Let me see ... which essence shall I start with? One of the five elements or one of the specials?’, I asked one of the elemental beings. ‘The one with the crystals’, he replied firmly. I wasn’t prepared for that answer. Crystals definitely weren’t on my list.

Soon enough it turned out that this elemental being would only help me with the preparations of this first essence. He introduced himself as ‘Jurrian, professor of the stones’. He was a crystal being.

In the meantime my brain was working overtime. How to create this essence? Jurrian remained silent on the matter. To me, it felt like one big test. I went through a thousand and one ideas. All thousand and one were dismissed by Jurrian. He kept on shaking his head with a deep and long-drawn sigh. All of a sudden a mandala caught my eye. This particular mandala is made up of crystals en semi-precious stones. It’s in my living room and it’s purpose is to create a vortex. A place especially for the elemental beings to unwind and re-energize. That had to be it; Eureka. ‘Jurrian, do I have to create a crystal mandala?’ A smile broke across his face. Yes, I passed the first test. I was ecstatic, not knowing that he had many tests for me in store still. ‘Okay, how to proceed further, Jurrian? Can I use all of my crystals and semi-precious stones?’ As I received an education in crystal healing, I had been collecting many crystals over the years. I looked in every nook and cranny. I carefully checked with Jurrian which stones I should use and which not. Overzealous I went about the creation of the mandala. It was my profound belief (maybe with a touch of arrogance) that I intuitively knew where to put every single stone. Finally I finished creating the mandala. I thought the mandala looked stunning. It’s power was mind-blowing. I took some photos and was quite delighted with myself. A few days later I was admiring the mandala, while sitting on the floor. All of a sudden Jurrian stood beside me completely outraged. ‘It’s all wrong.’ He was rampaging like a toddler throwing a tantrum. I was completely taken aback. How could this have happened? I went about creating the mandala so carefully. My first co-creation with elemental beings and now this happened. I was deeply disheartened. ‘Everything has to change’, Jurrian said annoyed. Dumbfoundly I removed all the stones. ‘I am so terribly sorry Jurrian’, I muttered. ‘We checked the stones already. They are okay, aren’t they? Or do I have to add or replace some?’ Jurrian calmed down a bit and together we sorted out the stones one by one. The first stone, had to be placed right in the middle. It struck me as odd. It was my own master crystal, received a long time ago during an initiation. This master crystal is a beautiful Dow crystal. A so-called Transmitter-Channeling crystal. Because I couldn’t see the bigger picture yet, at that very moment, I simply didn’t understand  why it had to sit in the very centre of the mandala. But, hey, who was I to question Jurrian. After an hour the mandala was ready. Yep, this one was perfect. The energy was softer and more harmonious, yet enormously powerful. The mandala was made up of a hundred and ten stones. Because I thought this number was special, I looked it up on the internet. It was called the ‘Harshad’ number. In Sanskrit it means ‘giver of joy’. ‘Now, that’s a great start’, I said to myself. 

The mandala was nearly one meter in diameter and lay on a big piece of paper made of nine A4 pieces of paper glued together.

A couple of days later Mimi was on my doorstep. She couldn’t wait to drool over the mandala. Enthousiastically she walked up the stairs towards my living room. Unfortunately I didn’t count on my dog. He was equally enthousiatic. Not about the  mandala, but about Mimi instead. He rushed up the stairs right behind Mimi. While Mimi stood still before the mandala, my dog was still at full throttle. He tried to stop, but slipped on the paper. What followed next was an eerie shriek that escaped my mouth. At the same time I covered my face with my hands. What seem to be unavoidable, was too much for my delicate constitution. Eventually I chose curiosity (or was it fatalism) over fear. I noticed the piece of paper had shifted about twenty five degrees. Miraculously only four stones weren’t in their place anymore. How was that possible? In a single moment I realized that Jurrian had used my dog to make clear to me what happens energetically when the stones weren’t properly in their right place. A teeny-weeny difference (a couple of stones that weren’t in place anymore), nearly neglectable you could say, had a tremendous impact. The whole mandala had been thrown off balance by twenty five degrees. For all that matter, you could be in a parallel dimension. Well, I can tell you, that really hit home.

