Jul 14 • General discussion
Dragons & Ravens & Wolves… oh my!
This beautiful community of souls is pure magic… and yesterday was just more of that for me. Allow me to me explain and openly reflect:
During our last Sparkly Dragon Social Hour, I shared a paranormal experience I had on our property that unbeknownst to me at the time is actually a phenomenon known as “Dragon’s Breath” in various dragon folklore. Without sharing the full story or going in to full details, essentially I felt trapped in a time-space distortion, and the sounds of the 10+ eagles one by one dropping from the peak of a tree sounded like big massive dragon wings flapping all around us (me, Mango and Maui, who were somewhat frozen in a line and unable to move), and when the heat came… hot wind from behind me in conjunction with the sound of GIGANTIC growling bear (dragon?)… I panicked. I ran, without the frozen dogs, back down the hill and without looking behind me… If it was a hot air breathing bear, I just wanted to live and see my kids again…
But I got about halfway down the hill and stopped. Immediately, I was overcome by guilt and shame… I felt I had failed some kind of test or initiation. I ran back up to the eagle tree (they had all flown away by this time) and the dogs were back to their usual state of passively circling me and exploring their own curiosities within the woods. No matter how hard I hugged that tree, or resumed my exact position between the mossy rocks, it was all gone… Time was normal again. There was no distortion or bending or absence of time and space, and I went back to the house and kids feeling like a failure…
I didn’t initially know what to make of this. Half carrying guilt and shame, half still scared of WTF JUST HAPPENED, I suggested to everyone around me that something dragon and something “crazy” just happened, but the words and my sense of reality didn’t add up. I mostly kept it to myself. I never shared on Instagram, but instead with a small select few who I knew would just listen.
The context came later, as the folklore “dragon’s breath” came in to my awareness, and with all the words and context to provide my own experience with my own credibility… I’m not crazy! And I was completely sober and without any mind altering substances, to boot. So it was as “real” as it gets.
So then forward to the sparkly dragon social hour, and I tell this story to everyone, and because this is the most amazing group of souls, everyone listened and validated, and furthermore, the guilt and shame was alleviated by compassion and understanding… Chalice said something like, “it’s common to feel fear during the initiation, even though we want it”… those weren’t her exact words, but it was something like that, and it felt like a ceremonial cup of cacao… OK, I’m officially validated and those around me have provided appropriate context. All is well in the world… This community is SO healing.
So post meeting, when Chalice then privately offers me a Shamanic drumming session to “meet my dragon”, it was the quickest YES PLEASE of my entire life!! We scheduled the call for a couple days later, and to say I was excited was an understatement.
But I woke up on the day of our call a little different. No motivation. No direction. A little lost, again. I made a thyroid reel where I even talk about it, with a Human Design energy update that said something like, “you shall do nothing with your week, Tatum, but sit and do nothing, and you shall like it”… I felt the energy of nothing inside, but I definitely didn’t like it lol.
My husband and kids left to the skate park (the most insanely beautiful skate park in the entire world btw), to free me up to “do work”, but as they drove down the driveway, I got the Align app update and felt all the unmotivated things. I made a reel anyways, to not waste the time, but then made an actual cup of cacao and sat on the deck, alone. It was 3 hours until my drumming session with Chalice, and so the nerves/excitement started to kick in… am I up for this? Do I even have the motivation? Yes, you do... It’s a dragon, Tatum, and Shamanic drumming, and you’d be an idiot to not take this offering.
At that exact moment, as if on cue, I looked in to my cup of cacao and clear as day, saw a raven. Whole beak to tail, claws, wings, an eye… wow, how cool. After it blurred out in to cacao again, I looked up and considered my last raven/bunny story, and it felt like it was a solid sign. I smiled at and offered my gratitude to the sky, and looked back in the cup. There again was the raven (omg twice?!?) clear as day, except this time it was moving its head up and down, it’s pointed beak annihilating what could only be that of the same fluffy bunny from my last shift at the hospital… The raven’s beak, going up and down, inside my cacao cup, destroying an innocent ball of fluff meant to resemble my fears… OK, I thought, geez I get it, drumming session it is lol.
Of course when I connected with Chalice at our orchestrated time, her aura and calming presence eliminated all fears about what this was going to be like…. Regardless, this was where I was supposed to be.
But then she surprised me, perhaps no dragons today? She pitched instead, maybe we go step-wise, with a trip to the underworld and to connect with my spirit animal… What spirit animal?
