Yesod: The ultimate drag queen

This post is the second in a series highlighting each sphere in the Tree of Life. For additional background on the Qabala, see Guided Meditation: Introduction to the Tree of Life, Learning Qabala through story, Learning Qabala: Where to start?, and Qabala is queer, and it isn’t even sneaky about it.

Yesod is the ninth sphere on the tree, sitting directly above Malkuth in the glyph. It synthetizes the powers that flow from the eight spheres above it into a digestible form for manifestation. Simply put, it makes reality possible, and is the final editor of all possibilities before they get to our plane. As such, there are a lot of impossible and untrue things in Yesod, which is why it’s the sphere of illusion.

As the Treasurehouse of Images that holds both the real and the imaginary, it’s easy to get caught up in illusions and believe them to be real, or to believe you have all the answers because you’ve made contact with something that feels true.

Illusions, however, are important. Imagination is important. Yesod can take us from understanding what things are to what things could be. Without imagination, there is no progress, no development, no evolution, because we lose our ability to adapt to change. (And as we struggle with major changes in our way of life right now, that ability to adapt is crucial.)

Further, to be a magickal practitioner you need an excellent imagination, because you must visualize that which you are trying to create so vividly that you can believe it to be real.

Because of these qualities, Yesod allows us to move beyond our perceived physical, mental, and emotional limitations.

What makes Yesod queer?

You can think of Yesod, the Treasurehouse of Images, as the universe’s clothes closet, with infinite possibilities. Yesod allows us to try on illusions and to bring them to life, just like drag artists do.

Taking that one step further: using our imagination to play with different looks and personae is one of the key parts of a queer discovery journey.

From a gender perspective, Yesod is quite wibbly-wobbly. It is the sphere associated with the moon and the unconscious, both concepts typically ascribed to the feminine, and yet the magical image for Yesod is that of a very strong, naked man, and its Hebrew name is masculine. Yesod also sits on the Pillar of Balance, which I like to call the nonbinary pillar because it’s between the “masculine” and “feminine” pillars. Yesod is the point on the Tree where all three pillars meet and bring their energy together before it becomes manifested.

Mixing lots of different kinds of energies and gender concepts together in the sphere of imagination makes Yesod queer AF.

Pathworking to experience Yesod

Below is a recording and text of a pathworking to help you experience Yesod. If you wish to subscribe to future pathworkings, you can do so on Soundcloud, Google Play, TuneIn, Stitcher, and Spotify.

Welcome to the Yesod pathworking, from Major Arqueerna. Please ensure you are seated comfortably and won’t be disturbed for the next ten minutes while you do this pathworking.

Close your eyes. Take three deep breaths, slowly, in and out. With each exhalation, let go any tension you find in your body.

Without opening your eyes, visualize the room around you. Now picture it filling with a gray mist, starting at the floor and working its way up to the ceiling, until the only thing you can see is grayness. As the mist dissipates, you find yourself standing on a small, wooden platform in a grassy field on a warm, summer night. You hear crickets and other insects chirping and smell damp greenery all around. Looking up, you see it’s a clear night with a beautiful, full moon.

Looking down, you see the platform you’re standing on is a wooden circle, about a meter in width. The circle is divided into quadrants painted olive, russet, citrine, and black. As you examine it, you realize it’s floating a few inches above the ground. And then it begins to rise higher. You decide to sit on the platform as it rises higher and higher into the sky. The field and its sounds and smells fade into the distance as you rise higher into the atmosphere. You can breathe normally and are unafraid of the height – the platform feels stable and secure.

You look up and notice there is a large, dark ring hanging in the air. You pass through it and suddenly the moon is much larger in the sky, much closer to you, as if you’ve just jumped many thousands of miles in an instant. The moon gets larger and larger and you feel yourself drawn to it, yearning to be on its surface. You can feel its pull upon the ocean tides, the ebb and flow of its energy, and you desire to be part of that energetic flow, to ride the waves.

Suddenly, a purple mist surrounds you, obscuring your view of the moon, and when it dissipates the platform and the moon have vanished, and you find yourself in a vast clothes closet, crammed full of every possible style of every possible article of clothing you could imagine.

A friendly voice greets you, and you look over the racks in front of you to see a very muscular, naked person smiling kindly at you. They have an illuminated crescent moon shape on their forehead, but are otherwise unadorned. “Welcome to the Treasurehouse of Images,” they say. “If my nakedness makes you uncomfortable, simply imagine whatever clothes you wish and I will wear them for you.”

(pause)

They lead you around the massive closet and you begin to realize it isn’t a closet at all, but a veritable mansion full of nothing but clothes, shoes, and accessories. And the selection is constantly shifting and changing! What seems to be a rack full of red formal gowns one second becomes a showcase of avant-garde neckties the next. A pile of top hats in various sizes and colors morphs into a display case of sparkly heels. It’s dizzying and overwhelming and tempting in equal measure. You can feel the shifts within you, rolling like tides all around you, an undulating rhythm you can feel deep inside, a feeling of desire.

Your host leads you to a wall-sized mirror and you look at your reflection. They bid you to see yourself, truly. What do you notice? What do you see?

(pause)

Now your host asks you to look at what you want to become, and you gasp as your image shifts. What do you look like now?

(pause)

Your image in the mirror vanishes and is replaced with a collection of various objects and symbols. Your host explains that these are all tools that can help you grow and develop into the person you want to become, but you cannot use them all at once. Examine the items shown in the mirror.

(pause)

Now choose one or two of the objects to take with you, and examine them closely.  (pause)  Your host may have something to say about your choices: listen.

(pause)

When you’ve finished talking, your host guides you to an elevator. You notice the floor of the elevator is the wooden platform you took to get here. They bid you farewell and you thank them for their guidance. You step into the elevator and the doors close. The night sky surrounds you. You think on your gifts as you zoom back through space, the moon appearing once more and growing smaller and smaller, then jumping to much smaller when you pass through the dark ring once again. You make a soft landing back on the field where you started and hear the insects buzzing all around you. You gaze at the moon one last time, whispering a thanks for the experiences you’ve had.

Eventually, the air around you begins to fill with a pearly-gray mist, until you can no longer see the field. When the mist dissipates, you find yourself seated comfortably once more. Take a deep breath, wiggle your fingers and your toes, and when you are ready, open your eyes.   

Thank you for listening to this pathworking from Major Arqueerna. If you enjoyed it, please take a moment to subscribe and share it with a friend. More content can be found at majorarqueerna.com.