Base chakra meditation: red shimmer
02/05/2014 at 6:00 pm | Posted in Uncategorized | 2 CommentsTags: chakras, inspiration, meditation, Spirituality, wellbeing
I am sitting in a small group meditating on the colour red. This is a challenging subject, because as Jennie will point out during the chat session afterwards, there is a duality around the colour red, as far as we humans are concerned.
On the one hand, red is about life and passion. It’s the colour of Valentine’s Day roses, a symbol of romantic love. On the other hand, red is about danger and anger. When we ‘see red’ in our minds, we are said to be furious. And when, in real life, we see red blood, it often means that someone has been injured or worse.
Red is also the colour associated with the base chakra, or root chakra. We can view this chakra as a concentration of spinning energy at the base of the spine, an energetic interface between the individual human and the wider world.
Primal survival
The base chakra is intimately concerned with survival, at the primal level. It’s about the building of the blood and bones of a being from the clay and water of Mother Earth. It’s about the creation and maintenance of the earthly vessel that contains our spirit.
And here’s the thing: the vessel, your human body, is fragile. Every day there are at least a thousand ways in which it could crash and die. And yet, most of the time, it doesn’t. It keeps going. Somehow, it contains the cellular wherewithal to grow and mend itself again and again. It is a spectacular example of self-regeneration.
Of course our bodies are vital to us. At this period in our evolution, we couldn’t function for long on this planet without them. And most of us grow very attached to the personality that goes with our own individual body, though sometimes it’s a love/hate relationship. We may or may not believe that our spirit endures. But we can be sure that the personality that occupies the body will never be quite the same without it.
Given the miracle of our bodies, it’s ironic that so many of us look at them with criticism. Why would we do that?
However, at this moment, while I am meditating, only fragments of those thoughts come through. They will be developed in the conversation afterwards. Meanwhile, I am trying to focus on the deep, velvety red colour of a flower petal. I am becoming that colour. I am imagining all the cells of my body are that same velvety red. I am an embodiment of the colour red. It is a good feeling, and I am enjoying it.
Roller coaster journey
Still meditating, I become, briefly, a blood cell, travelling through the amazing branched corridors of my body’s circulatory system. I am surprised and delighted to see that the blood cells all around me as I travel the roller coaster corridors are shimmering. They are vibrant with life and vitality.
And then comes a new insight: the blood we invariably see is not living blood. It is always injured blood: stressed, altered and either dead or dying. We can never see blood in its living, vibrant state, because it is in a closed system, away from our view.
Yes, we might see it through the lens of an endoscope. But that’s not real. It’s a digitised representation. It does not, and cannot shimmer like the real thing.
As I am marvelling over this insight, I hear a voice. Its tone is reassuring and calming.
“You can never see all of the shimmer,” says the voice, confirming my thoughts. Then it adds something else, totally unexpected:
“You can never see all of the angels.”
And suddenly I am suffused with a feeling of happiness, laced with tears. I am touched, immeasurably, by the wonder and mystery of our physical existence. It is such a mystery, such a miracle, so magical. Our physical lives, yours and mine, are unbelievable treasures. How did we get to be so lucky to step into these vessels?
And then I am travelling through vast, endless, complex tunnels. They branch and rejoin and keep on going. This isn’t my blood system any more. It’s immeasurably bigger than that.
It feels like I’m in a cosmic circulatory system of which we are all part. Forget evasive politicians and corrupt bankers: their actions are smaller than dust particles. These are the real corridors of power. We are each of us part of the cosmic system. It’s breathtaking, elegant and immense.
You can read more about the themes we’re meditating on this term here.
Who do you choose to be?
28/12/2013 at 6:12 pm | Posted in Uncategorized | 3 CommentsTags: affirmation, Health, meditation, personal growth
I was waiting to buy some items in a local pharmacy. In front of me were two women. The one who had her purse out was elderly. The other was there to help her. The process was taking a while. I found myself studying the elderly woman. I noticed that her skin was a uniform, pale colour. I noticed that her legs in their tan-coloured tights were thin and lacked muscle tone. Her ankles were swollen. There seemed to be no sense of fire or animation about her. If I focused with my inner eye I could see the English rose she used to be. But today she was child-like and obedient, simply doing what the carer instructed her to do. The carer used simple language, as if she was talking to a child. The older lady smiled sweetly, took money out of her purse, and passed it to the cashier.
