Kali's Sword

I wrote this piece for the Winter 2004 issue of Ascent Magazine.


It began innocently enough. It was 1983 and at a routine physical my doctor noticed a slight swelling on the right side of my neck. It turned out to be an enlargement of my thyroid gland, otherwise known as a goiter. At first, it was not that pronounced; the only people who noticed it were health-care professionals. Once cancer was ruled out, I opted for annual checkups, alternative healing, and learning to live with the goiter.

Some physicians I saw suggested surgical removal but throat surgery, with its attendant risks to my voice, was out of the question. I am a musician. Singing is my lifeblood and my joy, the way I channel inspiration and process all the twists and turns of daily life. At the time of my diagnosis, my career as a kirtan singer and workshop leader was beginning to take off. I was getting a lot of praise for the beauty and power of my voice. There was no way I was going to subject my throat to a surgeon’s knife.

While I do not subscribe to the notion that we create our diseases, I do see illness as both a messenger of the body, alerting us to something within that needs attention, and a metaphor, loaded with information about the hidden terrain of the soul. While no physician or healer I saw could diagnose my goiter’s root physical cause, at the subtle energy level, it sure seemed to suggest an obstruction in Vishuddha, the throat chakra gateway of the human voice.

I did copious amounts of inner work -- painting, music-making, movement, chanting and -- to unravel the blockage. This produced a wealth of insight about myself, but no matter what techniques or medicines I tried, no matter how many mantra repetitions, shoulder stands, or art and healing sessions, the goiter continued to grow. It was as if all the words not spoken and songs not sung were lodged there, held together with impulses squashed so as not to offend, needs ignored so as not to seem weak, questions not asked so as not to appear lacking in knowledge.

The goiter embarrassed me. From the perspective of sheer vanity, there was no getting around the fact I had a physical deformity that was, to put it mildly, unattractive. Worse than that, it belied my image of myself as a woman who spoke and sang from a ground of truth. How much of that precious authenticity, I had to wonder, was actually getting through this jammed-up portal at the center of my voice?

By the time I surrendered to surgery, nearly twenty years after a doctor first noticed the problem, my thyroid had defied a full range of Eastern, Western, traditional, alternative and creative arts healing modalities, growing large enough to make a very prominent bulge on the right side of my neck. I never felt I made the decision to remove the goiter. One day, I simply knew it was time, called my physician and said, “Okay, let’s go.”

The thyroid is a butterfly-shaped gland that sits over the vocal cord nerves in the middle of the throat. At our first meeting, the surgeon drew a diagram, explaining that if he accidentally severed one of these nerves, my life as a singer was done. Then he asked if I was sure I wanted to go through with the procedure. I choked back tears in his office and drove home sobbing, but I knew there was no turning back.

In the weeks leading up to surgery, I tried to make my peace, grieving the possible end of my life as a singer. I scheduled kirtan gigs all over town and sang as if every performance would be my last. Singing felt like the most precious gift and I seesawed between that sublime awareness and worst-case scenario fears that I would suffocate during anesthesia or wake up in the ICU without a voice.

Of all the deities I’ve studied, it is the warrior goddess Kali with whom I feel the most rapport. One way I think of “her” is as a blazing sword of light, liberating innocence an truth from the choking darkness of fear. I once had a startling vision of Kali. She wore a mask and veil, but I recognized her instantly, sensing that her face was covered, not to hide, but to protect me from burning in her fire. She was calling me into herself and I knew singing was the way, but when I opened my mouth, no sound came out. Terror froze my voice.

This vision haunted me for years. I might feel a subtle Kali presence, but nothing so graphic or dramatic ever happened again. I wondered if I’d ever have another chance like that. Then, the night before surgery, making my best effort to keep things light but actually filled with trepidation, I heard that Kali voice loud and clear, saying ever so sweetly, but with just a bit of consternation, “What have you been so worried about? Did you think I’d let you go through this one alone!” That was when I realized this surgery was not just a routine thyroidectomy. It was downright shamanic. This was Kali’s sword, in the form of the surgeon’s knife. I knew then, there was nothing to fear.

Twenty-four hours later, after nearly two decades of living with my goiter, it was gone. As it turned out, the right lobe had grown to the size of a grapefruit, wrapped itself around my throat and was beginning to strangle me. But the biggest shock of all, buried where no diagnostic test or exam had ever seen it, my goiter held a secret: thyroid cancer. Years of inner work had been ineffective in healing my thyroid gland. But the instinct to remove it had been exactly right.

Within ten days I was singing again. My voice felt wide open and people who came to my classes and kirtan programs said my music had touched them more deeply than ever before. With the goiter and its hidden tumor gone, I assumed that the throat chakra blockage must also have cleared. As it turned out, physical surgery was just the beginning.

I now discovered the energetic form of my goiter. It felt like a demon that had been weaving a snare around me for a long, long time, tightening its hold every time fear, unworthiness or pride tricked me into silencing my own voice.

During the year and a half post-surgery, my entire life seemed to fall apart as every structure and relationship caught in this sticky web was dismantled and pulled down. This was certainly nothing my thoracic surgeon had warned me about. But how could he know the mysterious ways of Kali? How could he know that removing my thyroid would open psychic space for the master surgeon of the soul and her infamous sword to get to work?

Unlike physical surgery, there was no anesthesia for this procedure. I had to stay wide awake. The less I struggled, the easier it was, but I often felt I no longer knew who I was. Friendships gone. Belief systems shattered. Work in ruins. Standing in the rubble of my former life, I began to see how much of my identity had been bound up in a secret longing for fame and fortune, and how much of my persona as a wise yogini at peace with herself was also a cover for pride and desire. I had to face the myriad ways my unfulfilled (and unexpressed) ambition had seduced me into giving my power away.

It was very painful to admit to myself and to others how many layers of self-deceit I’d woven around myself. There was no demon. I was the one who wove those snares. I now saw how asleep I had been, believing my spiritual practice, my teaching, my devotion all kept me on a sattvic path.

The ways of healing are so mysterious. I don’t think I’ll ever fully understand how it was that living with the goiter kept me from discerning what in post-goiter reality became so completely clear. I’d always seen fear and unworthiness as my chief inner demons. But they were actually second tier. It was envy and pride that had been choking me for years. During that long, shattering dark night of the soul, I came out from behind the facade. And much to my amazement, discovered I was standing in the Light. And even more amazing, discovered that the Light in which I stood was simply me.