Underworld Journey

The following visualisation is part of shamanic tradition. It takes you into the underworld, also known as the original garden (of Eden), a place of deep beauty where lost soul parts are held lovingly until the time is right for them to reunite with their owner. It can also be seen as the place of our subconscious, depending on the objective of the visit.

It is fundamentally a place of deep resource, where you can journey to replenish your energy and receive gifts. For the purposes of this visualisation, you will be going to the Underworld to meet its guardian, an angelic soul called Huascar. For this to be effective, you will either need to dictate this onto a recorder so you can play it back while you go on the journey, or ask someone else to read it out loud for you. If you have a sacred rattle or drum, the pulse beat of its regular rhythm will help you enter this mythic space. Here is the visualisation:

“Imagine you are standing barefoot in a beautiful meadow. Feel the moistness of the grass beneath your feet and the gentle brush of a warm wind on your cheeks.

At a corner of the meadow, there is a tree with a hollow core. You walk towards it, stepping into the space within its trunk. From this place, you sense an opening beneath you and feel your essence leave your body as it starts to journey down through the earth, past the roots of the tree and deep into the bedrock. As you progress through the rock you start to sense an opening beneath you and you emerge from the rock completely into a new world.

In this place, you find yourself on the edge of a stream, and decide to lie down in its flow, sensing the pebbles pressing on your back and the cool, refreshing water passing through you, washing away any weariness, concerns, or other energies that you may wish to shed before you enter the domain of the soul.

When you are ready, let the waters carry you deep into the belly of the earth, down and down, until you wash up on the shores of a beautiful lush garden. You leave the stream at this point, walking up the gentle incline of the bank, until you reach the outskirts of a colourful meadow sitting in the shadow of a woodland of mature and varied trees. In this meadow, there is a boulder where you can sit and listen to the songbirds. Do so; sit down and rest in this place for a while. This is the life-giving womb of the Great Mother herself, your own personal Eden, a place where you can come and recharge whenever you are in need of healing and renewal.

Now that you are fully rested, call upon the gatekeeper of this realm, Huascar, to meet you. He or she may appear in many forms – perhaps someone you know, an ancestor, a religious figure or an angelic presence. Trust what you see and sense.

Ask Huascar to show you around, through the groves of trees, the gardens, the waterfalls, meeting all the animals that you encounter on your way. Remember that this is your personal Garden of Eden, you can speak to anything or anyone you encounter here whenever you visit.

There may be messages of great value waiting for you.

For today, our goal is to find a gift; a power animal that has offered to work with you, to help you on your soul’s journey in whatever way it can. We are very close to this gift now, you feel its presence coming closer as Huascar leads you into a clearing. In the middle sits the animal that has chosen to be your guide and offer you support at this time.

Note what type of animal this is, whether it is male or female and whether there is anything it wants to say or show you. There may be a specific message around one of more of its archetypical qualities that it wants you to be aware of, something of particular relevance and resonance to you in this moment.

When you have gathered all the information that is available to you, allow the animal to come back with you and Huascar as you return to the bank of the river that carried you to this special place. Thank Huascar for being your loving guide on this journey and step back into the river, lying down as you and your animal wash yourself clean of anything that needs to be left here, that is not appropriate to the middle world from whence you came.

When you have cleansed yourself fully, allow the current to gather you both and carry you back up the river to the point where you first emerged from the rock. Journey up through the bedrock, past the roots of the trees, through the fertile soil until you arrive again in that sacred space within the tree.

You are back in the middle world. Feel yourself reconnect with your body here as you step out into the meadow. Become aware of the physical sensations of your hands and feet, of your breath as it passes through your lips and of the room as your consciousness returns to this level of reality. You are back”.

Having returned with your gift, you may wish to feel into its qualities further and ask it to explain how it can help you and how you can make best use of this assistance. Allow yourself to connect deeply with its energy and trust all that you feel.

You may also have a sense of a chakra or part of your body where your new power animal would be most at home and of greatest assistance. See if you can gather its energy and place it into this place within you. You will need to nurture it here for the next 28 days, feeling its energy, listening to its guidance and honouring its wisdom until it is no longer separate from you, but an integrated aspect of you that you can call upon at any time for its support and love. This journey and gift will then be fully honoured.

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