Journeying: Element of Air
1
Journey #2 – Air
The practice of Astral Projection
Journey with a Shaman
Beacon NY.
June 16, 2017
We all sit around in a circle,shoes off. The room is adorned with various sects of spiritual truths.
Before you arrive to a journeying session,the day or two before ,you are prepping your mind for travel. Just as you would pack a suitcase to go on vacation, you are unpacking your mental and making space for what needs to be seen and enter.Like cleaning your computers hard-drive for new photos to be saved.
Tonight I’m more ready than the last experience. I’ve worn the most comfortable linen pants I own and my hair is loose. Every aspect of my demeanor is open. My Boots are to the side,phone is on airplane mode and my journal is open on my left to grasp what I see immediately after my eyes open.
Journey #1 will commence. The shaman grabs 4 stones from a felt pouch and places it in linear order near the fire pit he’s created alongside the feather,sage,drum and maraca.
He stands above each one of us for 7 seconds with his eyes shut shaking the maraca to bless us on our way,and awaken the spirit.
And then sits in front of us all to reveal our mission.
“We are going to pick a stone. Each represents an element. Fire,Earth,water,Air. Whichever stone you get,you will journey to the spirit of that element and ask it 2 things.
How can I utilize you to transform my life?
How can I honor you?”
The brown felt pouch travels around the room and reaches my hands. I exclaim to the others, “I wish I get air.”
My hand reaches in and surely,It’s the stone representing air.
The others are amazed by my divination
I myself am amused with excitement.
I’ve dreamed of soaring higher into my creativity,past the obligations of my body,and beyond my mind’s conscious limitations.
We all prepare for lift-off by arranging our bodies comfortably in our lounge chairs aligned in a circle. I however,lay my body out on the industrial carpet in full surrender,arms to my side.
The shaman starts the drum and we all slowly close our eyelids and allow our pineal gland or “third eye” to peer open.
Dun dun dun
Dun dun dun
Dun dun dun
The sound of
The drum is our GPS,our navigation system into the spirit world,or the reality we only get to visit when the intention is clear. We are on a mission and as the progression of the drum resembles our heartbeats we slip into a semi subconscious state. Not quite asleep,not quite awake. Dancing in between two dimensions. The conscious state is aware of its surrender,but only completely if we allow.
I submerge .
Immediately I’m brought to a familiar place and am filled with joy. It’s not a place I’ve seen in the physical plain,but one I’ve visited in my first journey where I was seeking my animal totem. The field where he pranced around me and played hide and go seek behind my shadow. Green,illustrious field of my dreams. The very mouth of the forest. From where I stand,I can see the path of the forest that always welcomes me into other realms.There he is,my monkey. I smile with ease.This time he knows I know him from our last trip and grabs my hand for the race. We don’t have much time here and he seems to know this as well,with a swiftness of Spurs he encites me to follow. Monkey had been with me most of my life before he took manifestation here. Abu, from Disney’s Aladdin,was my most loved stuffed animal since 9 years old. Clutching him through anxiety drenched plane rides,arguing divorced parents,late night tremors and nightmares and now here. My mind had somehow developed an affinity to this animal,and he would be my guide along this magic carpet ride.
Woosh.
We are through the entire forest with no time to admire the trees. We must get to where we are going. He sends me through what feels like 3 seconds of Eden and suddenly I’m catapulting off of a steep cliff. I am falling . Fast.So fast I’ve lost sight of monkey and see no end to this drop.Until immediately a huge white swan cups under my body. Large wings that remind me of Hermes in Greek mythology picture books. Or the Swan symbol on the cloth My Buddhist mentor gave me to place my sacred beads in. It swoops me onto its back and we are soaring and safely landing onto a marsh near a river.
I know this River!
My heart fills with feelings of safety and home.
