(Saturday, July 11, 2015) Moon: waning crescent Taurus / Tarot: ace of swords
A night of long dreams but I recall just this: Chris and his “brother” Scott (childhood friend from Chicago) are entered in a race. Before the race begins, Scott raises an ancient brass ewer and pours a large amount of lavender oil over the top of my head. I feel it slowly cascade over my face, the back of my neck, all the way down my body. Like a warm, twisting river along my spine. I breathe deeply, eyes closed, to pull in the pungent scent.
Day notes:
A week of tests at the Methodist ER and Park Nicollet Heart and Cardiovascular Center, triggered by another one of my fainting spells, ends in a clean bill of health: low blood pressure combining with a gastric reaction to the iron in my multivitamins. Doctor recommends taking vitamins in the evening and drinking coffee in the morning to raise my blood pressure! I think of my recent dream of Lou (“Health Message”) discussing his ERD disease with me. ERD: Esophageal Reflux Disease.
I do think there is also a spiritual component to these symptoms. Call me crazy. T’ai-Chi Rob thought my vertigo was a kundalini symptom. I believe the fainting could be as well. The Hindu word for it is “Murchha.” There is a popular (and information dense) website called The Biology of Kundalini that goes into this symptom in some detail. “During the peak heart expansion event (Heart Nova or Solar Heart) again the sympathetic and parasympathetic are dueling at their maximum and the dorsal vagal complex again kicks in bringing on a freeze response. But in this particular situation instead of paralysis a dive reflex occurs, essentially pulling the individual into the ground and making them lie flat. That way the heart that is already laboring at max due to the expansion doesn’t have to work at pumping against gravity to get the blood around the body.” Fainting. The day I fainted (Tuesday) two small garter snakes crossed my path on my walk at Big Rivers.
This website also says sleep paralysis “with its complete or partial atonia, most likely is the result of hyper-parasympathic activation of the DVC (dorsal vagal complex). Sleep paralysis is experienced when the individual bypasses directly to REM dream sleep with its beta-wave cortical activity. The REM sleep phenomena is associated with the inhibition of certain motor neurons; inhibition of sensory input; rapid eye movements; activation of brainstem neurons that control the movement of facial muscles; and important to the hallucinatory experiences associated with sleep paralysis, the activation of visual pathways.” Sleep paralysis is something I have experienced since childhood. Ryan Hurd of IASD has written books on this subject. A gateway to lucidity.
Lavender is purple, the color of the crown chakra. Lavender oil is one of the “Twelve Holy Attars” (from Persia, Arabia, Israel, Egypt, the Far East). In my past-life regression at the A.R.E. I went back to ancient Persia, where I was a Zoroastrian priest.
From Wiki: “The holy anointing oil formed an integral part of the ordination of the Hebrew priesthood and the High Priest as well as in the consecration of the articles of the Tabernacle (Exodus 30:26) and subsequent temples in Jerusalem. The primary purpose of anointing with the holy anointing oil was to cause the anointed persons or objects to become qodesh, or ‘most holy’ (Exodus 30:29).”
I bought a new box of Mrs. Meyers lavender dryer sheets this week.
