1 00:00:00,000 --> 00:00:06,200 If you were to look at a map of all the different sacred places around the world, you would 2 00:00:06,200 --> 00:00:11,720 find that many of them are built along straight paths that sometimes circle the globe. 3 00:00:11,720 --> 00:00:16,820 Most scientists believe that these precise paths, called lay lines, are a striking but 4 00:00:16,820 --> 00:00:19,000 insignificant coincidence. 5 00:00:19,000 --> 00:00:22,820 Then there are others who believe that the placement of monuments along lay lines was 6 00:00:22,820 --> 00:00:33,660 a deliberate act by ancient mystics who could feel the Earth's secret energy. 7 00:00:33,660 --> 00:00:39,260 Imagine that the whole Earth is surrounded by a spider web of subtle energy currents. 8 00:00:39,260 --> 00:00:47,000 It can't be seen, felt, tasted, but the whole Earth is surrounded by these invisible force 9 00:00:47,000 --> 00:00:48,940 field lines. 10 00:00:48,940 --> 00:00:51,060 Those are lay lines. 11 00:00:51,060 --> 00:00:56,340 In 1921, photographer Alfred Watkins made a startling observation from atop a hill 12 00:00:56,340 --> 00:00:58,220 in Hertfordshire, England. 13 00:00:58,220 --> 00:01:03,300 The ancient mounds and monuments below him were perfectly aligned all the way to the 14 00:01:03,300 --> 00:01:04,800 horizon. 15 00:01:04,800 --> 00:01:09,140 Suddenly he had this image of fairy lines, he called them. 16 00:01:09,140 --> 00:01:17,420 When he saw cathedrals, churches, old stone monuments, wells that were on straight lines 17 00:01:17,420 --> 00:01:18,420 of alignment. 18 00:01:18,980 --> 00:01:24,660 And he began to say, well look, if this is here and this is here, they line up. 19 00:01:24,660 --> 00:01:26,460 I wonder why. 20 00:01:26,460 --> 00:01:31,820 And out of that was born the idea that he called them lay lines. 21 00:01:31,820 --> 00:01:34,260 Most scientists scoff at lay lines. 22 00:01:34,260 --> 00:01:39,420 But the fact that sacred sites worldwide do line up along invisible paths does strike 23 00:01:39,420 --> 00:01:41,460 some as more than coincidence. 24 00:01:41,460 --> 00:01:46,260 People in earlier times and cultures were much more aware of these things than we are 25 00:01:46,260 --> 00:01:47,460 today. 26 00:01:47,460 --> 00:01:52,300 But intuitively we are drawn like magnets to sacred places. 27 00:01:52,300 --> 00:01:59,260 People flock to places like Machu Picchu, Stone Hedge, Avebury, Glastonbury, and they 28 00:01:59,260 --> 00:02:01,780 don't always know why. 29 00:02:01,780 --> 00:02:07,020 The electromagnetic fields that are there are actually stronger. 30 00:02:07,020 --> 00:02:12,180 They're sufficiently stronger that they elevate and change your brain waves, moving you into 31 00:02:12,180 --> 00:02:17,360 alpha and theta states that are associated with creativity and insight and spiritual 32 00:02:17,360 --> 00:02:19,500 revelation. 33 00:02:19,500 --> 00:02:24,500 James Swan is an author and naturalist who believes in the power and reality of invisible 34 00:02:24,500 --> 00:02:25,940 earth energy. 35 00:02:25,940 --> 00:02:30,660 He uses the ancient art of dowsing to detect and map lay lines. 36 00:02:30,660 --> 00:02:33,740 There's a couple of ways to detect lay lines. 37 00:02:33,740 --> 00:02:36,260 The first of which is animal behavior. 38 00:02:36,260 --> 00:02:38,180 Animals gravitate towards lay lines. 39 00:02:38,180 --> 00:02:39,180 They love them. 40 00:02:39,180 --> 00:02:43,940 Rabbit tracks, rabbit tracks, migration paths of birds, that sort of thing. 41 00:02:43,940 --> 00:02:48,420 The second is that they can be sensed and felt. 42 00:02:48,420 --> 00:02:51,300 It's not a clairvoyant sort of psychic thing. 43 00:02:51,300 --> 00:02:54,260 It's actually physically felt in your body. 44 00:02:54,260 --> 00:03:01,260 What dowsing does is simply to amplify that experience of the subtle difference in crossing 45 00:03:01,260 --> 00:03:04,620 through this invisible current of energy. 