Tuesday 23 September 2008

Visualisation on the element of water


Here is a guided visualisation. If you want to try it, sit down somewhere you will be undisturbed, take a few deep breaths and read through it, pausing where necessary to visualise your own journey.

Water: a guided visualisation
You are in a beautiful garden on a lovely day, sitting comfortably beside a spring, where water bubbles from the ground into a pool. It is a haven of peace. The place you are sitting feels familiar and safe. Sit here for a few moments, watching the water and listening to the sounds and smells.

The spring is the source of a stream that runs beyond this garden, and you have decided to set out on a journey down that stream, to its very end. But this is more than a voyage of discovery; there is a matter of the heart, a question about something dear to you, that you hope to find the answer to at your journey’s end. Perhaps this is to do with something from your past, perhaps it is a choice you must make now, or perhaps it is about the future and what you hope for.

Think about this matter, as you spend a last moment or two beside the pool before setting off. As you contemplate your question, take a small item of value, something that is yours and which you have on you, and throw it into the pool, making a wish as you watch it splash into the surface of the water, then descend into its depths, to land at the very bottom of the pool.

You are now ready to depart on your journey. You gather any few things you might want to take with you, then walk through the garden, to its border. Stepping out of the garden, you follow the stream into the wider world.

You travel beside the stream. It changes along its course, perhaps deepening and widening, altering momentum, taking on a different colour and perhaps carrying flotsam with it. As you travel, you watch the water change.

After some time you reach the point where the stream merges with a river. The waters mingle and take on a new appearance.

You realise that you will need to find someone to ferry you if you are to travel along the river. You look around and see someone who can help. Approach them and talk to them to gain passage aboard a boat.

You thank the person who helped you, and climb aboard the boat, taking your place as crew or a passenger. You watch as the boat’s captain readies it to depart and casts off from the shore. Slowly the boat sets sail, and the gap of water between it and the bank widens. The boat is manoeuvred into its course to travel downriver.

Once the boat is underway, you are free to watch the changing river, and the changing scenery along the bank. Perhaps there are people engaged in activities. You pass other boats, and other river passengers. Perhaps some of them acknowledge you or perhaps some of them sail past or are left behind without looking in your direction. Perhaps there are buildings – homes or places of industry. As you float by, think what this changing scene is telling you, then peer down onto the river to see what you find there, and what that also tells you.

After many miles the river broadens, and becomes tidal, sometimes you see beaches at its sides, revealed at low tide and covered at high tide. You begin to hear the sounds of the sea not far off and the smell of salty water in the air.

At last the boat reaches the mouth of the estuary and the boat is manoeuvred to dock at a harbour. The boat’s captain tells you this is as far as they can take you. You disembark but before you bid farewell, you spend a few moments exchanging words with the captain that seem fitting as this stage of your journey ends.

Alone once more, you walk from the harbour to the beach, where the edge of the land meets the edge of the sea. Waves are crashing on the shoreline. You know that the answer to your question of the heart lies out there. You will have to venture into the sea, but before you do, leave behind things you cannot take with you. Divest yourself of anything you feel you cannot, or should not, take and leave it on the shore. Then, before stepping into the sea, spend a few moments watching and listening to the waves.

You move out into the salty water, the waves falling around your feet, but knowing that you are safe and that this is the right thing for you to do. Suddenly, a huge wave comes towards you. You feel a surge of emotion as the wave soars above you and seems as though it might inundate you, then you realise that the wave has swept you up and you are being carried along by it.

You find yourself transported to a wonderful place, a place that is in a watery realm not of the world, where water glistens and sparkles all around you, but you know you are safe.

You then realise are not alone, but are in the presence of a figure that you know to be the guardian of water. You approach them greet them in the way that seems appropriate. The guardian invites you to say what has brought you here and you feel the need to pour out your feelings, hopes and fears and the question that is in your heart. The guardian listens to what you have to say, and you feel that they understand. You spend as much time as you need talking to the Guardian.

After some time, the guardian says some words to you. Listen to what they have to say. Then, the guardian offers you a beautiful chalice and tells you to sip from it, then peer into its depths. You take the chalice and drink from it, tasting the water it contains and feeling it flowing into you, cleansing and healing and suffusing you with calm. Then, you peer into it and see an image form in its depths. That image, you realise, shows what you need to know to resolve your matter of the heart. Spend a few moments contemplating this.

At last it is nearly time for you to go and you thank the guardian for their help and say that you wish to return to your normal realm.

The guardian gestures and the waters around you swirl about, moving you with them, and when you are still again you have returned to your safe, familiar garden, with any items you had left behind on the shore returned to you, and with a greater understanding than you had before.

Take time to reacclimatise yourself with the normal world and, when you are ready, open your eyes.


You can find more guided visualisations in my book Pagan Portals - Guided Visualisations.



2 comments:

Vic said...

I hope you don't mind, but I linked to these visualisations on a social website I am on. The discussion's here:

http://kaloscoven.ning.com/forum/topics/new-course-now-available-in

I hope you don't mind. These visualisations are great!

Badwitch said...

Vic - Thanks very much for your kind comment. I am more than happy for you to link to the visualisations.