From the Hanging Gardens of Babylon to the Pharos Lighthouse of Alexandria, the pyramids of Egypt are the only one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World that still remain intact. After thousands of years, these massive man-made structures also still remain shrouded in mystery.
From composite pictures drawn by archaeologists, scholars, and historians, we now understand that these colossal constructions were monuments to death—temples built of stone and filled with treasures to provide a luxurious dwelling place for nobility who had entered the realm of existence called the afterlife.
The dead could not necessarily take their riches with them into this mystical next world, but ancient Egyptians of nobility believed that they could come back and enjoy the treasures they had accumulated in this world if their possessions were carefully placed inside the tomb. They also believed at first that entrance into the afterlife was granted only to those of nobility. And this afterlife could be achieved only if the body were preserved so the soul could return to it. The culture developed a sophisticated and successful method of preserving bodies called mummification. Positioning of the body was important, too. The mummified bodies were placed under the exact center of the pyramid. And the pyramids were constructed on the west side of the Nile River because the Egyptians believed that the dwelling place of the deceased was in the direction of the setting sun.
It is said that people love a great mystery. That term—“great mystery”—aptly describes the Great Pyramids of Giza. Although they are a wonder of the ancient world, they are the physical embodiment of the word “mystery” in contemporary culture.
How this ancient civilization constructed these mammoth structures has caused much speculation and remains an enigma. Over two million stone blocks, each weighing about two and a half tons, were transported and carefully positioned to build King Khufu’s pyramid alone—the largest of the three pyramids of Giza. Were the pyramids the result of much grunting, groaning, and primitive manual labor? Or were they constructed, as some people speculate, using innovative methods and tools that have since disappeared but, if rediscovered, would rival space-age technology?
When these pyramids were constructed now puzzles some historians and archaeologists. While many experts have surmised and long agreed that the pyramids of Giza date back to about forty-three hundred years ago, other scholars such as Joseph Jochmans are now stirring the historical and archaeological pot by suggesting that these mysterious monuments may have been built as long as twelve thousand years ago.
Although many puzzling aspects surround the “how,” “when,” and even the “why” of these pyramids, the ultimate mystery of these colossal tombs is the aspect perhaps least discussed by historians and most cloaked in legend. It is the secret surrounding the supernatural powers the pyramids are said to possess. The Great Pyramids of Giza may have been a gateway to the afterworld at the time they were constructed to entomb pharaohs Khufu, Khafre, and Menkure. But many of the millions of tourists who flock annually to Giza—despite threats of terrorism and war—and many local inhabitants, like Essam, believe that these pyramids are now, more than ever, a cabalistic portal—a gateway where passers-by can touch the edges of a world unknown.
My guide for this long-awaited expedition to get these special powers was again Essam’s seventeen-year-old nephew. He explained the mystery of the pyramids differently while we were horseback riding to get there. It was mid-afternoon. We had just scaled the side of a rocky hill. Now we were passing through a desert graveyard, the local burial ground for those not of noble birth.
“It’s better to be buried in a pyramid,” the young guide said, pointing to the dusty graves. “Otherwise the wind blows the sand away and robbers steal all the treasures.”
Essam had been talking to me about going into the pyramids to meditate since the night we first met. I didn’t understand what he meant about “getting the powers.” Nor did I especially believe him. But I had followed his strict instructions anyway. I had my four small white candles in my backpack. I was dressed in white. And to my great embarrassment, I was wearing a white cotton cloth on my head, held in place by a woven green band.
I had argued with Essam about wearing this kerchief on my head, but he had insisted. “If you want to get the special powers, you must wear that white cloth,” he said.
Grumbling all the while, I had purchased the white head covering from one of the young merchants hawking his wares on the path that led from the perfume store to the pyramids. It cost two dollars and fifty cents.
Riding the horse across the desert, headed for one of the smaller step pyramids, I felt more like a cheap tourist imitation of an Arab sheik than I did an enlightened woman on her way to becoming empowered.
I knew there was something special about the pyramids. I felt it my first night in Cairo, when I had been drawn to them. I felt it even when that menacing group of men made a run at me by the fence. I felt the powers of the pyramids each time I came close to them during my stay here. Their influence on the village of Giza was undeniable.
