Creating Circles and Ceremonies: Rituals for All ... - reading...

Book II: Rites & Rituals 171
7. Meditations, Initiations, & Mysteries
I. Meditations
By Nova Love
Grounding Journey
Imagine if you could take a moment and stop, knowing that the process of
life continues to move on around you, over you, under you, to each side, and through you.
Allowing the current of time to run its course, you simply stay put and rest. For three mindful
breaths, see the circumstances you are involved in that are asking for your attention flash to
mind. Now acknowledge them gratefully and inform yourself that you may return to them later
if you then choose. Taking three more breaths, each deeper than the last, settle into the position
you choose to hold during your grounding. Wiggle into a place of stillness, and then be set. Feel
the weight of your body as you release the muscles in your face and mouth. Feel the expansion
of your lungs as you settle your eyes either comfortably open or closed.
Imagine that you’re sitting on a mirror and that there is a reflection – another you – within
the realm below the surface. The image of your appearance is clearly your body in complete
reflection, and as you inhale a few more breaths, shift your consciousness into the other you of
the mirror’s reflection. Notice the difference in the surroundings beginning to emerge around
you. The walls of an earthen room are there; you are in a simple hut. As your inner eye opens to
the calm filtered light, you see a pail near you. Moving to get the pail you find it is holding
liquid…pigment. Begin painting yourself – if you can smell, the pigment is earthy and you know
what to do with it. Seeing your work, you recognize that you are ready to travel down the
stairway you now see in the room. You can walk down it and through a hallway into a court-way
that opens up. A throne-like seat awaits you here; you observe the look and feel of it.
Finding your way into the seat, you settle in. Vibrations of peace and healing concentrate
here, in you. (pause) Awareness opens and you realize there is a mirror-like surface above
you and the throne. You see yourself as the mirror person above and begin to move up,
completely entering yourself through the surface in a few breaths, bringing peace and a
grounded sense. Returning fully now into your body here in this room, breathing all of yourself
deeply into your body, moving some, remembering, and integrating as you open your
eyes, wholly return – calm, safe, gratefully grounded.
Centering Journey
After creating sacred space and completing grounding, get into a comfortable posture that
can be held for some time without effort. Breathe in, consciously feeling the air pass through
your nose and relaxing the muscles of your body as it enters and exits your lungs. Envision the
particles of the air as though they were clearly visible, being drawn into you, intermingling and
exchanging with the particles of your body, and exiting into a great sea of similar stuff. Take
several rounds of breaths and continue this visualization. Now looking down as though from
above, create a mental picture of your body peacefully breathing. Slowly begin expanding this
perspective of the self and start to include the room or surroundings about you. Your peripheral
vision is gaining increased perspective as you rise up safely. Now see the shelter you were in
from above the roof, as though you have just floated above the upper reaches of where you
came from. The outside sky welcomes you as you float on, seeing everything below you begin to
open in an ever more expansive panorama. As you float still further, it may help you if you see
the neighborhood or area beneath, and then the city or surrounding countryside all visible now.
The landmass begins to become distinguishable, and as your pace quickens now, you rise high