Forests of Imagination

The Six Elements

talk by Padmayogini (Wendy Le Ber) from the 2006 event

So I am going to be saying something about each of these six elements, how we might experience them and, how some traditions have seen them and talk about them and suggesting some ways that we can have a deeper understanding and connection with them.

At first what I will say is there is something of a mystery at the heart of the elements, they are not actually objects or things in themselves. Though we can separate them out and indeed here I will be talking about them Individually and we can see their individual qualities or experience their individual qualities, they are always linked together, interconnected in various proportions. What we usually experience is the physical contact, our perceptions engaging with some of the qualities of the actual elements, the resistance we meet with the earth element for instance, the warmth of the fire element, or perhaps the reflective nature of a still body of water.

May be something of this mysterious quality of the elements will appear in some form in our creative play, our art practice over the weekend.

the earth element

So starting with the element earth, what sort of experience do we have of this element? Well of course there is literally the earth, the soil on which all manner of trees, plants, fruit and vegetables grow. We may have our own patch of earth our own garden, and in my garden for instance I have a compost bin, and there is something quite remarkable about filling the bin with scraps from the kitchen and seeing it turn into crumbly brown soil.

There are the rocks and mountains, cliffs and sandy beaches ,it is good to connect with the, earth, you might remember the experience of taking off your shoes and walking barefoot on the grass, the earth , or the sandy beach.

Some traditional societies, and other groups of people today believe that the earth is a living being, There is the Gaia principle and other environmental understanding of the nature of the earth itself and how we treat it.

Certain mountains are still sacred, as are particular rocks and stones. In many religious communities there are caves, mountains, streams and lakes that are considered sacred and places of practice. Mother earth herself is seen as a deity and worshipped for the nourishment that she brings to the world. There are the stone circles that are still standing after many, many centuries, and often the focus of curiosity and religious practice today.

What is our experience of the earth element internally, in our own body. We have the bone, and nails and skin and muscles. Our skeleton literally supports our body, is the framework for our body, and is perhaps the hardest of the earth elements within us As we move around in a world whenever we meet resistance, we are meeting the earth element. We put our hands on the surface of objects and we need resistance, solidity and form. as we walk on the ground we are meeting the resistance of the ground under our feet the earth element is our support both literally and symbolically. When we feel heady or spacey then, it’s good to be connected to the earth, which can literally ground our experience. This is a good practice to do when you meditate from time to time and particularly if you find yourself caught up in a spiral of thoughts or emotions.

The element earth holds it’s shape, it can be as smooth as a pebble or a sharp as a piece of glass, as hard as steel or titanium, or as soft as skin. As we go about this weekend we can bring our awareness to the earth element inside and out of us.

I was remembering that film I think it was called Waterworld, as I was thinking about this weekend, I don’t know if any of you have seen it? A large proportion of the Earth’s surface was covered with water and earth, soil was a precious commodity, it was sold like gold and weighed out on scales. I remember the hero has a pot with a bit of soil and a small fruit tree in it and it is fought over, and stolen, It was a bit of a rubbish film but it did get me thinking about how precious soil or earth was and what would we do without it.

The element water

The element water apparently makes up over 80% of our body, we have blood and saliva, digestive juices, sweat and urine internally, water flows and moves ,as our blood moves within our body.

Outside we have rain and sleet and hail, we have rivers and streams, lakes and ponds and the ocean. We all use quite a lot of water in our own houses, water is piped into our kitchens and bathrooms. We drink water, we use it in cooking, we have baths and showers.

The element water runs, it collects and gathers, it sparkles in sunlight and reflects the world when it Is still. Water has traditionally been invested with magical properties many sites where water lies or springs from are believed to be the dwelling place of gods and goddesses or spirits. Springs and wells, streams and rivers are often seen as sources of physical healing and transformation. Cleansing in water is often part of a baptism ceremony symbolising washing away the old life, purification and rebirth. For Buddhist s the symbol of the Lotus is a very important one, the Lotus arising out of the mud through the pure water to flower in the air above.

