life, it's full of ups and downs
~ spring clean ~
episode 04
These mountains that you are carrying, you were only supposed to climb– Najwa Zebian
"You've got to come see this" resonated from loudspeaker as my wife called to tell of a bird as big as our son in the field between the cemetery and windmill. Moments earlier a flurry of ideas were moving through mind as I considered what to do with this rare free afternoon. Naturally I dropped what I was doing, heeded the call and flew up the road to see it with my own eyes.
There patiently awaiting my arrival stood a vulture, standing around three foot tall. I slowly moved towards it, within a matter of minutes mesmerised, sitting solely six feet away. Mentally moving into its energy, I recalled vultures contentedly circling the air, diving down to dine on death and decay. Scavengers who are more than pleased to clean up the diseased. I stared deeply into its eyes, my material world gaze became more a haze as I shifted to spirit.
I could see a lady by a fire surrounded with smooth stones. She mindfully moved around, delicately fanning its flames with vulture's wings, sending smoke high into the sky. Her warm and graceful gestures of gratitude guided home from earth to ether.
I called a biologist friend, he came, soon citing scientific studies of strong stomachs. Vultures top the table, highly acidic, capable of digesting dangerous levels of toxicity. Its weight meant it needed to wait for warm air to rise into the skies.
I ventured home to deepen my connection with vulture. Moving out from the birth canal to flowing and glowing Earth energy, mistress of magnificent magnetism, greatly grounding and relieving scarcity believing. I sensed its effortless ease with the gravity of life, restfully riding rings around rising warm air. My left eye circled in socket whilst seeing cylinders of light, a channel between earth and sky. I moved into space, my temperature falling as I was withdrawing, I became a star, a celestial being, terrestrial Earth overseeing.
How might this be interpreted?
Our Stomachs synonymous with Earth, our mother, who bares her breast, nurtures our needs, satisfies our summons. But later in life, many of us eat fast to live vast, forever fuelling fantasies. Acid levels ascend and stress soars as we seek to complete too many feats. Our Fire, burned out by endless desire.
Smooth stone surround, symbolic of Earth and boundaries, taming the flaming, perfecting the directing of Fire. Kept alive and revived by Air from wafting wings, igniting the old that we withhold, helping to digest what we've repressed. Air suggestive of mind, releasing of thoughts that go round and round in our head and moving to manifest meaningfully motivated and manageable missions.
Eye circling in its socket also reflective of Air, Vulture vision, excellent eyesight from elevated height. Frequently flying higher than fellow feathered friends, spotting dead prey in decay from more than four miles away.
Celestial being, a star from afar. Moving from Earth to Ether, weight to weightlessness, friction to frictionless and science not fiction that humans are made of stardust.
Birth canal and cylinders of light. We set course from source, destination Earth, slip into our skin suit as we shoot down the chute, surfacing from the sacred Water of the womb. Some struggle to climatise and embrace the gravity of this place. Others become stuck, unable to see up, forgetting the ease of floating on the breeze, why we've come and the clean up that needs to be done. When our journey on Earth comes to a end, the tunnel of light signals our time to ascend.
Dear friend, just as suffering can create awakening, magnetising toxic people and situation can lead to purification. Perhaps Vulture teaches us when to dive down to satisfy spiritual appetite and when to take flight for respite.
These are my own insights, but a great beauty of life is that of perspective, so how might others respond to the spirit of Vulture, unbeknownst to this being the spirit they are receiving. How might they perceive it through their six senses. How might life shift and change before, during and after the Session. And when we vertically align, what weight do we choose to dislocate and what might ensue from this new point of view.
6 willing participants, stretched out across the globe press play on a playlist as they are connected from afar with the spirit of Vulture. 30 minutes later they tell their tales, 3 days later they share the aftermath. Here are their stories, their perspective shared.
* some participant names have been changed for pen names.
* no participants were informed that it was Vulture we were working with until after they had all shared their experience of the Session.
* no participants were informed that it was Vulture we were working with until after they had all shared their experience of the Session.
Edyta
Before the Session
The sky often came before my eyes. I received lessons about light. I also experienced how floating with the light allowed me to sustain the energy of
life in any moment, and how tension created stagnation and drama.
On the day of the session I felt urge to clean. I spend the day in the garden removing weeds, I moved furniture to vacuum, I swept the floors. Creating space for light felt important.
During the Session
My experience was a lot about flying.
