A Passage into Sacred Presence
Initiation is no accident and I was clearly being primed.
The changing light was splattering brilliant colors across the monumental landscape. I was driving over several mountain passes from Evergreen to Crestone and along side the Collegiate Peaks forming part of the Continental Divide. Stress always melts away at the summit of Poncha Pass into the San Luis Valley as the Sange de Cristo, ‘Blood of Christ’ Mountains spread across 100 miles of high plains valley. I was anticipating a long stay in Crestone with my daughter, granddaughter and dear friends near by.
After much business travel as a Leadership Coach and Trainer, I was needing the deep rest and restoration that comes from being at the small off-the-grid eco nest retreat home I had designed on sustainability principles. I was ready to enjoy the stunning views from the high valley floor and the freedom from city noise. The absence of light pollution allows viewing limitless stars, the deep silence encourages the coyotes to ‘talk’ in the night in this vast open space.
Towering above the sleepy little town of Crestone, are snow-capped fourteeners to the east, including Kit Carson, Crestone Peak and Needle. To the south, is Mount Blanca, also called Tsisnaasjini’ or Dawn Mountain, the fourth-highest peak of the Rocky Mountain Range. She is honored as the eastern peak of the four sacred mountains that mark the borders of the ancient sacred lands of the Hopi people. I love to watch the light and weather change her look from my southern living room windows. People come to this area for both outdoor adventures and for deep inward meditation retreats at one of the nearly thirty retreat centers in the community devoted to attaining spiritual insight.
During my drive, I was listening to music and remembering a lovely encounter with nature I had experienced three days before while doing a rather mundane thing, getting my hair cut. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw something fly past. As I looked, I realized it was a hummingbird who surely was not interested in being in a hair salon wearing magnificent, iridescent, tiny feathers! Sure enough, it smashed itself into the plate glass window attempting to get back into Colorado blue sky and just hovered there against the glass.
I paused my haircut, got a towel, and gathered the tiny bird to set him free outside. I assumed ‘he’ because of his brilliant colors. I sat with him in my lap in the yellow quaking Aspen grove outside the shop. Expecting this tiny little engineering miracle to fly as soon as freedom came, I opened the towel that was holding him. There he stayed, dazzling me, turning his little head to see me, so close, actually making eye contact with me! As if a little baby, I leaned closer and began to speak to him, “Aren’t you so beautiful, with your color and sparkle!” I noticed one of its wings was askew so I began to stroke its neck or shoulder area where the wing begins. The word ‘stroke’ in this case only means the slightest movement of my finger maybe a fraction of an inch. In response, the bird lifted its wing, straightened it out, and put it back in perfect order. I was calmly petting the neck of a wild hummingbird and we were sharing a moment of awe and wonder! He was turning his head back and forth getting a different perspective of this large being he was perched upon. I whispered to him as he continued to sit there with me, “You are Ok now, you can fly”. As if perfectly rehearsed, he ducked his head a bit and took flight up into the gorgeous, golden Aspen leaves quaking above us. The sight is printed in my memory; his ruby and turquoise brilliance shining against the bluest of Colorado skies. I was in awe on this bright, blessed day!
From Monday’s haircut to Thursday’s drive down to Crestone, I was telling anyone who would listen, about the hummingbird encounter I had experienced. Such a gift of awakening to life’s beauty and inter-relatedness I was granted by this tiny bird. Hummingbird as totem was touching me; tireless joy and the nectar of life with wings that create an internal massage, as Ted Andrews explains in his book Animal Speak, that restores health and balance reminding us to find joy and restoration in what we do. This tiny bird has the ability to move its wings in a figure eight pattern, signifying infinity, linking past and future into now; bringing awareness of cause and consequence. We are reminded to draw the nectar from life at its essence and create what may even seem impossible, from one’s own life circumstances.
I was aware, as a younger Grandmother, I was being initiated into an elder role; a wise one with life’s experience and wisdom to share, and ever more attentive to the evolving wisdom; a willingness to be fully present here and now to whatever is unfolding. It was becoming clearer to me that as we step deeper into our responsibility for our lives, meaning our ability to choose our response to life’s offerings, the more life affirms our capacity.
It was a glorious summer evening on August 14, 2008, just turning dusk as I drove due east on the “T” Road toward Crestone, the only entrance and exit from the small community. To my right, the full moon had risen over the mountains, Mt. Blanca and the Great Sand Dunes. Not knowing I was driving toward quite an initiation experience, I was in awe of the mountainous splendor unfolding before me as I drove at 60 mph toward the Sange de Cristo range, now wearing it’s alpine glow of rose-colored light.
The first time I had approached the town of Crestone to visit in 1994, I sensed a message, “You are not ready to live here yet.” I found the word ‘yet’ to be the most interesting to suggest someday I would; someday had arrived. My initiation has included the honing of my intuition. I did not read the warning well enough that evening on the road into Crestone.
