Yesterday, in the very early hours of June 21, the full moon peaked in Capricorn, the second full moon in a month in this region of the zodiac. Celebrated as the Guru Purnima, this July full moon was one of the most auspicious of the lunar calendar of the year. The guru is one who dispels ignorance and brings the light of wisdom, in order that we may experience the benefits of expansive consciousness and spiritual growth.
July’s full moon was in Uttarashadha nakshatra, associated with the vishvedevas who collectively represent the wholeness of divinity, Truth, Justice, and Order. Its lord is Jupiter, the planetary guru, bestower of wisdom, knowledge, and spiritual expansion. Jupiter and Mars are in Taurus, creating a guru mangala yoga, imparting a fire and enthusiastic energy to our beliefs, empowering us with courage – and removing obstacles which may have previously stymied us. Perhaps you have experienced such a removal of obstacles recently.
As I stepped outside to gaze upon the full moon, she was perfectly framed by clouds. I watched the clouds and the moon as my daughter observed that the moon was framed by the clouds as if it were an eyeball in an eye socket. We continued to watch the clouds as they formed a near perfect dragon head, with the moon as its eye.
As my practice has evolved, deepened, and transformed over the years, I have developed a keen interest in slowing down and opening to the wisdom imparted by seemingly mundane experiences – the flight of a hawk overhead, the sighting of deer on a hillside, the way certain plants grow wild and thrive around a home or neighborhood, or … the framing of the moon in clouds. In this way, what I observe in nature takes on the import of an active conversation with Nature and the spirits of place and time; a return to Divine Mother consciousness and an acknowledgement of the power or shakti of her elements; and the interconnectedness of the living web on the planet, which offer up signs and symbols to us, for our edification, consideration, and contemplation.
So I began contemplating the Dragon.
It had been suggested to me that the dragon is an ancient symbol, a symbol of the feared and demonized Divine Feminine. And as these things go, through this practice of mine, another thread of wisdom and remembering was served up to me this morning, the thread of the myths of ancient Babylon and Sumer, in the story of Marduk and Tiamat. Tiamat was understood to be the feminine principal of the primordial salt waters, represented as a dragon. Marduk in the old stories was a powerful younger god, who established divine Supremacy by defeating Tiamat, establishing structure and order in the universe. Marduk created the earth out of Tiamat’s dismembered body. And later, Marduk created man and woman, to serve the gods.
Invoking these myths sparked ancient remembering, and I remembered a similar story from my Danish and my family’s Nordic heritage, the story of Odin’s birth and that of his brothers Ve and Vili, and Odin’s vow to rid the universe of the wickedness of the original beings sprung from the great abyss of Gunnungagap – the Ice Giants. The largest of these was Ymir, and when Odin successfully slayed Ymir, Ymir’s body parts were used to create the Earth. And later, Odin and his brothers created man and woman out of the Ash and Elm tree, the first man named Ask, from the Ash tree, and the first woman named Embla, from the Elm tree. Odin gave the first man and woman life by His breath, and the gods sought to protect this new life from the evils of the Nine Realms.
And here I am with you – eons of time later – remembering the old stories.
Which brings me back to the image of the Dragon and its eye, the Moon. Tantric ayurvedic moon practices revolve around the acknowledgement of the waxing and waning of the moon as the force, or Shakti, which governs the tides of our earthly oceans and the tides of the salt water that flows within our earthly bodies – in the blood. The symbolism of the moon is intimately tied to the cycle of fertility in the female body, and her monthly menstrual blood, synched to the timing of the lunar cycle. In practicing moon cycle awareness, women can hone their awareness of their own cycles of fertility, abundance, strength, and glowing vitality, as well as their need for rest, rejuvenation, and quiet inward contemplation. The 15 nityas of the moon are the qualities of the energy or Shakti of the Supreme Deity Herself, Lalitā Tripurasundari, the Red Goddess, and she encompasses all of Time represented by the Kala Chakra (the spinning wheel of time) and the four elements upheld and supported within the fifth, Akasha or space. By working with these 15 nityas, and the 16th, the Divine Mother Lalitā Tripurasundari, women can reclaim their inner and outer strength, wisdom, and health.
Dear One, Tripurā is the ultimate, primordial Śakti, the light of manifestation. She, the pile of letters of the alphabet, gave birth to the three worlds. At dissolution, She is the abode of all tattvas [aspects of reality], still remaining Herself
– Vāmakeśvaratantra
The Dragon and the Moon at this most recent Guru Purnima reminded me of both the demonization and reverence of the Divine Feminine, in her wisdom as Sophia and her role, in the time before time, of the cycles of creation and destruction, the illusion of separation and through her, the path to Divine Union.
It is a tantric, or feminine understanding, of Ayurveda that I embody and invoke in my practice, a weaving or braiding together of the intellectual, traditionally masculine, understanding of the systems and structures of Ayurveda, including the scientific understanding of herbal, mineral and psychotropic plant medicines and their mechanisms of action, and the subtle and powerful healing powers, the Shakti, or feminine principle, of the practices that make up Ayurveda. The shakti prana of Ayurveda is the foundation of all healing, and healing in this way is multi-dimensional: it takes place, at one and the same time, on the physical, emotional, and spiritual planes of existence. As Maya Tiwari writes, “Indeed, the health of the entire earth lies in honoring the female energy and its interconnection to nature’s rhythms.”
The level of effort my clients must offer to themselves, to experience remarkable results, is fully dependent on their efforts to purify the mind and body. Anybody can start at any time, and your results, with application and adherence are guaranteed to be extraordinary.
Proportionately slight effort is enough for erasing slight vasanas [karmic imprints or behavioral tendencies]. He whose mind has been made pure by good deeds in successive past incarnations, gains supreme results quite out of proportion to the little effort he may make – Tripura Rahasya, XIX, 65-66, Ramanashram edition
So, in these final weeks of July 2024, let the Dragon and the Moon guide our way. The Red Dragon as envisioned by St. John in the Book of Revelations tried, and failed, to devour the Child born by the woman clothed in the moon, the sun, and the 12 stars – and when the dragon failed, went after the woman herself in a fit of rage. This is deep and ancient imagery, of the dual aspects of the Divine Feminine, and today the Dragon is demonized as Satan itself. A deeper, more ancient remembering of this imagery however will reveal the Dragon as a symbol of the chaos of pre-emergent Creation, the Gunnungagap, the shadow of the unconscious that resides collectively in each and every one of us, which Christ consciousness came to illuminate that we may have Life.
And if we are to heal our physical ailments, we must go beneath the obvious, gross physical symptoms, to what lies beneath – those unconscious patterns which determine behavioral patterns, movement patterns, and everyday diet, lifestyle, and health decisions. We must work within ourselves to tame, or slay, the Dragon, the chaos of the destructive unconscious, and uplift the Woman clothed in the sun, moon and the 12 stars, by shining the Light of awareness. This then empowers us to come into an alignment with the Spiritual hierarchies, with Nature, the Above and Below, and works, through sacred magic, to heal our lineage, past and future, from this very present moment.
At this hottest time of summer in the Northern hemisphere, the fire of transformation is upon us, bringing us a sense of upliftment and courage, giving us the ability to face what has blocked us, and to dispel our fear, by the Light of understanding.
Michael-Sophia in nomine Christi,
Hari Om Tat Sat,
Much love,
Heather
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