But I had never particularly fantasized about going into a burial tomb to meditate—even one of these colossal stone monuments. I didn’t understand what mysterious powers could possibly be inside the pyramids or how these powers could possibly affect me. Although I liked, respected, and trusted Essam, I secretly thought this whole ordeal of going into the pyramids and “getting the powers” was a tourist gimmick.
If there’s so much power here, why are so many people living in poverty? Why are the women so trapped? And why do these people drive the way they do?
I was skeptical. I was skeptical about the “special pyramid powers.” I was skeptical about crawling around inside a tomb. And I was skeptical about wearing this stupid white rag on my head.
After clearing the mountainside and the graveyard, I loosened my hold on the reins, nudged the horse with my heels, and began galloping across the stretch of desert that separated me from the pyramids. I was still baffled by how quickly I had taken to horseback riding. But I didn’t question that mystery. It was as if I had been riding horses all my life.
The ability to break through a barrier or block in one moment and begin doing something that in the past appeared unfathomable was awe-inspiring, yet I almost took it for granted. If people could do that, I thought, they could do almost anything. It’s about our perception, our fears, and the limitations we place on ourselves.
When we neared the Great Pyramids, my guide pointed to one of the smaller pyramids that stood at the edge of the three large ones. The smaller pyramids were the burial tombs for the queens and relatives of the pharaohs, he said. We were headed there.
We rode to a small hut that housed the pyramid guard. My guide took my horse’s reins and tied up both horses. Soon, a frowning bulk of sun-dried man emerged from the hut and approached me. He was wearing a uniform. He was the official pyramid guard. He would take me inside to meditate and get my powers.
Essam had prepared me for this. I knew I would have to pay off the guard for allowing me private entrance into the pyramid. Well, not really pay him off—I was to tip him. But Essam had instructed me not to pay the guard until after I finished meditating.
The guard led us on foot to the pyramid entrance—a small hole in the side of the pyramid. The guard asked if I was ready. I said yes and showed him my four white candles. The guard shook his head no. He had four white candles he wanted me to use. He said he wanted to be sure I got the powers.
And probably wants to be sure he gets a bigger tip, I thought.
“Okay,” I said. “We’ll use your candles.”
The bulky guard squeezed himself through the small opening in the side of the pyramid. I followed him, trying to climb in head first. That didn’t work. So I hoisted myself up and lowered myself in, feet first. In an instant, I went from blazing desert sunlight to the pitch-black interior of this tomb. We walked hunched over through a narrow passageway that was only about three feet high. My guide followed behind me. After a few moments, the guard in front of me stopped and lit one of the candles.
I looked around the musty, dank interior. The walls flickered with gentle light from the candle. The rock was crumbling. It was the palest shade of yellow, almost off-white in color.
We followed a circular trail leading to the heart of the tomb. After a while, we were able to stand almost straight. Then we came to a juncture. One passage led to the right, one veered to the left. We went left. After walking a short distance, we reached a dead end, a small womblike room in the center of the pyramid. The ground was littered with crumbling rock. A natural ledge about three feet off the ground encircled the area of this three-sided cubbyhole.
The guard dripped a few drops of candle wax onto the ledge from the candle he held in his hand, then stuck the candle firmly in place. Then he lit the remaining three candles, carefully positioning them equidistant apart on the ledge, creating a semicircle of light. I sat down on the ground, with my back to the dead-end wall of the small room, and adjusted the white kerchief on my head.
The pyramid guard and my guide wished me luck in getting the powers. Then they left me alone.
I sat on the floor of the tomb. This is ludicrous, I thought. What am I doing? Is this really how one finds enlightenment? It seemed more like the height of absurdity to me.
I didn’t know what to do next.
This wasn’t the first time my quest for enlightenment had left me feeling in the dark.
A year ago, on my journey through the western United States, I had wandered into a Native American sweat lodge in Sedona, Arizona. I understood that it was a sacred ritual symbolizing spiritual cleansing and purification. But that was all I understood. I dutifully and respectfully stood and allowed myself to be purified with sage smoke before I entered the tent. Then I climbed through the flap with the other participants. I watched as the fire keeper brought glowing hot rocks into the tent, placing them in an indentation in the ground. I could see that the rocks would create the heat that would make us sweat. But I wished I had an instruction manual.
