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Taken from “Sky Above, Earth Below” Sounds True, Inc. ©1999 John P. Milton
Offering To the Eleven Directions
This eleven directions ceremony is a very powerful way to connect with a fundamental essence of all form, of inner truth, and of the wild. The ceremony will help to deeply cultivate two qualities: your relationship with all other beings and recognition of your own fundamental nature.
This ceremony will deepen your relationship with the entire family of nature. Your prayers and offerings will bring you closer to nature in ways that will surprise you. Animals, for example, might begin approaching you without fear. When animals and birds become familiar with you and are willing to spend time in your presence, they often become your teachers.
The eleven directions ceremony will also help you to recognize our source: our true fundamental nature. It will clarify and refine your path through nature, leading you inevitably to the pristine state of clear essence.
The ceremony is derived from various Celtic, Native American, and Tibetan ceremonial processes as well as from the grace of spirit’s inspiration, passed along directly to me during many of my vision quests. It is specifically designed so that you can make it your own especially important for many of us in the West, who typically have little experience with ceremonial process or prayer. The most important aspect of ceremony is that it comes from your heart: that it expresses the truth of your heart’s natural radiance; that it comes from the depths of your being. Accordingly, the instructions that follow are not designed to be rigidly observed rather, they are offered as a foundation for our own, personal ceremony.
Preparing For the Ceremony
Gather a few offering substances. Sweet grass, sage, tobacco, and cedar are some traditional western offerings. Offerings from Asia might include rice, corn, and corn pollen. Or you might simply offer something you like, such as chocolate or movement, like qigong. In making the offerings, imagine that they are magnified millions of times as their essence is converted into a kind of ambrosia that satisfies, liberates, and brings happiness to all beings in that direction. As you move to face the eleven directions, always turn clockwise. See the directions as points on a sacred medicine wheel, or as complementary and interdependent parts of an exquisite mandala.
Performing the Ceremony
Go into a place in nature where you feel inspired. Sit or stand, facing the east. Now place an offering to the east: the direction of spiritual birth and awakening. Let whatever in nature appears to the east whether a tree, an eagle, or a boulder represent the quality of that direction in that moment of time. This is how the east manifests in the natural mandala of your eleven directions. Do not try to apply a preconceived notion of “east” to this sacred form. Work exactly and truthfully with what nature herself provides within the natural medicine wheel in that moment.
Now turn clockwise to the south. This direction is normally associated with the life force: the vitality that arises when the heart opens. In the northern hemisphere, the sun rises particularly powerfully in the south; this is one of the reasons we and the entire plant kingdom feel its tremendous vitality in this direction. The radiance of the sun also represents the radiance of the open heart. Make your offering, and give heartfelt thanks and love to all the beings who are helping you to experience the power of your own qi.
Turn again, this time toward the west. This is where the sunsets where all the forms of the world metaphorically die, dissolve, or are transformed. West is where we honor death, which is the precursor to rebirth. Here we allow inner transmutation to turn those parts of ourselves that are ready for change into new forms of manifestation. West is synonymous with metamorphosis. As you face this direction, recognize your opportunity to let go of any old baggage that no longer serves you. When you make your offering, feel that it is being received by all the beings associated with the west: all the aspects of nature, the spirits, all the plants, animals, and stones.
Turn once more, and face north. Just as south represents the quality of unconditional love, north holds the quality of universal wisdom. It also has a purifying aspect that derives from that power of wisdom. Make your offerings of thanks for the blessing of universal wisdom; and for all the gifts you have received from spiritual beings, all the other teachers and beings, plants, and nature that lie in that direction.
Next, as you address the diagonal directions northeast, southeast, southwest, and northwest visualize the qualities of the individual directions merging together. For example, the north’s universal wisdom and the spiritual awakening of the east come together in the northeast. To the southeast, spiritual awakening (east) merges with the qualities of vitality and unconditional love (south). In this way, you will begin to see the medicine wheel as a unified field where all of the four fundamental qualities merge. Continue turning clockwise, joining the aspects of all directions in a single mandala.
The fifth direction, then, is northeast. Make your offering here to the unified aspects of universal wisdom and spiritual awakening.
Turn past the east to arrive at the southeast. Feel the qualities of illumination and spiritual awakening merging with vitality and unconditional love. Give thanks to all the beings of nature and particularly the beings to the southeast for these life-giving qualities.
When you arrive at the southwest, experience the qualities of vitality and unconditional love merging with the death, transmutation, and transformation of the west. Make your offering to all the beings of the southwest.
Turning to the northwest, make your offering to all the beings that represent the unified qualities of death, transmutation, transformation (west) and universal wisdom (north). As with all the previous directions, visualize the offerings vastly magnified and transformed into ambrosia for all the beings in the northwest direction.
Each time you turn to face a new diagonal direction, you cross over the line joining two of the primary directions. For example, as you turn from the northeast to the southeast, you pass over the line connecting east to west. As you become more familiar with the eleven directions ceremony, begin taking note of these crossings. Feel, as you pass over the lines joining east/west and north/south across the mandala, the joining of the qualities of those two directions. Crossing over the north/south line, experience the unification of universal wisdom and unconditional love; and as you pass over the east/west line, feel how transformation and spiritual awakening meet in the unifying energy of their opposite positions.
Having made our offering to the eight horizontal directions, turn past the northeast to face the easterly direction once again. It is from this position that you will experience the power of the three final directions: below, above, and the infinite within.
Kneel down to make your ninth offering to Mother earth. Feel your connection to Gaia and the vast, nurturing abundance she steadfastly offers all beings who live within and upon her. See the essence of your offering magnified millions of times
Now stand and, still facing the easterly direction, look up and lift your offering into the sky. This is the tenth direction, which represents Great Spirit, god, goddess, or the Tao.
Make your offering to all the enlightened beings who benefit us so greatly through their teachings and unconditional love. Include your human teachers, thanking them for their blessings and help.
Finally, turn in a slowly expanding spiral, feeling the entire mandala of the sacred circle being transformed into a sphere of great Nature: a unified field of luminosity, clarity, spaciousness, and pure awareness.
As you turn, all the directions dissolve, along with all the forms of nature, plants, animals, birds, planets, sun and moon. All the inner forms of the senses, inner vitality, emotions, thoughts, and concepts dissolve as you turn. This is the eleventh direction of primordial awareness. Honor the fundamental essence of this pure source that lies within the heart of all being, and out of which all form naturally arises, spontaneously manifest, and effortlessly dissolves. Rest in this state of spontaneous presence, clarity, luminosity, and spaciousness.
As you remain in this pure awareness of source, gently notice all perceptions, emotions, and thoughts. Moment to moment, recognize these forms arising naturally from the pristine state of primordial awareness; manifesting in its vastness; and dissolving back into its clear light. Realize that you and all the forms of inner and outer nature all the beings of all the eleven directions are profoundly connected in this formless source awareness. Continue resting in this recognition for as long as you can.
In every way possible, make this practice your own. Introduce elements that have special meaning for you, and experiment with what feels most aligned with your own experience and integrity. The central theme is to generate and express profound appreciation and love through the whole ceremonial process. If you do that, all the rest will unfold very spontaneously. If you perform this ceremony in the wild, you will find it leads to an incredibly powerful opening of your heart … and deep awareness of spiritual source with all being. |
