| The Flame of Life
by
Wendy Darling
Note: While this essay stands its own, it
can be better understood by reading Wendy's previous essays
on imagery-based meditation and energy channeling. These include
the "My Life As a Celibate Sex Goddess" series ("Limitless
Power," "Power
Trip," and "Regaining
the Light"), an article on Reiki, "Limitless
Power: Reiki" and an article specifically on
meditation imagery, "Close Your Eyes and You Will See."
Over
the past four years, I've experimented with many different forms
of visualization, many of which I've detailed here in Inception, both as a personal chronicle and
as a way to teach others working in similar areas. After completing my last such
essay, "Close Your Eyes and You Will See," I thought I might possibly be done
sharing, since I seem to have covered the gamut. And then something new popped
up!
I regularly discover new imagery and places. Often I stumble into an "area"
and it's only through repeated visits that I explore the areas and get into
the deeper powers. In the case of the area I'm about to describe, getting "deeper"
was a literal thing, as I first began to see images of a dry desert place and
after repeated visits, wound up deep underground in rock-walled rooms, caves
under the desert or within a cliff or mountain.
To begin with the above-ground visions, I kept finding myself visualizing
myself standing on an outcropping of either stone or dry sand, with the wind
blowing and a wide, wild plane or valley below me. It seemed to me this place
would be somewhere in Arizona or New Mexico. Although I've never visited
either place, I've certainly been exposed to enough imagery (nature documentaries,
shows about National Parks, Native Americans, and even car commercials!) to
recognize them. Standing in this "foreign" place I've never been
in real life, I would feel the power of the wind and the landscape itself,
and it was like some ancient power was coursing through the ground and into
my mind's body (the "me" I picture in my head standing there) as
well as my physical body. I was quite surprised by the power of this, since
all I was "doing" was stand
on a hill in the middle of nowhere, but every time I visited the area, the
same thing happened.
Then
one night I thought of the desert, but instead of finding myself on the hill,
I found myself underground. I was seeing a series of low rock chambers, either
natural caves or hewn out of rock by people. The rock was orange-red and
glowed with firelight. People were living in these rooms. In my mind's
eye, I explored the chambers and noted the way some of the rooms were decorated
with plants and flowers. People moved in and out of the rooms and passages,
working, talking, and obviously living in some sort of community.
Finally,
after going through several rooms, I came upon their purpose.
The chamber I'd entered was larger than the others, and on the
floor sat gathered a group of people seated in a circle. In the
center of the circle burned a fire — but
not of the conventional type. Although I cannot remember a word being spoken,
apparently those gathered intimated to me that the flame I saw coming out of
the ground was not merely a flame, but an expression of great power.
This flame
was lit with the power of life, for all in the earth around and beneath us
lived the vast fountain of life that feeds all the earth and its creatures.
The people gathered around the flame were keepers of the flame — watching
it, protecting it, and feeding it their own energy to sustain it. The caves
were secret, sacred and dedicated to the maintenance of the flame. I was awed
by the flame and in the vision and my body, let the feeling of the great power
fill me the same way I've imagined the power of an ocean, mountain, city or
lightning storm filling me, energizing me.
That
was my first visit. On my next visit, I once again found myself underground
and quickly went to the room with the flame. This time I got close to it and
actually melded with it. Guided by others, I put my hand into the flames, discovering
that the flames were not hot, but composed of a different kind of energy, the
fire only an illusion. The power was real, however, and I found that was receiving
massive amounts of energy even as my own energy melded with that of the flame.
It was an energy exchange, with the flame taking and then spreading out unique
bits of energy from me, while I meanwhile got the massive dose of energy it
represented. It was exhilarating and completely amazing.
After
that I experienced the flame a couple of additional times and soon it was
like I was some kind of explorer trying to understand the natives. I didn't
really get far; I never learned any history of the area, for example. However,
I was quite welcome, as everyone seemed to make an effort to get across to
me the importance of the flame and allowed me to participate in community worship
rituals.
It
was a couple of weeks after my initial vision of the flame that I experienced
the most powerful vision yet — the power of the flame combined with a
ritual topping anything I'd seen before. This time I was in a truly large chamber
with lots of people, all seeming to be in the costume of what I would call
Aztecs or some other Native Americans indigenous to present-day Mexico. There
were eagles and/or birds made from gold and precious stones, and in the center
of the gathering, by the flame, a priest wore gold jewelry and wore clothes
made from animal hide, teeth and bone.
This set-up was much more elaborate than anything I'd found in that place
so far and I quickly gathered this was because it was a special ceremony, rather
than the everyday ritual. The priest was in command and shouted out some words,
announcing the power of the flame, the source of life, and then the power of
corn. Corn was and is a major part of the native diet in Central and South
America, and naturally corn would be worshipped, but the way this ceremony
worked was amazing.
The priest initiated a process whereby a huge amount of corn — whole
cobs — began to fly out of the same hole as the flame. The corn spread
out in all directions, flying through the air, and it was as if the harvest
god was literally providing a good harvest! Everyone rejoiced, gathering up
the corn, all the while chanting something which (upon coming out of the vision)
I wrote down as "On-e passeebe han pasal." I have no idea
what that means, and probably it's something my mind simply made up, but it
was definitely a ritual chant in praise of the successful harvest.
Beyond the simple shock of seeing this ritual was the sensation of feeling
the power of that corn. Afterward I felt rather stupefied over having received
a thrilled from thoughts of grain, but at the time, it was like corn was life
and life was energy and it all flowed through me. I was the corn and it was
me, just like I was the flame and it was me. Everything is one and it is only
through tightening up and building walls that people create barriers that
block us from this universal energy sharing.
Interestingly, since the corn ceremony, I have not been able to return to
the underground chambers. Instead, when I think of the flame or the desert,
I find myself above ground, with the flame burning in a hole in dry ground.
I look down at the flame and it burns, energy pouring off of it, coming out
of the ground, as if the fire above ground is a child of the one down below.
It doesn't seem as potent as the other one, but for now, it will do. When I
direct my own energy towards this fire, it glows brightly.
About the Author:
Wendy Darling (nickname Wiebke Fesch) is a web designer, fanfic author,
and editor of Inception. She lives in Atlanta, GA, where she is self-employed,
operating her own web design business, Metro Girl. Wendy is co-author of a Wraeththu
Mythos novel called Breeding
Discontent, and is an editor with Immanion Press. You can reach Wendy
at wdarling@abraxis.com. |