It’s the house near the river where the woman lives.The elder who always serves me chamomile and cardamon tea,and speaks to me in her rocking chair while I admire the hundreds of books aligned along the shelves behind her. I never ask questions here. She tells me because she already knows. Perhaps she is the me from lifetimes ago,or the me from 60 years from today.This time she comes outside immediately to meet me. Points to the wind chimes above her front porch and stretches her arms out allowing her fingertips to stroke the chimes against the wind one by one. I do the same. The sound is delightful and reminds me of how I did the same as a child, in the presence of wind chimes.
“Pay attention to the wind.” she says
She points to the sky and passes her fingers past the wind chimes again.
We are now inside. There are no transitions in journey. Your body fades into frames as if time does not exist. You move effortless.The whistling sound of the teapot is heightened,more noticeable to me than before. My senses wide open to all elements of air.
“Listen to your breathing.” she says.
She continues, “Your breathing will speak every answer you need.I am talking to you in this language,but this is not my language. I speak a dialect you cannot hear. I have adjusted for your understanding. Listen to your breathing. ”
She motions to her chest and makes an upward and downward motion,resembling a beating heart. Faster then slower. Faster palpitations then slower.
Feelings of anxiety,fear, then calmness rush me as she describes my breathing in association with emotion.
“Listen to your breathing.The air around you. Notice the air.It will tell you everything.”
I recognize now that she is a guide.The mothership through all my journeys.
We are gone now.Not a particular place but a place in my mind,and I don’t see my monkey. He seems to be the string pulling me,and I’m the kite.
Images flash before me like a twisting kaleidoscope of a pleasant intermingle of things resembling wind.
Image after image Innundate my mind fast.
Like in movies when you see your entire life flash before your mind.
My girlfriend’s arms wrap around me. She places her hand on my chest and hers and says, “Home.” It feels like an anchor.
Images of windchimes,dandelions ,children blowing dandelions all rush through my cerebral vortex,repeatedly like a television show on repeat. Milliseconds of images moving faster than light.
Dandelions,wind chimes,spinning flamenco dancers who’s dresses brush against my face.
My fingertips stroking the strands of Ramona’s hair as they dance in the wind.
Windows open in a car on a highway and a golden retriever enjoying the wind.
My girlfriends arm’s grip around me again,her sweet voice saying, “This is Home.”
This fades and now there’s a dress of multi colors spinning. A woman spinning as her dress brushes along my knees. I know her from a parable I learned as a child.She is Oya. I am delighted and overwhelmed.
More images of windchimes and blowing dandelions peruse my mind in milliseconds. My girlfriend grips me again.
I am now above my bedroom in another realm watching my body sleep next to hers. My floating spirit above my limp body. I am living an outer body experience,in an already outer body experience.I see embers of thoughts permeating from my brain. Clouds carrying music notes,words and actual tangible energy moving in and out of my nostrils with every breath. I watch myself breathe in knowledge and music and breathe out chaos. Sleeping and unaware. I see myself in the most vulnerable form and feel immense love as if I were God watching over his child.
Cut to
A spinning parachute,and hands gripping its edges. I look higher to see the hands of my future mother in law,father in law,and rest of my immediate family gathering around a parachute. Spinning and laughing like children in absolute intention and togetherness.
A field of dandelions and a voice telling me to “wish again.”
“Wish again,wish again,wish again.”
Images of my elders fingers moving past wind chimes and the sound of the teapot.
The drum comes back into my senses.I haven’t heard it since now. It’s felt like lifetimes but the drum reminds me it’s time to go back home,into my body. It beats faster and faster.
dun dun dun
Dun dun dun
Monkey grips me by my arm as we swiftly move past the forest like two jaguars and onto the beautiful bed of grass in the field we both met.Crashing softly into the ground we look into eachothers eyes and laugh. The kind of nervous laugh you make when you almost miss your flight,and plop in the seat amused and relieved.
There is tenderness in his eyes, a human dependence,as if saying,he hopes to see me again. We make quiet promises to remain friends and I will return.
I open my eyes. Here is life.
We all look around at one another and sigh
And start writing in our journals what we saw.
