Arzua:
Keynote: Vulnerability
Allowing yourself to be taken care of and supported in moments of vulnerability.

The group of five that I was traveling with was nearing the end of the trail. Suddenly the stresses of the outside world were all starting to reappear and weigh on us. I was in a particularly anxious place and one of my friends spent the afternoon sitting on our bunks in the aubergue talking to me and generally supporting me through the crisis of all that had happened the days before, and all of the unknowns that awaited me when I returned home. It is very hard for me to practice this skill of allowing people to be there for me in my messiest emotional states, but on the trail I was reminded that vulnerability is a great bonding force and brings us closer to the ones we love.

Lavacolla:
Keynote: Cleansing
Helping your body clear its emotional field of any clutter that remains from past and finished energetic work.

Spiritual work is hard to do. Sometimes you have to get dirty emotionally and in my case, physically, to get it done.

The river Lavacolla outside of Santiago was traditionally the place that medieval pilgrims washed themselves before they walked into Santiago. For this reason the Flowers collected around this spot are about cleansing. My group did this by playing along the riverbank. A few of the brave boys even tried their hand at modern dance in the riverside meadow. It was such an apt way to cleanse before the walk to the end.

Santiago:
Keynote: Integrity
For the moments when you experience false endings, created by our culture or society when the internal journey is still ongoing.

This essence was a particularly clear one for me, as the arrival into the famed city of Santiago was clearly not the end of my journey. I had always known that I would still have 100km left of walking until the end of the land and the beginning of the sea at Fisterra. The energy of the city and in particular the pilgrim office at the cathedral was one of conclusion. Groups were jubilant with the sense of accomplishment, but I was still itching to dive into the last few days of walking. It was a challenge to keep the momentum of my own journey alive as many people around me had settled into their endings.

Fisterra:
Keynote: Birth
Help to support all the energetic and physical systems of the body through a transition where the soul is at the end of a long process of laying down a major paradigm of this or many lifetimes.
This is the final essence in the collection. It was made from Flowers collected on the last day, leading up to the arrival at the final 0km marker, the lighthouse, and the sea itself. This Essence is really more than just about the physical end of the trail. It is about how we take care of ourselves after a major shift in our lives has occurred. It’s about how we integrate the information we have gathered and find the next path forward. This Essence is about how you go forward when your life has changed completely from the inside out, how you reintegrate this new way of being, this new lightness into the old structures of your life that still remain. Its about how you find the courage and discernment to take these changes from your internal world and make external world shifts. The process of walking the trail was one of closing a large chapter in my life. It was a letting go of major thoughtforms and patterns which did not serve me. It was a deep shift at the root of myself. I needed help to not totally spin out of my body with this shift. This Essence is there to ground and support the soul and the body as it becomes a newly evolved version of itself and finds the next trail that is even more authentic than the last.