Earth is the center of our ground of being. In Greek mythology, Gaia, Mother Earth, is the ancestral mother of all life. From her fertile womb, all life sprang and is interconnected. This energy is located in the pelvic region. Water is centered in the solar plexus or gut region of the body; our intuitions and emotions are energized here as our inner hydraulic cycle where our “moods” may surge, rise or fall. Air encompasses the energies of the chest and include the heart, throat and lungs; our voice, and personal expression are the “atmosphere” within us and come from here. Fire is the seat of our mind and energizes our thoughts; it is both receiver and transmitter and as such, is a channel to a higher cosmic awareness which may be experienced as a “flash of insight”.
In a philosophical sense,Earth is known as The Way; water, as the Water of Life that unifies the pairs of opposites; Fire is about light and purification and Air is symbolic of Truth. The sages of old saw man as a microcosmic realization of a larger cosmic consciousness. Each element, moving from the gross and heavier Earth up to the subtlest energy of the mind in Fire was seen as a process of purification that required concentrated effort on the part of each individual through inward contemplation and meditation.
With each element seen as rising up through the body, one dissolving into the other, the mind, intellect and sense of individual ego dissolve and gradually merge into a higher state of consciousness with the Cosmic Ego or ultimate reality where there is a realization of your oneness with God, the Supreme Spirit. The idea is that consciousness expands into knowledge of the one life and wisdom, truth and enlightenment are realized in the statement, “ I and the Father are One.”
It is a divine revelation of life eternal where the soul becomes one with God’s will.