Playing with Fire : Treating Fire like a Teacher

What if fire isn’t just something you watch, but a teacher you can meet every day? We dive into simple, powerful practices that turn warmth and light into focus, courage, and creative momentum. Through breathwork, candle work, and mindful ritual, we build a steady relationship with the fire element that feels grounded, safe, and genuinely useful.

We start with solar fire breathing at sunrise, drawing golden energy into the heart and sending a beam back to the sun. That exchange sets the tone for the day and activates the solar plexus—confidence, direction, and calm drive. Then we move into a clear, safety‑first walkthrough of Breath of Fire: posture, pacing, diaphragmatic pumping, and how to prevent dizziness by resting and using brief holds. You’ll learn when to use it, how to slow down afterward, and why this yogic breath is so effective for sharpening attention before work or workouts.

From there, we reimagine candle gazing as dialogue. Instead of passive staring, you create a yes or no language with your flame, ask practical questions, and train your intuition to notice subtle cues. We also lean into embodiment: mirror the flame’s dance to bring heat into the body, then close the loop with offerings—bay leaf, cinnamon, or tobacco—and fire safety essentials. Finally, we explore scrying with the flame to read symbols, confirm insights, and turn intuition into action. It’s a toolkit you can return to daily: solar breathing, Breath of Fire, candle dialogue, movement, offerings, and scrying—not as superstition, but as a mindful way to kindle clarity and agency.

We’re also sharing a guided fire shamanic journey on Patreon this Wednesday and welcoming a Diné shamanic practitioner next week to deepen the practices around the fire element. Subscribe, share with a friend who loves breathwork or ritual, and leave a quick review—then tell us which practice lit you up most.

Chapters

• 0:00 Framing A Relationship With Fire
• 2:10 Solar Fire Breathing At Sunrise
• 4:50 Guided Energy Exchange With The Sun
• 8:30 Breath Of Fire Technique
• 18:30 Candle Gazing
• 22:40 Speaking with Fire
• 27:30 Yes Or No With Flame Signals
• 32:00 Dancing With Fire And Embodiment
• 36:00 Offerings And Fire Safety
• 40:00 Scrying Symbols In The Flame
• 46:30 Recap, Patreon Journey, And Next Guest

