The Safe Place



Why a Safe Place?
 The safe place is the ideal place to start all your shamanic journeys and meditations from. It is a place that gives you maximum protection from negativity, and at the same time a place where you feel completely safe and comfortable. As I have already explained on the Underworld Page, it is not a good idea to journey from a public place. By starting your journeys in your own personal safe place you ensure that negative people and forces are being kept out of your Underworld. This can save you a lot of trouble and grief! Unfortunately there are those who would like to exploit your vulnerabilities and invade your inner worlds, your Underworld and other places, in order to steal your power and cause you harm. This may sound far-fetched but unfortunately it is much more common than people think. You can read more about the invasive methods of these black magicians and false shamans in my essays "Vampires Suck!" and "Sham Shamans".

In any case, many problems can be avoided just by journeying exclusively from your own personal safe place, and by not revealing anything about your safe place or your own personal entrance to the Underworld to other people! There is no harm done in playing safe. In your car you also put on your seat belt, instead of denying the possibility of an accident. Playing safe is not negative thinking, it is wisdom! Having your own private safe place to journey from is your first line of defence and makes your journeys more powerful and enjoyable as an added bonus.

How to Find Your Safe Place
Your safe place will be uniquely yours and completely private, because you yourself will build and design it! If you have never worked with a safe place, but wish to journey, then you should go ahead and create one. First think of a place where the Earth is beautiful, a wonderful serene place in nature where you would feel completely safe. But do not choose an actual place from physical reality. Do not make your garden or Stonehenge or your favourite place in the woods into your safe place, simply because these are still public places that other people have access to. All kind of unwanted vibrations and forces could get into your inner worlds if you choose such a place is your safe place.

Instead, in your mind make up a natural place of pristine beauty, a place where the Earth loves herself. In the Otherworld whatever you think materialises. So when you make this place up in your mind and do it vividly enough, it becomes real. The more often you use your safe place the more real it will become and the more powerful as well. Here you can meet your guides, your Higher Self, your power animals and other helpers in total privacy and total confidence. Gods and Goddesses that you love and worship can have access to this safe place as well.

Make your safe place as beautiful as you can. Create a place that gives you a feeling of total safety. The safe place can take many forms and is only limited by your imagination. It could be a cave, a mountain top, a clearing in the forest, a beautiful meadow with wild flowers, or as serene place by a lake or ocean shore. As long as it makes you feel safe and happy it is good. And of course, it must not be a physical reality place or it won't be totally safe and private!

How to Get There and Back
The first time you visit there is when you create this place. You create your safe place by visualising it and making it real by opening all your senses in this safe place. Look at the sights, hear the sounds, touch something and really feel its texture, even smell the scent in the air. After that initial visit each time you want to go to your safe place, all you have to do is think of it and relax your body enough that you fade from the world of matter and cross over to the world of spirit. Your intent of going to your safe place and the memory of how it looks and feels will guide you. Use whatever relaxation method works best with you, or simply count yourself down from five to one, as quickly or slowly as you feel is right for you. In time you will be able to go to your safe place very quickly. Once there, open your senses, as described above. Make this a regular practice because it reinforces your safe place. When you have finished your journey or meditation and want to return to the world of matter, just count yourself up again while thinking of physical reality and your physical body!

Making It Real
Every time you go to your safe place spend some time to open your senses. Explore and look around in your safe place. You can plant certain herbs and flowers that you like. You can add on to it each time and make it more beautiful. Pick the cherries or take a swim in your pond if you have one. By spending some time in your safe place and making it more real it becomes more solid on the astral. In time it will accumulate power.

You can invite your power animals, power plants, your Higher Self, your guides and the Gods and Goddesses that you love and serve into your safe place. You shouldn't take anybody else there, not your healing clients, nor your friends, and certainly never any unknown animals or beings. Only power animals and power plants that you are 100% sure of should be allowed in your safe place. Never let any other beings follow you from the Underworld into your safe place!

Journeying from Your Safe Place
In your safe place you will find at least one, maybe several openings in the ground that lead down to your personal Underworld. You should be exploring them to find out where exactly the different entrances to the Underworld go. They may come out in different regions of your Underworld. From here you can access the Middle World safely or journey to the Upper World. And you can also create connections to Other Worlds that you frequently visits, such as the Faerie Realm. Once you have retrieved a power animal, you can meet it in your Underworld whenever you journey. Alternatively, you can already call your power animals too you while still in your safe place. Once you have brought an animal there it will always have access to your safe place. From your safe place there should be paths to various other places in the Otherworld. In time you will get to know your way around in your safe place and the adjacent areas.

A Word of Caution
You can journey to the Middle World and the Upper World from your safe place as well. You may already have your own methods of going to of those places. I have heard some very contradicting methods of reaching the Upper World in particular. I will not go into this in detail here but will say that much: if you have learned your method of journeying from a skilled, experienced and ethical shaman, and it works for you, stick to it. If your teacher however is one of the black sheep among shamans, then it is best if you -- besides breaking all contact -- completely change your journeying methods so that this person cannot get into your inner worlds any more.

After I had contact with such an unethical and abusive sorcerer, I completely changed all my journeying methods and the way I do my shamanic work. This was necessary both as part of the tie cutting with that person and to keep him out of my private space. It is for this reason that I am not giving exact instructions on how to go to the Upper World or Middle World. I have developed my own methods, and will keep those to myself. Once burned, twice shy! I am wiser now and therefore I am not sharing everything any more.

Keeping it Safe
Your personal safe place will soon become a place of inspiration, power and beauty. Do not let anybody defile it! Keep it private and don't disclose its secrets, and you will enjoy it more and more with every visit. It will grow in power and become even more beautiful. Should it ever become compromised or invaded you must create a new safe place. But it is best to not let this happen in the first place.

Your safe place changes with you as you grow spiritually. It can be your own private resort, a place to recharge and a wonderful place to spend time in. Your safe place is the meeting ground for all your allies and your personal deities. It is your personal place of power and simply the best and safest place to start your journeys and meditations from. Keep it safe and enjoy journeying!

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