The Hedge Druid

Archive for the ‘Tarot’ Category

I know it’s right in the middle of the Delphi posts, but this post is becoming ever more relevant to this year’s work, so I thought I should put it out there for reference. Having acquired a new spirit guide, who I shall nickname “Ash” for the purposes of brevity, I felt that we ought to get better acquainted. One of the best ways I know to do this is to draw a series of tarot cards to answer questions related to various criteria.

I had two stipulations for this draw: one was that I would call upon Ash himself to guide the process, and two, I would not use dowsing rods to guide the process. Instead I would let things unfurl as they may. A new year, a new method. I felt I should use the Druidcraft Tarot for this layout, but the design should come to me intuitively.

Druidcraft tarot reading for new spirit guide

Here’s what I asked and the responses:-

QUESTIONS

1 card to identify his sign

2 cards to identify his and my purpose in our work

3 cards to identify the nature of the work we will do together.

4 cards to describe his characteristics/powers.

THE CARDS AND THEIR INTERPRETATION

1. Call sign

• The Lord – a mature man with a beard sat in a cross-legged pose. The number 4. Jupiter.

Jupiter is in Gemini at the moment. Both being Air signs this means strong creativity and new projects. This is in line with the rest fo the reading. Seems like Ash is going to spur on my creative side and encourage me to bring projects to fruition. See this link.

2. His purpose / my purpose

• Queen of Wands - he wants to learn about the power in the land – ley lines and earth energies
• King of Cups – he will teach me about bardic attainment, creative expression for the good of the tribe, publishing and telling stories

3. Nature of work

• Princess of Cups - follow your dreams (dream work). New project exploring the inner world.
• 8 of Swords – to become unbound from restriction, to go beyond current boundaries, liberation
• Fferyllt – fluency between worlds, harmony, alchemy and magic

4. His powers and character

• 3 of Pentacles – he has the ability to increase someone’s craft or skill, or appreciation of art
• High Priest - he offers counsel, tradition, education, initiation
• 6 of Pentacles - he has generosity, patronage and gifts, harvesting good works
• 10 of Pentacles – he gives blessings, prosperity and the possibility of creating a legacy

CONCLUSION

I felt this was an incredible draw, yet again. The interpretations made complete sense to me immediately, and I felt I had very quickly created a link between Ash and myself. We have revealed something of each other, and had just described the ties that bind us in our future work together.

I look forward to the work that is to come, however long we remain bound together.

Even though I was supposed to wait until Imbolc I did my first Camelot Oracle draw. It was only supposed to be a test so that I could become familiar with the cards and the unusual layout of the pack on the “Lands Adventurous” (the eight sacred sites in the Arthurian panoply), but you know how things go… I got carried away and did a real reading. I chose to do “the big question” – after all, if you’re going to test something – test big! My question was:

“How will I fare on my spiritual path for this coming year?“

Thanks to the open-ended questioning style that John Matthews’ accompanying guide suggested this was how the request emerged. It was a powerful question.

The Champion

Firstly I chose my champion – an archetype that would represent a unified approach to the answers I was seeking. I felt that Galahad would be obvious choice for this year although I have not confirmed that in my spiritual work yet. Not until Imbolc will I know whether this year is really a Galahad/Gwalchaved year or not. Nevertheless, he was the card I manually chose to represent my work this year. He was placed at Camelot.

My champion for 2013 – Galahad

The Path Card

The card that was chosen as defining the nature of the journey this year was The Doubtful Path. This told me that the path this year would be filled with questions, doubts and points during which I would need to make decisions on how best to proceed. Already I could see that the year would be challenging. Onwards!

Read the rest of this entry »

I have a new set of oracular divination cards. I call them this because they’re not really tarot cards in the usual sense. They describe themselves as an Oracle card set and I will go with this description. Especially given that I am going to Delphi soon to see THE Oracle. Seems appropriate that I should “gem up” on this ovatic tradition.

The set was devised by that eminent Celtic mythology scholar and druidical wise one – John Matthews. Of course, he got Will Worthington to do the artwork for the cards. Any sensible person in this field would do. I have several other sets of tarot cards featuring his excellent artwork (e.g. The Wildwood Tarot, The Druidcraft Tarot) and I highly recommend them for anyone in the field of druidic divination.

The Camelot Oracle cover

As you know, though, my work has been taking on an Arthurian bent over the past few years. Since 2010, when I encountered Merlin as a tutor and guide along my spiritual path, I have found that I have been working through Arthurian archetypes each year. This year seems like no exception to that, but trying to find information about Galahad/Gwalchaved is very difficult. Hence, I felt I needed a meditation tool that would allow me to get into “the spirit” of this archetype. When I saw the Camelot Oracle, and that it was written by John Matthews, then I needed only a split second to decide to buy it.

I have only read the manual about them – I haven’t tried using them yet. This being The Quiet Time I’m not wanting to stir things up just yet. I will get acquainted with the set first, for the next few weeks, and then when it comes to that all-important Imbolc or Spring Equinox moment when the year begins in earnest I will do my first draw with these cards and then report back on their efficacy for me.

As the set uses the Arthurian Archetypes I fully expect that I will be aligned to their output. I need first to confirm that my “champion” for this year is what I expect it to be. Once this is done I’m off – full flow – and let’s see where it takes me this year.

My quest for the previous part of the Wheel of the Year (Solstice to Lammas) was to open my Third Eye. This was quite a hefty challenge, I felt, and Kal had said to me several times (with blowing of cheeks, and shrugging of shoulders) that it would be a lot to attempt in the few weeks between “spokes” of The Wheel. So it turned out to be. The Third Eye opening quest turns out to be something that I need to work on for the whole of the remainder of the year. It’s a “half year” quest that will take me up to Yule.