The light had faded enough to make the sides of the road much darker than the western sky behind me, and visibility was waning. As if a theatrical curtain had been dropped to change scenes, suddenly before me a herd of elk was running south across the two-lane road. They were stampeding, three and four deep, covering both lanes and the sides of the road. I knew mine was the only car on the road, none behind me, none coming toward me. As a driver, the choices were very limited. Avoiding all of them was impossible. I chose only to keep the car heading straight ahead, brake as hard as I could to minimize impact. I also chose to close my eyes. I felt a surrender come over me; a surrender to the circumstances, to life, to what was to be. It was out of my hands. I simply let go.
I felt just one impact, a soft and solid sound, then all was silent, completely silent. My head was upright, back against the headrest. I opened my eyes, the windshield, in millions of crystalline pieces, was only a few inches from my face. No airbag had reacted. All was in stillness. I turned to the right, no elk, no movement, no other cars, no wind, no sound of my Prius; only the full moon hanging there in the southern sky over the Dunes and Blanca. I sensed the prayerful feeling the mountain elicits as I tried to assimilate what had just happened. I felt blessed as it dawned on me, I am still alive.
Sitting very still, I slowly scanned my body; no pain, no blood, just an odd stillness, deep calm. I became aware of one desire, find the elk I hit. In my mind I was asking, “Where is she?” I began to move and was thinking quite presently, like little commands being given to go on, “Find my sandals, put my feet in, get the door open, push the door with my feet as tiny glass shards dig into my soles and scrape the crevices of my arms, neck, chest. Get out of the car, find her.” I shook off more tiny glass pieces as I walked back to her, straight to her, despite not seeing her in the growing darkness.
As I approached her, I saw no rise in her chest, no movement in her soft belly. I knelt down next to her, with respect and awe, regret and gratitude. I stoked the thick beautiful mane of her neck and felt the warmth of her. I was in deep, loving prayer; I gave a blessing of sorts, deep thanks to just be with her, a send-off of love, an apology, forgiveness. It was a rare and blessed moment as she transitioned out of this life and I stayed on. With reverence, I was petting the neck of a wild female elk. I had often hoped for this chance, but a living, wild elk would not allow it. All at once, petting the neck of the wild hummingbird came back to me; the two once separate experiences swirled in me, time and space ceased to exist. The separations between dualities were collapsing. The illusion of separation was evident. Notions such as, “living on is good; dying in an accident is bad’ were melting into a pool of what is real now. The notions of dark, sacred night and bright, blessed day were one.
Is it silly to even try to put into words an experience that is beyond our cognitive mind, beyond individuation where “I” as identity no longer exists? When my awareness expanded to include the being-ness of a beautiful female elk with her beautiful coat, lying dead, and the vibrant, outrageously iridescent coat of a tiny hummingbird, flying so alive, my sense of only me was non-existent and being-ness was of both. I felt an awakened space that holds all that is; a space that is beyond moral dualism, right or wrong, benign or malignant, superior or inferior, nothing worth more or less, including ‘me’. An opening containing brilliant light, fluttering aliveness, and dark, heavy, still coat of death, all within the limitless space of all that is… nothing, everything. The freedom of equality is enclosed in the spirit of “Mitakuye oyasin” meaning ‘all my relations’ in Lakota. It is a prayer of oneness and harmony with all forms of life: other people, animals, birds, insects, trees and plants, even rocks, rivers, mountains and valleys.
My sense of separateness had vanished, my interrelatedness was so evident that un-knowing it was now impossible. I was initiated into all that is in this most sacred place called Crestone, my new hometown. I was literally at the edge of this space, now ready to be fully present to the gifts of wisdom being offered by all that my new community is, and as an initiate, ready to serve as loving grandmother in my community, and wisdom guide through my work as a coach and trainer. I indeed loved the wisdom pouring into my awareness, altering my reality. I am deeply grateful for this life-threatening incident that transformed into an initiation.
One aspect of my initiation was a new understanding of how my intuition speaks to me, including the appearance of wild life. Just before the elk herd was suddenly in the road before me, I had thought, ‘Gee, I have not seen any elk or deer during this whole drive.’ I now know that was my intuition alerting me to watch out, be attentive.
Elk as totem symbolizes strength, nobility, and when she came so powerfully into my life it was clearly time to find my stride and step further into my most powerful ways of contributing my gifts in service of others. The neck is a bridge area, a point of crossing over and balancing. Clearly, my intentions for living in Crestone included living aligned with my values, more on purpose and in balance. Elk also reminds us of our need for the company of the opposite sex. I had been living primarily alone for nine years at the time of my initiation and met my husband just five months later. An entire herd of elk on my path certainly suggests community and collaborative living.
It took me many moons to be ready to write about my initiation. Efforts to share the experience always felt partial, incomplete and it is still unfolding as I write. I only hope that those reading this take some useful message and use it to live more gracefully on this blessed planet of ours, knowing we are all in this together and are constantly impacting one another. Let us share the living wisdom.
The gift of my elk encounter was to touch Divinity. My identity and sense of separateness was transforming into a vast unification of life. I will always know that each of us beings is a holy spark of Divine presence in our waking lives; when we know this, all separateness ends.