The phoenix is a creature of mythology from the Ancient Egyptian, Greek, and Chinese traditions. He is a bird of fire: red, orange, and gold feathers, the image of the rising sun. Like the day itself, the phoenix burns out and is born again with the dawn. The image of a bird whose brilliance bursts into flames is reduced to ash, but from this death is continually reborn.
So much of our suffering arises from attachment. We resist letting go of what we have for fear we’ll never find it again. We fear if we make the leap for change, the fires of transformation will destroy us. Without the phoenix’s energy in our lives, we grasp at ashes and mourn the setting sun. If we were to bring the phoenix into ourselves, we would be able to see the never-ending rising of life. The change would become a rebirth. The fires of transformation would not destroy: they would only burn away what no longer serves us. We would not strangle our potential in a tangle of attachments and a life we are afraid to let go of. We could free ourselves to be our full selves.
Invite the spirit of the phoenix into your life. Know that you are free to change and grow, and you will yet keep the essence of your heart. Know that a moment of pain, an ending, a death, is also the opening for renewal. Know that you can release anything that’s holding you out of your full light. It is possible to change. It is possible to start again.
The energy of the phoenix brings us into a mindful awareness of the present moment where the past is burned away, the future is promised. We are alight here, now, as we are. We find the soul of peace within, we find the center which does not burn, we release the ashes of the past, and are reborn to the rising sun of a new life, a brighter self.
