Will Your Divine Serpent Rise On the Year of The Snake?

We are just beginning the Year of the Water Snake in the Chinese zodiac, and this also happens to be the first year of rebirth for humanity. What does this mean within the context of the Divine Feminine regaining power and Mother Earth shifting to a higher dimension?

Things have been and will remain a bit sleepy, slow, and somewhat difficult, especially between the Winter Solstice and springtime, because we are like newborns, gently waking up and integrating where we came from and where and how we’ve chosen to continue our journey on the planet. We all know that newborns sleep most of the day and take their sweet time before they start making sense of sounds, shapes, colors, and external stimuli.

I observed my daughter remain in a meditative slumber for months after birth, very slowly letting the world in and allowing new sensations to break through the peaceful energy bubble that wrapped her and provided a buffer against the world. Similarly, depending on our individual level of awareness, we are now gradually awakening, allowing, and recognizing the influxes of subtle energy and light that are helping us to remain in the physical body while we shift dimensions.

For many, however, this may feel like low energy and depression, and also create physical issues and illnesses. So instead of experiencing that we are being reborn, some of us may feel like we’re falling apart, or that our relationships are falling apart, or that our financial and security supports are falling apart, and so on. Our systems are being recalibrated and re-wired, so to speak, and we need to give ourselves permission to simply be where we’re at and take care of ourselves—on the physical, emotional, and spiritual levels—as much and as best as possible. It is imperative to choose love over fear right now!

Time to Shed Our Old Skin of Attachments and Fears

The snake or serpent has been a powerful symbol and totem in many cultures throughout history. It represents rebirth, awareness, healing, cycles, protection, transformation, hidden knowledge, intuition, and wisdom, as well as evil power and chaos from the underworld. It is no coincidence that this year is a snake year! It bears the potential for transformation, rebirth, and healing on many levels, as well as the surfacing of both the individual and the collective subconscious (our emotional underworld).

In the Hindu traditions, the snake represents the Kundalini Shakti, which is the divine creative energy manifesting in physical form. Once it has shaped all tissues, organs and systems in the body, it goes dormant at the base of the spine. When it awakens, through intense spiritual practices, deep devotion or the grace of a liberated teacher, it begins to move upward, clearing and opening the main chakras to bestow enlightenment once it reaches the Sahasrara (crown) chakra.

So on the way down, Kundalini creates and connects the individual soul to the physical, earthbound body and on the way up, it purifies our mental, emotional, and physical aspects to give us access to higher consciousness. This energy, as well as the energetic heart (the soul’s abode) have been increasingly stimulated for the past couple years and will continue to be in the coming years. It is important to note that the activation of the Kundalini marks only the beginning of a spiritual awakening, and that its ascension requires commitment, effort, and self-discipline. All aspects of the ego-mind have to be recognized and shed as this divine serpent slowly brings us to the realization of the Self.

In the West, both the Caduceus of Hermes (or Mercury, the messenger of the Gods) and the Rod of Asclepius (the Greek God of medicine) bear serpents as symbols of healing, rejuvenation, life, death, and duality. The snake sheds its skin and leaves it behind, reminding us that we need to go through different cycles of life, death, regeneration, and awareness, leaving the past behind in order to move forward. This is true in terms of our many incarnations, life phases, and stages of self-growth, as we shed what prevents us from shifting our consciousness and perception.

Integrating the Feminine and Masculine Within

Some esoteric traditions state that a hybrid race was formed on Earth to end the war between two original races: the Humans, who were the feminine light bearers, and the Reptilians, who were masculine, patriarchal, and dark in nature, and who eventually took control of the planet. No wonder why the snake is one of the oldest and most widespread mythological symbols! In Greek mythology, Humans were most likely the Olympians and the Reptilians were the “earthbound” creatures, born of Gaia (the Earth) and Ouranos (Uranus), often depicted with snakes (Hydra, the Titans, the Gorgons like Medusa, etc.).

In Mesoamerican cultures, the Feathered Serpent was part of an agricultural triad: the Goddess of the Cave symbolizing motherhood, reproduction and life (Mother Earth); Tlaloc, the god of rain, lightning, and thunder (giver of life and death through water); and the feathered serpent, god of vegetation and renewal. To the Aztecs, Quetzalcóatl (which means “feathered serpent,” much like a dragon), was the son of the Lord of Duality and both the boundary maker and transgressor between the earth and the sky. He essentially contributed to the creation of Mankind.

