Elemental Shrines and Shrine Tenders

Living With The Elements

This page is to collect our LMCommunity’s history of working with the elements and elemental shrines so that our collective knowledge can grow along with the power of our working relationships with the elements. This page includes stories from LMCommunity members about building and working with their own shrines, photos, and what they are learning from working with their elemental shrines.

 

Gayle’s Earth Shrine My process was very organic, very much like my artistic process. I didn’t do a ritual or even a formal journey. I just let the vision and intention build over time at the site. Then one day, I finally got the time and space to start clearing the place from the debris that was there. Every time I carted off a load of debris, I brought back a big rock from in our woods where some were left from construction. I would ask each rock if it wanted to come be part of my shrine, and would thank the earth and the rocks as I moved them. When all the rocks were gathered that wanted to come, I started fitting them together, like a puzzle. Thirty minutes later, it was a Shrine. It sort of reminds me of the Great Spirit of the Appalachian Mountains, who is my main Yang Source!

 

 

Over the next few weeks, I planted ferns and flowers and added small stones. The spot resonates deeply with me. I had been calling in the Directions at my fire ring, just beside the Shrine, and connecting to the Earth via the Red Oak that now shelters the Shrine for almost 2 years. Since the shrine was built 6 weeks ago, I have used it to help me transform a 6 year old Shadow Mask (now buried in pieces in the Shrine), hold the vision for Masks of Illusion workshop, and as a spot to sit and rest during a 4 hour fire ritual. (I actually sat right on the rocks of the Shrine and felt SO supported!) The Great Spirit of the Appalachian Mountains is at the heart of its energy. This is the Spirit that called me back to the hills of Pennsylvania almost 30 years ago, though I didn’t know his name then.

 

 

Bec’s Earth Shrine

The creation of my personal earth shrine was a combination of intuition and journeys. I gathered objects as they captured my attention – kept adding them into a zip lock bag – these were all objects that held meaning for me. I kept dreaming in daytime about how the shrine might look, where the right place was, how I would mix the ingredients all together, and so on. One day, it was the right day – no other objects were calling me, and it just felt like all the pieces were there. As final preparation, I journeyed to ask for a ritual to open the shrine, and for offerings for the
shrine and land spirits.

 

 

Then, I literally made a mud pie with all the collected objects, and earth, but in a gorgeous ceramic mixing bowl that I rarely use – it is so beautiful, but a bit fragile. Then the mud pie went into in a giant terracotta pot with a hole in the bottom, so the earth energy could come through easily. A few significant objects were then placed on the top with the intention that they would be power objects. One of the objects is a goddess figure, and another is a “lightworker”. I placed them opposite each other and surrounded by 4 “elemental looking beings”, with the prayer that the goddess would transfer her ancient wisdom to the modern day lightworker (me). I placed the pot right in front of a special tree that has been calling to me ever since I moved to this place, and so the pot and the tree together are the shrine.