I listened attentively, sweating, huddled in the tent, as the old Native American shaman began the ceremony with a prayer. My anxiety heightened as it became apparent that participants were expected to say something aloud. I wanted to fit into the rhythm of the experience. I wanted to get all I could out of it. I wanted to do it right.
Sweat dripped down my face. I leaned forward intently, hanging on every word the shaman uttered.
“And now we will honor the spirit of yeast,” she said, “who brings us . . .”
I lurched back. The spirit of yeast? I thought. What does that mean? My mind raced. I tried to figure out if we were honoring bread, or agriculture, and what I could say about that when it became my turn. I was thinking so hard I could barely listen. All the while, I struggled to act calm and enlightened.
I mumbled something when it became my time to speak.
“And now we will thank the spirit of the West,” the shaman said next.
Oh, I thought. The Spirit of the East. Now I get it.
On another occasion, I had gone to my doctor, a holistic healing professional, for almost two years before I understood what he was talking about. During that time, he had regularly referred to my “orc” field. I had no idea what he was saying. None whatsoever. I knew vaguely that he was talking about the energy that was part of me and that surrounded my physical body. The work with this healing professional had been profound. It had helped me greatly. So I didn’t question him about my “orc” field. I assumed it was some new discovery everyone but me knew. After almost two years, while I was reading a book, I finally understood. My doctor, my healer, had been talking about my “auric” field.
There were a lot of things about life that I just didn’t get. Sitting in this tomb on the edge of the Sahara Desert, I didn’t understand what I was supposed to do now. But, if sitting here with a kerchief on my head was going to help me get one inch closer to the missing piece, then I would try it. I really wanted to be enlightened. I really wanted “the powers”—if there were any special powers to be had.
I will do what I know to—meditate, I thought.
I looked around the area where I sat. I picked up a couple pieces of the light crumbling rock and held one stone in each hand.
I would begin by praying.
First, I said the Lord’s Prayer. “Our Father, who art in Heaven, hallowed be thy name. Thy Kingdom come, thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread, and forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil. For thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory, forever and ever.”
Next, I said the Ave Maria. “Hail Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with you. Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the fruit of your womb, Jesus. Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners now and at the hour of our death. Amen.”
Then, I did a Buddhist chant I had learned. “Om ah hung vara guru padme siddi hung. Om mani pami hung.”
There, I thought. I sat for a moment. I was a lot dustier. The candles had melted some. Other than that, nothing had changed. I felt exactly the same as I had before I entered this mystical pyramid.
I closed my eyes and tried to concentrate, but the droning voices of two people talking outside the cubbyhole distracted me. I wondered how much these people had paid for this enlightening experience.
“Shhhhh,” I said loudly. “I’m meditating.”
Next, I tried some less formal prayers. I prayed for the people I loved—my daughter, my son, my family and friends. I prayed for the people I resented. I finished with some prayers of gratitude, counting and expounding on my blessings.
Then I opened my eyes and looked around. Nothing was happening yet.
I reclined on the ground, using my backpack for a pillow. Now I would “breathe my chakras,” an exercise my holistic doctor had recently taught me. Chakras are thought to be the energy centers, or openings in the body. Deliberately envisioning them and breathing into them during meditation supposedly clears out residue and opens us to power.
I visualized breathing a spinning circle of color for each chakra, starting at the bottom, or root chakra, and working my way up to the crown. I started with red at the bottom, at the base of my spine. Then I envisioned an orange circle slightly below my belly button. Next, I saw a spinning yellow circle in my solar plexus, then green for the heart, blue in the throat, purple on my forehead, and white at the crown. I went up the body, then down the body, imagining the colorful circles rapidly spinning counterclockwise. I did this for ten or fifteen minutes with my eyes closed, breathing deeply.
I thought I started to see “The Light,” but when I opened my eyes, I saw it was just the flickering from the candle flames.
I still felt exactly the same as I had before entering this tomb.
