The Maypole of Kundalini Awakening: Beltaine's Deeper Magic

In this episode, Brooke talks about the power of Bealtaine, Kundalini and the Fire. Stay to the end for a delicious poem written by Brooke, that weaves this liminal time of Bealtaine with the power, healing, fertility and sensuality of Kundalini awakening. 

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Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Good morning, Wild Temple listeners. Happy full moon. Happy Buddha Purnama. This is the full moon dedicated to the Buddha and Buddha consciousness. And happy Bieltana or Beltane. This episode is for all of you yogis and people on the spiritual path that love Mother Earth, perhaps have ancestral heritage coming from the Celtic Isles. And any of you who are interested in Kundalini awakening, the power of prana, what I call lumen nature, this is an ancient alchemist term, the power of the light of nature, and how we can recognize this within us, and how we can really step into this threshold right here, right now, on Beltine.

SPEAKER_01 0:43

We the omnipotent fermentations of time, thinking ancient dreams, the logical prime, keep the stories of the old, right through the soul, and so they told and told until they start to transform. The born again comes to a next era with the modiflair. But the message still bears one in the many, many in the one. So come on in, cause you're most welcome to the temple of birth, the sun and the moon. Reclaim your power, it's the place we commune. A place with the mind, the body, and soul. Deceited through the ages become infrangible. Welcome to the Wild Temple. Welcome to the Wild Temple.

SPEAKER_00 1:26

I personally find that these practices from Ireland, Scotland, pre-colonial Britain are really in tune with Tantra. And I would even say that the deeper my studies go into classical Tantra, that the relationship to the earth, the relationship to one's own body, the power centers within one's own body, the spaces between. So the subtle, more hidden aspects of the subconscious, that's the liminality within you, within the body, as well as the world behind the worlds in nature. All of this relates inner, outer, Yata Brahmande Tata Pinde. This everything that is within us is mirrored outside of us. Yata Brahmande Tata Pinde, everything that is outside of us is mirrored within us, as above, so below. All of this is found in the tantric teachings as well as in the Celtic remembrance. And so by studying tantra, we can remember the heartbeat, the pulse, the truth, the lineage of the Celtic Isles. So I'm sure many of you listening know that the wisdom that descended from the Druids, descended from the land, from the many thousands of years of peoples on these places on the planet, which are considered the naval center of the planet, specifically Ireland, are lost. They've been lost to colonialism, imperialism, war, suppression, and an extreme amount of violence and harm. And so it is our duty, I do feel, as descendants of these peoples, if you are in the heritage, and even people who just love to heal and love to see this world as a whole wide, wild, wide network, an interconnected web, that this healing is a reclamation. So whether or not you come from these lands and yet maybe you're drawn to these celebrations or these rituals, that just the very act of remembering, like doing the practices that can help us remember what the truth is, what occurred here, what, and I don't just mean occur by like, what was the real history? Because we know the history was written by white men. What actually occurred as an evolution of the landscape? And what does the land want us to remember? And yeah, so maybe part of that is the truth of the suffering so that can be reconciled and repaired. Maybe it's, and I love to lean on this a little more now because I think we're already in the full flashlight of seeing all the pain and woe of how much harm has been done throughout the past, you know, 400 years at least. And the flashlight is also shining light on the powers, the empowerment, the uh the truth of the rituals, the the deeper pulse of the knowing of the intelligence of this planet and how this is also mirrored within us. And so it could have been quite possibly, I believe this to be true, that thousands of years ago there was no separation from this power. We we were the land, we were intimately connected to the land. And we know this in the rituals that have been carried down, this remembrance of the sovereign deity, the sovereign goddess, often was the protectress of the landscape, the piece of the earth that a king would rule. And this area was considered feminine and her watch, right, of a divine feminine nature, like Queen Maeve from Connucht, for example. And so when a king would come to rule that area of the land, it was required for him to marry her. And so the legends have it that Queen Maeve was an actual human, and so she married a lot of the kingslash warriors, and then went even a step further where she would make love to them to give the consent of yes, you can be the protector of this land, but also to transmit the Shakti of her power to ensure that this union of this all-encompassing intelligence of the union of love, but also divine recognition of equal masculine and feminine would be the that which was protecting the land. So, from this remembrance, this remembering the land, listening to the land, to actually learn from the land, which is one of my favorite ways to learn, we remember the union, the power of the union, and the importance of the union. And we can also see how far we have come from this unification. And it's just like turning the gaze slightly, but are we really that far from it? It's