Something about the scene unsettled me. The older lady was being spoken to as if she were simple, or senile. Perhaps she was. That was certainly the assumption. Yet it would have been so easy for the carer to choose her words differently. What if the carer spoke to the older woman as though she were a wise elder, a treasure house of experiences? Would the older lady have been different as a result? I believe she would have been.
And what of the older lady herself? Was there a moment in her life when she began to say to herself: “I am old. I am not as able as I used to be.” What if she had never said that – never believed it? What if she had decided to keep herself in tip-top shape with a few gentle stretches and a walk every day? What if she’d developed a taste for nutritious daily smoothies, or loaded her plate with fresh fruit and vegetables? What if she had, as Louise Hay (87 years old) recommends, gazed at herself in the mirror every morning and said: “I really, really love you.”
I read recently that our DNA is altered by our beliefs – i.e. the physical structure of your body and mine is altered by what we believe. And these beliefs go very deep. An estimated 95% of these beliefs are unconscious. So it’s not really enough to keep telling ourselves to ‘think positive’ (although affirmations can be helpful). That approach is like trying to put a layer of sugar icing over a deep, deep ocean – it just won’t stick.
A better solution, it seems, is to access our unconscious. Luckily, there are many paths to this strange, deep place within the psyche.
Writing a journal, especially a dream journal, is one good path. It’s therapeutic to allow the intuitive insights to emerge, and listen to their wisdom.
Spending regular time in nature is also such a good idea. Most weeks, I spend a morning in the garden. Recently that involved digging up roots – elecampane and marshmallow (pictured above) – then shredding and drying them for herbal teas. The process helped me to connect with rich, dark earth; the stored up, vibrant, healing power of plants; and also my own roots.
And then, of course, there is meditation. The sort I share with others is what I sometimes call ‘Intuitive Meditation’. As a group, we enjoy the deep personal insights that emerge when we are sitting still, focusing on a single word that changes by the week.
But ultimately it’s not about following any method in order to achieve a result. Ultimately, it’s about having fun, and learning. On the deepest level, it’s about letting go of all outdated programming, and choosing to be ourselves.
Avebury vision: gateway to the Universe
01/09/2013 at 9:56 pm | Posted in Uncategorized | 10 CommentsTags: Guidance, healing, Intuition, meditation, psychic development, sacred site, Spirituality
John Wilding lives with his family in the centre of Avebury Stone Circle. It must be a little like living in a fairy tale, full of myth and magic. Do you know Avebury? It’s a picturesque Wiltshire village which contains the largest stone circle in the world. (Or maybe, even, the stone circle contains the village).
John runs the Henge Shop, which is full of delightful mystic gems and esoteric books. It’s a hub for spiritual travellers from all around the world.
To help the visitors, John is setting up a new website, to be called Visit Avebury. Last week he asked me to write 200 words on sacred sites and meditation for the new website. “I’d love to,” I emailed back.
It then occurred to me that I can’t remember the last time I meditated at Avebury. How can that be? I only live 15 minutes’ drive away. So I decided to get up early at the weekend and do my usual morning meditation there, within the circle…
First, I share a quick breakfast with my nine-year-old daughter, who usually loves a trip. She wants to know why I am going to Avebury. She doesn’t look impressed when I explain.
“Are you definitely going to meditate at the stones?” she asks.
“I am.”
“Then I’m definitely not coming,” she decides.
I smile. It appears that my daughter has just started to understand that parents can be Seriously Embarrassing.
As I walk down to the garage, I happen to glance into our front yard. I see the words ‘hope’, ‘joy’ and ‘love’ chalked onto the stone slabs in a childish hand. I smile again. Maybe she and I are not so different after all.
At Avebury, I walk over to my favourite part of the circle, the quieter north semi-circle. There are no people here, just sheep. I go up to several of the stones and place the palms of my hands against their rough surface. It feels like a form of greeting, a ‘signing in’ as it were. I study the patterns of rock and lichen. I am tuning in.
I notice that I am feeling distinctly light-headed, and the feeling persists.
Carefully, I choose a stone in the outer circle to sit by – then walk to an entirely different one. I sit on the ground and lean back. The stone supports my back so well, it almost feels soft.
The sun is warm in front of me. The stone is cool behind me.
A gentle wind brushes a few hairs against my face. I hear wood pigeons cooing placidly high in the trees.
I decide to do a listening meditation. Simply breathe, and listen, and feel, and listen.