So as we drink our water today or our coffee and tea over the weekend, we can bring the water element to mind. Perhaps it will rain at some point and we can experience the water element falling on our heads or on our umbrella , perhaps splashing in puddles or noticing the reflections in the standing pools of water. We already have a hosepipe ban here in the southeast, perhaps we’re already aware of that and thinking about what we can do to conserve water.

The element fire

As I said earlier in the introduction and, the ability to make fire to create fire was considered one of the most magical acts sometimes only particular religious leaders were allowed to perform this task. In many traditions the symbol of an everlasting flame, which is kept alight at a shrine, stands for what is enduring and noble about that tradition. We have part of this tradition continuing in the Olympic Games.

The element of fire can be destructive as well as divine, it can devour everything in its path and, we still see the destruction of forest fires around the world today. We use fire in funeral rites, as well as in our home The hearth was considered both the physical and spiritual heart of the home ,in this country until fairly recently, Gathering around the fire all be it a gas fire, an Arga or an electric fire these days, still has the resonant power of a powerful symbol, witnessed by its use in advertising still today, and our own desire to move next to a source of warmth.

In Buddhism fire ceremonies or fire pujas are still a large aspect of practice, there are usually four kinds of fire offerings with four different colours. The implements, the substances used, the costumes and the wood to burn in the fire are all in a particular colour. To attract favourable circumstances the predominant colour is red, to pacify the colour is white, to increase merit and meditational experiences the colour is yellow and to subjugate inner and outer obstacles the colour is dark blue. Other traditions also have used fire in their ceremonies, and I’m thinking of the fire walk that has become a bit more popular in the West recently.

The fire element inside is the warmth and heat of our body, that we need to keep us alive .We need just the right temperature to be well and healthy. When it is too hot we sweat and lose water and can become dehydrated, when it is too cold we become drowsy and forgetful and can suffer from hypothermia or frostbite.

We constantly adjust our temperature by taking off layers of clothes or putting more on. We can notice over the weekend our experience of heat In our body, of our own internal temperature and the temperature outside. We can experience the warmth of the sun on our face and body, as we are into spring now we might notice that the strength of the sun’s rays has increased.

As we eat our food, we can notice the temperature of the food, and how the act of eating often increases our own body’s temperature. If we drink a cool glass of water, we can notice our experience of the cool liquid running down to our stomach.

The element air

As we move through the elements they become a bit more intangible. So air itself is quite hard to literally see, we usually experience its effect and its qualities on us and our surroundings. In Buddhism the element air, the word for air, means moving air or wind .we associate the sky, flight and our breath all with the elements of air. As Buddhists we may put up prayer flags ,to blow in the wind. Deities and spirits, Angels, gods and goddesses often have wings in various traditions. Birds who can naturally fly have been venerated and worshipped over the years and we have tried to imitate birds for centuries, cumulating in the aircraft that we have today.

In our bodies we experience air as we breathe in and out, and our breath has been the object of spiritual and meditation practices in a number of traditions including Buddhism. We can realise just how dependent we are on the element of air if we try and hold our breath for very long. We often don’t notice our breathing unless we become very agitated emotionally or if we’re doing some physical exercise or hard work. but we and most living creatures are dependent on air for our life.

Air also moves around inside us, especially in our digestive system and in the oxygen in our blood. The expelling of wind from our body can cause great embarrassment at the wrong moment or in the wrong place, but it is also a great source of humour. I must confess I had one of those whoopee cushions when I was a child, and thought it was hysterically funny.

There are also more subtle movements of energy in our body, in our nervous system, our hormonal system and in the firing of neurons across the synapses in the brain. There are also the movements of our mind of our thoughts and emotions.

Outside we can experience the wind blowing, we can see the movement of the trees and plants around us being touched by the wind. We can watch the clouds racing across the sky, or birds flying in the air, and the rubbish often being blown across our city streets. Air flows around objects or when It is strong it can actually suck up or blow things over, hurricanes and tornadoes show just some of the power of the element air in action.