Now I was out of things to do. I sat there, looking around, feeling stupid, watching the candles burn. I wished the two men would come back for me. I wished I wasn’t wearing this ridiculous hankie on my head. I wished I had a shisha with some tobacco in it now.
I felt as if I had failed.
I sat, and sat, and sat, waiting . . . for at least an hour. Nothing happened. Nothing was going to happen. I wanted to leave. “Help,” I began to yell softly. “Please come and get me.”
The guides appeared instantly at the entrance to the cubbyhole. “What took you so long?” I said.
“We were just sitting around the corner,” the guide said. “That was us talking. We were waiting for you.”
I grabbed my backpack and followed the two men out the narrow passageway, through the hole in the side of the pyramid, out into the bright light of the Sahara Desert. I tried to give the pyramid guard the amount of money Essam had recommended, but the guard made such a scowling face that I immediately gave him some more. Then my guide and I rode the horses back to the sandlot.
I dismounted, tipped the young man who had escorted me on my journey into enlightenment, and went to find Essam to say good-bye.
I was thirsty, dirty, dusty, and disheartened. I was also done for the day.
“Did you get the powers?” Essam asked earnestly.
“Yes,” I lied, “I did.”
What a crock, I thought, in the cab on the way back to my hotel. I have really and truly outdone myself this time.
When I returned to my hotel room, I flopped down on the bed and stared at the ceiling.
I felt cheapened, stupid, and betrayed—again.
I don’t know when it happened, but at some point I stopped thinking and began talking out loud.
“I don’t get it,” I said. “I absolutely and totally don’t get it. I am so sick of chasing the truth. I’m so sick of the pain on this basically uninhabitable planet. I’m sick of trying to make a life and failing. I’m sick of getting back up again each time, trying again, just to stumble and fail again. I’m sick of going through pain, then calling it a learning experience, only to have neither the pain nor the learning ever end. I’m sick of trying harder, doing better, and being someone I’m not. The whole thing is a crock.
“What’s the point?” I screamed at the ceiling. “Why do we have to come here if all of life is going to conspire against us to make it as hard as it can possibly be?”
Life hurt. I hurt. My spirit hurt. My emotions hurt. And my butt hurt from horseback riding.
I felt as though I’d been fighting the devil every step of the way.
“Oh, I can keep doing this,” I said aloud. “I can keep going through each disappointing experience. I can keep struggling. I always survive, don’t I? I’ve done it for almost forty-eight years. I’m a strong woman. I go through whatever it is I need to go through. And I do it like a trooper. Yup, that’s me. I’m so good at dealing with pain, disappointment, heartache, betrayal, and problems. I’ve learned how to be grateful for every bit of it. I’ve learned how to breathe into the pain. I’ve learned how to get through, get around, make the best of, transform, and even turn it into healing for other people. Yeah, I can do it. I’ve turned it into an art . . .
That’s what this is about, I thought suddenly. I got up off the bed and stood in the middle of my hotel room. “Eureka!” I said. “I’ve got it!”
I flashed back to the summer before this trip.
One day Nichole stopped by the house. She was going through a hard summer—that transition from being a child to an adult. She had been groveling around in emotional muck for months. That day, she was complaining about her pain—about all the pain in life.
“You ought to be happy,” I said. “Today’s Friday.”
She just stared at me. “Does your pain end on Fridays?” she said.
We listened to Janis Joplin belt out “Me and Bobby McGee” and “Get It While You Can” on the stereo, then Nichole told me the story of how she thought life really worked.
“My girlfriend Jen and I figured it out over lunch,” she explained. “There’s two kinds of people in this world: the pigs and the vampires. The pigs think they’re going to be happy when they buy a new home, get married, get a new car, or get a new job. They really believe those little things will stop the pain. And for them it does, kind of. They just go bowling, or they golf, and that’s enough. The vampires are different. They’ve been through some kind of tunnel, some kind of experience that’s really changed them. And it’s not that they’ve never come out. They just get changed by it. They know too much. They do all the same things pigs do. They get new cars, they move, they get married, they take new jobs. But they know that these things are never going to make them happy. They know that life is going to hurt sometimes, at least a little bit. And sometimes, it’s gonna hurt a lot.”