Transcript

Rainbow Raaja: 0:34

Thank you so much for joining me this week. This week we're going to be talking about the different practices that are going to help you start to cultivate a relationship with fire. Last week we talked about the different cultures and how they like to connect with the fire element. But this week, I'd like to give you some beginning practices that are going to help you start to create a relationship with the spirit of fire. All the elements have their own spirit. And even though we may see fire in many different places in many different ways, fire is always the same spirit wherever it is, whether it's a campfire, whether it's a candle flame, whether it is a bonfire, or the light of fire on your stove, or even in your fireplace, or even in our own sun. The way that you can start to create a healthy, mutually beneficial relationship with fire is to practice some of these beginning practices. So the first one I'd like to start with is called the solar fire breathing. So we are going to do this solar fire breathing in the morning when the sun rises. Now, if you don't wake up with the sun every day, that's okay. You don't have to. But if you want to make the most of this practice, I encourage you to wake up as the sun is rising, go outside and face the sun. If you wake up in the later morning or early afternoon, you can do this practice as well. But the goal is to face the sun. As you are breathing in, you are pulling the energy from the sun into your heart. Your in-breath is pulling that solar energy into your heart space. And on your outbreath, you are sending your energy to the sun on a beautiful golden beam. So I'm going to do a couple of just example breaths so that you can kind of see how I practice this when I do it. And I encourage you to try and start this practice either today or tomorrow. So once again, we're going to face the sun. We're going to find the sun in the sky. We're going to, there's the sun, and we're going to take a nice deep breath in. You're pulling that energy from the sun into your heart. And as you breathe out, you're sending your energy to the sun on a beam of golden light. Breathing in the sun's energy. And breathing it out. Breathing it in. Breathing it out. Breathe in that prana. And breathe it out. Now you can always finish this practice with some gentle stretches or with just kind of thanking the sun for all that it does, or a gentle meditation where you sit beneath the sun and allow its light and its energy to induce some visions or some inner clarity for you. And just sit with that beautiful light after you've done about three to five minutes of exchanging energy with the sun. Now, the next practice that I would like to introduce you to is called the breath of fire. It is a very common yoga breathing technique that is a little counterintuitive if you've never done it before. Your goal is actually to breathe really quickly, and it is to create a push and pull in your diaphragm. This breathing technique does tend to cause lightheadedness and dizziness. So I encourage you when you are doing this for the first time to really take it easy and to listen to your body. And if you start to get lightheaded or you start to feel too dizzy, that you return to a normal breathing pattern until your system calms down so that you can return to trying this new practice out. It does take practice to get to a place where you can do this breathing where it won't be causing dizziness or lightheadedness. So I'm not an expert in this breathing practice as I've done it with one of my ex-colleagues, Dr. Blake Dennis. He taught it in a class that we did together called From Victim to Valiant. He was so wonderful with teaching this. And if you haven't checked out our course yet, I really encourage you to. He goes over so many different uh meditation practices as well as different healing techniques to self-heal the victim wound. That was what the class was intended for was to help people who have been through either utilizing their empathic abilities to such an extent where they have become victimized, or people who have been victims in their lives and don't know how to say no. And this course is was created to support people in reclaiming their power. So this particular breathing practice, I happened to stumble across it. I was doing a reading for myself before I started today's recording, and it came up in my reading. So I'm going to go ahead and read the specifics on how to utilize this. And I'm reading it in the Light Code Apothecary by Izzy Ivy. I think she is such a gifted intuitive. She has created multiple decks, and I love the Light Code Apothecary because it is so in tune, just as it was this evening when I was doing a reading for myself on what I need to be most in tune with tonight's recording, and it happened to come up. So this is how she encourages you to start doing the fire breath practice, the breath of fire practice. She encourages you to sit in a comfortable cross-legged position or a kneeling position, if preferred. It is recommended to do this practice seated on the floor. I am not seated on the floor. So I encourage you to sit on the floor. Place your hands on your knees and turn them to face your palms upwards. Then fold your index fingers of both hands so that your fingertips touch the tips of your thumbs. Have your eyes closed, keep your head and back straight, and relax your shoulders. I know when I first learned this yoga breathing practice with Dr. Dennis, he encouraged that I roll my shoulders back several times in order to really open up my chest and to allow the best lung expansion. Inhale deeply through both nostrils. Focus on the region of the belly where your navel is, where your