Mindful š„Fire Magick
How to Boost Confidence, Feel "Enough", and Get Motivated with Core Chakra Fire Magick
Storytime
The story Iām about to tell you is 100% true.
I still canāt completely believe that it actually happened.
But it did.
And it illustrates the MAGICKAL power of FIRE.
In 2009, I went through a month-long elder initiation process with West African Shaman Malidoma SomƩ. At the time, I was the youngest person ever invited by the Dagara tribe to be initiated as an elder.
The initiation started on my 36th birthday.
Malidoma told us that we wouldnāt understand most of what we experienced in the rituals, and that he couldnāt explain to us the results we would experience. He promised that they would be significant, life changing, and that we should buckle our seatbelts because we were in for a wild ride.
This took place on sacred land in the Berkshire Mountains of New York, and we were entirely cut off from civilization for the entire month.
The last day of the rites, the day before our Homecoming Celebration when we shaved our heads and presented ourselves back to society as initiated elders, we were deep in the butchering process of preparing the food for the Homecoming.
While butchering, my knife slipped and sliced my left thumb webbing.
I was lucky, by the time the knife hit my thumb webbing, it was just the tip of the knife that cut me. The slice went through the skin webbing, but something had stopped it from cutting deeper into tendons or nerves. Given the force I had put on the knife at the time, if the center of the blade had hit my thumb, I might have cut my thumb right off.
It was a clean slice, but also nothing to sneeze at. It was a significant cut. Deep enough to probably need stitches.
But we were still in ritual space, and couldnāt be touched by anyone outside the sacred circle until after we had bathed in fresh rain.
Yup, I know. Weird, right?
Thatās what I mean, I still canāt believe this happenedā¦but so many things surrounding my six years study with Malidoma were completely unbelievable.
I showed my injury to Malidoma and he laughed.
āPut sacred ash on it,ā he said, dismissively, almost as if I should know this already.
Peggy, one of the mentor elders (who had gone through initiation 3 years prior) took me by the hand and led me to the ancestor house, where the sacred ash was kept.
Every morning, for the duration of the whole month, I would go into the ancestor house with Peggy. Iād strip naked as she would bathe me in sacred ash. We werenāt allowed to bathe in water. Just these morning ash baths.
The time in the ancestor house with Peggy was intimate, tender, and deeply sacred. The ash was a light grey, almost silver. It was a fine dust that I remember felt as soft as silk as she gently spilled and rubbed it all over my entire body. She prayed over me with intentions of the ash to keep me pure, cleanse me of toxins, and offer me protection.
This time was different.
Instead of stripping naked, I peeled the cloth wrapping off my wound.
The bleeding had stopped.
āDo you think this will really work?ā I asked, a bit terrified.
āI donāt see why not,ā she said as she picked up a gourd filled with ash and sifted it over my wound.
Once my whole hand was completely covered in ash, she dunked both her hands in the gourd and used the ash to *wash* her hands. Then she grabbed my hand in hers. Wrapping her palms around my thumb webbing, she prayed. I donāt remember what she said, but I remember how it made me feel.
It made me feel special.
Like I mattered.
I felt a heat in my belly, like the warm embers of a fire.
And that heat made me feel strong, confident, andā¦wellā¦empowered.
I felt Peggyās words penetrate my being and activate something deep inside me.
A š„FIRE.
She told me to hold my wound in my other hand for at least an hour.
So I sat down and held my own hand for well over an hour.
About and hour and a half later, she found me and asked to look at the wound. By then most of the ash had either dusted itself off my hands or absorbed into my skin.
I released my grip on my wound.
We both looked at it in utter amazement.
We couldnāt speak, we just looked at the wound, and then at each other, and back at the wound.
Except it wasnāt a wound anymore.
It was healed.
Something beyond the thumb webbing healed in me that day.
I somehow knew that the prayers Peggy offered while holding my hand were more than just to heal the cut tissues. Her prayers, and the sacred ash, and the power of the fire that created the sacred ash ignited something in me, an empowerment I had never felt before in my life.
I knew at that moment, despite being only 36 years old, I was truly an ELDER.
My sense of self-confidence and self-worth improved instantly, and forever from that point forward.
It was true MAGICK.
