The Taoist view is that Tao, although named, is unnameable. Matter, space, time, form, and the experience of consciousness is considered to be real in only a relative sense. This can disconcert those who hear in the Taoist message a suggestion that everything is non-existent. Obsidian Essence is a modern teaching with origins in Taoist spiritual development.
The essence of black obsidian
Mystically, essence is experienced as the vibration of truth in it's purest original manifestation, free of samsaric distortion.
Obsidian is named for Obsius, who was the first person to bring obsidian to Rome from Ethiopia. It forms in a variety of colors, the most common color being black. Obsidian is formed when a volcanic explosion releases most of the water vapor and gasses prior to the lava flowing out. When the water content of lava is one percent or less it becomes very viscous and solidifies extremely rapidly preventing the growth of crystals. As a result, obsidian has no crystalline structure and is considered a glass and not a mineral.
It is associated with grounding, protection, the cycle of birth, death, and rebirth, the underworld and afterlife, and regeneration.
Obsidian can support scrying, divination, and reflection. It can help in accepting responsibility for both past and present actions and decisions, and in dealing with the consequences of such decisions. It can reveal what has been hidden, drawing out the underlying reason for stress and tension, bringing up imbalances and shadows into the light, and magnifying negative energies so that they can be dealt with at a real level and remedied, rather than being glossed over when only dealing with the symptoms.
It can heal mental, emotional, and spiritual issues. It supports grounding, centering, strength, power, and resilience. It can block negativity and cultivate self-control. Obsidian can also aid in deepening the journey into the subconscious, helping to face the true self, and discover the inner mysteries. It can be used as an entrance to the labyrinth at the beginning of meditation. It blocks negative energy and can increase invisibility for protection. It can enhance keen vision, dispelling negative spirits and energies, and releasing issues from the past. It can support vision questing, prophetic dreaming, and increasing calmness, security, and stability.
Obsidian shards have been used as sharp cutting tools and obsidian is associated with enhanced intelligence and precision of mental discrimination.
Obsidian is also associated with the planets Saturn and Pluto. Obsidian’s influences from Saturn evoke authority, transitions, construction, creation, manifestation, observation, and perseverance. From Pluto obsidian is associated with the deep psyche, reflection, regeneration, death, and rebirth.
The essence of obsidian in many ways evokes Tao and the qualities of reality encountered in the practise of Taoist inner alchemy.
Hui-tzu then said to Chuang-tzu, "I have a gigantic tree, but its trunk is too gnarled for the plumb line and its branches too twisted for the ruler: even if it were set in the middle of the road, carpenters would pay no attention to it. Now what you say is grandiose but useless, rejected by everyone alike."
Chuang-tzu replied, "Have you not seen a wildcat? It lowers itself close to the ground to watch for careless prey; it leaps this way and that, high and low, but then gets caught in a trap and dies. A yak, on the other hand, is enormous, it can do big things but cannot catch a rat. Now you have a huge tree and worry that it is useless: why not plant it in the vast plain of the homeland of Nothing Whatsoever, roaming in effortlessness by its side and sleeping in freedom beneath it? The reason it does not fall to the axe, and no one injures it, is that it cannot be exploited. So what's the trouble?"