Meanwhile, my mind has decided to do its bit to unlock the mysteries of the circle. No one really knows why Avebury Stone Circle is here, and there are countless theories. My mind is intrigued by the fact that there are two smaller inner circles within the outer circle. Within the best surviving inner circle, near where I’m sitting, there are two giant stones which many people call a female and a male stone. Guess which is which…
And then I remember that I am here to meditate. I am here to breathe, listen and feel…
Maybe, my mind points out, the stone circle is a Neolithic depiction of Yin and Yang? All physical matter is composed of binary opposites: sun and moon, male and female, hot and cold and so on… surely Avebury is a beautiful representation of that?
And then I remember, once more, that I am here to meditate…
The area around my heart begins to feel warm: a spreading, pleasant glow.
It’s then that I notice that a particular, unusual word keeps popping up in my mind:
“Locus. The circle is a locus.”
Just in case there is any doubt, the voice repeats itself.
“Locus.”
And then… it happens.
I hear these words:
“It is not the stones themselves that matter. It’s the spaces in between. “
Without any warning, there is a whoosh!
I see a gateway to the All That Is. The stones are the gateway. Through them, I can see the Universe.
And on my right side, between the stones, laughing, I can see women, very like those I have seen before. Maybe they are the same. Natural, lean and bare-limbed, they are laughing at me, though not unkindly.
“At least you are beginning to get it,” they are saying.
And then I am through the gateway and I am dancing between the particles of matter.
I am bigger than the stars and smaller than the atoms.
My previous light-headed feeling has gone, because I am now in the space in which I am meant to be. This is my normal state of being, I realise. The rest is just a crammed up, box-like dream.
This is real life. This is reality.
I am in bliss.
I am bliss.
There is only bliss… bliss stretching out to infinity….
Gradually, as if from above, I become aware of the pattern of the stones again. I understand now how they act as a locus. The circular structure is helpful for returning back to your body.
We can think it, perhaps, as a Neolithic landing pad for the soul.
And then I am back again, sitting on baked bare earth, the sun on my face, cool stone behind my back. My heart area still feels pleasantly warm and glowing.
I am happy.
I return home via Silbury Hill, the tallest prehistoric human-made mound in Europe.
In my psychically open state, I can see a man directing others in front of a younger and smaller mound. A wise woman, well-regarded, is behind him. She is in the light. Younger men are asking why they are building up the sky.
The old man says, “It will remind them.
“The time of forgetting will come.
“The time of forgetting is necessary.
But then, the time of remembering will come. “
This is fascinating, and I want to stay, to learn more. But I am feeling a growing pressure. At home, my family are waiting for my return. So Silbury must be a story for another day.
How to meditate the EASY way
21/08/2013 at 11:31 am | Posted in Meditation | 5 CommentsTags: Guidance, inspiration, life skills, meditation, personal growth, positive thinking, self-development, special needs, visualization
Meditation is the easiest way I know to feel better fast. During challenging times, meditation can be really helpful. During good times, meditation can create a sense of bliss. It calms the mind. It stops the cycle of negative thinking. And it creates a space for hope and happiness to enter.
I aim to meditate for 20 minutes a day, early in the morning. I don’t always succeed. Sometimes I miss a few days, or even weeks. But when I catch myself feeling low, I’m quick to start meditating again – because, quite simply, it works.
Here is the EASY method that works for me and many of the people who attend my meditation studio.
Establish a routine.
Accept that it won’t go perfectly.
Sit still in silence.
Yield to the process.
Let’s take each of those steps in more detail…
Establish a routine
You’re more likely to meditate if it’s booked into your diary. Find an ideal time of day for you. You might try 20 minutes at the start of every day, or in the evening; or both those times.
Aim to meditate at the same time every day. Choose a length of time that will work for you. Anything from 15 minutes to half an hour is good. However, it’s better to do ten minutes, or even five, rather than none. Aim to meditate in the same place, and make it pleasant and uncluttered, the way you’d like your mind to be. You might like a shawl or blanket over you, so you feel warm and comfortable. It’s helpful to set a timer to let you know, gently, when the meditation has finished. You can use your phone, as long as you’ve switched off incoming calls. There are also some lovely meditation timers around, but keep it simple. A brilliant low-tech alternative which I use for my own morning practice is to meditate with beads.
Accept that it won’t go perfectly
Sometimes we try to create the perfect, calm environment, and then feel fazed if a fly enters the room and buzzes around, or building work starts up outside. Accept that life isn’t perfect. If anything disturbs your concentration during your meditation, simply witness it. It may well be a reflection of your own mind, which may be buzzing like a fly, or in a state of change and renewal, like a building that is being restored.
