“Conscious evolution is humankind’s final frontier, the ultimate freedom sought by humanity since the dawn of time. Thus, the challenge seems to be one of overcoming the fear of the unexplored territory that lies ahead and finding the courage and optimism to illuminate the spiritual dimension hidden within our nature.” Pir Vilayat Inayat Khan
A Preamble
The Nine Directions offers a deep dive into a particular set of metaphors intended to aid your fulfillment of what I see as the “Prime Directive”: “Know Thyself.” This material is designed to reinforce and enlighten your connection with Source. It is offered in the hope that it may help you to “…illuminate the spiritual dimension hidden within our nature…” and, thus enlightened, enable you to draw upon the limitless power of the Eternal Consciousness that is Creation. Doing so helps you animate that Creator Within.
The metaphors of The Nine Directions are based on Native American traditions of the Seven Directions, while incorporating my own understanding and practices of those traditions. Setting out on this path offers you the chance to become familiar with, and come to know as true, the individual elements of your “Whole True Self.” In such a state of “knowing,” you come to think, act, and attain an optimal level of Hu-Man behavior.
The success of these exercises is premised on your willingness to open yourself to these “conversations with Creation.” The individual Directions are meant to help you integrate the qualities associated with each symbolism into your core being. In being willing to embrace them as guideposts on the path to your Wholeness, you are asked—at each position of its compass—to take on the point of view of that Direction, to see yourself as the Direction, as though you were looking into the Medicine Wheel from that specific compass reading. By consciously embracing each of the Directions, one can open a dialogue with it. By allowing them to speak with you in this meditative embrace, you will come to understand what it means to say, for example, “I AM/WE ARE the East.” In the end, owning each of them, you realize that You Are One with the Creator.
A final note: As we are all One with the Creator, so are we One with the All. In light of this truth, when we step into these Directions, it is only appropriate to say, I Am/WE Are Them.
I hope you enjoy the journey.
Johnny
The First Direction: The East
The Native American teaching with which I am most familiar comes from the traditions of the Marten Clan of the Red Lake Band of the Anishinabe tribe. In that teaching, the entrance into the Medicine Wheel is in the East.
Qualities, Aspects, and Traditions
The Animal Totems of the East are the far-sighted winged ones: the Eagle, Hawk, and Crow. Listen to the messages from Spirit they carry. Soaring so high and with absolute clarity, seeing so far, they encompass within the breadth of their vision the vast field of potential upon which you play out your lives. Imagine that field as an endless sea of grass. See, etched upon that fertile green field, the lines of the several paths that you have trodden. See the twists and turns, the dead ends and false starts, the various forks you have encountered, and the path you have finally chosen that has led you to your own Here and Now. As you see those paths spread out in front of you, acknowledge those people whose own paths have crossed yours; some you have embraced, some who you have let go, each with Love.
The East is the color Yellow, as the new day’s Sun.
As such, it is the time of Dawn, the new day, and always represents the birth of the ever-present Now. It is Spring, the season of new life, your callow youth, and the flower’s first bud.
The Element associated with the East is Fire. This is the fire of the first Sun, and the Divine Fire of Transformation, into which the Eagle dives, and is ultimately transformed into the rising Phoenix.
Spirit Guide—Wounded Warrior Woman
Minerals—Hawk’s Eye and Opal for Visualization; Silver for Intuition
Lessons—Illumination, Clarity, New Beginnings, and the True Value of Freedom
Astrologically, the East aligns with the First House, symbolizing the dawn that illuminates your world. Therefore, it indicates how you will behave in the outer world, as the environment illuminated by that light naturally influences your actions. But in turn, it also throws the light on how you act, influencing what others think of you—because their judgments are most often based on how they see you behave.
These attributes represent aspects of the East, and—since YOU ARE the Wheel—they are integral to YOUR spiritual identity.
Embrace those attributes in your heart, feel them within, and say:
AM/We ARE The EAST!