just an awareness of, an awakening to, and then a stepping towards bringing back the connection. So this time of year, May 1st, built in, and it actually starts around April 30th, the night before, is the cross-quarter mark in between solstice and equinox that is celebrated with fire. And in Tantra and in the Celtic tradition, fire is pivotal. Fire is transformation. It's the light that's the flashlight that helps us to see truth. It's allowance of in seeing that truth helps us to burn the dross of the pain and the woe so we can move forward and not like heavy burdens continue to carry it with us in our psyche, in our bones. And it's also in that same light that we can see through the darkness that empowers the way, that it that shines the light on how we can start to come back together. How can we stitch the wounds and jump over the thresholds and move through the liminality so that we can get to the other side of empowerment, of healing, of repair, of closeness, of unification. And so the fire as a symbol in both of these traditions, and this episode, I'm definitely going to be talking about kind of both of these traditions. So if those of you listening are new, just welcome. I love having you here. And for those of you who have been with me for a while, thank you for continuing to come and listen. And thank you so much for sharing with me how much these episodes are meaning for you. The key takeaway, I would say, from this particular episode is really the power that is inherent within you that's known as kundalini in its dormant form, and how it is mirrored in the landscape. And we can feel and tap into this power in the landscape by just laying our ear to the earth, our heart to the earth, our bodies laying down onto the soil, and you can start to feel the hum and the throb, or even just this peaceful kind of emptiness that is really alive. And this is you tapping in in your way, in how you feel, see, touch, hear, everyone's different to the power that is in the landscape. And conversely, learning and starting to attune to the fact that there is also power within you should you turn your senses inwards, so away from the screens, away from the news, cultivate some quiet, peaceful practice time. Maybe you're meditating, maybe you're uh just sitting by a tree, closing the eyes and breathing, but the real honest turning inwards to feel and to recognize the courses of the power that's moving through you. And for some, it's it's hearing. I know that uh that sound can actually lead you towards a transcendence within your own self or a deepening into your own self. For me personally, it's a felt sensation because I'm more of a clear sentient. I see-feel things. So each of us have a unique superpower, no one is left behind. We all have this, and it's just tapping into what's yours, and you have maybe a couple, maybe you have strengths in a couple of different areas. Maybe you can hear, and that hearing will lead you into a deeper knowing within yourself or into the earth. Maybe it's as I said, feeling or touch, and that moves you into yourself or into the earth. Yeah. So I'm gonna shift gears a little bit here. The power of this time is equal to Salwin. We know it is Samhain or Halloween. It's pronounced Salwin. And this is usually October 30th into November 1st. So it starts that day before, evening before into the next day. So that's the threshold. And these cross-quarter marks are held high on the altar of respect, recognition, remembrance, and ritual due to their potency of the liminality of time and place. It's the time and place where in Salwin there is a release to the earth, a letting go, a composting of a sort, and a death. We also have in our uh Latin countries the El Dia de los Muertos. So it's not just coming from the Celtic Isles. There's this recognition of this liminal time and the potency of the honoring of the ancestors during that time of year. In this time of year, it's, oh, I love this so much, it's the opposite. It's the bringing in life, life force. It's the recognition of, I would even say, again, that luminatore, the intelligence that is in nature, runs through nature, runs through all of us. In Tantra, it's called prana shakti, this aliveness that creates life. So it's not just life, it's not just the physical, oh, there's a lot of, there are a lot of fledglings in the trees. There are a lot of sheep, uh, lambs being born, whatever you may see in the real physical plane, it's deeper than that. There is an aliveness that is encouraging the plants to sprout. There is an aliveness that is encouraging you to possibly wake up a little bit earlier, or in waking up this spring, you realize you don't have that winter heaviness and you are light. And first thing in the morning, you're like, ooh, I'm ready to move my body. I don't need to push through any density here. I know I talked about that, I think, in the last podcast episode where I was still in that kind of winter heaviness. That's so gone. Like the life forces come in. I'm just waking up, you know, 5:30 a.m., 6 a.m., so clear, so ready to do my pranayama practices and my asana practices that lead me into these really deep, alive, awakened meditations. And I want this for you too. It's when we align to the powers of nature, we are held by her forces. She directs us. Or you can, if she doesn't feel like a good terminology for you, the love, the great spirit of nature can start to guide you. So one of the main themes of this time of year from the Celtic viewpoint is this idea of weaving. So they're weaving the ribbons of the Beltane pole, merging from this weaving, these pairs of opposites that are masculine and feminine into a union. There's also a weaving of the sacred into