When you find a wide, flat sandy beach along the Pacific Ocean, at low tide you may discover money strewn along the tideline…sand dollars. I remember finding my first one when I was just six at Cannon Beach, Oregon. Even at that age I knew they were magical.

With a five-pointed star centered inside a larger star, gracing a round white dome of a shell that evokes the full moon, the sand dollar is surely one of the most delightful shells on earth. And it’s a pentacle.

A pentacle—a five-pointed star in a circle—has gotten some bad, erroneous press. Ignorant people claim there is something satanic about them, when in fact, they couldn’t be more wholesome. DaVinci famously made the image of man a five-pointed star—legs spread wide, arms outstretched, the head the final point. For me (and many other pagan symbolists) the pentacle merges our two most primal icons: man as star, contained within the circle—which is the earth, the sun, the moon, the wheel of the year—time itself. It represents the unity of humans with our world and all it contains. It’s a powerful reminder that we’re all inextricably connected, all made from the same molecules.

In that iconic pose our feet are anchored in the earth, our arms extend to make connections, and we can both send and receive positive energy. It’s a stance of trust and openness to life. Yet it’s also a position of confidence and power. Try standing like that in an open space in your bare feet and pull the energy of the earth up through your soles. See how empowered you feel, becoming a direct conduit for earth resonance. Don’t be surprised if you experience spontaneous combustion into song! I love to stand like that on the beach in the early morning and wait for the sun to rise over the mountains and wash me in a golden glow.

But back to the spectacular sand dollar. There are other reasons why it’s so magical. It actually represents all three of the traditional allies. First, it’s made by an animal as its home. Second, when the animal dies the shell (also known as a test) remains intact, bleaches to a bright white and becomes more mineral than animal. Third, when you turn it over, the distinct pattern etched into its flat dorsal side is unmistakably a root system. Also, the larger star on the front side is very leaf-like. So there you have it: animal, mineral, plant, star, moon, man and time all contained in one miracle pentacle shell.

The moon is full tonight, so I made a meditation mandala from the sand dollars I gathered last weekend at Hobuck Beach. Click on the image to enlarge it and lose yourself in a springy, beachy, lunar landscape.

CONTEMPLATIONS

• What other five-pointed stars have you noticed in nature?
• How do you feel when you become a standing pentacle?
• What other symbols suggest unity to you?
• What is culminating in your life this full moon?

Learn why I’m a lunatic here.