belly button is. And you can even place your hands there to support the focus being on your navel. As you exhale, pull your navel back towards your spine as much as you can. The exhale should feel like a light outburst. It should be fast while you pull your stomach inwards. During the exhalation, you should be able to hear a hiss sound. On the inhale, the stomach should come outwards. Upon the exhalation, it should move inwards. You take 20 breaths to complete one round, and you repeat three to four rounds. The goal with this is your focus should be on the exhale. And even though this practice doesn't sound, she didn't necessarily say how quickly to do the breathing practice, I know from experience it is supposed to be rather quick breathing, like a dog panting, or I mean, it it really is a very fast breathing practice. So if you are not driving, if you are not in the middle of something that requires your attention, I encourage you to just try this breathing practice for the next 20 breaths with me. So what we're going to do, once again, we're going to roll our shoulders back. We're going to take a couple of normal breaths. Place our hands on our navel, on our stomach. If you're sitting upright in a chair like me, place your feet on the floor. And we're going to do very quick inhalation and exhalation, where we are focusing on your stomach expanding with inhalation, then contracting on the exhalation. So you're creating a pump. Now, while you're doing this, you can do it in through the nose, out of the mouth, like I do. That's just how I like to do it. But I have seen people do it just with their nose. I find that a little harder to do. So find what feels comfortable for you, but pacing is really important and making sure that you are keeping your focus on your core because that is where we are keeping our inner fire. That is where we are trying to ignite this fire through our breath, right? So when you are ready, go ahead and join me. Give it give it give it a try. Place your hands on your stomach, feet on the floor, or butt on the floor if you can. And one, two, three. Told you. Breathing through the nostrils is hard for me. I was doing it proper and then I switched, and now I can't get back. If you keep your eyes open, you might recognize them as, you know, dizziness or kind of a lightheadedness. For me, because I do a lot of energy work, it feels like I am raising my energetic frequency with every five to seven breaths that I'm doing. So if you do practice this enough, you will actually be able to, I feel a lot more focused after doing that one round of breath work. And if you do it for five to ten minutes and you're taking those slower breaths, as I did, where you slow yourself down, you're holding your breath on the when you get to the exhale, you hold it for three, and on the inhale, you hold it at the top for three. So it's like, and that's kind of how you calm your body back down from doing that exaggerated, high-paced breathing. So that is the breath of fire. It is a yogic breath. You can check it out on YouTube. There are a bunch of tutorials, but I really encourage that you listen to your own body like I did as I was trying to get myself back into my own flow. Yes, I demonstrated breathing in and out through my nose, but for me, being more body aware, energy aware, I like to be able to really feel my core. And I might start slower and increase the speed as I become more comfortable with this new breathing pattern. So I really encourage you to try this at home. Make sure once again that you're listening to your body, that you're not doing this in a place that might put others at risk, such as driving, and that you do this maybe before you have to do an intensive project or when you need some energy to, I don't know, clean your house or something. So the next practice that I would love to share with you today. We have this wonderful candle here. Everybody, welcome the candle. Hello, candle. Hello, fire. The next practice I would like to teach or to encourage you to try is candle gazing. Now, you can just do this by watching the candle and staring at it in the dark. But that's not very fun. So I would like to encourage you to open up a dialogue with your candle. Hi, fire. How are you today? And as you start this dialogue and you start to create a relationship with your fire, with your candle flame, I'd like you to pause after each interaction and observe how the candle responds to you. So I'm going to do this with a couple of some demonstrations. Hello. Hello, fire. You can see the candle is flickering. It's saying hello back. Hello, fire. I'm gonna lift it up. I don't know if you guys can see. I am so happy that you're here with me today. Oh, you're happy too. That's good. Well, I am here to teach my listeners of the podcast how they can connect with you. Does that make you excited? So, for those of you listening, the candle is getting small, it's flickering very small, and then gets taller and flickers taller, and it kind of waves back and forth. So, because I have had many dialogues with my candle, I know that this candle is it's excited, but it's a little timid, it doesn't really know what to make of it. So let's ask some questions. For me, um, I'd like to ask, hey candle, do I have a healthy relationship with fire? So for those listening, it had a very thin flame and it flickered and it went back and forth and then got very fat and it wiggled around a little bit. And you may think, oh, that's what candle flames do normally anyway. But you'd have to get a candle and start a dialogue to understand that sometimes it really does respond to you. And in this instance, when I'm listening to my candle with my heart, it's saying, Well, you have kind