the mundane, a weaving of the human and the human life into that of the earth and the pulse of that which is not human civilization, but the rhythms of the seasons of time. And so this weaving creates a togetherness and a belonging that actually can go a long way towards healing and repair. When we are weaving our sacred into the mundane, we are infusing that mundane, which maybe it's just the preparations that you do prior to going to work. We're infusing them with life force and love, with beauty and awe, with curiosity and a timelessness that throws off any rigid thinking and throws off any constricted ideas of what that ritual routine needs to look like into a more whole, beautiful pulse of adaptability that can help you with aging gracefully. We know that on one level, when we are aging, aging is due to a constriction. The awe disappears, the curiosity flies away, the hum, humdrums take over, and it's a life that is more leaning on to-do checklists instead of inspiration and devotion. So let's just turn back a moment to the fire rituals and the potency of the fire. So in the folk and historical customs, there were twin fires, twin bonfires lit, and these signified blessing and protection. So often people would jump over the fires, they would bring their cattle over the fires, and this ensured just a nice healthy season for livestock and the humans that were tending and taking care. Now, when we look at these fires, these sacred fires, I see them in the yogic lens, in the tantric lens, as this journey from the root, from the base muladhara, so the earth journey and that fecundity that is often defined as a divine feminine force, the journey that she takes up the spine to merge at the flame at the forehead, which is that masculine energy of Shiva. So this is Shakti's journey to unite and marry with Shiva. And this practice is enhanced or ignited by attuning to prana. This is where the term pranayama comes from. It's a practice that helps to expand, to guide, to control, to direct life force energy. And so at the heart of Tantra, this is what we're doing. Tantra is a practice, a science, a study of and a management of life force energy. It is way more than what modern people think Tantra to be. So if you kind of put on your put on your rose-colored glasses for just a moment and kind of think this one through. So, what does this mean? Okay, there's this life force energy, this pulse of creation that's in the land that's in our body. What if you had a system, a methodology, a map, and a guide that gave you the tools to actually learn how to define this energy, how to organize it in a way that you could actually use it as equally as like a toolbox? I'm gonna go over and pick up my hammer and my nail today, which is going to be my Vishnu Mudra and my nostrils, because I'm gonna work with Nadi Shodanam. And in that light, you are knowing that you are directing the life force energy within you to move in a certain direction. And that direction is based on working with Mother Nature, with divine energy, and it's also working with your own body's health and strength, but it's clearing, it's clearing the dross, the obstacles, the lack of awe, the forgotten curiosity, the disempowerment being repaired, the remembering, the healing. That is also what this life force does. And when awakened, she's called prana shakti or just shakti. When asleep, kundalini. So essentially, this time of year, I am noticing I have a lot of clients right now that are having kundalini experiences, and it makes a lot of sense to me. First and foremost, it's because prana is stirring. The hum and the pulse that is deep in the earth and deep in the soil of our own muladharas is thrumming and stirring and wanting to rise. We are reflections of our planet. And this is really, I just realized, for those of you in the northern hemisphere, so for those of you in the southern hemisphere, you're going to be receiving this just a little bit differently. You are in the realms of Salwin and this returning down and under and inwards towards the wintering. But for those of you who are in the spring season, if you were to listen, to feel, to touch, and take some time to set aside for your practices to tune you inwards and to work with your breath, to work with your yoga asana, and to work in a way that you know you are attuning to the life force energy and helping it find its seat, take its throne, be sovereign within you, the land that is your body, she takes her seat. Then that reclamation eventually leads to her healing and repair of the places in your body where she rests. So this is Svadisthana, her own abode in the womb. And often we're right here. As women, we're often right here, especially with Epstein files being released and the uh rape academy and all of these horrible things that are being revealed. We as a collective, women's healing, women's wombs is really important right now. So allow that energy to heal your womb. And once the healing has really occurred and that kind of knitting and that uh uh love and repairedness has come to place, come into play, then the next stage is that she will be ready to ascend. She'll be ready to ascend without woe and pain and suffering. As she's trying to ascend, she might be hitting these walls of, oh, the aches and the pains and um everything is just harder and menstruation is harder, the PMS is stronger, the menopause is more intense. Our healing, we use this energy, we work with this energy, which is also it's like a fire, right? Tending to the fires of the healing within you to repair, to then be able to transcend and ascend into the higher realms towards the flame that unites at the Agnya chakra. So I think I went just a little bit esoteric, and