It took me a while to realize Nichole wasn’t using the word “vampires” the way I usually thought of that word. She wasn’t talking about werewolves, monsters, bloodsuckers, or human parasites. She was talking about pigs and vampires the way a college girl would talk about two football teams. They were just terms, or names, for people on the teams of life.
“It’s not that vampires are never happy,” Nichole said. “But they’re happy in a different way. They feel all their feelings. And sometimes they have moments of pure joy. But they know those moments aren’t forever. They move right on to the next feeling and experience.
“In some ways,” Nichole said, “the vampires are even happier than the pigs because vampires know how they really feel. They tell the truth and people like that. People like being around them, even though, for the most part, vampires’ lives suck. But they take the pain and they turn it into something more. They do something with it.”
I flashed back to a letter I had received from a young man I met on Christmas Day, the day I first saw the crescent moon and star in the sky.
He was in his early twenties. He and his mother were friends of a friend of mine. They had joined Nichole and me and our mutual friend for Christmas dinner. In the year past, this young man had almost died. Then he had made a decision to come back to life, a decision that made him and his mother happy.
“My dream is also to be a storyteller,” he wrote to me in a letter thanking me for the day. “I sometimes wonder if that’s why I survived—to give hack something of what I’ve learned. I hope that one of my purposes on this planet is to use the perspective gained from tragedy to illuminate life. I think it is in reaching out to the universe and deeply within ourselves that allows us to transcend these experiences. It is what allows us to turn tragedy into a life force for ourselves and others. It is what allows us to transcend surviving.”
I flashed back to the beginning of this trip in Paris, when I had whisked through the Museum of Man and the Louvre. That’s what that was all about, I thought. It was the setup, the kickoff, for this adventure. It led directly to today. It was all right there. I had seen the eternal themes of life on this planet—birth, family, health, marriage, religion, divination, and death—and the art that results from all the anguish and joy of those experiences—the rich and treasured art that fills the halls of the Louvre.
Evolution wasn’t something that may or may not have happened once, at the beginning of time. Our planet, the life and people on it, continually evolve. As we grind through each issue and theme, the work and art we create embody these experiences for the rest of the world. Our creations help us evolve, but our lives and our work help others evolve, too.
We’re not just here to live our lives and to create our art. We’re part of the art being created.
For a long, long time—somewhere in the back of my mind—lurked the codependent exhortation that if I really loved God and truly wanted to serve on this planet, I would force myself to take vows of chastity and poverty and live the lives of the people I served. Now, in the hotel room in Cairo, I began to see that’s exactly what many of us had been doing all along. We were having the range of human experiences and emotions of the people we would later serve.
Lives without pain, comedy, drama, irony, romance, suffering, some foolishness, and a dash of unrequited love would be like going to see a movie without a plot. It’s not that life is only pain, suffering, drama, and tragedy, but those elements are part of it. And always have been.
From the raw material of these experiences came the art we would create—the art of living our lives and the art we create in our work. So often the experiences I wanted to deny were the raw material that had been handed to me to shape and form into truth and into art. Nichole had been correct. This way of living and creating art involves speaking the truth. My new friend, the one who had written me a letter, had been correct too. This way of living, working, and approaching our lives allows us to transcend survival and martyrdom, and it illuminates the truth for others. It’s not the art of living happily ever after. It’s the art of learning to live joyfully.
It is the walk of the Christ.
I have a friend, a diva, an opera singer from the East Coast. Early on in her career, when she was a beautiful young woman, she resonated to the Mozart Requiem. Her instructor at the Juilliard School of Music, Leonard Bernstein, asked her then why such a young woman with a brilliant future was so interested in such a heavy work. She replied that she didn’t know, she just was. Over the years, she continued to sing. Then she married and gave birth to two beautiful sons. When her youngest son was twenty, he was killed in a motorcycle crash.
“Now I know why I was so passionate about the Requiem,” she said. “It was my destiny to sing that song from the depths of my soul. The problem was,” my diva friend said, “by the time I learned to sing the Requiem with passion and understanding, I was so embittered and broken-hearted I no longer wanted to sing.”
