In previous articles I’ve talked about the Familiar World and the Elemental World. Now it’s time for the Dragon World!

In mythology, dragons are powerful creatures, much bigger and more powerful than people. They can be symbols of impersonal energies, which may be outside or inside of us. How can we deal with these energies?

The story of Lludd and Llevelys in the Mabinogion tells of a plague caused by fighting dragons “The second plague was a shriek which came on every May-eve, over every hearth in the Island of Britain. And this went through people’s hearts, and so seared them, that the men lost their hue and their strength, and the women their children, and the young men and the maidens lost their senses, and all the animals and trees and the earth and the waters, were left barren.” King Lludd finds a way to make the dragons sleep, so they can be buried in the earth in Dinas Emrys, where they protect the kingdom. Later on, in another story, the young Merlin reveals the hiding place of the dragons.

Dragons in Us

The Dragon World corresponds to the level of true thought (or abstract thought) on the Diamond Mirror. This is a level of mind that we’re not usually aware of, although we sometimes see the results in a flow of inspiration, or in solving a difficult problem. A characteristic is the enthusiastic rush of energy from the dragon’s passing.

We need protection from the dragon’s power, which can be destructive, and within us there is a natural guard, a sentinel, which keeps us safe. We can leave food for the dragons on the threshold, and they can do us favours in return. It is also possible by carefully setting aside our own preoccupations to ride a dragon. This can be a symbol of mastery of impersonal energies.

Dealing with the Abstract

When I try to solve a difficult problem, I often start by working in the realm of association and meaning, perhaps reading about it, or talking it over with someone. Then sometime it helps if I leave it to the ‘subconscious’ to work on it. I might make a cup of tea, go for a walk, or sleep on it. Later on, I often find the solution is ready. I’m not really aware of the process itself.

An example of this problem-solving method was the way that the German chemist Kekulé worked out the structure of the benzene molecule. After thinking about it without success, its ring shape came to him after he had a dream of a snake seizing its own tail, the ancient symbol called the Ouroboros.

Poetic Inspiration

“… poetry is composed at the back of the mind; an unaccountable product of a trance in which the emotions of love, fear, anger, or grief are profoundly engaged, though at the same time powerfully disciplined.”
– Robert Graves in his Oxford Addresses on Poetry (1962)

In Welsh mythology, the inspiration of the bards is called awen. It’s described in The Book of Taliesin as proceeding mysteriously from a cauldron:

ban pan doeth peir
ogyrwen awen teir

“the three elements of inspiration that came, splendid, out of the cauldron”.

The word ‘peir’ (cauldron) can also mean ‘sovereign’ often with the broad meaning of God or the Divine. In either case, the mystery is that inspiration seems to come from the unseen realms.

Entering the Dragon World

I think it’s possible to be more aware of the dragon world by leaving behind our sense of ‘I’. This can happen in meditation, where we learn to step over a threshold. It’s like going through a gate that protects one world from another, so that the sense of ‘I’ doesn’t get overwhelmed by deeper processes, and deeper processes are not interfered with by the sense of ‘I’.

I’m sitting on the lakeshore in amongst the reeds. I want to listen to the reeds, so I sit there quietly and try to pay attention. As time goes by I become aware of something unusual going on – there is a sense of communication taking place, although it doesn’t feel like ‘me’ doing the communicating. I picture it as the spirit of the reeds talking directly with my spirit – some larger part of myself that I’m not normally aware of. It is communicating with the reed, and I am just picking up on the backwash of this exchange. It is quite frightening to feel that something is going on in me that I’m not in control of. It would be easy to switch off, or to let the fear take over, but I try to keep with the experience and just keep the awareness of that strange conversation that seems to be taking place.