Becoming
As I sit in the heat of the Southern summer, I listen to the cicadas and the hunting owls. As the sounds of darkness grow in the lingering blue twilight, I feel the earth’s rhythm as it extends through my body and alters my perception. There are no stars, no wind. The sky above looks deep blue.
Although I love to exercise, meditate or write late in the evening, I stay to hear the night and feel the new currents of life. Around ten o’clock, the stars will rise, and I decide to remain in the delicious night and wait.
Flat on my back on the bare earth, I look toward my garden to see the shapes of my roses –their vague color appears as dull reds and pinks in the weak illumination. The delight
full fragrances of white bee balm, lemon balm, mint, and pennyroyal come on the first wave of the wind. The wind carries moisture and coolness from the top of the mountain.
Pressing into the warmth of the earth, I go into myself where the currents of my inner light meet with the outer light. Beneath every shape, stone or animal, there is an inner shape of light. As I go deeper, I perceive the ethereal form of plants, trees and rocks.
Briefly I revel in it. My heart opens with joy when I see the inner world. I want to stay here all night, to see what lies beneath everything. My orange cat comes to me. He lies against me and purrs. His vibrating voice blends with the cicadas, and the earth draws the tension from my body.
Now the entire night sings. I move back and forth between the inner light of objects and my own inner light. I focus on the plants and trees until their light expands and radiates into my inner being. Then I expand my light and radiate it back to them.
After a time, the light grows. It fills the neighborhood. I think about a troubled friend and the light draws a path to her location. Without asking, the light radiates and fills this person. Now my mind turns toward friends, students and loved ones. I watch as the light moves to each of them.
A few Kabbalistic names of angels pop into my mind, and I recite the letters, focusing on the colors and meanings of the letters of each name. I imagine drawing their sigils or symbols in the sky. Then I feel their energy, the power of their presence. Beauty comes with angels, as does protection and support.
Glimpsing their inner beauty, my heart space grows and amplifies its light. The light coalesces, joining with nature. Then it flows to me and its original source – back into the trees and earth. The exchange is so delightful – I may never go back indoors. But I want to know and learn more.
My spiritual quest never seems to end, my appetite sometimes seems insatiable. With the thought, the light returns. It takes on a luminescent shape in the darkness, seen by my inner eye.
Sometimes when the light is strong, I’m free to ask questions and the universe answers. Yes, on this beautiful night, it is what I want – when I’m alone and accompanied by the light.
Of course, I cannot just ask questions. I know better. I carry questions around like a backpack for the times the Universe answers, but they are rarely appropriate at the given time.
I have to think carefully and choose wisely. I think about the new influx of light that I’ve experienced intensely since days surrounding the solstice. I ask to know more about the light.
As I look at the light, I realize that it looks quite different from my past perception of light on the planet in the past months or years. I feel into it, link with it – and intuitively guess – then recognize it as a new, greater light on the earth.
It feels harsh to me at the first glimpse but then I realize I’m not capable of traveling deeply into it. It’s too bright and strong – too much light at one time brings instability.
I ask to see it properly, from a perspective that is correct for me. I focus on the light through my heart chakra, and I can see it more clearly. I ask to know more.
Now the stars are rising against the dark blue sky. I stop asking questions while they glitter and heighten in the sky. My inner peace returns as I become conscious of the earth around me, but then I return to the new light.
“What are you about?” I ask, as the question floats away from me up toward the stars.
“Becoming,” a voice answers.
I turn the answer over in my heart. I want to know more. Oddly I see and hear Bob Dylan singing “Don’t Think Twice.” The lonely loud sounds of harmonica and his strange voice flood through my mind. I think about how his songs touched the world.
I hear Beethoven and then Mozart. Great paintings flash before me. I briefly glimpse the words of philosophers, see an image of Socrates and then it all passes.
“Greatness, genius,” I think.
“Everyone has it.” The light responds. “Everyone is awakening to it.”
For a moment I feel great melancholy. All of the great geniuses pass from the earth, even if their masterpieces stay to inspire. “What’s the point of it all?”
Then I see the times that my heart was broken, when I became fragmented or lost a part of myself but continued onward. Sometimes I feel as though I am lost at sea. The world has changed so much in only a few years. I feel its rollicking, the choice of every soul to choose to move with the light – or not. “It doesn’t have to be like that.” The light says. “You can heal your heart. Love heals the heart.”
Then I see the light moving outward throughout the world, briefly touching everyone with its flame. I realize that we’ll become accustomed to it in time. I think about adapting, evolving and cellular change, but I feel the light pull away and hear the word “becoming” again.
Suddenly, I understand that becoming means wholeness, the repair of the schism of the soul through many lifetimes, with the old patterns of misunderstanding the self and others. False perceptions –including dark emotions and thoughts — on the inner plane must cease. When the inner plane changes, then the outer world will reflect the shift of higher consciousness.
Then I see the greatness, the beauty of the light in so many souls. I remember that not everyone feels the light – yet. But everyone will feel it in their own way and time. I realize the message has traveled full circle from my first vision of the ethereal body to a glimpse of the outer planetary light.
Now I’m amazed – and awed – by the appearance of the light in the world. The sounds of the cicadas grow louder, and I return to the night. For the moment, I want nothing. I am replete. I listen to the sound of the wind and watch the dance of the flowers, the flight of the stars.