I felt the hunger for the sky. To the point I had to open the window in the roof above my head and despite the coldness feel the fresh air.
My wish was granted. I was flying. Spacious sky, clouds, tips of the mountains, light and shade coming down from the sky and I was passing through their warmth and cold, experiencing the space with no reason or goal. Just passing through it. Just being in the air.
I felt there is the urge to see from above. To grasp the meta plan. To see all from the plane that allows to connect all the dots: the moments of pain, death and birth, war, love, happiness and make sense of them. And at the same time knew, that it’s useless. There is no need. The point is to be and feel the air on the skin, rather that to understand with the mind. The mind in the experience of flying is obsolete. Flying is intuitive.
At the beginning of the session I felt constrained and agitated. I felt the need to create boundaries, to separate myself from the energy of the others. The softness and gratitude came. I felt moved. I opened and understood the gift of being fluid and flexible. Of passing through. The deep relaxation came with it. I allowed the lesson of not knowing, of gracefully flying through the life to sink into my heart.
After the Session
When I learned the animal of the session was a Vulture I was touched. I just got back from traveling in Costa Rica. Vultures were birds I saw so often there, and from so close; I observed them on the beach eating a dead turtle, drinking dirty water from the puddle on the local bus stop, flying above the palms.
This bird touches what is the lowest and seems so repulsive. The same bird took me - during the session with Andy - on its wings to the highest place, to the light.
Maike
Before the Session
The beginning of something beautiful was a sentence that kept appearing in my mind the days and weeks before the session. it felt like there was a widening, an opening happening.
and it wasn’t comfortable to say the least. there were days where i was questioning everything, my whole life, my work, all i do. i felt a deep emptiness inside myself. death was very present. in thoughts and also in physical life. and then one of these days it felt like i hit rock bottom big time. i felt destroyed. a big topic raised to the surface…abuse…it hasn’t been at all in my consciousness until this moment. i had heavy releases from my physical body. especially around my clavicles and jaw. there was so much pain. emotional and physical. many tears. it felt more then i can handle and at the same time i somehow could see the beauty of it. i could see how i abused myself so often in tiny ways, where i ignored the signals of my body, where i put everyone else needs before my own. i could see that i carry an imprint of abuse in my cells from my lineage. i could see that it was related to karma i was carrying. it felt like so much weight on my shoulders. it wasn’t just about myself. i could feel the connection to the collective. like dots connecting faster and faster. like a warm dark stream leaving the system. the word "truth" kept on coming to me. it is time to see the truth. to face the truth. to speak my truth. like the truth was coming crushing down from the sky. the divinely orchestrated events, the art of life. it was like i was being in the middle of events and at the same time outside of it. it was non dramatic, natural. beautiful and terrifying at the same time. the days just before the session i felt like being in a void, in an empty space, like someone pressed the pause button. i had the feeling of coming out of an eggshell, that surrounded me my whole life. like a shell cracking open. my body somehow moving from form to formless and from formless to form.
During the Session
As soon as i pressed play i felt an energy entering straight into the centre of my chest. there was a big crack in the back of my heart in my spine, where i did feel a lot of tension the days before. i feel restless, lots of resistance, wanting to get up. asking myself why i am doing all of this. i tell myself to relax. a voice shouting in my head telling me to run! to run as fast as i can! that there is danger. my body starts moving, i see myself running. something coming from behind, pushing me down onto the floor. holding me down from my neck. i feel angry. so angry.
Change of scenery. i am asked to open my right hand. a golden ball of golden liquid gets placed in my hand. i feel it expanding. a beautiful warm healing energy. it feels very powerful. divine. my hand starts moving in complex patterns. a masculine energy appears, putting a hand on my heart, telling me that i can relax now, that i got this, that i am safe and supported. i am asked to put my hands on my womb. lots of darkness. i want to pull my hands away, it seems too much, but i can’t. my hands are like glued to my belly. picture of African women carrying water. change of location. same women dancing, singing, praying. picture of Romanian woman sitting at a fountain. feeling of loneliness. sadness. again a lot of resistance. a voice asking me if i am ready to die. i carefully say yes. my body cramping. a dark stream of energy exiting from my heart space and my head. i see myself in the jungle, under a waterfall, playing a drum. i see other people coming. some known, some unknown. i see the connection of it all. the power we have when we remember. my fingers are still moving, i take some deep breathe. like a weight lifted from my heart. feeling very peaceful. safe. a thought in my mind: now i can finally be a woman without needing to fear. the music stops. i feel very present and very far away at the same time.
