Spiritual Alchemy

Visit Iona Miller’s collected works of alchemy SuperPortal 2008
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Working Through Depression with Alchemy

by Iona Miller, 2/2008

"Right at the beginning you meet the dragon, the chthonic spirit, the devil or, as the alchemists called it, the blackness, the nigredo, and this encounter produces suffering..." ~ Carl Jung

"I am an infirm and weak old man, surnamed the dragon; therefore am I shut up in a cave, that I may become ransomed by the kingly crown...A fiery sword inflicts great torments on me; death makes weak my flesh and bones...My soul and my spirit depart; a terrible poison, I am likened to the black raven, for that is the wages of sin; in dust and earth I lie, that out of Three may come One. O soul and spirit leave me not, that I may see again the light of day, and the hero of peace whom the whole world shall behold may arise from me..." ~ Aurelia Occulta Philosophorum

THE GREAT WORK

Alchemy is the Great Work, a process of separation, transformation and integration. This is just as true of the substances worked experimentally in the retort as it is of the personality undergoing the transformative process.

Alchemy is an accelerated pathway to self-mastery, to self-realization. It is an alternative, pre-scientific spiritual and philosophical interpretation of life, encompassing its physical, emotional and mental aspects. It is an elegant worldview still relevant in contemporary life. There are many ways to articulate the dynamic process.

The old paradigm was hierarchical; the new paradigm is transformative. In the first, we search for order and security outside ourselves. A confining belief system is the greatest hindrance. In the later, we seek inner wisdom and wholeness, freeing ourselves from external control. It is the paradigm of synthesis and integration. Transformation from within leads to freedom from dependency on the power brokers of hierarchy.

You are the alchemical vessel and the contents of your psyche is the means and object of transformation. The dragon is your own unrealized infinite potential. There are deeper dimensions of soul and spirit beyond ego gratification. Active evocation of the imagination reveals your invisible depths. Understanding of your own essence, unmediated by hierarchy, is like a beacon that draws you into an even deeper connection with the sacred.

Psychologically, the dragon is union of ordinary human reality with the potential of the Transpersonal Self and the passion for transformation. It is a symbol of DNA and/or the kundalini energy. This symbol of the Great Work represents the Anima Mundi, or Soul of the World, which is the sum total of planetary existence, the holographic blueprint of all being.

Medicine confering the gift of youth can be made from its venom, so the dragon is a healing power. This spiritual food of immortality signifies that the ego assimilates the previously unconscious aspects of the Self. This elixir of youth creates the immortal body, equivalent to the Philosopher's Stone, the Adept whose lightbody feeds on the nuclear core of creation.

As the images and substances change, you change too. You connect with your divine intelligence, your essential nature. The character of your life can supercede even genetic predispositions. The sense of security and belonging of the old paradigm, based in inadequacy and insecurity, is transformed to a unifying vision. You realize you can access your divine essence directly. Alchemy begins working when you design your life on sacred principles.