The Origins of Subtle Seed Prayer Beads
The idea to make Prayer Beads began to take form deep in my meditations during A Heart of Service Shamanic Training with Bloom Post. In this training, Bloom helped me and the other participants to develop and nurture our "Shamanic Toolbox"- an assortment of practices and aids (both physical and metaphysical) to support us on our healing journeys.
She always gave the comforting reminder that, "whatever you see is perfect". This truth of healing work has resonated deeply with me and given me the confidence to pursue my path no matter how different it may look from others around me. As a Libra and a highly sensitive person, I have always sought outside reassurance that I am "doing it right". I look to those around me to guide my practice and tell me if I am heading in the wrong direction. When I am too shy to ask for feedback, I simply file away my idea and assume it won't be worth anyone's time. While I am lucky to have truly loving people who give me the best, most honest advice that they can, I have often allowed outside perspectives to take me away from a path that is uniquely and wholy my own.
The Heart of Service Shamanic Training gave me the biggest gift I could ever ask for my practice. It gave me permission to have confidence in my weird way of offering healing to the world. I sat in circle with women that both humbled me and accepted me. They openly received the ideas that I have shut away and felt the most shy about. They validated and intiated me as a healer- not into a shared tradition, but into one that is actually my own.
In this context, I suddenly found myself wanting a rosary. I would be in meditation and hear the call, "You should make yourself some prayer beads. Something like a rosary, but different." After a few weeks of consideration and procrastination, I sat down with an old bag of beads and started stringing. I found a bead that represented Earth energy to me, seven beads for each main Chakra, and a final bead that represented the realms, or the Heavens above.
The first time I ran these beads through my thumb and forefingers, guiding my active mind to stay in a Chakra meditation- I knew I had to make more. I thought of my friends and family who, like me, sought to connect with their personal divinity through meditation. We all shared in a struggle to keep a constantly distracted mind focused. In the Prayer Beads I saw a guide. A gentle reminder to my wandering mind of where I wanted my attention to be.
