Crows have long been a trusted guide in waking and dreaming life, as well as conscious dream journeys, guided by the drum. I began having a series of dreams connected with Crow before my divorce in 2001 when crow helped me to navigate this challenging time in my life for me and my children.
One day, my son and I were sitting at the kitchen table drawing and my daughter was playing a game she created where she was the librarian for a dream library. She demanded that me and my son create some dream books to place in her library. I took the assignment to heart and began thinking of the Crow dreams I had been having, as well as a beautiful blue phoenix that had been showing up in dreaming. Based on these dreams, I created the story of “The Crow and The Phoenix”. I wrote the story in a miniature book I had made from construction paper, and handed the book to the dream librarian. She was pleased with the addition to her dream library, and placed it on a shelf.
Later I shared the story with an online group of dreamers devoted to dreaming up some Peace in the World Dreams Peace Bridge. I shared my inspiration from my 6 year old daughter and her imaginary dream library, and the story that came through in response to her assignment to create a dream story. The Crow and the Phoenix was the result. It goes like this…
The Crow and the Phoenix
Once upon a time…
there lived a Crow who liked to stay in darkness. Crow lived deep in the earth. When Crow was lonely, it would fly up out of the Earth and find someone to take into the underworld.
One day a girl named Anna Belle was walking in the rain with her most favorite companion, her umbrella. She loved to walk under the gloomy, wet, gray, skies protected by her faithful umbrella. Anna Bella and her umbrella were quite a pair.
Suddenly she heard a great thunder and it felt as if the ground beneath her was shaking from the sound! She wondered if the Earth were going to swallow her up, when a great Crow swooped down upon her and carried her and the umbrella into his underground laird.
She lived deep inside the earth with Crow, until she forgot who she was. Not even her umbrella could protect her from the darkness that surrounded her. She lived in the darkness of Crow.
One day in the depths of her slumbering, Anna Belle was awakened by a mysterious blue light that shone like the stars. She was frightened and could barely look into the brightness piercing through the underworld.
She caught the glimmer of light as it flashed from high above and she held tight to her umbrella. Crow tried to pull her back from the light by grabbing her umbrella just as the bright wind caught Anna Bella up in a swirling torrent, taking her up into a world of light and love. Crow was left holding only the umbrella, alone once again in the darkness underground.
The bright wind that caught up Anna Belle and lifted her away was really the wings of a magical blue Phoenix. The Phoenix took her high into the heavens to a mountain cave. There in the cave was a magical reflecting pool. The small girl looked into the water and was shocked to see a girl covered with dirt looking back at her. She had forgotten who she was in the depths of darkness.
Phoenix gently guided her into the healing waters of the pool, where she was cleansed of all the darkness that had been surrounding her life. She stepped out of the water, and looked again into the reflecting pool. She saw a beautiful girl named Anna Belle and her eyes gleamed from the light of her heart.
Phoenix knew it was time for Anna Belle to return home, and placed her in her warm bed where she slept peacefully. The Phoenix whispered gently, “You may return to the waters of remembering whenever you feel lost.”
Anna Belle awoke with a start! What was that?…a dream? She looked down and saw on her bed a mysterious feather. When she picked it up she felt a familiar light in her heart. She remembered her dream.
The End
By Valley Reed with inspiration from Delaney Clark.
When I shared the story online with a group of international dreamers, several asked for a copy to share with young family members, and one felt so inspired she thought it would make a wonderful dream dance. I shared by background as a professional ballet dancer, choreographer and teacher and was offered a stipend to create a dance based on the story and perform it in Cincinnati Ohio for a Regional conference with the Association for the Study of Dreams in 2001.
The story came to life as a dream dance, and the Crow, Phoenix, and Anna Belle danced it into being. Later at another conference in Montreal in 2008 the dream dance was performed again as an improvised performance to dream and dance the story forward.
While all of this was going on I continued to dream of Crow, and was told I am to be the keeper of “the Book of Crow”. The book of Crow is a book of Sacred Law, and bridge between worlds that enters the mystery. Human Law is not the same as Sacred Law. Crow has a shared meaning across cultures, the Book of Crow gives access to sacred law from cultures across the world and across time. Below are just a few dreams of the mysterious nature of Crow as guide.
