The Thunderbird
I am a Mestizo American, a product of Jewish Spaniard and Indigenous American ancestors. Born in McAllen, Texas, a town that borders Mexico. Raised Christian with an extended family of devout Catholics. Spanish was my first language, but the school system made sure I would forget that.
For most of my adolescence I loved the Theosophy I was taught apart from the idea that God should be feared and that we are born unworthy. That’s not how I felt. When I discovered dance, I knew I tapped into a way of channeling higher conscious realms. Dance became my fellowship with the Divine. I knew that I felt a part of the natural world, the circle of life, and that modern Human existence constantly separated me from that. I talked to the animals, climbed trees, and confided in the highest, most remote branches. I felt at home, I felt if there was ever a place I could call a church, a place to commune with higher worlds, it was in the womb of nature herself.
I would forget this as I aged and became wrapped up in life, trying to accept myself as a gay man while being taught that it was unacceptable and unlovable. I grew to hate my body, developing an eating disorder that would last over 12 years. After I broke my feet - an injury that dismantled my dance career - I plunged into solitude and a deep, long depression. I would forget all of this. I’d be frustrated because I could feel the empty shape of my youthful memories not knowing how to fill them back out. I wanted to find relief, I wanted to heal, but I reacted more than observed and in an effort to quickly escape suffering I’d choosing enthusiasm more often than discernment.
After my Brush with Infinity, my life changed. Perhaps it was divine intervention but regardless it was an experience of grace that changed the questions I was asking and changed what would satisfy the thirst in my soul. Over time I found my way with the help of my dearest friend Anthony. I learned tough lessons and started to heal which developed more agency in my life. Many years and many initiations later I would be invited to a class taught by a man whose life intersected those of my spiritual friends and whose experience offered a wealth of insight. I was initially drawn by his connection to Master Choa Kok Sui, founder of Pranic Healing, but even more so by his background with a Medicine Man from the Lakota Tribe and his many fellowships with other Indigenous groups being trained in ceremonial healing through the use of sweat lodges, pipe ceremony, sun dance, fire dance and healing through plants. I had no one in my life to introduce me to these traditions and I felt the pull.
By this time, I was getting back in touch with my roots, the parts of me that are native to the Americas, and my indigenous roots to the Earth. After a weekend of classes, a group of us were invited to take part in a pipe ceremony to enhance the practice of Kriyashakti, a Sanskrit term meaning manifestation. It was a blend of traditions! Both are practices coupled with invocation and prepared for through healing and transmuting lower tendencies and heavy energy. For clarity, there is no drug or inhaling involved.
This was a remarkable event for me. I had been developing my clairvoyance for years before this point and thanks to many practices, events like this offered me chances to be a receptive observer inundated with visions. I saw many things, many beings of different sizes, angels, ancestors, nature spirits, teachers members of individuals spiritual families, and lineages who came to bestow blessing or impulse. The diversity of beings was as diverse as the people attending the ceremony. Each coming together from different traditions and meeting at an intersection point.
Closer to the end of the ceremony while the energy had still been building I saw it. At a high point in the sky, a star flashed with thunder. The light of this star stretched out into a hallway of electric blue where the tips of wings appeared first as if pulling itself through. A massive bird-like being came forth, wings of electric light and brilliant white. I had been invoking for guidance, support on my spiritual path, blessing for my family, friends, and myself. In awe, I looked up at this being knowing it had come for me. My perception met the being as it stretched out its wings and with a clairaudient thunder, a stream of warm-toned energy traveled down my spiritual column integrating with my etheric body. It gave me goosebumps and left me in awe. The being fell back into the hall and the hall collapsed back down into a point of light that flashed before it disappeared.
It was only upon discussing my vision with the teacher that I came to realize what I saw and from that day forward I have recognized and invoked the Thunderbird.