After the Session
The day after the session my body feels very open. soft. extremely sensitive and vulnerable. a feeling like an armour that was all around me broke away. i don’t really know how to navigate just yet. it is a bit like a whole new world opening up. everything is new. at the same time incredible beautiful and scary. my inner child is very present. there is a bigger sense of trust inside if me. trust in life. trust in divine timing. trust that all is as it is supposed to be. i can feel myself being more and more willing to give up control. to surrender more fully to what life has to offer, like a mixture between surrendering and giving up. no more need to fight. it is like a big fear left my system, almost like my cells look different now. like the ground underneath me is more stable.
at the same time there are many emotions rising to the surface anger, sadness and frustration. a feeling of restlessness, not knowing what to do with myself. lots of tension in my jaw and my neck. my mind racing. but somehow even though it is so intense and challenging to navigate i feel a sense of peace with all of it. like vulture whispering in my ear: let go…cause you can fly now.
Xanthe
Before the Session
When I received the message from Andy to tell us to start paying attention to any potential feelings or synchronicities, I happened to be sat outside in bright sunlight among a group of strong women having a very empowering and spiritual conversation about our children, parenting and the power of gods words and scriptures. I’m not at all religious and have been quite negative towards religion in my life because of past experiences, but I found myself really appreciating the power and depth of their faith and the vibration and connection between us all in that moment. I went onto have a couple of synchronicities later that day, one involving one of the ladies I had been relating to earlier.
I became more introspective over the next day, feeling slightly restless and a little defensive about things happening in my external world, but that feeling didn’t stay for long. It came in harshly, but disappeared quite gently.
The day before the session after suffering a hormonal migraine which is something I suffer from frequently, I had a long night of insomnia, with some anxiety and heart palpitations. The repetitive thoughts and images I had throughout the night were related to 2 specific past relationships, which I guess have left residual pain, guilt, a feeling of unease in their memories. No hard feelings, except maybe toward myself for not being fully in touch with my priorities back then. There were a few other issues that arose, worldly conflicts and individuals on the world stage. It did feel like a “dark night of the soul” in many ways. I felt clearer the next day despite the fatigue and I was able to talk openly about it all with my husband; we have considered our past relationships clear stepping stones to where we are now, with many lessons we have had to learn. I guess I’m still learning from those particular ones, or holding onto the lessons.
During the Session
I felt calm although with a heavy feeling in my stomach. There was a subtle shift in energy, at first I was seeing a very clear orange colour which later turned to deep blues. I had a swishing feeling throughout my body like I was underwater and some light tugging and pinching on my left arm. Later I felt tickles on my head and some faint whooshing sounds, but I couldn’t tell where they were coming from. I was surprised I felt so calm and relaxed, it’s not always easy for me.
After the Session
The day after the session, I felt so much better, I’d slept deeply. I had a small emotional outburst which I put down to my fatigue, but there was definitely some release in it. I kept having a sense I needed to declutter and clear away and can’t wait until I have more energy to do so. I’ve felt increasingly calm in my thoughts as the days have gone on and clearer in my mind. Thinking back now to the night of insomnia I feel more aware that I need to let go of a lot of these emotions relating to my past, silly regrets and habitual thinking. I can see now that these have perhaps been obstacles to my own healing and kinder ways of thinking, about myself, about others, my own inner voice. A need to let go, to lay the power of these emotions to rest somehow. I can see that more clearly than ever.
Wendy
Before the Session
From the moment Andy indicated that things could shift, I felt a kind of lightness, energy and cheerfulness. I felt less insecure in my contacts with others and really dared to interact with others, without worrying about how I came across. I was just okay.
It was contagious because suddenly people I hadn't spoken to for a long time came to make contact. Within a few days, my agenda was full of appointments.
Like a goose watching over her young, I felt motherly and protective of people important to me. Subjects related to fertility seemed to be a central theme. Also felt my hormones start to kick in.
During the Session
The session itself started beautifully and seemed to be a continuation of the cheerfulness I had experienced the days before. I walked across an open field and felt the warm sun on my skin. A fox asked me to follow him. I happily hopped after him.
The whole environment was so idyllic, it was as if I had entered the world of a children's book. The fox kept looking back and urging me to follow him further. Tears of happiness streamed down my cheeks. This open-mindedness that I myself had missed as a child felt so good!