Sit still in silence
It’s helpful to focus on a single thing in your imagination, and to keep focusing on that during your meditation. An object from nature, such as the flower pictured above, makes a fantastic subject for meditation, because it has shape, pattern, texture, colour, scent and depth that you can dwell on in your imagination.
Or you might simply witness your breath, noticing every detail of it.
Or you might count up to four, one number per breath, and start again, counting up to four each time.
Or you might repeat certain words, silently to yourself. Breathe in “I am”, and breathe out an uplifting word that you have chosen. It might be “peace” or “love” or “leaf” or “flow”. This is the method we use during twice-weekly meditation sessions that I run in my Wiltshire studio.
In the studio, we typically combine more than one of the above. For example, breathe in “I am”, breathe out “tree” and visualise that you are a flexible willow tree, bending gracefully in the breeze. Or a tall, strong oak tree with rough bark and spreading branches.
Whenever you notice that your mind has wandered, simply remind yourself that you are here to meditate, and go back to the object that you are focusing on, or your breath, or counting.
Yield to the process
There’s a sort of ‘giving up’ that goes on when we meditate. We’re letting go of that list of things to do that seems to have permanent residence in our head. We’re giving up trying to control anything. We’re giving up, sitting down and being still. That is when the magic happens. You may experience colours that aren’t there, voices of people you can’t see, shafts of sunlight, and sudden insights. Simply witness these. Keep witnessing. Keep returning to counting breaths, or noticing your breath, or whatever you have decided to do to still your mind. And at some point, you may well experience bliss. Let yourself bathe in that bliss.
Afterwards, don’t try to recreate what happened. Don’t worry that you’ll never manage to achieve it again. Remind yourself that you meditate in order to meditate, that’s all. There is no goal. Bliss is… well, blissful, but it is not a goal. Follow the EASY steps, and simply witness all that happens.
I wish you a calm mind, peace and happiness.
A walk to the compost
02/08/2013 at 10:30 pm | Posted in Uncategorized | 6 CommentsTags: happiness, inspiration, meditation, nature, positive thinking, wellbeing
It’s time to take the peelings out, to the compost bin at the end of the garden. My body is weary. It’s the end of such a busy day. In the kitchen, I pick up the dark green caddy. It’s full of richly odorous vegetation.
At this moment right now, I have two choices. I can do this task resentfully, feeling my tiredness every step of the way. Or I can choose to enjoy the experience, choose to be fully present and notice my short walk to the compost bin with all my senses.
Today, I choose to be present.
I step barefoot into the yard. Above me, I hear the tall poplars whispering in the breeze. I feel the warmth of stone beneath my feet, a spa-like sensation. Then, I step onto cool lush grass. The soles of my feet are thrilled. It feels like ancient reflexology for body and soul. My tiredness has vanished – so fast!
I walk by small trees laden with young apples, bursting with life and vitality.
Beyond, on the hill, I see cows grazing in the sunlight. 
I reach the compost bin. I tip the contents of the green kitchen caddy into it: onion and garlic peelings tumble with tomato stalks and marshmallow leaves into the pungent abyss below. The odour of vegetation returning to nature is unmistakable. In a year’s time, it will all be rich, brown earth.
And then I turn back, treading over that lush, cool green grass, my bare feet still revelling in the sensation. I look skywards, at towering clouds just masking the sun. My daughter, as a small child, used to say that unicorns played in the white cloud light of the evening sun. I can and do imagine them there, invisible in the brightness.
Can you see them?
That, then was my walk to the compost. It could have been awful. It was idyllic. The choice was only ever mine to make.
What choices did you make today?
What did you do today?
07/07/2013 at 10:36 pm | Posted in Happiness, Inspiration, Nature, Uncategorized | 11 CommentsTags: happiness, healing, inspiration, meditation, nature, positive thinking, Spirituality, wellbeing
“What did you do today?”
I breathed. I lived. I put my bare feet on the earth.
“Yes, but what did you do?”
I’ve just told you what I did.
“What else did you do?”
I had a laugh with ones I love. I ate almonds under a wild cherry tree. I breathed the sweet scent of a pure white rose.
“Sounds nice. Anything else?”
Yes, now that you come to mention it, I gathered yarrow under a cloudless sky. I touched a silver birch whose leaves were shimmering in the breeze. And I watched the red sun go down, while a handsome man held me close…
That’s what I did today. And what about you; what did you do? Don’t tell me the stuff you didn’t really care about. Tell me what mattered to you.
