“Entering the Mystery” by Dea Bozzo

There are moments in life that defy words, that can only be captured in an image and then there are moments in life that neither words nor images can capture and remain a mystery. Entering the sacred site of the oldest Neolithic temple Ggantija on the Island of Gozo in Malta, was one such moment of mystery.

On a cool May evening, myself and my two other co-facilitators started down the winding path to the 6,000-year-old temple, lit only by the light of the full moon and the small flashlight of our guide’s cell phone. Typically, by day this site is crawling with tourist but by night it’s open to private reservations only, made months in advanced. Apart from the one security guard off in the corner, the site was completely deserted.

“I’ll be back at 11” said our guide and then there were only the three of us.

We looked at each other, huddled in closer, and with a girlish giggle I said “now what we do?”

It’s not like we weren’t prepared, we had been planning for this for months, ever since we came together with the idea of running a Women’s Retreat in Malta : “Journey to the Divine Feminine Exploring sacred sites of Malta."

We purposefully chose this night, as we knew it would be a full moon and wanted to have a midnight meditation. What we didn’t know was how struck we would be by the enormity of standing in the shadows of one of the worlds most important and mysterious archaeological temple sites in the world.

The Ggantija temple is one of the biggest temples ever discovered, some of the megaliths exceed five metres in length and weigh over fifty tons. It is called the Ggantija temple after the myth that a culture of Giants once occupied Malta and were able to move such massive rocks. More interestingly to me, is the idea that it once was a place of worship, dedicated to the fertility Goddess. This is based on the numerous female figurines and statues found in the temple and the shape of the temple built to resemble the body of a woman.

So here we were, together agenda in hand, ceremony goodies packed - candles, sage, singing bowls, all the things you would normally bring to a midnight meditation at 6,000 years old temple. We were going to “go deep”! Instead the ancient temple walls brought out the giddiness and giggles of young girls. The heaviness of our agenda fell away along with the heaviness of our lives. We brought out our joy and playfulness. We stood with our arms wide open to the wind and allowed it to carry our giggles that echoed off the walls. It was our joy the site seemed to want.

I don’t know when it happened, maybe it was after we gave our laughter, our love, tears and our joy, that we laid our bodies down on the earth, the floor of this temple, and fell into a deep silence. Nothing needed, no words, no acts of ceremony, simply a return to our joy.
When our guide came back to lead us out, we tried numerous times to take a picture of the three of us, but the flash would not turn on, different cameras, different cell phones, same result, only the silhouettes of us in the shadows of the temple remained.

Dea Bozzo is passionate about living a life of truth, love and wonder. As a life coach, she's committed to serving women who share this same intention. Visit her website here.

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