Lesson
Fire is a vital part of everyday life.
š„ We use it to cook our food.
š„ We use it to warm our bodies.
š„ We use it to provide light in the dark.
š„ We use it to communicate (smoke signals).
In fact, fire is so vital to life that every ātrapped on a deserted islandā movie or show depicts the starting and tending the fire as necessary for survival.
Sadly, fire is something we take for granted, unless we find ourselves in a survivalist situation. Nowadays it seems the only time we really relate to the necessity of fire is when the power goes out and we search the house for matches and candles.
Mind-less Fire Magick
Many people use fire as magick without even knowing it. For example, every time someone lights a cigarette, they are activating fire magick. More often than not, the first deep drag of a cigarette (which is also a deep breath) is a jolt of energy, a burst of endurance, that gives the smoker a push to keep going. (this kinda explains why so many over-worked nurses are also heavy smokers).
Every time you express anger you are activating an internal fire in yourself and turning on a bit of fire magick in your soul. I always say āanger isnāt a bad thing because anger means action.ā I just watched this on a documentary called Trees and Other Entanglements. A bonsai master, Ryan Neil, in Oregon came home one night to his entire home and garden vandalized and destroyed by a woman who was evidently very angry with him (and likely suffering some sort of mental illness psychotic break). Her anger created a massive destruction.
The next day, as he walked through the destruction, he spoke of the resiliency of nature, and the power of his trees to survive despite the worst experiences. As he fed a giant fire with the dying woods of the destruction, he spoke of his own resolve to persevere and how this destruction will create something new in him. It was the fire of that destruction that caused a spark in him to take his work to levels he hadnāt considered before.
Her mind-less anger/fire produced a massive mind-ful action/change for him.
Fire is Spirit.
When Ryan Neil lit that bonfire, he may or may not have realized he created his own spiritual healing ritual for himself. (Given that he apprenticed for six years with a Japanese Bonsai Master, I suspect he was spiritually aware of his actions.)
Fire, in all its forms, as flame, ash, smoke, (and yes, even rage) has been used as part of spiritual rites and rituals since the beginning of time. When you work with fire as part of sacred rites and rituals, it activates something in you that is profoundly magickalā¦just like the healing of my thumb webbing.
Every spiritual tradition on the planet works with fire as a way to connect with Spirit. š„ We light a candle to honor the ancestors when we enter a church.
š„ We light candles on the Advent Wreath or Menorah.
š„ We burn incense, sage bundles, or braided lemon grass to cleanse a space.
š„ We hold burning bowl ceremonies to let go of what no longer serves us.
When you are MINDFUL with FIRE, it provides the greatest healing.
Fire is the element of your CORE CHAKRA which lives at the center of your belly.
The core chakra is where your digestive organs reside, and is about your ability to take in the outside world and assimilate it into your body as fuel. The digestive organs, juices, and enzymes are fire-like in the ability to burn and break down food into fuel and resources for the body.
In essence, the fire of your Core Chakra is about
Motivation/Endurance
Confidence
Transformation
Hope/Inspiration
Cleansing/Healing
Fortunately, you donāt need to bathe yourself in sacred ash every day to access the Mindful Magick of Fire. Rather, being mindful of fire, and using it with intention on a daily basis actually has a stronger power than the deep shamanic rituals I have experienced.
Daily Mindful Fire Magick
The human brain and nervous system responds best to simple every day actions that you do consistently and regularly over time to create habits. When you create a mindful habit, it becomes a norm, and the norm produces long-term results and change your world in the ways you intend for the better.
**side-note - I highly recommend Charles Duhiggās book The Power of Habit as a great reference to the science of habit.
Personalized Support
If you are experiencing imposter syndrome, a lack of motivation, low energy, or the opposite too much anger or rage, I can help you figure out simple mindfulness exercises you can do to balance your root chakra and balance your fire in your system. Send me a message with the details of your fire challenges, and Iāll personally write you back with an action plan for coaching.
Homework/Practice
5 ways to Access the Mindful Magick of š„Fire in Your Every Day Life
Below the paywall I offer a number of simple ways (including short 2min demo videos) to mindfully work with fire and your core chakra internal fire in your every day life that can help you with motivation, confidence, transformation, hope, and cleansing. This