Toward An Invincible Summer: More Light!

Winter Solstice, the shortest and therefore darkest day of the year, will be here soon. The light in my neck of the woods lately has been like one of those new energy-saving light bulbs: grey and dreary, weak and unnatural. I miss the hot sun so much, and try to time my runs when it's at its brightest so I can find a tree to lean against and let the revitalizing warmth shine on my face and hands.

While doing this, I recite the following prayer, as referenced in The Book of Runes (by Ralph Blum) under the rune of Sowelu -which signifies Wholeness, Life Force and The Sun's Energy. Ralph tells us, "Sowelu counsels opening yourself up, letting the light into a part of your life that has been secret, shut away. To accomplish this may call for a profound recognition, for admitting to yourself something that you have long denied."

The Gayatri Sun Prayer
"You who are the source of all power,
Whose rays illuminate the world,
Illuminate also my heart
So that it too can do your work". 

When reciting the Gayatri, visualize the sun's rays streaming forth into the world, entering your heart, then streaming out from your heart's center and back into world. This is a very powerful way to raise energy and open the heart area, while making the chattering monkey mind quieter.

Here are a few quotes by some mystics that might bring more light to any mental darkness in our life right now – one by Boris Pasternak, one of my Risen guides and colleagues, and another by Victor Hugo - little-known medium and mystic, who wrote a book about his seances, and who also "just" happens to be a direct ancestor of mine.

"In the depth of winter, I finally learned that within me there lay an invincible summer."
Albert Camus

"It snowed and snowed, the whole world over, Snow swept the world from end to end. A candle burned on the table; A candle burned."
Boris Pasternak

"Winter is on my head, but eternal spring is in my heart."
“Laughter is the sun that drives winter from the human face.” (August once received this in a fortune cookie after a long conversation about Victor Hugo.)
Victor Hugo

"Sometimes our fate resembles a fruit tree in winter. Who would think that those branches would turn green again and blossom, but we hope it, we know it."

"More light, more light!" - from his bed while transitioning.
“We do not have to visit a madhouse to find disordered minds; our planet is the mental institution of the universe.”

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

“The moment we indulge our affections, the earth is metamorphosed, there is no winter and no night; all tragedies, all ennui, vanish, - all duties even.”
Ralph Waldo Emerson