of an on and off relationship with fire, you're not as consistent as you need to be, you don't listen as much as you need to to when you should be connecting with fire. And that is what I hear when I'm asking fire, do I connect with you enough? And it's like, no, you have a good relationship with me, but you're not you're not doing it as often as you should. You know, I want to burn more with you. Is that right, fire? Am I am I translating you well enough? Okay. I've gotta try it over and over and over and over again. It's it's saying the consistency is really important. Yeah, fire fire speaks really loud if you listen. It's not really a sound, it's more it's more of a pattern. Right, fire? The steadiness is is its confirmation. When it flickers, it's kinda talkin', right? So you can ask the fire some things like Do I have brown hair? And the fire just shook. No, it just went and no. Okay, fire, do I have blonde hair? And it goes up and down like this. It went up and down like this. So for me, if I'm able to ask questions that give me yes or no responses from the fire, now I can come to the fire and actually ask it yes or no questions. I know no is the flame going back and forth. And I know yes, is the flame going up and down? Like a shake and a nod. Isn't that right, fire? Pretty steady, pretty steady. Yes, there you go. Thank you, fire, for confirmation. Now, it does take practice, and it does take constant. Thank you, fire. I love you so much, fire. We want to feed our fire, we want to feed it compliments. We tell it what a beautiful little flame it is. You're such a beautiful little flame. Yes, you are. I think you're so pretty. You don't have to talk to it like this. It's just how I have a relationship with my fire. Now, now that we've talked about some candle gazing, the best the best way to start to cultivate that relationship with the fire itself, you've talked to it, you've established yes and no, you've had some questions, maybe you just want to have a little discussion with it about who you are and what you're hoping to get out of working with fire. You know, hey, fire, I'm hoping that through our work together, that that you can help show me how to harness my passion in a way to inspire others. Do you think you can help me with that? Yeah, all right, sweet. That's great. So, what are some ways that you'd like to show the viewers and listeners how to connect with you? What's that? You want to teach them how to dance like you? Well, that's the next thing we're gonna be doing, fire. So, something else I like to do with my candle flame is right now I've got in my hand, so it's gonna be a little hard to do. But when you really do start to do these practices where you're building a relationship with fire, a good exchange you can have, besides giving the fire your wishes and you know, talking to it and showing it that you see it as a comrade and as a friend, something that isn't just a non-animate object, that it is sentient in some way, shape, or form, and that you respect it and that you want to build a stronger connection with it. Dancing with fire, because fire dances so beautifully, it doesn't want to dance alone. It definitely would love you to dance with it, isn't that right? Oh, yes, yes. Fire loves dancing. Does fire like singing too? Singing's like, yeah, it's okay, but you really like dancing, huh? Oh yeah. Yeah. So fire wants you to dance with it. You can dance with fire. You put your candle down. You don't dance with your fire like me. I'm a weirdo. You don't don't we don't play with fire like this. I don't have a place for fire at the moment, and I'm maybe, maybe I put fire here. There. We'll put fire there temporarily. Is fire doing good there? Fire's doing great there. So you you have your candle you put in front of you, and you're gonna start to mirror the flames. And you want to dance, and you want to really breathe like as much of that fire, flame that you you feel from a fire, that warmth. You want to breathe it up and use that to move your body and do as much as you can to move that that warmth and that that fire through your limbs. I'm not going to do it fully because I'm seated, but if if I if I move like fire right now, and I'm I'm watching fire and I'm like, I'm gonna get wider. Ooh, and skinnier, and I'm gonna shake a little bit. Ooh. You like that fire? We're doing good? Yeah, shaky, shaky, shake. So it seems silly, and don't worry, you're not gonna be on a stage in front of, oh, I don't know, thousands of people embarrassing yourself like I am. No, no, no. You have the comfort of your own home and no eyes on you to look ridiculous. But me and fire, we don't mind looking ridiculous, do we, fire? No, no, we don't. So I just I just did that just for you guys. Look silly, dance with your fire. Trust me, fire will be happy. Another way that you can utilize just a candle, okay? Is let's let's place fire back over here because fire was doing great. You're doing a great job on the podcast, fire. Another way would be to make an offering to the spirit of fire. You want me to make an offering to you, spirit of fire? Yeah. So a good way we can make the offering to the spirit of fire, you can get some good old-fashioned tobacco, or you can use a bay leaf, you can use cinnamon, any kind of herb. Now, keep in mind, just like we covered in the earth element, all the herbs have their own special medicine, their own purposes. And I do recommend that you look into what those herbal purposes are before you decide to make an offering to the spirit of fire. I don't really have the best mechanism to do this offering to the spirit of fire. Oops, as it would usually be done where I would write a blessing or a prayer to fire. I'd sit here and