Shaman's Fast 2012- Part One

Shaman's Fast 2012- Part One
(c)TuesdayMayThomas

I fast once a year and have been doing so since 1999. The Fall is always such a powerful time for me to settle within and find stillness amongst the changing of the leaves and coolness that beckons in the air. In the early years of fasting, when I lived in New York, I did so amongst a six-day workweek. I still found time to be still, pray, meditate and simply ‘be’ with what ever came up, mind and body. The Master Cleanse is the means by which I usually undertake my fasts. Over the first eleven years, I started with fasting for three days, the next year I did five days and continued up to ten days, expanding the length of time in alignment with what felt correct for my body.

The past three years have been very different, they have signified a specific calling within and the universe has requested I undertake to fast for longer periods of time. 2010 called on a twenty-one day fast. 2011 guided a thirty-day fast & 2012 is asking a forty day fast. I understand this to be an initiation of sorts that serves not only to strengthen inner discipline, will, commitment and focus, but serves as an opportunity to expand my capacities to channel finer frequencies of love and light. Personally, I feel my soul purpose is to share my life’s experiences with the world through written word, song and story. As a writer and author of spiritual transformation and multidimensional meanderings, I can’t help but connect this longer phased ‘fasting guidance’ with the upcoming alignment of planets in our solar system and the said ‘shifts’ that will continue to occur during this time and space we all share here on this planet and cosmos.

To channel divine downloads of information is a precious gift we all have the capacity to share. We can sharpen intuition, balance our sensitivity and fiercely strengthen the ability to face addictions (be them mental, physical or emotional) and overturn them for good over time. We can redefine our relationships with substances, people, places and things and learn to be a Master of our Time and Space. Fasting is one of many routes to assist this paradigm of becoming ONE with all that surrounds.

The guidelines downloaded from my Higher Self for this year’s fast are; Begin the fast with the Master Cleanse for seven to ten days, and then slowly include clean foods such as following a simple macrobiotic diet.

So for the next forty days, this means No Wine- Oh and I just discovered I love 'Garnacha'- a yummy smooth Spanish red wine that gives my usual love of 'Shiraz' a run for its money! No Tobacco- I occasionally smoke what I call ‘sagerettes’. A sagerette is a mixture of organic tobacco with sage that are mixed and rolled in a cigarette paper with a cotton filter. No Caffeine- Arghh! I love my morning cuppa- coffee- and the occasional Iced Vanilla Soy Latte! And- No Junk Foods-Now this is generally no big deal as I’ve been a vegetarian for over 25 years and have what would be considered a ‘healthy diet’- but my ‘healthy diet’ usually goes out the window when my monthly cycle comes along ... Oh Yeah, I like to let myself eat pretty much anything for a couple days in a row including cheetos, french fries with thousand island dressing, chocolate cake and , well anything chocolate and red wine!  Alas I will skirt through my macrobiotic recipes to find an alternative to my monthly sweet treat cravings..

Ok, so all this said, I am on day 2 of my fast and want to share with you my morning meditation. I light a candle and sit with a picture of Yogananda, my drum, and a selection of crystals that ask to come along for the journey.  I sit silently for some time, focusing on my breath and using it as a tool to draw light into the Sushumna, Ida, Pingala and up to my Pineal Gland. Next my cells begin to breathe and I feel an expansion of light from these central channels expand and absorb into each cell in my body, through each organ, muscle, bone, tissue- to my brain , every part of my internal being is breathing light in and out.

I am next guided to begin drumming.  Sitting with eyes closed I begin to drum softly and after several minutes, begin to travel down the kitchen sink pipe-lines as a means to enter the inner worlds. Upon my entrance, I am greeted by my family of animal totems. We sit for some time in meditation amongst a beautiful lush-green area next to a lake. I then notice my Puma totem sitting next to a cave entrance to my right as if to signal I am to partake in a journey through the cave. When you journey through the inner worlds, ask for the accompaniment of one of your animal totems to travel with you- always. He sits and awaits my readiness and we both begin to walk into the dark cave. I am suddenly holding a rattle of invisible/clear leather that contains many shards of quarts crystal and sacred beans. I shake the rattle as we walk and our path is made lit by the shining light of the crystals as they dance in my rattle. I feel the cool muddy earth beneath my bare feet and it squelches between my toes as we walk.

After turning and meandering along this cave’s curves, I hear a drum beat. In the third dimension I am still drumming as I sit in meditation, but notice there is a distinction between the two. The beat I hear in the cave is harder- and there seem to be multiple drums in the distance. I walk with my puma and we calmly enter a cul-de-sac where six tribe’s people are drumming and awaiting my arrival.  I stand at the entrance to this space and look at my puma. He sits calmly and it serves as a signal no danger lies here. I enter the space and continue shaking my rattle. The tribe’s people next take me into the center of the circle and begin to drum harder. The Tribe’s Leader takes a handful of porcupine quills and proceeds to enter them through various areas of my body by piercing my skin. There is no pain, only an elated sense of communion with these beings and this ceremony. After all the quills are in place through my skin, a dancing ritual begins and we all circle and pound our feet to the earth for some time while dancing in reverence for this ceremony we participate in together.

The drumming then ceases and the Tribe Leader repeats a prayer over and over in a language I do not recognize. I look to my puma and he is now laying down in a relaxed fashion at the entrance to this mini cave cul-de-sac. The Leader guides me to lye down upon a slim straw bed and proceeds to crack and break each quill while they remain inside of me, this leaves shards of quills inside of my body. For example, one quill was pierced through the palm of my hand and he broke each side off, leaving a piece inside my palm. He next rubs a healing salve upon my wounds, and I feel no pain in this inner world of worlds. The tribe members next wrap me in a dark linen type of cloth like a mummy, and telepathically tell me to rest there for three days. Puma comes and lets me know he will stay with me the entirety of the time.

I am still drumming in the third dimension and feel pulled to make a way back to my living room and allow this journey to be complete for today.  My spirit floats back out through the cave’s tunnels and into the lush green landscape I once arrived and I next travel up through the kitchen sink pipes and into my body where I sit and continue to drum for a while until it feels natural to stop.

Yesterday, day one of the fast brought with it some lower back awareness. Not pain as such, but a weakness of sorts while I taught Yoga. I consider it the breaking down of the old patterns kept there, and the freeing of space for greater love and light to channel through this vehicle. I receive it. As years go by, the initial shifts and changes brought about by fasting can truly quicken and launch us into a new terrain of understanding, expanded consciousness, alignment with our destiny, energetic expansion, enlightenment, and sweet joy, as we welcome the awakening of wisdom innately embroidered through our D.N.A. (c)TuesdayMayThomas

With great respect I have asked in Spirit if the above photo may be included in this journal 

and am grateful the presence of this Tribe Leader.

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(c)TuesdayMayThomas