Over the weekend we can bring our awareness and attention to the element air, perhaps noticing our breath more frequently, or noticing our perception of the airport and on our skin or clothes outside

The element space

Space contains all things, we all occupy some space, the buildings we live in all take up a particular amount of space, we delineate things by measurement of space, in the city properties are sold by square foot or square metre and the price can be amazingly high.

I’ve been looking at this element space in Lama Govinda’s book, creative meditation and multidimensional consciousness. Govinda talks about the element of space and the word space in the Buddhist tradition being derived from the root to shine. This connects space with movement, vibration and radiation and can be defined as the non existence of obstruction or hindrances .Space is also an element or property of our mind, something that is explored in depth in Buddhist meditation practices.

As this is also an arts weekend I was particularly Interested in Lama Govinda’s comments on the development of a way of seeing in the East and Western traditions. Govinda sees that in the east the conception of space developed in a different way to that of the West, instead of exploring visible space those in the Indian tradition regarded it merely as a projection or an imperfect reflection or symbol of their inner experience. In their artwork they didn’t try to imitate the world before them but rather the world they knew within themselves. They did not as we developed in the West have system of perspective, the illusion of optical space on a two-dimensional surface.

In Western painting as it developed perspective, the beholder was lead to look into the illusory space of the picture. In the Ajanta cave paintings ,Govinda says we look In the opposite direction. These paintings he says seem to manifest their forms from a, space less background. This is something I thought I might look into it more carefully myself as I find it all very Interesting and wonder whether it relates to my own work.

What we actually see with our eyes is actually not space at all but a world of light resisting objects which we interpret in terms of our own inner space consciousness ,according to Govinda. This inner experience of space, space within our mind, is a characteristic of meditation and becomes an experience for us in our normal activities when we become aware for instance that there is a space between our breath or between our thoughts as we become more concentrated. We can begin to experience the space between our perception, something that happens to us, and our reaction or our response to that situation.

Over the weekend perhaps we can notice the space that we take up perhaps we become more aware of the personal space that we need around us both when we with people and also in our own rooms. We can pay more attention to the space in this rehearsal room the particular qualities of particular spaces and we can see if we can notice more space within our mind perhaps we can find more room to be creative with our thinking and expression.

The element consciousness

The final element is the element of consciousness and perhaps this is one of the most difficult elements to have a grasp of and I won’t be saying that much about it today. We cannot see it, or taste it, or touch it in the same way we can with some of the other elements. But all the other elements are embraced within the element of consciousness. We experience consciousness when we are aware of the thoughts we’re feeling, when we notice something inside us or outside of us, when we meditate or concentrate on something.

All our experience from our senses and mind are aspects of consciousness. It is through being conscious that we know we are alive and that we can reflect on our selves in meditation and at times of peak experience we can become aware of our consciousness expanding. We may become aware that there are other levels and dimensions to our consciousness. In some meditation practices, the aim of the practice is to expand awareness into our consciousness to deepen it expand it and develop it, and there are all sorts of benefits of being able to put aside the hindrances and enter into the joy and bliss of other states of consciousness.

Over this weekend perhaps we can just become a bit more conscious a bit more aware of what we are doing and experiencing and in this way have more of an experience of the element of consciousness

My own experience of practising the sixth elements meditation and of being more conscious of the elements in my experience, is one of happiness generally speaking. We all share the same combination of elements in various proportions, this planet is constituted from the elements and when the elements come together something miraculous happens. We can see all the amazing complexities of life including ourselves in all our diversity, and we can become aware that we are all connected through the elements of which we are composed. Something of this reflection makes me feel happy, maybe you will experience that as well over the weekend.

Finally as an artist I find myself involved with the elements ,a lot of the different colours in my oil paints are still made up of various coloured earths and stone, crushed and milled and bound with various oils or chemicals. I use water with some paints and acrylics, I use the burnt twigs of charcoal and sometimes sand and gravel, which we have here this weekend. If you are a sculptor perhaps you use wood or stone to make your artwork. When we start to express ourselves creatively this weekend, we will be making use of a lot of different elements in our work and this is something that will be coming to in the next part of the morning.