Crow Initiation
I dream I have been given a diagnosis of a condition that will end my life. I submit to my own death and am unafraid. I have a sacred fire lit where my body will be tied to a post where I will meet the wings of crow. I see my body burn up as I surrender to the fire and become the wings of crow and fly into the spirit realm.
Crow Unfurls the Darkness
I am leading a group on a journey guided by the drum. I see crow appear within the darkness of my mind’s eye, and he pulls away the curtain of darkness and I find I am in another territory in dreaming where I stand before a great stone gateway. Crow is hopping around the ground and picks up a golden bracelet and drops it in my hand. I find the stone gateway has a circle carved into it and when I place the golden bracelet in the carved circle, it fits perfectly, and the massive stone gateway begins to open. A bright white and blue light shines through as the massive portal opens that is so powerful I can barely hold my own in the face of it. I am concerned what else may be coming through this portal I have opened.
Three Crows
I see three crows on a tree limb and one flew over to me and brought me a citrine crystal cluster. When I looked at the citrine crystal more closely, I found that part of it is a candle. I am walking through a room where a crystal skull sits on a table, and the crystal skull recognizes me and begins giving divination of what will come to pass in my future.
At a recent Dream Healing workshop I was teaching in Grand Junction, Colorado, there were themes of heart and soul interwoven with the dreams shared. I incubated a healing dream while catching an afternoon nap, prior to giving a lecture that evening on the Healing Powers of Dreams.
“Bennu Bird” by Michelle Celebrielle
During my dreaming, I was gifted with the presence of a large white bird which flew overhead. I could clearly see the huge white wings until it landed on a tall tree upon bare branches. I looked closely at the face of the bird, noticing the streaks of black coming out from the eyes and long narrow feathers reaching out from the crown. I recognized it as the mysterious Benu bird of Egyptian myth, bringer of renewal and capable of retrieving and bringing forth the energy of soul. A wonderful ally to accompany our dream journeying for the weekend.
There were themes of the heart and relationships which presented themselves over and again from our group of dreamers. One participant shared a dream which was full of opposites and polarities which gave the opportunity to dance with each of the polarities represented in the dream. The dream was brought to life through the movement accompanied with the intent of each of the polarities. The dreamer was able to reach a resolve toward wholeness through the movement and integrate the separation of loss into complete freedom. The wings of the Benu Bird were flying through the dance at the end, to bring about healing liberation. Another young woman brought through a vision of seeing a possible love relationship which culminated in the couple riding off together on black and white horses. The dream also gave counsel and warned her of the need to be willing to wait and not hurry into the relationship.
A doctor who attended was eager to see how dreams could help her better care for her patients. She journeyed with two power animals, that of the cougar and the eagle which became one creature. She was on call during the whole workshop and was indeed living in two realms at once. The bringing together of these two animal protectors will help her to better navigate the challenges of her dual life.
The energy of relationship and the balance of opposites flowed throughout the day, and in the end, the feeling of connection was the gift, like the egg of the Benu bird in the tree of life, which promises renewal for the future.
The Benu Bird according to Egyptian mythology recounts the bird as a carrier of “Ba” or soul energy. The soul energy is able to leave the physical body and travel at will, something we can do nightly in our dreams. The Benu Bird is akin to the Phoenix and bringer of renewal which comes with each era. It is a rare occurrence to witness a Benu bird, as there is only one such bird in existence. The Benu bird has no mate but continues through self regeneration. It has the capacity to integrate both polarities of Masculine and Feminine into one being. It builds its nest in the tree of life, laying a single egg to break open a new era of soul. It was the song of the Benu bird which sang creation into being. The mysterious Benu Bird is a beautiful story of how, we may each give birth to ourselves and participate in this renewal of soul and spirit. Through this transformation of death and renewal, we can bring all parts of ourselves into wholeness as a way to help heal the past and bring about a brighter future for coming generations.
