Meditation is one of the most vital elements of occult and esoteric
practices, especially in the study of the Kaballah. I've heard it said
that prayer is talking to the Divine and meditation is listening for the
answers. I've also heard that the answers come in the form of our own
intuition, which is said to be the Divine talking to us. Through
meditative practices we can gain a wide variety of benefits from finding
answers, to reducing stress, to gaining insights, to strengthening our
inner essence.
There are many varieties of meditations. Some are in the form of imagery
guided journeys, some focus on physically relaxing the body, some require
the mind to be empty. You can reach a meditative state by doing a
prolonged activity where you can achieve a rhythm, such as drumming, long
distance running or swimming. The rhythm induces a hypnotic effect and
stimulates the mind into an altered state of consciousness or a form of
trance.
This level of consciousness is called an alpha state and is where one
wants to be to perform magic, manifestations, spells, and other occult
practices. It seems the best way to get the most out of a meditation is to
pick one (or two) and stick with it for a while. Work with it often and if
inclined, keep a journal of your progress.
I find the most personally effective forms of meditation to be exercises
with movement. Most favorite for relaxation is swimming, with my eyes
slightly unfocused in front of me so I can get hypnotized in the
reflections of the water. For esoteric development I prefer exercises that
move light energy through the body. I like these because they strengthen
the inner essence of our energy, and perfect the ability to direct this
energy. Because working magic depends a great deal on being able to
accentuate, move and direct energy, these forms aid in the achievement of
this skill.
I have been working with a couple of meditations, the Qabalistic Middle
Pillar exercise and a form of raising shamanic kudalini with a tape
produced by a friend of mine. I've written of these two in previous
essays, and would like to share some experiences and insights gained from
working them.
I began working the middle pillar meditation about five years ago. The
meditation involves invoking various God names which correspond to
specific Sephiroth on the body. They are points just above the head, the
throat, solar plexus, groin, feet. Above the head is Kether and is invoked
with the name Eheieh (Eh-hey-yay) meaning " I am". ("I Am" and the
profound personal realization of "I Am That I Am" are the qui essential
Divine essence of who we truly are, quite apart from our physical body or
our personality.)
The throat corresponds to the invisible sphere Daath, the abyss of
knowledge, and the name YHVH Elohim (Yode-heh-vav-heh El-oh-heem), "The
Lord God" is intoned. The light center at the solar plexus is Tipareth.
The name YHVH Eloa ve-Daath (Yode-heh-vav-heh El-oh-ah v'-Dah-ath) "Lord
God of Knowledge" is vibrated here.
The name Shaddai El Chai (Shah-dye El-Chai), meaning "Almighty Living God"
is intoned at the pelvic chakra corresponding to Yesod. Ending at Malkuth,
the feet, with vibrating the name Adonai ha-Aretz (Ah-doe-nye ha-Ah-retz),
"Lord of Earth". Many of the Jewish scholars express immense importance in
the correct pronunciation of these names.
Here I'd like to bring up the Tetragramaton formula. The YHVH, the Divine
name. It is comprised of the Hebrew letters Yod Heh Vav Heh. Per Regardie
from "A Garden of Pomegranates", "The letters of the Tetragrammaton are
used to imply the whole gamut of the four elements. Yod as the creative
function of the Archetypal Realm, is Fire in the Chiah, (associated with
Chokmah) and is the Divine Father. The first Heh represents water in the
Neschamah (Binah) and symbolizes the the passive character of the Creative
World, The Mother. Verve is the Son, (at Tipareth) the active vice-regent
of the Father and is Air in the Ruach; and the final Heh is the Nephesch
(Yesod), the daughter, the passive receptive earth, fructifying all
things". I will explain the regions of Chiah, Neschamah, Rauch, in the
near future.
The Tetragamaton is a very important formula and concept for the adept to
grasp. Per Regardie "..the unredeemed Virgin, the last letter Heh (at
Yesod), must carry the celestial bridegroom, the Son (Vav) who is in
Tipareth.
This process is called the attainment of the Knowledge and Conversation of
the Holy Guardian Angel. It is the alchemical marriage, the mystical
nuptials of the heavenly Bride and Groom. This union makes the virgin a
pregnant mother (Binah, the first Heh, Neschamah) and with her the Father
(Yod, or Chokmah and the place of Chiah) eventually unites himself and
both become absorbed into the Crown at Kether", the sphere of Divinity.
"The final Heh (in Yesod) is the Nephesch or sub consciousness. Normally,
ones conscious mind, the Vav or Son, (Tipareth) is in dire conflict with
the subconscious self, and confusion and a disruption of one's total
consciousness is the result.
One's first object must be to reconcile the conscious ego with the
subconscious mind, and set the factor of equilibrium between the two. When
this usual source of conflict has disappeared, one is in the position to
obtain Understanding, (Binah, the first Heh, the Mother). From
Understanding, which is Love, Wisdom (Chokmah, Yod, Father) can arise.
With the union in oneself of Wisdom and Understanding, the purpose of life
may be divined, and the steps leading to the consummation of divine union
may be instituted without danger, fear or the ordinary conflicts of the
personality."
The Middle Pillar exercise can be done without the invocation of the names
by just visualizing light at the chakra points instead, although I would
say it would be much more effective to intone the names. You visualize a
bright light above your head. Then you bring it down to your throat and
allow it to glow there. Then to the solar plexus, pelvic area, and feet
while letting the light glow at each place for as long as it takes to feel
that you are finished.
Sometimes points take longer than others and may differ each time the
exercise is performed. When the light is at the feet pull it up your
right side and down the left. Do this a few times. Then up the front and
down the back of the body. Then circulate and spiral the light from the
feet all the way up the body to two feet above the head. Take your time
doing this because this is the most exhilarating part. When you are all
wrapped up in a cocoon of light, sit and relish in its splendor. Any color
of light or multi colored lights can be envisioned, or you can correspond
colors to the chakras.