46 00:03:04,620 --> 00:03:09,100 After years of traveling the world, Swan and his colleagues are studying the power of 47 00:03:09,100 --> 00:03:11,500 lay lines in an urban setting. 48 00:03:11,500 --> 00:03:16,060 Seattle, Washington is the first city in modern history to map its lay lines. 49 00:03:16,060 --> 00:03:20,580 The project has been organized by the non-profit Geo Group, which is attempting to bring the 50 00:03:20,580 --> 00:03:25,220 pulsing currents of earth energy into the public consciousness. 51 00:03:25,220 --> 00:03:31,020 It's possible then if you begin to map out a city and you read the lay lines and you 52 00:03:31,020 --> 00:03:37,940 read the chi, it's possible to work with those things and incorporate them into design 53 00:03:37,940 --> 00:03:44,300 to begin to reduce violence and create a sense of creativity and spiritual inspiration 54 00:03:44,300 --> 00:03:45,300 within places. 55 00:03:45,300 --> 00:03:49,380 What we're proposing to do here is the exact same thing that was done all over the world 56 00:03:49,380 --> 00:03:51,980 by ancient people of every civilization. 57 00:03:51,980 --> 00:03:57,860 They found special places on the earth and then they used earth and stone to build places 58 00:03:57,860 --> 00:04:02,620 of power and sacredness for their culture, for their society. 59 00:04:02,620 --> 00:04:07,540 Geo Group president Chuck Pettis used dowsing rods to locate what he believes are all of 60 00:04:07,540 --> 00:04:10,100 the lay lines in the Seattle area. 61 00:04:10,100 --> 00:04:14,580 He then consulted with artist Mike Sweeney to create what looks at first glance like 62 00:04:14,580 --> 00:04:17,180 mass transit gone awry. 63 00:04:17,180 --> 00:04:21,180 It's a layout of the lay lines and the power centers in Seattle area. 64 00:04:21,180 --> 00:04:25,660 The crystals indicate where the lay lines actually enter the earth and that's where the power 65 00:04:25,660 --> 00:04:28,300 centers created. 66 00:04:28,300 --> 00:04:33,500 The goal is to enhance the overall energy within the city of Seattle to make Seattle a better 67 00:04:33,500 --> 00:04:39,100 place to live, a more spiritual place to live, a more healthy place to live. 68 00:04:39,100 --> 00:04:42,100 Spiritual monuments don't dot Seattle's lay lines, yet. 69 00:04:42,100 --> 00:04:48,060 If we were in Scotland, Ireland, England, many ancient places, this place that we are 70 00:04:48,060 --> 00:04:52,700 standing by would have a stone circle, it would have a standing stone, it would have 71 00:04:52,700 --> 00:04:56,140 a mound, it would be a special place. 72 00:04:56,140 --> 00:05:00,660 But the city of Seattle has only been here for a hundred years. 73 00:05:00,660 --> 00:05:02,700 So this is a virgin power center. 74 00:05:02,700 --> 00:05:07,020 What we need to do is create a space here, put in a standing stone, a seating area to 75 00:05:07,020 --> 00:05:09,460 make this place special. 76 00:05:09,460 --> 00:05:15,100 So far, the Geo Group has a $5,000 city grant to begin to design what they hope will be 77 00:05:15,100 --> 00:05:17,380 the stone hinges of America. 78 00:05:17,380 --> 00:05:21,340 These power centers are special places on the body of the earth. 79 00:05:21,340 --> 00:05:27,780 So by building beautiful artworks on these special places, we're healing the earth. 80 00:05:27,780 --> 00:05:35,700 We're making the earth more healthy, which creates a sense of world peace and harmony. 81 00:05:35,700 --> 00:05:40,660 The Seattle Lay Line project is ongoing, but two major obstacles are standing in the way. 82 00:05:40,660 --> 00:05:45,440 The organizers want to involve more artists and officials in other cities to expand the 83 00:05:45,440 --> 00:05:48,660 scope and influence of their Lay Line monuments. 84 00:05:48,660 --> 00:05:52,820 And as is the case with most public art programs, they need more funding.