Power Spots

Within traditional religious thought as well as occult spirituality, different physical locations are believed to be holy sites because they possess an access to spiritual energy. Common sacred sites include many mountains, caves, springs, and the locations of unusual natural phenomena. This concept of power spots has received special emphasis in the contemporary occult community through the New Age movement. Recognized power spots are places that intensify whatever people bring to them, so that spending even short periods of time in them can lead to spiritual transformation.

The modern theory of power spots can be traced to the literature of the 1920s on the old monolithic culture in Great Britain that erected many stone monuments, of which Stonehenge is the most notable. In 1925 Alfred Watkins proposed that a system of straight lines, which he called "ley" lines, could be traced across England and from there to other parts of the world, and that these lines were aligned with the sun and various star clusters. This idea was expanded by later writers to suggest that the lines, which tended to cross at the sites of ancient pagan temples, manifested psychic energy. These writers compared the lines with the acupuncture meridians believed to crisscross the human body and hypothesized that ancient peoples intuitively chose the points where ley lines crossed as places to build their holy shrines. Archaeological evidence has proved that some straight paths actually exist, and, apart from any speculations about psychic energy, modern research has shown that magnetic forces surround the Earth relative to its magnetic pole. Published maps show those lines of forces as well as spots of strong deviation from the norm, which has led to the designation of new power points such as Sedona, Arizona, which is believed to be home to four power spots.

Power spots tend to be sites of striking natural beauty (such as Mount Shasta, in northern California), ancient holy sites (such as the Egyptian pyramids, or the Incan temple in Machu Picchu, Peru), and unexplained human constructions (such as the massive earth drawings on the plains of Nasca in Peru, which many believe were built to guide UFO landings). Such sites have become the object of pilgrimages.

Sources:

Corbett, Cynthia L. Power Trips. Santa Fe, N.Mex.: Timewindow Publications, 1988.

Sutphen, Dick. Sedona: Psychic Energy Vortexes. Malibu, Calif.: Valley of the Sun Publishing, 1986.