Included in this healing and to honor the Benu Bird, I offer this poem of prayer;
Dream of the Benu Bird
May we walk in beauty as we step upon the earth,
and sing our lives into being.
May our souls learn to soar as the Benu bird,
and dance awake our dreams.
May we bring about more balance in connection to each other,
the Earth we all share, and all the creatures upon it.
May we honor those who came before us,
and the gifts they have given.
May we remember where we came from,
and what we each came here to do.
May we honor and protect the children,
and future generations, through our actions today.
In the Fall of 2007 , I was given the news that my Father has cancer. He had stage four lung cancer with a large inoperable tumor, and he is 83 years old. Death is inevitable for each of us, and so the news of my father’s illness brought me closer to the portal of death. It also brought a pain so deep within me I was doubled over as if a knife were piercing my soul. I was feeling pulled deeper into the darkness and pain of these events as if my soul were being pulled down into the underworld. My father had recently given all of his things away and moved in with his Sister in El Paso, Texas. The borderlands, El Paso means “the Pass” and these are lands where the ancient Aztec territory had once reached and ancient petroglyphs of Quetzalcoatl can still be found in the Hueco Tanks area. One night I surrendered to the pull that I felt in my soul, and I said a prayer for a dream for my fathers’ protection and healing. In response to my prayer, I had this dream;
The Call of Quetzalcoatl
I see an Aztec Mandala as a large circular structure built with Aztec Codex tiles. Each tile is connected to a person’s life and there is a tile for each individual soul. I see a spirit presence there who is the guardian of this place, which is a portal to cross into the other world. The first panel I was shown is connected to me and my life. I stepped on the panel with my awareness, and it lit up with golden light and the God Quetzalcoatl, the flying serpent came to life and flew away. Then this gatekeeper guardian spirit told me he was directing my father’s death. He told me my father would be going into the underworld when he passes.
I see a friend with me in my dream and she stays on the perimeter of the circular space that makes up this portal. She is talking with this spirit and he gives her a very large ruby that he takes out of the side of the earth that is the wall of the perimeter. It seems to be some kind of cave maybe or part of a temple or a pyramid. Another part of my dream is showing me another layer where the Aztec Codex tiles are floating up in space like an Aztec temple but on the etheric realm. The spirit offers a simple bowl and sets it on a tile and the bowl flips over to the other side and it disappears immediately. This is a place where offerings are made to the ancestors or spirit realm. I am given the information that if I put my hand on one of those tiles it would disappear just like the bowl. Instead I take out some Milagros which means “miracles” they are small metal medallions in different forms such as a hand or head or a house offered as prayers of healing and protection. The Milagro prayers are received, but they don’t disappear. It shows me the importance of making offerings of prayers in Milagros or tobacco or sage to be received in the spirit realm. The prayers for assistance offers an opportunity for the ancestral spirits to be of service from the other side. – End of Dream
I shared this dream with my friend who had appeared in my dream. She has Mayan Ancestry and speaks Spanish and I told her I felt I needed to go to the Pyramids in Mexico and make prayer offerings for healing. I asked if she would accompany me as my translator since I did not speak Spanish and also since she was one of the people in my dream with me. The next day, we were flying to meet in Mexico City on a quest to the Pyramids in Teotihuacan to explore my dream healing ceremony. We stayed very near the Pyramids where there was a small village, my friend felt she wanted to explore the village nearby that evening in search of a Toltec Elder who might know how we could participate in the annual ceremony of the Aztec Moon Dance. She asked several people in the village if they knew anyone who might help, and finally we were directed to a house where a Toltec Medicine Man lived. We knocked on the door and spoke with a delightful young woman, a cousin who explained he was not there but he could give us a tour of the pyramids in the morning if we came back then. She also explained we would not be able to participate in the Aztec Moon Dance without a written letter of referral, which had to be submitted in advance. She let us know the Moon Dance would be taking place the next day in Mexico City. We left and returned to our hotel for the evening with a plan to return in the morning. It did not look promising for us to participate in the Moon Dance from what this woman had told us, but I left it up to spirit to decide. My sights were set on doing ceremony and making offerings to the ancestors in the territory I believed I had seen in my dream, the Pyramids of the Sun and the Moon and the Temple of Quetzalcoatl in Teotihuacan.
