The Mirror of You
Today’s Full Moon / Eclipse fully opens the Equinox window and shows us a first glimpse of one of life’s circles.
This morning, I received a video of a whale breaching. It was a North Atlantic echo of a South Pacific occurrence that happened in 2010. I was in deep recovery from ‘the stroke’ and, through the machinations of a friend, Dr. Baskaran Pillai invited me to his retreat on the island of Kauai. I had always wanted to visit that particular island, {Being surrounded by the sea is kind of my thing} and, with his kind invitation and sponsorship, packed my physical fear into a carry-on and got on a plane. I knew I was held and carried. I knew I could let this particular fear go, somewhere over the Pacific. Funny, I hadn’t remembered that until this morning.
One morning during the retreat, I walked out to a quiet place on the beach, away from the resort kerfuffle, and sat for a while. I felt the mountain of island beneath me, grateful for its support and our communion. At that time, it still took most of the strength I had to walk from the hotel out to the open sand, and the land had acted as my ‘walking stick.’ I removed my First Nation thunderbird ring, zipping it securely into the small pocket of my beach bag. Crossing my legs, I sat to meditate.
I felt a strong impulse to open my eyes at one point, as if I was being pulled into the sea. Much to my delight, a humpback whale breached directly in my sight line. Once, twice, three times, it leaped above the surface, falling back with monstrous splashes. Its joy was palpable and brought tears to my eyes. I felt myself gasp for breath, drinking in the sun’s embrace along with that of sea and cetacean. So began a journey of physical healing and transformation. At the time, I thought I had just finished “the big one.” I had no idea what was about to begin. Our minds are such silly rabbits!
Receiving a video of the whale breach this morning brought the moment back in its entirety, including the massive sense of wonder and the incredulity when I unpacked my beach bag later to find that my thunderbird ring had vanished. The zipper pocket was intact. It could not have fallen out. Even so, I retraced my steps to the sheltered bit of beach and dug into the sand around where I had been sitting. Nothing… except Nature’s laughter.
The ring, a symbol of my commitment to my awakening journey, was gone. I wore a thunderbird as a child, in defiance of the traditional religious symbols of humanity. Others wore their gold crosses. I wore a silver and turquoise symbol of the Great Spirit. And so, on one of my driving journeys across the US, when I found a ring with the same symbol, I purchased it and rarely took it off. Now it had left me.
The retreat I had been attending on Kauai was entirely Hindu, in honor of its sponsor, Dr. Pillai {also known as Dattatreya Sivababa}. The Hindu ritual forms have never spoken to me in this life, though part of me knows them intimately, and I find them beautiful. It’s all just a bit much, with placing Divinity outside of oneself. So, I sat through the retreat, accepting that this was where I needed to be and what I needed to receive. Oh, by the way, I did receive the name “Nalini” and massive insight into the rebirth that label would create…
Two days ago, as the eclipse window began to open, I was moved to pop onto one of Dr. Pillai’s sites and donate to his full moon puja. It has been a few years now since I have done so, though I remain infinitely grateful for the assistance of the fully enlightened master of the Tamil Siddha, who didn’t know me from a hole in the ground and facilitated my healing… {another part of the story}.
Revisiting the magic of that time, from a current embodied certainty that everything is Divine and I am separate from nothing, brought warm golden joy through my heart. I remembered the reawakening of sound as a crucial tool for transformation that had accelerated at that time. It had not been an initiation, but an upgrade into more of what moves through me, as me. I was learning to glow.
What moves through you, as you that is both beginning and completing at this moment? What new cycle of being calls you into its embrace? What cycle has ended, birthing you into a way of being that you will discover only by facing the mirror of you?
As part of my morning blessing circle, I share joy with the cetaceans as they masterfully perform their function of singing us home. May we flow with the waters of life as its song carries us all.
Namaste ~
