Higher Self: Fire
Like the Sun, fire also symbolizes the prolonged state of Presence. Fire represents the idea of transforming suffering. The fuel of friction and negativity ignites the Light of Presence, a higher state of consciousness.
Very few can sit down in the middle of the fire itself. [Rumi]
A man who leaves the world for love of God (presence)
attains fire from the start, and like fire set to fuel,
soon reaches combustion.
[The Philokalia, John of the Ladder]
You who seek to feel the Divine fire in your heart,
who wish to know and to receive the kingdom of heaven
existing within you, come,
and I will impart to you the science of eternal heavenly life.
[Nicephorus the Solitary]
To truly evolve you must integrate the male
and the female within you,
and refine their fire upwards.
[Lao Tzu]