Sensations from this meditation have varied greatly. At times more intense
than at others. The most dramatic effects occur when I am spiraling the
light around me. It doesn't always travel in a neat circular spiral from
head to toe. Sometimes the spiral assumes a more elliptical shape,
traveling around me as an electron travels around the nucleus of an atom
with the speed varying greatly from time to time. I've worked it where it
seemed to take forever for the light to make it to the top of my head,
then I've experimented with purposefully speeding up and slowing down,
even suspending the light. Sometimes it spirals two feet from my body,
sometimes so close I feel like a wrapped mummy.
Since I have been doing this exercise I have incorporated it into other
areas of my life. I combine this exercise with Reiki when I work on
clientele, sometimes swirling them up in a spiral of twinkling light, or
increasing my visualization of light on specific stressed areas of their
body.
A wonderful meditation that I've been working with for the past eight or
so months is raising Shamanic Kundalini by Walter Soaring Eagle. With this
meditation you raise the Kundalini energy, the essence of your being, the
"I Am That I Am". This energy is situated at the base of the spine. By the
guided meditation, you bring the light energy out through a door at the
base of the spine and it spirals up the body in a glass tube. It has many
similarities to the Middle Pillar, and because of these I have taken to
combining the two. The meditation begins with alignment of the chakras. "I
Am That I Am" is atoned at each of the seven chakras. This has had
profound effects on me over time, namely the projection of my voice. I've
noticed when I sing along to songs I have a much wider range than I did
before. When I first began this exercise my voice would slip through the
chakras all by itself. At times coming out sounding unlike me. Likewise
with the Kundalini itself. It took me several attempts to begin raising
this energy, then 4 to 5 months to get used to it because it would cause
irregular patterns in my day to day life, creating pulses of energy, as
if it was radiating from the center of my body. I found that I would feel
manic, with higher highs and much lower lows on a day to day basis.
However, when I did come upon an emotionally upsetting situation, I was
able to shift my energy much more easily, to alter my perspective of the
situation, as in shifting from being a victim to being dominant, and
doing it more calmly than I've ever been able to do before. It has taken
me a full 8 months to finally feel comfortably in more control of this
energy.
When the Kundalini is raised, it travels out of a door at the base of the
spine and in front of the body past the root chakra, located two feet in
front of the pelvic area, with the stem reaching through the body to the
spinal cord, which, at this chakra, would be the tail bone.
A bright red flower is envisioned two feet in front of the body, in the
auric field, and then it is set into a spinning motion by the imagination
that shoots red light down the stem to the back of the spine. Then it
shoots up the spine through the top of the head, and a shower of red light
is envisioned shooting out of the top of the head and falling all around
the body, encompassing it in red light. The Kundalini then travels up the
tube spiraling up the body and the same is done with the other chakra
points. Lower abdomen, or spleen chakra, has an orange flower. The solar
plexus is yellow, the heart is green, the throat chakra is blue, the
third eye is indigo. This spiral tube also gets closer to the body as it
ascends and ends up piercing through the left side of the skull, takes a
few twists inside the cranium, them comes out the top of the head,
stimulating the crown chakra, which is an illuminous violet lotus flower.
The flower is set into spinning and a violet light comes down the stem,
hits the top of the head, and showers violet light all around the body. It
is said that the body can arch and sway like a snake when the Kundalini is
awakened, and that without proper guidance through the process,
spontaneous human combustion could occur. Well, I can't say I have
combusted yet, but I have experienced a lot of body twitching something
akin to foreplay in working this.
You then ascend up a silver cord, through the top of your head, upward
toward a huge golden sphere. You enter the sphere where the light
penetrates through your body, your bones, and it is here that you take
some time to experience your higher self. At the end of the meditation you
turn off the lights, starting at the violet lotus. As the Kundalini spiral
descends down the body each flower is stopped and the light is turned off.
When the Kundalini travels back into the base of the spine, the door is
closed and locked. I have done these two meditations together. At the
part of the Kundalini exercise where I am up in my higher self, I
incorporate the Middle Pillar.
Since I'm already up into Kether, I then either intone the God names and
begin the Middle Pillar, or I go right to taking the bright violet light
and running it up and down the sides of my body, front to back, and then
spiraling it up the body in the same direction that I swirled the
Kundalini.
After working with a meditation over a prolonged period of time you may
find yourself changing it to suit yourself, or naturally taking it to
another higher level. After about 7 months of raising Kundalini, one
morning I discovered that I have mirror flower petal[ed] chakras extending
from my back.
So now when I set a charka lotus spinning, I set two in motion, the ones
in front of me and the ones behind me. Let me tell you, this greatly
increases the momentum of the energy. By doing this faithfully I have also
dropped a noticeable amount of weight with no effort and lost inches in
places I didn't think I could loose from, and instead of growing nails it
seems I grow talons.
I have been doing this meditation faithfully since about the end of
January every weekday morning. I have made it part of my morning ritual. I
even invested in an expensive bottle of pink lotus absolute, (the real
stuff), as an aroma inducement, being that the scent of the true lotus
will work on cellular memory to trigger deeper states of consciousness.
Lotus has been used forever for mystical activities by civilizations of
Ancient Egypt and India.
By smelling true lotus you can awaken to the memory of the ancients at the
cellular level, which can allow access to their collected consciousness
or morph-genetic field. Around 7:30 in the morning, there I am with a
strong cup of coffee and a bottle of pink lotus absolute, combining the
Middle Pillar with raising Kundalini. This works so well, and I can get
the light swirling so fast, that I glow in the dark!