I did have a kitty trying to jump on my lap at the same time. So I hope that that was clear. What I want to leave you with today is I wrote a poem yesterday coming out of my own meditation. It actually just poured from me. I think it took about 20 minutes. I didn't even think about it. It was a two-fold thing, a remembrance of the land that is considered to be the naval center of Ireland, specifically the cat stone. So it's a stacked stones that just have so much vibration. They feel like a temple in India to me. And they are in the center of Ireland, which is considered to be the naval center of our planet. And that remembrance of visiting that area, and I would bring people to Ishnach in, I think it was from 2015 for a couple of years prior to it becoming a public land for people to visit. So I had an archaeologist storyteller, Bendri, so a female druid, would bring our group to this area, and it was owned by a farmer, so it was really just. The land of this farmer and his family's land that this sacred site was located on. And again, it was private. And this is the same center, sacred site, where in lore the first of the Beltane fires were lit. And what would happen would be the entire, all of the tribes, all of the surrounding areas, every home would extinguish their fire in their fireplace, which was a big brave thing to do at the time, and they would come to the hill of Ishnoch, where they would take the kindling from that fire which was lit, and it actually stayed lit for seven years straight. They would take that fire and from this togetherness of being a part of the land and community would bring that kindling home and use that to ignite the hearth fire within their own home. So this poem comes from my own remembrance of laying on this land, of meditating on this land, and how the land taught me about what it is that it wanted to share with me, the liminality, the liminal spaces within the land itself, the healing and repair that was wanting to be done, the remembrance that was wanting to be talked about. And since then I've been doing that. Since then I've been sharing what the land has taught me. And you can probably find it one of my first aha's. I did a podcast episode with Katie Silcox, and at the time it was called The Ghee Spot, G-H-E-E. And I talk about how the land told me how to listen to the teachings, to the desires, to the wishes of our own ancestors, which were the minerals and the bones in the landscape itself. And so this poem comes from partially that remembrance as well as came right from a kundalini experience, right? You know, that's it's so interesting to try to put these things into words. The aliveness of the prana awakened within my own body and how she moves. I do refer to her as a she. This is a very healing feminine force that moves through my body upwards and back down. So in the upwardness to me, it feels like the force that's behind the blooming of the flowers. And these flowers are located along the spine as chakras. And as these flowers are blossoming and igniting, we are remembering the fires. We are feeling into these potent centers of healing, of transformation, and of seeing that are these fires of Beltane, that are these fires of tantra, that are these centerpieces of ritual, and they are found within us and remembered in the land. So I hope that you enjoy this poem. I think for some of you, if you really listen, you will be taken on a journey in a way that really helps you to feel the ascent and the descent of kundalini. Maybe listen to my words as you breathe and meditate, or you're laying your ear or your belly or your heart to the earth, and you can feel into the remembrance of the power of the land for yourself, and something within you awakens. A poem inspired by Dinhercas Erin, the Lure of Place from Ishnoch and this fire of Biotana. It's also a poem that is dedicated to all of you, women, who are on the path of empowerment, of awakening, and of healing. Put your ear to the land, listen to the hum of your blood, feel the veils of the great amnesia lifting from your heart, your womb, your mood. There is a story about this place, a space that dwells within you too. The hum is the memory of the ages, human and none, no longer in bloom. Hear the cackle of the branches and the whispers of the reeds, see the nymphs play in the moonlight while the frogs emerge from the deep. Put your heart to the land and feel the lore emerge, pulsations and sound vibrations, a maypo attuning you to love. There is no separation lying pressed against the earth, soil cradling your body as you surrender and give birth, to flower after flower, igniting sparks through your center, they rise and they fall, you are the pulse, the breath, the chanter. Give your offerings to the fe, to the fire, to the song, the mirth emerges from the landscape of your spine and your home. Let the humming find its center in your body which moves and sways. Feel the serpent rise from your womb belly, this Biltana, this first of May. Put your eye to the land and see into the deep, the darkness is no longer putting you to sleep. See the lure of this place within you it too dwells. Burdens and bones, ancestral tomes, the pleasure a knife that your heart opens and knows. There is nothing to fear as you surrender right here to her, the liberatrix, the guardian of the bones. She holds out her hands, her love and her tongue, you drop it all into the fire and the fire you become. The Maypole is your dance, your journey just begun. But remember the medicine is the lure of this space, the stories within, the love that is your place. Rise high, dear one, find your union, feel your song, and do not be afraid to return back to the soil where you belong.