My diva friend told me another story about a composer who lived in another time. This composer considered himself a craftsman, someone who diligently worked at the job of composing music each day the way a shopkeeper goes to his store or a dressmaker fits and sews dresses.
The craftsman-composer had hit a wall with his creativity and his work. He was stuck. He couldn’t write a note. One day, while feeling tormented over his dilemma of not being able to write music, the composer opened his window. Outside, he heard three notes being played beautifully on a horn. The notes seemed to be coming from a barn nearby. Each day for days, when he opened the window, the composer heard these same three beautiful notes being played. Finally, the composer left his room and went in search of the origin of these three hauntingly beautiful sounds. He then discovered a young boy hiding in the barn playing a horn.
The composer talked to the boy for a while. He learned that the boy’s father beat the boy terribly and refused to let the boy play music. To avoid the daily beatings and have the freedom to play his horn, the boy hid in the barn and played the only three notes he knew.
The craftsman-composer went on to use these three beautiful notes as the inspiration and foundation for the next piece of music he would write—the lovely, lilting “Strauss Waltz” by Johann Strauss.
Some of us hear and learn to sing a wide range of emotional notes in our lives. Others learn to sing or play only a few. It doesn’t matter how many notes we’re called to sing. What matters is that we sing them the best, the purest, the finest we are able. When we do, our lives and work not only bring healing to the world, our work brings healing to ourselves.
In an afterword to the stories she told me, my diva friend told me something else. If we struggle and work to learn our craft of living and creating with emotional honesty and joy, we will train our voices and our souls to sing the final, high, resonating sound that is the purest note in the scale, the one divas work so hard to achieve.
It is the full, rich tone of peace.
In less than half an hour, in my hotel room in downtown Cairo, a lifetime of dissatisfaction had shown its grim face for what it was. It was as though a vortex had whirled through me, cleansing me of these dark remnants from my past.
These grim emotional secrets that had been buried in me were not necessarily news. I had lived with, through, and in spite of them for years. What was an innovative thought was that I could be healed, or freed, from these beliefs and emotions that had colored my vision and spirit for so long.
I wasn’t elated or euphoric. But my emotional state had spun around distinctly for the better. In the whirlwind that followed my excursion into the pyramid, my skepticism had dissipated. So had my contempt. In its place, I now felt excitement, a rush of joy, and a sense of purpose that had been missing for a long time.
Something had happened inside that mysterious tomb. There was a power there. I could feel and see it now. This journey, this grueling excursion, was leading someplace. It had a point. Even though it hadn’t felt as if anything was happening, something important and magnificent had been taking place all along.
Mysteries, secrets, ancient wisdom, and special powers had been buried in these tombs. Now this wisdom and these powers were being released. I had touched the edges of a world unknown.
The mystery of my life was being revealed.
UNTIL NOW, I HAD BEEN LIVING out of an unpacked suitcase in one room in a downtown Cairo hotel. I had been indecisive about how long I would stay in Cairo and exactly where I would go next. I had originally planned to finish my trip by flying to Greece and writing my book there—but that leg of the trip still hadn’t materialized.
Despite the language barriers, the unbearably chaotic traffic, the overcrowding, my great caution about the food, my lingering stomachache, and the large number of people who wanted gratuities whether or not they had performed a service, Cairo—and its suburb, Giza—had become my home.
I immediately decided what to do next. There are times and places of heightened and accelerated spiritual growth. I had just entered one.
I would stay in Egypt and write my book.
WHAT IS WRITTEN ON THAT piece of paper you’re hiding from me?” demanded the interrogator in Tel Aviv.
I sheepishly showed her the two words scrawled at the bottom of the sheet. “Vampire Art,” I said. “That’s all it says. It’s a note to myself.”
“I see,” my interrogator said.
“Open your computer,” she said. “I want to see what you’ve written in there.”
“I would gladly show you what’s in my computer,” I said. “But there’s nothing in there to show. I didn’t get around to writing. Something happened that changed my plans.”
She looked at me as if she didn’t believe what I had just said.
I began to stumble through the next part of my story. I didn’t completely understand the shift yet either—the one that had wrested me out of Egypt and propelled me into the interrogation first in Cairo and now here in Tel Aviv.
What I couldn’t yet explain was about to become clear.