I'd write my little blessing in prayer, you know. Oh. Fire, please accept my offering of tobacco. I hope to be more focused and aligned for optimize career opportunities this week. I love you. Thank you. All right. I made my little note. Now that I've made my note, I'm gonna take my offering. I I usually do like poetry or whatever. So I got my my offering. You see, you see, we've got we've got a little and then I just fold it in. I make a little pouch. Set myself up. I got my pouch with my offering inside. And because, like I said, I don't have the optimized place to burn this, I'm just going to pretend to burn it. Woo! Burnie, burnie, burn, and I'll I'll give you this later, I promise. I'm gonna burn, burn it. Ooh, we burned it. And then and then the fire receives that. And once you're all done, you would then thank the fire for receiving your offering. Fire, great transformer. I feed you so that you may feed me. So I've rolled up my little offering into the note. I've placed my tobacco inside, and then I feed it to the fire, which I'm not gonna do because I don't have the best fire set up here. That's a bit of a fire hazard. So I encourage you to make sure that you check your environment and make sure there is a safe place for you to burn your offerings because fire can be unpredictable. And I will be giving fire its offering. I promise I'm gonna give it to you. Those are some practices that I encourage you to try this week. Once again, connecting with our solar fire, which is our star. Connect with our star, exchange energy with the sun. Receive the energy from the sun, send the sun your energy, allow for a healthy exchange, and build that connection with your solar plexus chakra, fire breath, which is going to increase the energy in your body. It's going to help you connect with the fire element, candle gazing with some healthy dialogue and questions and yes, some connections with your fire and starting to use the wonderful connection with your fire for scrying as well. You can look in the flame and ask it questions and see what images come up from the flame. And by picking those images or you know, figuring out oh, right now I'm going to, you know, okay, okay, fire element. Help me help me see what's gonna happen this week for my business. So what I'm seeing here. So I see that as as me doing more energy work, whether it's on myself or others. I'm seeing inside the flame the wick has become what looks like a black bird, and I can only interpret that as crow because that's the bird I work with the most three. So I would interpret from these images that I received, which was an apple, there was a crow, there was a hand doing energy work. I see the number three, I see a mountain. I think I'm being encouraged to hike. Yes. I'm being encouraged to hike to a higher perspective. Yeah, okay. So I'm also being encouraged. What am I uh a what a power retrieval? No, soul retrieval. Yes. Okay, so soul retrieval. Yes. And am I being asked to focus on my health this week with my diet? Yes. Okay. And am I being asked to do more reiki? Yes. Is it for others? Yes and no. Yes. Am I am I doing Reiki daily? Are you just saying every day I gotta do Reiki? Yes. Yes, every day. Okay. Doing Reiki every day, I guess. Um, is there anything I'm missing? What is the grasping? We keep doing this grasp, like what I gotta I gotta take take life by the Grab it? Yes. Okay. You gotta take action then, huh? Alright. Thanks, Fire. You're such a good friend. Always giving me good advice. Anyway. I scry. Fire tells me what to expect. I have to be the one to do the kind of deciphering of the symbols. Fire will confirm yes or no. Once you know how to read it, and you can just have a nice little dialogue. You can really have like, you can find a good friend in fire. And fire can become a wonderful companion for breath work. So, you know, just sitting there with your candle and practicing breathing, exchanging your energy with fire, just like we did with the sun. And then when you're all done working with fire, just sprinkling a little offering on her, on him, and on this wonderful little friend. You can choose what what you'd like to call them. They are your friend. So that is it for today. I appreciate you guys so much for tuning in, and I uh I will be posting a guided fire shamanic journey to the spirit of fire on the Patreon. So I encourage you to check that out. I will be dropping that on Wednesday. So please check the Patreon for that meditation. I look forward to being able to share it with you guys. I am so excited. Next week, we're going to have a Dine Shamanic practitioner, Craig, joining us on the podcast. I am so excited to hear about all the different practices of working with the fire element. He will be sharing with us. And I know he is a very talented artist as well. So I look forward to being able to share some of his wisdom and to learn more about his journey across the United States and working with so many different tribes and learning how they all work with the fire element in different ways. So I hope you guys tune in next week for that. If you haven't already, please do write a review or share this podcast with others so they may find it. I appreciate all your guys' patience as I am re-entering the podcast space and becoming more accustomed to my new equipment. Thank you guys so much for being patient with me as I get back in the flow. And I love each and every single one of you. And I really hope that this show helps you, that it helps you grow, that you are encouraged and you feel inspired to start building your own relationships with the elements through this season's suggestions. All right. Well, thank you so much, and I hope we all keep ascending together. Bye.