West’s sacred medicine: Going with the flow

Each of the four cardinal directions (and the fifth direction, Spirit, if you honor it) teaches us lessons about life and spirituality. I create tools to invoke and honor the four directions so that you can work magically with their medicine. The season of autumn brings us to the direction of West on the Wheel of the Year. West is where we encounter the element of water, and the setting sun. West brings us to the ocean, our vast and luminous seascape where we can surrender all, and where all flows to us effortlessly.

One of the most profound teachers in my life focused much of her work with me on this concept of effortlessness, of letting it all happen in perfect time. What does the word effortless suggest to you? Many of us in Western culture have been taught to fight for what we have and get, and we buy into dogma that without “hard work” we don’t deserve what we receive. West reminds us that is not so. Sometimes the harder we “work” for something, the more it eludes our grasp. What if – what if – all that was meant for you was already on its way to you now, flowing to you as if adrift on wild waves, headed unequivocally in your singular direction? What if by working hard, you might mess up the flow, disturb the groove of what is yours?

It’s a radical thought, isn’t it? But truly, the most spiritual people I know don’t spend their days hustling and trying to make it happen. They do work hard, and they do focus and set intentions, but they also sit way back and ALLOW what is coming to them, trusting in a benevolent and wise universe that is always divinely conspiring on their behalf. They let the river do what it does best: Flow to the point of least resistance. They don’t push rivers. They know you can’t.

I believe that trying to push upstream is the root of illness, sadness, and despair. I believe that allowing the flow is one of the greatest of our life lessons. Are you learning it now?

The ritual tools for West will be beautiful and sacred reminders to you that you belong in the flow, that your emotions are safe and valid, and that your life is unfolding effortlessly in accordance with perfect time. Create a West altar that is dedicated to this work and when you sit before that altar, remind yourself to relax and soften into what is. Flow to the point of least resistance. The old saying “Go with the flow” is no joke. Tell yourself, remind yourself, to do just that every day. Repeat this mantra in a daily meditation with the West tools: “I allow my path to unfold, I trust in perfect timing, and I surrender to the divine flow of life and energy. All I need is already on its way. Everything I desire flows effortlessly toward me. So it is.”

Aho as you move like the water within you that is moved by the moon above you that flows to the seas around you.