I decided at that moment to tell her about my cup of cacao and my nerves about this experience, and how I didn’t believe in coincidences, but was ready to meet my spirit animal in whatever form… What are the odds that I would see a raven two times in my drink just prior to going to a dragon ceremony, without knowing it was going to be a spirit animal ceremony instead, and NOT have said spirit animal be a raven?? Could it be Mango, she asked, but I instinctively knew it was not… Mango is a deeply connected companion of mine, but he is not my essence, that I am sure… he would hate that lol. But maybe? I was still open to it, but the truth and that inner gno-ing feels a kind of way inside my body…
We started the journey and she began drumming her beautiful rhythmic drum.
She guided me to any spot in nature, and I took up my seat on a big beautiful dragon scale that sits in the middle of our shallow creek, and I chose the time when the nearby cherry trees and lilac bushes are in full blossom, with flowers and lush green foliage and the sound of chirping birds everywhere… normally my kids are screaming or fighting or shrieking, but not in this journey. This time Mama is soaking it up alone and at peace. The temperature is high-70’s/low-80’s, with a gentle warm breeze and the sun on my face… I can hear the babbling creek and the pebbles underneath the crystal clear water radiate different colors and patterns… yes. This is my happy place.
Mostly, happy. Though I didn’t fully contextualize it, the energy was still somewhat dense… I told Chalice afterwards, it was the feeling like there were still chem trails in the sky on this beautiful day, nagging me. As beautiful and pleasant and perfect as I tried to make it, my “happy place” still felt slightly dense and a little uncomfortable.
She then guided me to a spot where the roots under the nearby fruitless mulberry tree opened up to a hole of roots, and a muddy tunnel to descend down. It was short, I could see the cavern below, and so I next thing I was in it. I was officially in the underworld.
It was bluish kind of dark, like a wet cave, but the walls had roots going down with little drips of water that echoed throughout. And there, right in front of me, MASSIVE in size, bigger than me, was a raven, dancing… his wings lifted a little on either side, and each foot stomping rhythmically to the beat of the drum. He never once stopped dancing through the whole journey.
I watched him for a bit, just enjoying his good time and his beat. With eyes closed, my avatar was probably smiling in real life. As I just listened to the drum and took in the beat and his little raven dance, inside this large dripping cavern.
It was actually very calm and peaceful in this underworld… I didn’t really know what to expect going in. But it was a dimly lit from a glowing light coming in from behind the raven, with beautiful drops of water glistening off the tree roots and dripping in to sparkly little puddles on some kind of slate floor. I could see a light coming from behind the raven, and a large drainage pipe leading toward wherever the light was coming from.
The drums kept playing and the raven kept dancing… At some point, the sounds of my screaming toddlers upstairs broke through, and my ego wondered if Chalice was going to guide me anywhere from here? Am I just going to stare at the dancing raven in this beautiful cave the whole time? I could probably use it… a little escape, and some peace and quiet in the underworld…
I decided to let Mango in. My thoughts went to, what if this raven isn’t actually my spirit animal, but my fixation on what I saw happen at the hospital, and then again in my cacao? What if I am denying Mango as my spirit animal?
So he entered the cavern from my periphery somewhere, the same size as the raven, both much bigger than me, but Mango probably sized right by comparison to the raven… he curled up on the stone floor next me and the overwhelming vibe was, yes he’s here, but he’s not interested in this lol. He’s not dancing to the drums. He’s not even looking at me. His presence was exactly the same as it’s always been, my devoted companion never leaving my side, even after we’ve moved from baby bed to toddler bed and back to baby bed, annoyed to have to curl up at my feet again, but also willingly and not making it in to any kind of thing… he’s just doing what he does... He didn’t even look at the raven, but instead curled up on the stone floor, facing the way I came in, and sighed as he closed his eyes and fell asleep amidst the drumming, dripping water sounds, and a dancing raven.
I turned back to the raven with conviction that he’s exactly who I thought he was, and began to explore… I looked around his legs and into the long drainage pipe. As I got right up next to him, he pivoted and his little dancing claw legs stepped side-by-side with me as we made our way down the tunnel and toward the source of the light.
At some point Chalice did say to leave the underworld, and we were already on our way, but at her words we blasted through with the water on the other side.
It was bliss.
Instantly met by an abundance of flowers, it felt like a scene from Avatar meets What Dreams May Come meets the little boy’s room and gifts from Encanto, but bigger and more expansive and way more vibrant... That density I felt in the creek was gone. The sky was bright blue and there were lush tropical forests and trees and foliage everywhere.
I was swimming in the most beautiful crystal blue river, against the gentle current, and the raven stayed dancing on the mossy banks and bridges as it followed me. Still dancing to the drums, but staying close by wherever I went.
