” in charge of our mind, an executive that makes decisions. But this isn’t the case, so much of how “we” work in down to synergy between our conscious mind, the gut microbiome pumping molecules into our system, muscle memory and even the collective unconscious. That sound we hear, buzzing about our New Year’s Resolutions, it isn’t a CEO, it’s just one bee buzzing. What a comfort but also, what a dilemma.
I see this as “the pressure chamber problem”. I have spent all winter filling my creative aquifer, building the pressure, but I can’t just wave my scepter and “release the hounds”. Willpower can’t force the creative gush I am depending on. How do you squeeze rock? I can’t force creativity, but I can tempt it through the narrow channels, priming the pump so to speak, laying the creative trail. Water under pressure finds release through temperature shifts, natural weakness in the rock and seismic movements, rumbles in the gut of the earth. But I can pull water from my aquifer by seduction, laying a small trail of water to pull the creativity forth.
I like to think of this as “seducing” spring. On my altar of the season, I have a bottle of native honey and with care for the temptation it may provide to inappropriate creatures, I will leave an offering of honey for the Bee Goddess, returning the transformed fruit of bee labor as a gift. In the case of my art, the seduction is something like the “artist’s date”, from Julia Cameron “the Artist’s Way”. An artist’s date is doing something to feed your art, to seduce your creativity, it isn’t just self-care, it’s an actual courtship. Artists should make Valentine’s Day a Holy Day to celebrate the moment that we fell in love with our practice.
To seduce spring, I bring out the silk scarves and concentrate on the sensory details of my own hive mind, the fresh mint scent, the warm flush of baby chick yellow, the flavor of honey. The whole world is coated in creative pollen, I can just wiggle my way through and drink it up. I can be the flowers I want to see in the world. Flowers don’t track habits or set quarterly goals, they are open when conditions are right and they offer their beauty freely, trusting that the bees, the pollinators will come. My hive-body wants to move towards the creative nector, I just need to let myself be seduced.
The sudden flush of calls for art, the dizzying list of opening receptions, its a garden, ready for us to buzz in and share our waggle dance. The business of bees is reciprocity, not extraction, the Power of the Bee Goddess is to accept what we are already desperate to share. Forget the to-do list, just follow what smells so sweet right back to the spring.
Thank you for reading what emerges from my process.
Gwendolyn