The music belonging to the playlist for the session sounded like never before. I felt all the different layers and vibrations of the music throughout my body. What a wonderful session this is going to be!
In the next image everything shifted to dark. It became clear to me that I had an appointment with someone who severely injured me as a child. I felt such tremendous resistance and really blew myself up trying to resist taking another step in his direction. Physically I snorted like a bull. It wasn't fear this time, it was pure anger!
I tried to snort through this anger, putting boundaries up to the person in question. I found peace in the fact that I am an adult now, he can no longer harm me and it was time to let go of the energy that this person took in my daily life.
I stayed in the dark for a while and saw witches burned alive at the stake. In our municipality we are currently in the process of erecting a monument to the witch persecution but they all angrily yelled at me that they were just being put up as a spectacle!
Suddenly I felt snatched away by the other members of the session. They flapped their arms up and down and hurriedly shouted "push, push, push" to rise again from the dark into the light.
The last part of the session is a bit vague. It felt like I was time traveling and constantly landing in a different place in history. The people I encountered all felt misunderstood and if I really wanted to listen to them but I couldn't make sense of their words, which felt quite frustrating.
After the Session
In the days after the session, I mainly felt the need to clean up, to throw away, to add structure. Last night I got into an argument with my boyfriend and we hardly ever argue. Where I normally give in I now felt a strong need to stay true to myself regardless of the consequences. I can't pinpoint exactly what the vulture brought me, just that it was important..
Lisa
Before the Session
The days before the Session I started to feel my heart more intense. It allowed my fears to be seen. In the beginning I did not understand what that feeling was but it reminded me on something old. My Heart started to speak louder and louder to me, it made me cry from a deep place within even though there was nothing happening in my outer world that gave me reason to. I cried and wailed in a way I have never done before, it was my mind not getting what it wants, realizing it needs to work together with my soul, not against, as this causes the pain. I started to see my fears clearly, my biggest fears, realizing they were leading me through my life, covering my souls beauty. I made room for the truth. I made peace with my soul and made the decision to not let my fear guide me anymore but start to live aligned with my souls purpose and wish. As I followed the coming days before the session what my soul wanted, old patterns came up again, distracting through the outer world I forgot to be there for me first, but I got the lesson as my heart started to speak very loud, through a strong sensation. A big topic was also Detachment from every experience, good or bad, as holding on to either of them both creates a different reality in the now. Letting go of bad experiences to not let this happen again and letting go of good experiences to not expect any other experience be as good as it was. Using Earth to help grounding and releasing energy that is too much, releasing pressure, stress and tension.
During the Session
Right at the beginning of the Session I started to cry, intense but short. My hands got warmer, nearly hot and my legs were floating between sky and earth. I connected to my fears after all these days already in a peaceful and accepting way as I have gained back the control. I felt this intense feeling of letting go, being ready to integrate it and let the fears be a part of me. Mostly I felt my heart during the session, calling me to come from thinking into feeling to change the perspective on how I see life. Being connected to my inner guidance, here and now, protecting the parts of me that need protection with awareness. At the end of the Session I could see a big bird, light colored with my inner eye.
After the Session
The day after the session I cried a lot, gave myself space to crawl under my blankets and just cry. Every time I cried it made my heart feel lighter. I felt it did release emotions that have been stuck there for longer that I am here in this body. With allowing myself to let these emotions run through me as they wish I experienced more clarity in my mind and a stronger connection to myself and to people around me. Topics that came up the days after, which I feel these are coming from my ancestors to help me break the chain of old patterns: Money and Abundance. Feeling Alone and Trapped, not knowing what to do. On the other side the shift was visible for me, allowing myself to feel, release, express, communicate, connect, receive on deeper levels. The message of slowing down and Trust in the process came pretty clear. A lot clarity about myself, my actions in the past and how I want to change for the future living in alignment with my Bodymind and soul, connected to earth and sky, being present, doing what I am doing with all my Heart as this is the only thing that matters. Allowing my heart to express itself in all its colors makes me vulnerable, but whole and beautiful, nothing to hide anymore, nothing to fear. I can just be me. Truthfully and Real. Life is beautiful, and so am I.
Thank you Andy for this wonderful, releasing and cleansing experience. It helped me to truly fall in love with my light and darkness and knowing which I give the power to guide me on my path.