Before retiring for the night, I realized we were actually sleeping on sacred grounds with ruins on the property located walking distance to the Pyramids. I made the intention for a dream of assistance for the quest we would embark on the next day. My dreaming was difficult and disrupted, I awoke in the middle of the night with a feeling that chilled me to the bone. It was as cold as death in our room and I could not get warm no matter how many blankets I piled on me. I looked at my companion and she slept peacefully without any signs of discomfort.
Over breakfast the next morning, I described my lack of sleep and dreams to my friend and we determined she would go and seek out the Medicine Man we believed lived in the nearby village while I waited at the hotel. She would then bring him to the hotel for me to meet him and I could tell him my dream. She returned with his wife who spoke some English and I told her with the help of my translator of the dream of Quetzalcoatl that had brought me before her. I spoke of the need to offer prayers for my father. She understood immediately and went to retrieve her husband. Upon our meeting I felt as though my dream was opening up and I was falling back into my dream. I recognized the man standing before me as the guardian spirit I had seen in my dream. This Medicine Man is the keeper of the Staff of Quetzalcoatl and the guardian of this sacred place for his people. He offered to do ceremony at the pyramids with us and asked us both to accompany him and his wife as his guests to participate in the Moon Dance in Mexico City later that day.
Avenue of the Dead and Pyramid of the Moon
Before we entered the sacred grounds of the pyramids, the Medicine Man and his wife offered me colorful stones as offerings of healing for my father and myself. They explained to me that it was through my own healing that these healing energies would be made available to my family. They also gave my traveling companion a stone that was the color of a red ruby, we both looked at one another with a knowing grin understanding this was actualizing a part of the dream. We were on the path of my dream and together we went to the pyramids and offered prayers with traditional Copal and also Sage which I had brought and offered out of respect and gratitude. It is the traditional way as I had been taught in my past years of study practicing ceremony with my teacher, a Lakota Sioux Medicine Man known as Ten Bears. The teacher before me now was an Aztec Medicine Man and he was young as was his wife, and they had nothing but smiles and concern for my well being on my healing journey with them.
We offered the prayers without the flame to burn the sacred herbs as the traditional ceremony would be done. The four of us stood in each of the four directions offering prayers in Nagual the language of the Toltec people. It was sad for me to see the indigenous peoples living in this area on the land of their ancestors forbidden by the government to practice their rituals with an open fire and so the ceremony we did was without flame. After we made prayers, we went to the temple of Quetzalcoatl to open a portal of healing energy. We climbed the steps of the temple in a zig zag serpentine fashion to connect with the energy of the feathered serpent. When we reached the top, the guardian of this portal spoke the sacred prayers and told us to concentrate our energy and open up to the power of Quetzalcoatl. We stood looking down on the ancient carved serpents that covered the temple holding our hands out over the temple breathing in the energy. I could see in my minds eye a V shaped opening occur where golden light poured fourth and then two giant golden serpent eyes were staring back at me. The energy of the feathered serpent had been released and it had made contact with me. I could still feel the energy coursing through my body as we made our way down the many steps of the temple back toward the earth in a serpentine direction.
Keeper of the staff of Quetzalcoatl
Our next destination would be the underground ruins of the Jaguar Palace. I followed my guide as he lead me to the ancient ruins and found myself in the territory of my dream. Inside the underground palace, we were led to a location that had once been a waterfall. It was obvious where the water had once run down where the sides of the earth where smooth. I was directed to stand underneath it, as if the water were flowing today. I leaned my face and body up against the earthen wall under the barren water fall, and I could imagine the once plentiful waters flowing over me washing away all of the wounds of my past. I stood taking in this energy for a long time until I felt my spirit replenished, the water was long gone, but the healing energies of it remained and I was grateful to be in this amazing place. We then went deeper inside the underground ruins known as the Jaguar Palace and I was shown what seemed to be a covering over some kind of opening. When the covering was removed it revealed a dark hole that went deep down inside the earth. My guide pointed down into it as if he wanted me to enter this portal. I looked at him like he was crazy and exclaimed, I am not going inside that! It was so deep and dark you could not see the end! He laughed and had me place my hands hovering over the opening and told me to draw the energy of Mother Earth up into my hands and through my being. I stood positioned over what was an ancient well that lead deep inside the earth and drew from the healing energy of Mother Earth.