The next obstacle would be the transportation of this mandala. The whole mandala, so Jurrian told me, had to be placed on the biggest ley line centre in Holland. It turned out to be in a grave yard in Oosterland. To give the mandala a better support, I had made a circular piece of mdf wood of one meter in diameter. A piece of wood this size, would it fit in a car anyway? It had to be in a horizontal position as well because of all the stones on it. ‘How could we transport the mandala, without shifting anything, from our hotel to the grave yard?’ Experience proved that co-creating with elemental beings was a very tricky business. I could already picture it. Walking in the middle of the night (the essence had to be created at 04.29 hrs.) through the village towards the grave yard. Juggling  like a third rank circus artist who tried to balance an oversized wooden plate in the air. And shortly after that trying to hold a torch light in my mouth to put all the hundred and ten stones back on the plate.

Meanwhile I had learned from Jurrian that the master crystal had stored all the ethereal information of the mandala. The crystal then sprays this information like a fountain onto the surroundings. With this knowledge I took the bold step of asking Jurrian whether it was possible to only take the master crystal instead. After all, this crystal contained all the information of the other crystals and semi-precious stones. I listened carefully and couldn’t believe my ears. To be totally sure, I got my pendulum out: the answer was yes. This really was fantastic.

In order to map out the surroundings, Mimi and I travelled to Oosterland a couple of weeks prior to the exact date of creating the essence. In this way we could meet the owner of the bed and breakfast where we would spend the night. We wanted to check her reaction how she felt about our walk at that ungodly hour. She welcomed us as if we were queens. She listened to the story of our nocturnal outing as if it was the most normal thing in the world. The owner of the bed and breakfast – as well as the whole town – were aware of the existence of ley lines. She would simply give us the key to the front door. We then walked over to the beautifully restored tufa church, built in the first halve of the twelfth century. The church was surrounded by the grave yard that was full of blossoming flowers. Both were maintained with love. Unfortunately the church was closed. But after a while we heard voices inside. We knocked on the door and somebody opened it. Several people were busy setting up an art exhibition. We were more than welcome to have a look around. The church’s ceiling was covered in a huge painting of archangel Michael, painted by a Haarlem painter (what a coincidence). Of course, I thought, the Michael ley line ran right through this place all the way to Archangelsk in Russia. What a great affirmation. It totally fitted that we had to be here.

The day arrived that we had to create the first essence. It was so exciting. Normally I am a total neurotic when it comes to sleeping in a strange bed. But this particular night I slept like a log. Later on it turned out that the bed and breakfast was situated on a ley line. At four o’clock the alarm clock went off. From our window we could see the church and the grave yard. It would only take three minutes to get there. Handy enough in the middle of the night. Armed to the teeth with the crystal, a glass bowl, water, alcohol, a funnel, a torch light, an audio recorder and pen and paper, we went off. Mimi started to tone very softly. Just imagine that one of the residents could hear us. Two ladies in the dead of the night, singing in a grave yard. They would have phoned the mental health association for our removal. The previous evening the weather had been pretty wild. Now, only a couple of hours later, the weather was very calm. The temperature was modest. We sat on a wooden bench and we felt we were welcomed for the third time. This time the cosmos gave us a present: a deep black sky with innumerable twinkling stars.

I tuned in to the elemental beings and welcomed every one that served the divine plan and who would help co-creating this essence. Little by little it became clear what the essence was about. So many elemental beings were present. Around six o’clock this first essence was ready. The ethereal information that had been stored in the master crystal had flown effortless into the ley lines. Mother Earth, in turn, had passed her unconditional love via the ley lines onto the master crystal. What a wonderful exchange. Despite all the preparations, obstacles, the somewhat strange place and the nightly hour, this went down really well.

Six days later Mimi and I set about co-creating essence number two.