The real meaning of home
28/09/2012 at 3:02 pm | Posted in Happiness, Meditation, Nature, Wellbeing | 12 CommentsTags: Guidance, happiness, healing, inspiration, Intuition, meditation, nature, pre-history, Spirituality, wellbeing
In our distant nomadic past, home was where we settled for the night: it was shelter, a place we lay down – a place of rest. Recently, on the West Coast of Scotland, I came across a perfect example of home at its simplest. This stone outcrop at Sand provided shelter for our ancestors nearly 10,000 years ago. It was their bedroom, and also their kitchen: there is evidence that they collected limpets from the sea shore and boiled them up in water before eating them.
My daughter led me up and onto the roof of the shelter. “There’s a place I’ve got to show you,” she said. “You’re going to love it; it’s really special.” And she was right. On the heather-clad roof there were several broad stones: slabs of natural paving. One, in particular, was a perfect meditation seat. It was easy to sit there, gaze out to sea and simply let your thoughts drift into that in-between place – the other realm.
When I did so, I found myself talking to the inhabitants of that time. We weren’t using words, exactly, but we were communicating. To my surprise, I found they were admiring my build: the fact that compared with them I looked immensely well fed. I was aware of their lightness and slimness and superb fitness, and found myself wishing that I exercised more.
Self-acceptance
They were surprised at my lack of self-acceptance on this matter. They reminded me of the goodness of Mother Earth, or the Mother as they called her. She provided what we needed, and it made no sense to disparage her gifts. Abundance was a blessing. Each of us was a creation of the Mother. Each of us was divine. How could we criticise ourselves in that context? Criticism was utterly meaningless.
I actually had the sense they were laughing at me, as if I were a child who didn’t quite understand. And yet there was also respect. It was as if they saw wisdom in me, as I saw wisdom in them. And the wisdom wasn’t individual wisdom; it was collective. We all shared knowledge… and this knowledge was infinite awareness.
And then I understood the true meaning of home. It is unconditional love, and it is acceptance. When you are at home – truly at home – you are loved, you are accepted. During the many times we find ourselves on our own, we can still feel unconditional love and acceptance towards ourselves. And when we are with others – however distant in terms of culture, or the passage of time – we can feel that exact same connection. As I did on that rock.
Down below, a car horn was sounding. I was being summoned back to the 21st Century. I clambered down the heather slopes, sea breeze in my hair, aware that the bliss I was feeling is our natural birthright.
It’s your birthright; it truly is.
This moment now
30/07/2012 at 10:25 am | Posted in Happiness, Meditation, Nature, Uncategorized, Wellbeing | 1 CommentTags: affirmation, flowers, Guidance, inspiration, meditation, nature, Spirituality, wellbeing
This moment now is all we ever have, but it’s enough, because it’s everything.
Have a magical day.
Happiness is being open
27/07/2012 at 6:58 pm | Posted in Uncategorized | 4 CommentsTags: Guidance, happiness, inspiration, Intuition, meditation, wellbeing
This week has been all about happiness: pure happiness. My meditation groups have been focusing on the word – they have breathed in “I am”, and breathed out “happiness”. Then, just this morning, I recorded a ‘Happiness’ guided meditation, which I will send out to people when they book a place on my September Intuitive Development course.
One of my favourite intuitive insights from a week of happiness is this: the opposite of happiness is control.
“Surely the opposite of happiness is unhappiness?” pointed out one guy in a group session.
That’s true, of course. However, consider the happiness levels of a young child. They are not especially in control of their lives. But in any given moment, a child can find happiness in playing with absolutely anything that comes his or her way, whether it be a twig, some earth, or a bowl of water (or even better, all three together).
Consider, in contrast, the last time you organised a fun event, like a party. Did you freely enjoy it, or did you spend a portion of your time worrying about everything that might go wrong?
When we try to control how things will turn out, that’s where unhappiness lies. In contrast, when we open up to life and accept surprises along the way, that’s when we experience happiness.
So after a week of focusing on happiness, have my happiness levels risen? Definitely, by around 100%. There’s been less rushing, and more enjoying the moment. If you haven’t done this already, I warmly recommend it: sit somewhere quietly for 20 minutes or half an hour. Breathe in “I am”, and breathe out “happiness”. And just see where the word takes you.
Spirit of the Earth
15/06/2012 at 5:06 pm | Posted in Meditation, Nature, Uncategorized | 3 CommentsTags: inspiration, meditation, nature
Following on from my last post about the Stone Age and the base chakra, here is a favourite verse, from the Navajo Blessing Way, placed with a photo I took last week in the Dordogne, France, centre of the Stone Age. Enjoy.
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