Moon Dancers
I was feeling lighter with each step along the way of our journey and now it was time for us to travel to Mexico City. My companion and I had decided we would accompany our Medicine guides to participate in the Ancient ceremony of the Aztec Moon Dance as their guests. I was profoundly grateful to them for their generous spirit, and all the love and support they had shown me and my friend. It was here in the Moon Dance Ceremony that I was able to make my prayer offerings for my father. I had brought the Milagros with me, and put the stones that I had been given in a small bag that I carried with me. I danced with the bag during the ceremony, and I was amazed at all of the colorful costumes and the many different people from across the region who arrived for the dance. The Medicine Man and his wife who accompanied us, wore the costume of the black jaguar while his wife was dressed in the beautiful flowing colors of water. I did not come prepared with a costume for the dance, however my friend provided me with a headdress of colorful parrot feathers that she and I wore during the dance. The dance began around 2:00 in the afternoon and it went on until the Sun was down around 8:00 we danced the entire time without taking a break on concrete in the middle of the busy square in Mexico City. There were different Aztec tribes there from across the region and well over 50 dancers who participated. I was accepted as one of the tribe as if I had been there my whole life without hesitation or question. The Moon Dance was so hypnotic and yet I felt so completely alive with the sounds and smells and the movement of the dance. I thought my body would collapse in the waning hours of the dance. I could feel the energy of the dance take over and I was no longer one person struggling against the difficulty of my physical challenges but surrendered to the dance and became one with the movement of a whole community. The energy of us dancing together as one took me and lifted my exhaustion away. I felt lifted ever higher by the energy of this Sacred Moon Dance and I knew my dance was a prayer that was offered to the ancestors of this sacred place.
When the final words of the closing ceremony had been spoken, we all gathered in the square to join in a sumptuous meal of chicken mole, beans and rice with even a shot of Agave Tequila to take the edge off tired muscles. The night wore on as it was getting late and I was ready to return to my hotel to rest and asked our guides to please escort us back home. They had other plans however the ceremony and the night was not yet over! They insisted that we accompany them back to their village to join in a small group of people to do a temascales purification sweat ceremony. They insisted this was a crucial part of the day of ceremony. They had both shown such tremendous concern for my well being all along the way in the course of our journey always checking in to see how I was feeling, and if they insisted on this final step I had to trust them. We arrived at the temascales where the rocks to heat the lodge had already been well heated in a ceremonial fire and everything was prepared. I was given a simple white cotton gown to wear in the lodge. Special herbs were burned over the hot rocks and then poured with water to release the steam. In the lodge we sang songs and prayed deep in the night and into the early morning. Several of those who shared the sweat lodge with me that night kept complaining about it being cold inside the lodge. The Medicine Man whom I had come to love and trust, let everyone know the reason they felt cold was because they were experiencing the trauma they held in their body. This rang a bell for me, that must have been what I experienced in my dreaming the night before when I woke up freezing and was unable to get warm. The Medicine Man checked with me to see if I was cold, I shook my head no. He gave me a warm and knowing smile shaking is head in agreement. The healing was complete. Now I knew I had received healing through the day of ceremony and ritual. I was the only one in the lodge who was not cold.
We then finished the healing lodge and prepared to leave. I gave a donation for the services of creating the space for the lodge and I offered my faithful guides money for the healing I had received. They thoughtfully declined, knowing I was called to them by the dream and through spirit, and it was their honor to be of service. These were indeed people of beauty and faith and love and integrity. They had helped me find the miracles I came searching to find. Now I could take this energy home with me and share it with my loved ones. It was hard to say goodbye to these special people that the dream had answered in response to my prayer but I knew this was a place and a people to whom I would someday return.