I found a waterfall at the end, and in the same minute, I was sipping on a cup of coffee from a high balcony in the middle of a vibrant jungle. The waterfall was spilling into the blue lagoon beneath where I was sipping my coffee, and there were flowers everywhere.
I knew Jake was inside the room behind me, and I was about to go see what our journey together in this place would be like, when Chalice’s voice stopped me, and I stayed peacefully looking at the giant raven and the waterfall…
“Ask the raven what you can do or bring with you from this realm in to your reality to help ground you?”
And there weren’t any words from the raven, but instant knowing and one solitary image. The instant knowing was the morning cup of coffee in my hands, the morning sunshine in my eyes, and the delicious slow morning rituals and routines that I’ve grown to love so much was a fundamental part of both my existing reality and my connection to the spirit world. And then a solitary image of my feet in the same creek where I started.
I smiled and felt so much joy to my core... the raven nodded. I knew it. Those things do matter.
Chalice said “ok, now it’s time to leave… and take the same journey out, the same way you came…” but I smiled and admitted “oops I’m already flying…” when she said “leave” but before she said “the same way you came,” I had grabbed those dancing blue black feathery shoulders, and hopped on… we were above the trees now. The river I swam up snaked through the paradise below us.
We got to the opening of the drainage pipe and squeezed in and made our way back through the cave (Mango was gone), and back to the rock in the creek.
And then the drumming stopped and we were back...
I went over my journey with Chalice who provided me much needed insights… Certain things, like me not waiting for the sign to move, and taking initiative to pursue outside of the underworld without permission, stood out to her. I thought initially it could be due to my lack of patience, but with gentle redirection, I was able to see it as my own inner curiosity which has always lead the way for me, with or without permission.
We began discussing the raven spirit and some of its symbolism, and some new insights came through. She said it can be known as “the trickster” of sorts, and I had no idea how much that would resonate lol. True to the raven, it is not a malicious trick, but one that inevitably leads to the betterment of the collective at large… I’ve always associated this with my Aquarian “emotional detachment”, but Raven “trickster”… I’ve been the class comedian every time it was voted for, and so yes, this absolutely resonates. There’s a certain amount of tricking the psyche within comedy… comedic timing is all about a twist or a trigger at the right moment… there’s a degree of psychological trickery within that pursuit, and being able to assess the crowd to do so.
Other Raven traits I deeply marinated on beyond our call included “guide between worlds”, the intellectual, the spiritually enlightened, the intuitive… the trickster lol… On my raven journey, dancing was also potent, and that raven was all joy; a grown up and more serious pivot away from the playful dolphin that guided the majority of my youth… but there are no dolphins in rivers, waterfalls and creeks… which is very clearly my happy place…
We touched briefly on my deep connection to the wolf as of late, and I wondered if there could be a connection there as well, despite not being present (outside of Mango)… ?
Chalice informed me that yes, we tend to have one main animal “essence”, but can be assisted by other animal spirit guides, as well. As I came to understand it, the closer you work with them, the more you can call them in for assistance navigating certain things.
So I further explained the energetics I feel with the wolf: intention, SWIFT FOCUS, stay of its way, and it needs to be respected… strong attachment like feels to the predator that took my own little wolf…
BOUNDARIES, Chalice immediately piped in. Within this walk, call in the wolf to keep my own boundaries secure and respected.
That definitely landed, as all the feels I feel about the wolf, the somber seriousness it that is to stay focused and aligned, and that’s exactly what Mango was… all those hard boundaries I had to set. The relationships I cut loose. The hard boundaries that hurt more than just my own heart… Mango was my real life companion through all that, and as soon as the last of the toxic debris left, a real life wolf took him out… and the spirit of the wolf remains, curled up on the damp cave floor, not dancing, but here to keep me swift and focused and aligned and respected.
For the next one, Chalice plans to guide me to meet my dragon, so I have a week to integrate my spirit animal journey in the meantime. And I think this was indeed the appropriate step-wise fashion. Because this next time I face my dragon, I won’t run away. I’ll have the curiosity, joy and instinct of the raven, and the protective swiftness of the wolf to keep my intention and focus locked in.
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A million thank-yous, . Your drums and your presence in this physical incarnation is such a gift, and I am definitely more divinely aligned for it. Looking forward to part two 🥰❤️🔥🐉💫✨🙏
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Dragons & Ravens & Wolves… oh my!
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Renaissance Wellness exists as a paradigm shift away from matrix conditioning, and in to what founder, Tatum Toner, MD, has coined "Divine Alignment".
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