Dragon Born

I have always had a strong relationship to Dragon. Born the year of the Dragon in the Chinese zodiac, as well as always having a feeling that dragon was around me “protecting” me. This year I took a big leap of faith, and strengthened my relationship to Dragon. While on sort of a “retreat” processing all this, I decided to head into the woods to build a nature shrine. As I walked along I thought about where I would build it? The image of this recumbent stone on the forest path I was on came to mind. I knew I wanted to build a Dragon. It suddenly dawned on me as I walked that this is the same spot I had built another mandala/ shrine about four years ago. It was a nest mandala. The center of which held a nest with a cracked egg shell in it. I chuckled thinking it was the Dragon’s egg and now he wants to be born on that same exact spot.

This shrine took hours of pain staking work getting the rose petal spine of the Dragon just so. It was hot, humid, and the bugs swarmed. But I was determined to birth this Dragon! So, like a labor, I sweat and worked, and took breaks, and jumped back in again, until he was born. He is magnificent.

Dragon’s are land spirits, much like the Faerie folk are. They are actually related. Dragons are protectors of what is sacred, of treasures and this can be both metaphorical treasure as well as physical treasure. Some of these treasures can be treasures of the self, or the mind, of a spiritual truth or path. I find it fascinating that in the nest mandala four years ago I had placed some small stone mala beads inside the broken egg shell. In the practice of Buddhism, one uses a mala (prayer beads) to say their mantras. Much like rosery beads for Christians. When a mala breaks it is said that you are done with working with that particular mala, and it should be buried, thrown in a lake or given back to the Earth somehow.

I had these mala beads from a mala I had been working with and broke many years before the construction of the nest shrine. I felt that some of that energy of the the hours of practicing mantra, and the thousands said over these beads, would be a powerful addition to the energy of the nest shrine. (You can see the beads in the close up photo on the nest shrine post.) My relationship to Tibetan Buddhist practice, and especially Red Tara who comes out of Bhutan, is linked to Dragon. The Bhutan flag has a Dragon on it! I strongly feel that Red Tara, as well as many other Goddesses in many other cultures (like Quan Yin for example,) have a Dragon protector. It was the Red Tara mantra I did on that mala all those years ago. Now Dragon emerges from the nest with those mala beads inside! Insisting to be “born” on that same spot.

AND….he was, AND ….he came out breathing FIRE!!!

Sweaty me after hours of building. Me and my Dragon! Cue the Sesame Street song “Me and my Lama.”