Much of this symbolism is also reflected in the Christian book of Genesis, where the snake tempts and manipulates the first humans (Adam and Eve) to rebel against Divine Law by eating the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil, thus getting them banished from Paradise. Eating the fruit can be likened to planting the seeds of darkness, shame, and guilt in their perception, thus creating a vibrational pattern that would be reproduced and reinforced from then on.

Christians call this the original sin, which it truly is, if you see it as the loss of innocence and disconnection that going against our own divine nature entails. In the oldest story ever written, the Epic of Gilgamesh, Gilgamesh loses the power of immortality because it is stolen by a snake. We definitely lost the awareness of our divine nature when our innocence was compromised. We fell from the state of bliss and innocence that the Garden of Eden represents, into one of oblivion and disconnection, and in doing so we gave our inner divine power away.

In other words, we fell from our original 5th dimension into the 3rd dimensional density we are now so familiar with. We dropped our vibration from the upper chakras down to the first three and got trapped in the illusion of life being about survival, sexual gratification, and material power. In other words, we betrayed ourselves and our purpose on Mother Earth. This is why guilt is so prevalent in all cultures—it’s an ingrained memory that gets continuously reinforced to keep us in the same type of reality.

We can be easily manipulated through guilt and shame into believing and doing things that don’t ring true, don’t feel right, or don’t make sense to us. Look around and you will notice how guilt is the prevalent “currency” in relationships. It is pernicious because it’s subtle and invisible and so culturally prevalent. Our behaviors are molded with shame, and our whole self-perception is imbued with judgments of being “bad” and undeserving.

If we follow the external, patriarchal social and cultural guidelines, we’re okay; but if we follow our inner, feminine voice and set out to discover the truth in ourselves and regain what is rightfully ours, we are bad. In truth, integrating the masculine and feminine within means letting the Divine Feminine rule over the masculine mind and start thinking with the heart. Why? Because the Self, with its feminine intuition and creative potential, should be the master while the ego-mind should be the servant, and not the other way around, as it has been for thousands of years.

The Time for Compassion and Forgiveness Is Now

In the dysfunctional world we live in, growing up means accepting guilt and giving our childhood innocence up; taking responsibility is about obligations toward others, never about understanding who we are; love is only about relationships, and power only about externals—money, possessions, success, and so on. The journey toward regaining our innocence, freedom, and inner power, which constitute the happiness we seek outside, is a lonely one because it is an internal path of self-love, and that makes us feel selfish!

This is why I call the journey of self-exploration our Sacred Selfishness. In the masculine world of externals, appearances, and illusions, the path of love seems selfish if it is not directed outwardly; yet we have to look within to understand and access our divine nature, which is the ultimate goal of all human life. Self-knowledge becomes a sacred quest toward the integration of everything that makes us the original light bearer Hu-mans: God in wo/man form.

The truth about the rebellion that took place on the planet will probably come to light in the coming years. Each of the ancient cultures of the world have told a version of this story in their own way, through their scriptures, symbols, and cosmology, and we can begin to put all the pieces of the puzzle together by allowing our intuitive feminine to decipher their symbolism in our own terms, not those of the religious powers-that-be that have veiled the truth for thousands of years.

It is necessary to recognize the old patterns within ourselves if we want to create new paradigms and see any change in the world. We have to rewrite our story to create the New Earth with compassion, forgiveness, and love toward ourselves and others. We all have been and are in this together, so there should be no judgment: each of us has at some point been the sinner and the saint, the powerful and the powerless, the judge and the scapegoat. It is time to heal our wounds and rebuild our home and sense of belonging on Earth with the knowledge and understanding of our past, and the willingness to leave behind what does not bring us more life.

Likewise, it is also time to begin putting all the pieces of your life story together and to understand how your soul is continuously trying to communicate the truth of who you are and what you are here to do, through its symbolic language. If you focus on the material, tangible (i.e., scientific, patriarchal, masculine) world of the senses, you will most likely miss the messages that are meant only for you. Yet if you turn around and look within, you will find all the answers and you will begin to remember who you really are and, like the snake, begin to shed what no longer serves you.

Are you ready to rewrite your life story from your soul’s perspective, put your new puzzle together, and create clarity of purpose out of the fuzzy picture you’ve been living in until now? Then contact me to get started with intuitive spiritual counseling, and make this the beginning of the life filled with love, awareness, and meaning that you truly desire!

© 2013 Yol Swan. All rights reserved.

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