Archangel Ratziel Copyright Taylor Ellwood 2020
1-22-2020 Tonight I connected with Ratziel/Chockmah/Neptune. I know Neptune isn’t traditionally associated with Chockmah, but I actually think it makes a lot of sense, when you consider that Chockmah is both wisdom and pressure. Chockmah fine tunes everything and when I consider that seat salt is the alchemical substance associated with Chockmah as well as my previous experiences with the planetary energy of Neptune, it seems to make a lot of sense. Ironically, William G. Gray doesn’t set a lot of store by associating Neptune with Chockmah, though he notes its done by modern day quabalists. The irony is that his own explanation of Chockmah and Ratziel completely supports the connection, but it makes me wonder if he ever worked with the planetary energy of Neptune.
Ratziel also showed up and what was interesting is that he made it a point to show me how Chockmah and Binah connect and work together. I felt suspended between the saturnic energy of Binah and the Neptunic energy of Chockmah and I felt how that balance played off each other and strengthened each other. It also gave me ideas about where to take this work next. Feeling balanced between both forces made me realize how essential this work is because in finding this balance, I’m also creating opportunities to deepen my connections with the powers and work with the more holistically. There’s a lot more to share, but I’ll do it once I’ve had more time to process the experience and research I’m doing for this month.
1-24-2020 This work feels very tidal in a way. I’ll confess to feeling intimidated about working with Neptunic energy because of the experiences I had a few years ago, but this time around I’m finding it easier to navigate that energy perhaps because I’ve learned not to fight it, but instead to work with it. I’m not trying to control it, but instead flow with it. In the Ladder of Lights, Gray notes the following about Chockmah:
“The Wisdom of Chockmah is not any form of learning, ability of memory, or other accumulation of mental energies. Chockmah is not a form of anything, for it is Force, pure unadulterated Power at top level. Pressure applied at maximum. The full potential of the applied Energy maintaining our Existence in manifestation.”
That concept of pressure fits the experience of Neptunic energy, or at least my experience of it. That pressure changes you, transforms you and thus you learn wisdom. In my case the wisdom of letting go of control, and of focusing on using the pressure to better shape and hone my own work.
Gray also notes: “Although Chockmah precedes Binah numerically on the Tree, it is not higher than, but level with the Great Mother. They should both be considered as inseparables, like two ends of the same Rod. As we have learned, extend the Rod infinitely and the ends become. So do Chockmah and Binah.”
This was my experience the other night and its been my experience since, where I’m feeling both Sephiroth at play. I feel myself suspended between them, experiencing the mesh of their energies, knowing I could be torn apart, and instead I give into the pressure and limitation and then form it and myself into something else.
!-28-2020 I’ve spent most of this initial week just attuning to Chockmah and the tidal aspects of its power. In fact what i’m really learning is that simply being present with Neptunic energy and Chockmah is essential to working with that power. It’s not about directing it so much as flowing with it and working with the currents, while also being open to being guided and directed by them. Ratziel is a silent presence, just there in the background.
2-2-2020 Each time I work with Chockmah/Neptune/Ratziel I feel like I’m taking a dive into the ocean. The initial impulse is to try and control where I’m going, but I let it go each time and the tides take me and hold me and then I end up wherever I need to end up. It’s raw, primal and elemental. It’s power, and by surrendering to it, I find that I’m able to work with it much better, and get where I want to go. With power, its really more about being present with it, and discovering what you can do with what you need, instead of trying to all of it for yourself.
2-3-2020 Today’s meditation ended up being a series of images and a feeling of rocking back and forth. I felt Ratziel’s presence as I experienced the images, which were glimpses of alternate worlds and lives, possibilities being given form, but be careful with the power. The right application is necessary, too much, too little will make it not work.
And otherwise doing stretches I’m learning from reading Pain Free and also realigning the way I carry my body. I notice how my body responds, eager, happy, alive with the changes I am making.
2-7-2020 I’ve been re-watching the Crown lately and there’s a scene where the eldest queen mother advises queen Elizabeth that one of the most potent acts of power is the choice to do nothing, to be nothing. It seems odd, but I meditated on it today in relationship to my ongoing experience this month and it fit the experience I’ve been having on meditating on power. Sometimes the most effective way to commune with power is to do nothing, to simply let it fill you, without trying to do anything. this is my experience this month, where I’m simply communing with Neptune/Chockmah/Ratziel and with the power they represent and learning to be with it, without necessarily applying it. The right application isn’t necessarily the most overt expression of power, but rather only using what is needed to get you where you’re going.
2-8-2020 Kat made an interesting observation, that Ratziel is a witness. And indeed when I think about my experiences this month, the way Ratziel has bee communicating with me is through being a witness, through modeling the very thing I’m doing, which is sitting with the power and working with it. I also have been thinking about how small actions lead to big changes. So often people get caught up in grand gestures, but not everything needs to be grand. Instead it is through iteration and optimization that change happens. Gradual improvements lead to big results.
2-11-2020 In tonight’s meditation I considered a simple fact: There is power in presence. There is power in being present and witnessing something. Sometimes that’s all the power you need to have. When you can be confident in your presence and let it fill you, you will show up the way you need to and that alone can move a situation in your favor. You just have to be present fully with yourself and the situation.
2-1-3-2020 Tonight I finally did something I wish I had done a long time ago. I finally closed the door on a choice I made years ago that has been not been healthy for me. I find you can’t change something until you’re ready to change it. I was finally ready to change it.
2-14-2020 Last night I did an experiment with the sphere of art. I did it right before bed and then put the alchemical substances I’ve been working with beside my bed. For the rest of the night I had vivid dreams and I sensed the presence of Ratziel as well as the neptunic power of Chockmah. I felt like the entire night was an example of working with that particular essence. I’d never done a sleep practice like that before so it was quite fascinating and I may try it again.
2-17-2020 Today’s meditation was restless. Actually the last couple have been restless, and I’m feeling the neptunic currents of power stir and move and I’m moving with them. I’m not fighting it, but I find it interesting because it’s also helped me make several decisions that I’m going to work toward and that I know I will have the support that I need, so that I can accomplish those choices. Instead of trying to make something happen, I feel like something is naturally starting here that will carry me forward in my decisions.
2-20-2020 As I get ready to wrap up this month’s work I was reminded to stay humble, to remember that a current change change and to ride it and work with it, but not try and force it. And I take that reminder and express gratitude for it. I’ll enjoy the current direction, but i’ll also lean in if the going gets harder, because I know i’ll come out the other side better for it.
Neptune Copyright Taylor Ellwood 2020