My father later died peacefully surrounded by family and I feel strongly that through the dreams and ceremony and sacred dance and prayers offered a pathway that was prepared for him to travel into the afterlife. The day he passed my daughter had this beautiful dream of his death.
The Butterfly Tree
The Butterfly Tree
I see an old two story house with a front porch and grandpa is sitting on the porch in a rocking chair. The family is gathered around and everyone is coming up to speak with him and tell him goodbye. My mom and I go and speak with him and say our goodbyes. We see a butterfly land on his shoulder and then he dies. A tree in the backyard holds many butterflies who now flow around him, as they do he begins to transform from his older self to his younger self of about 40 years old. He looks happy and peaceful. End of Dream
There are stories about butterflies in Mexico that the return of the butterflies each year during the migration are the souls of departed ancestors coming to visit. The Butterfly Tree is a migration of the soul and the end of the journey we call life.
In Kundalini Yoga,the progression is to raise the Kundalini energy coiled in the root chakra up through the seven Chakras toward the crown Chakra. In these intensified focused classes, each one is devoted to working with a different chakra following this progression. In this class, we entered the 3rd chakra and practiced chanting, fire breathing & yoga positions to raise the energy into the third chakra. I found difficulty at first penetrating into the energy there. I saw a protective ring of fire surrounding the third chakra that did not allow me to enter. I focused my awareness on the fire and put my intention there and the fire change from a closed circle to an open V shape, like wings, which created an opening for me to enter. The fire then transformed into a Phoenix, and I could see the face of the Phoenix had become a heart shaped portal and inside I could see the enchanting faces of Shatki and Shiva beckoning me to join them. I was feeling shy and did not go through the portal to join them, my attention was drawn to enter the palace of many jewels, the third chakra. I then saw my 3rd chakra energy change into a green lotus that reached down into the spinal cord, it then changed into a bright blue and once again I saw the phoenix as a blue bird flying toward the Palace of Jewels.
My initial entry, was through a cave of emerald that I knew to be the cave of the Emerald Buddah. I felt this was not the right place and so I waited until an Egyptian Sphynx Woman appeared and the cave became the color of Lapis Lazuli. She lead me through the cave until we came to a wall. I could see it was very dark as I approached and there was a wall made of a shiny black material like onyx and I could see my reflection looking back at me in the wall. This was the place in my life where I had lost my power, and my guide was there to help me, she whispered in my ear gently guiding me, while giving me confidence and gaining my trust. I was at a loss as to what to do about the wall, it was thick and solid, I turned to my guide with a look “what now?” She raised a hand and the wall became nothing but smoke. It completely disappeared, and there hiding in the shadows were childhood figures of me as an infant and my three older siblings. It was behind this wall where the family secrets where hidden, and next to the shadow childhood figures, hovering in complete darkness was the energy of my mother, although I could not see her, I could feel her, and I embraced her and gave her my complete forgiveness.
I now realized that my sphinx guide had wings, and that she was ready to fly! I took off riding on her back and she flew me to the top of the palace where artists painted beautiful frescos into the dome topped roof. The colors they used to paint where made from ground up jewels of lapis lazuli, emerald, and ruby. The frescos painted on the dome where depicting history, and we flew circling around the dome absorbing what one could learn from the artistic vision. There on an adjacent wall, reaching up the ceiling, was a library of sacred books that required ladders to reach the upper shelves. This was a place of ancient learning and sacred texts. Then suddenly the sphinx and I, flew through the top of the palace and changed into a blue beam of light that shone into the heavens never ending. I was aware that part of me was traveling this beam of light upward into infinity while another part of me was inside the palace still. I rejoined my awareness into the palace of jewels and saw there was preparation taking place for a sacred ceremony. I was being bathed and massaged and perfumed as purification before the ceremony by a host of attendants. I was then escorted and laid down on a platform and given a drink. I looked at my face and I was a beautiful man, with cocoa colored skin, tall and thin with a long narrow face. I was about to undergo a dream ceremony in the palace of many jewels.
Awaken the Sacred Dream 