Eveline
Before the Session
In the days prior to the session, when I wasn't even actually enrolled in the session, I suddenly felt a lot of reactivity and triggering coming up rather unexpectedly. it felt like a big and sudden shift from a period of really nice flow in my work and life. Which is why it took me so much by surprise. There was a sudden sensitivity to triggers, showing up around self-worth in my work, but also personally, with an ex partner. And finding it a little bit challenging to navigate that because of the surprising element to it. Then, I received a message on the plant-ally telegram group, saying that there was one spot left for the Sunday session. Stating that if anyone had been feeling triggered in the last few days they were sure to know that the spot was theirs. And I knew immediately that it was my spot. So I jumped in.
During the Session
Unlike most other sessions I've done with Andy this one was a really physical experience. Initially, I just felt this blanket of dense energy falling over me, which transformed into pain spots. They were very localised spots of pain in the left ovary and in the stomach, some moving through my joints. This transformed into this heavy weighted tiredness, but not a regular physical tiredness that I experienced when I have done too much, but like tiredness in my bones and it was difficult to carry, there was a lot of weight to it. At some point during the session, I wasn't comfortable anymore, just laying flat on my back. So I decided that what my body was really asking for was a little bit of gentle movement. I did some soft gentle yoga poses just to allow the energy to flow through me a little bit. To create some resilience around being able to carry what felt like a lot of physical weight density moving through my body. That was it for the session itself, the session itself had very little visual stimulation. For me it was really very, very physical. It was very dense and very physical and very much present in my body.
After the Session
The the night of sleep after the session, I really feel like the energy was working through me quite strongly and I had a lot of circular motion of going through wake sleep cycles, not knowing whether I was in a dream state or in reality, a lot of visuals coming up. I really felt like there was a lot of toxicity being processed of imagery in form but also a nausea and restlessness in my system. It was difficult to fall into a deep sleep. I don't feel like there was a period in the night where I really fell into a deep sleep. So I woke up feeling quite
tired and and like I had a hangover the next day with a headache. The Monday after the session, I carried around this sense of hangover in my system, and I started to feel like my body was swelling up with water. I also felt quite sensitive, like I didn't have a lot of space. I felt easily frustrated. There was a lot of impatience coming up, but mainly around this discomfort of being in my own skin like discomfort of being in my own body. And the sense that I felt like a balloon, full of water and blown up and uncomfortable. And so the outer world was mirroring my inner world, it was rainy, and it was dense, and it was misty and it was water filled. This led to another restless night, very little sleep and being awake a lot. But this night was different in that through the midst of the density, there was also a soft voice saying that I didn't have to stay in the density, the density was not mine, I was allowed to just let it flow through. The voice telling me that I could trust the process, that I had an alternate reality. I had a much clearer, much freer, truer self and space that I was allowed and being welcomed to really fully inhabit. And I could sense and feel that it was really about surrendering, just letting go just not wanting to steer, not wanting to control, not wanting to push not wanting to attach, just allowing. Allowing. And so that voice also stayed and helped me navigate that second night of just allowing. So when I woke up on the Tuesday morning, still with a headache, still really in this detoxifying process, there was already more lightness. There was more of a sense of freedom and spaciousness. And as the morning sort of transitioned into the afternoon, I could sense that there was more physical and more emotional space, once again, That I could sort of breathe again. Yeah, that was my journey. So from the Tuesday transitioning into the Wednesday, I'm sort of feeling the last little remnants, the little bit of residue, of this big detoxifying process, that has moved through me. And feeling a new lightness. Feeling a new groundedness in trusting life, trusting my path, trusting my way, trusting the space that I'm welcomed to inhabit here in my body, on Earth. Bringing in sort of a new level of kindness towards myself and towards what's unfolding in my life.
Where other sessions I've been very much intune and very much aware of the connectivity with a group, I felt like this was a very solo journey for me, and I wasn't really ready to share that much during the session itself. So thank you, Andy, for this beautiful journey for this beautiful session. The vulture has really done a lot and moved through a lot of density and old toxicity for me.
Allow me a moment to summarise some things shared in this podcast. Stomach, restless, resistance, constrained, boundaries, impatient, anger, heat, karma, ancestors, old patterns, abuse, heavy releases, past relationships, density, weight, let go, death, clean up, detoxify, crying, tears, grounding, slowing down, floating, flying, relaxing, lightness, clarity, kindness and truth. This shift from disgust to delight, passing away of the dark night, as we clean up the old within, to invite new things to begin.