A Consciousness Container

Traditional Andean culture was rapidly fading during my study with Don Manuel. Young people were moving to the cities and Anglos would likely invade remote Quechua villages when the government built roads to increase tourism.  Of course, Don Manuel was aware of the dangers. Like the Tibetan lamas, Don Manuel wanted to preserve his teaching by training an Anglo who would introduce the traditions of Q’eros Shamans to the West. I was selected by Don Manuel who, in dream-time, gradually informed me of my new responsibilities.

The Q’eros region, a very remote area high in the granite mountains of Southern Peru had extremes of weather and was suffering long term drought. It had yet to be mapped and was free of roads, electricity and phone service during my travels there. Q’eros had a unique consciousness which nurtured and held me in a gentle, yet firmly supportive embrace. Its high vibrational ceremonial quality encouraged the spiritual practices of villagers and their priests.  

Traveling in remote Q’eros was not unlike Alexandra David-Neel’s descriptions of visiting remote areas of traditional Tibet in the 1920s. The similarities led to Tibetan lamas visiting the Q’eros priests early in the 1990s, a meeting arranged by another of my teachers, the anthropologist and Andean Shaman, Juan Nunez Del Prado.

Back home in California, I needed to create an equivalent of Q’eros energy when my training with Don Manuel had concluded. I selected a remote spot in an area of scrub and forest free of overhead electric wires and cell phone towers. It is north of San Francisco on a ridge above an ocean beach. Here I began weekly visits to create a highly refined energy for ceremony. It would need to be vibrationally higher and more intense than the land was naturally, with more sparkle and glow. I was cautious at first not wanting to impose myself. At each step in this process, I would wait for the land and a nearby water spirit to signal their approval.

My process was simple. Greet the land. Wait for a response. Mirror back its response. As the land became more responsive, I would mirror back its response now with added energy from the beach and ocean. Then I noticed that this newly emerging energy was being held within an area formed by the ocean beach, the nearby creek, and surrounding ridges. As weeks turned into months, I continued to mirror the land and slowly raise the vibration of the energy I mirrored back. This back and forth continued until I had raised the energy to a high-level awareness, held within the land. I now had a supportive and relational arena for my healing ceremonies.

Each week when I arrived at this venue, I was greeted and welcomed. This remote spot with its natural boundaries was holding a unique consciousness, what I came to call a consciousness container, which was noticeably different from the larger ridge line. I would renew it weekly.

Now this consciousness container has become self-sustaining and independent of me! It is relational and supportive with a unique and independent character. Its qualities remind me of Peruvian cloud forests on days when the container is enveloped in coastal fog. Always, I am ‘seen,’ witnessed and held in its rejuvenating embrace, its kisses and hugs.

Recently, a forest fire decimated the area just outside the container. The larger area was closed off for months because of fire and intense smoke. When I was finally able to return, the consciousness container was hidden and unavailable. But three weeks later, it had revived itself. Lately, the container has been stressed by drought. But now we have had a return of seasonal rains and consciousness inside the container is more relaxed, a reminder that this container is land based.