Because February 2nd is a fire holiday, I light a candle in sacred space, meditate on the flame as it burns low, and then allow a single word or phrase to enter my awareness as the flame transforms into a puff of smoke. This oracle card of Imbolc from my Journey Oracle deck seems to echo the sensation of the trance.
This year I received the word "emptiness." I wrote in my journal, " This year I will experience emptiness." Because of my Buddhist practice I do not think of this word with apprehension or dismay. Instead I understand that emptiness is the true nature of all that is. But how to to experience emptiness when my head is always so full of plans?
I decided to do an oracle card reading about my intention for the year and here is what I learned.
I asked "what situation will give rise to this experience of emptiness?" This oracle card shows a person lying down, awake, at a slight tilt. Doesn't look very comfortable. The surface upon which the person is lying seems made of grey fog, or ashes. I receive a jolt of understanding from the Oracle pronouncement: The momentum of this situation is fed by finding a mystery. The true mystery of emptiness is not nothingness, but rather that everything is a flowing of inter-related causes and conditions--nothing is permanent. So planning is ultimately of limited use.
I next drew this oracle card as an image of my experience of emptiness. The figure seems to be suspended between the physical world of nature and the god-like world of the devas. The Oracle names this experience Beginning Vision. What an experience to be in balance comfortably with an awareness of life arising, sustaining and passing away without trying to control it.
The oracle card representing the change I need to foster to experience emptiness is this. What a strange creature! Or is it a face of wonder? The Oracle's message from divine will regarding change is completed transformation will be felt as a quality of unlimited horizon. Being in the flow of all, instead of isolated inside my sense of self, would feel a true revelation.
The last oracle card of this reading shows my resolution about this intention for the year. The image of the spiraling shell or horn that reaches into a blue that might be the void, but also might be another reality or another planet is like something trying to trick me into knowing what reality is. And this is the deepest teaching of all. That life cannot ultimately be directed or controlled, but only experienced in each present moment.