The quest began to take full effect in July. I felt that July was a “good time” to try opening my Third Eye. I took this process to mean that I would be attempting to find ways to enhance my spirituality, to increase my psychic awareness, divinatory capabilities, and to enhance my visions. As I ventured into the month of July the first thing I noticed was this news article about the increase in solar activity forecasted for the month of July:-

“Electromagnetic activity from the sun affects our electronic devices and human electromagnetic field. We are physically, mentally, and emotionally altered by electromagnetic charges from the sun, our body can feel sleepy but also become highly energized.

Psychological effects of CMEs (coronal mass ejections) are typically short lived and include headache, palpitations, mood swings, and feeling generally unwell. Chaotic or confused thinking, and erratic behaviors also increase. Solar storms can drive our emotions and maximize it to both good and bad side – the point here is to be aware of it.

The pineal gland in our brain is also affected by the electromagnetic activity which causes the gland to produce excess melatonin, a hormone which can cause sleepiness but it’s also known that some people have opposite side effects, usually those that are aware of the effects.” (source: thewatchers.adorraeli.com)

Now, I know a thing or two about the pineal gland. Our old friend Dr Serena Roney-Dougal gives a good account of the pineal gland in her book “Where Science and Magic Meet“. If there was a time in the year when I could benefit from increased pineal gland activity then it would seem that it would be when the sun was particularly active too. And that was July (and into August, it turned out). The coincidence seemed … fortuitous at least, pre-ordained at best.

The Pineal Gland’s location (c) Oddly Even blog

I began to think about what things would help me enhance my third-eye opening. I had already discovered a number of techniques that I think would enhance such work:-

1. Chanting the “i” vowel sound to tune and open the third-eye chakra point
2. Facing a source of light (sunlight) with your eyes closed but looking at the point where the Third Eye is located
3. Imagining a spiralling bridge connection to whatever the focus is (the Open Portal technique)

In practise, here are the things I have found that are useful specifically to promote the activity of remote viewing, which is an activity that I have concentrated on most as a means to open the Third Eye:-

1. Being in a altered state of consciousness, grounding and centering
2. Having either strong sun or full moon energy available
3. Transferring my vision into an imaginary hawk that is flying over the place that I want to remotely view

Here are some examples of how my third-eye powers have been increasing whilst using these techniques:-

1. Seeing the aura of a gnome, and of the Spirit of Place at Penmaenmawr
2. Sensing the location of spirit forms even when i can’t see them visually – Moel Ty Uchaf’s spirit of place, and the dog spirit in Sherwood Forest (via sense of smell)
3. Getting stronger and clearer visualisations, and being able to see the location of the object being shown to me via an energy bridge/connection path or as an aerial view of a hawk

Third-Eye Quest Tarot Reading

As I often do when I am at a major decision point, or facing a quest that needs the kind of enquiry that cannot be reduced to a simple binary “Yes” or “No” answer, I turned to the tarot cards to explain some aspects of the quest I was facing. Here are the cards that I drew in response to specific questions held in mind as I drew:-

1. WHAT DO I NEED TO TAKE INTO THE PROCESS? –  The Great Bear (Arthur – leadership, power of the land)
2. WHAT DO I NEED TO CHANGE? –  6 of Vessels (Reunion) and Page of Stones (Lynx)
3. WHAT WILL HELP ME MAKE THE CHANGE? - 4 of Bows (Celebration), 8 of Stones (Skill), 2 of Stones (Challenge)
4. WHAT WILL THE OUTCOME BE? – Ace of Arrows (Breath of Life), Queen of Vessels (Salmon)

Some recurring cards there, as previous draws recorded on this blog will attest. From this reading I drew several important pieces of information:-

1. I need to go somewhere where I can connect to the land in order to begin this process – somewhere connected to King Arthur.
2. 6 of Vessels is talking about re-uniting with old memories and resolving them. Like Kal has done – to go into the past to absolve an old memory of energy.
3. Something physical at a mound is suggested,
4. I will overcome a challenge using skill at a time of celebration (or the effects of celebration – joy -will be the key to unlocking the ability).
5. Wisdom and the Breath of Life are the rewards of opening the Third Eye

Armed with this useful information I felt empowered to take the quest further when it came to the Lammas Festival date – August 1st. In my forthcoming post about that you will see how the tarot card interpretations fitted into that day’s places and events.

Gwas.

Ace of Cups

I was visiting with an old friend of mine when she asked whether I had my Tarot cards with me. She had recalled that I had been an itinerant Tarot reader and wanted me to do a reading for her. Alas, I told her I hadn’t got the cards with me when she said, “why don’t you do a reading without them?”

I gave her a confused look and she related a short story. She had been at a gathering a few weeks ago when the organiser had a lady to read her tea leaves. Unfortunately they had no tea to drain the leaves from when the organiser suggested that she do it without the leaves. “How does that work?” the lady had asked and the organiser had responded by asking the question. Do you really need the leaves? Or are they a permission slip for you to be able to access your gift?

What an interesting concept and one that isn’t new in this blog. How many times have Gwas, I and readers (notably Liz) suggested that we lay aside our dowsing rods. Surely they provide a good analogy for a permission slip, don’t they? We have of course on occasion laid them down, however we still don’t leave the car without them.

Returning back to my friend and her request for a Tarot reading. I said, why not? I was game to see if anything useful comes from it. So I took an imaginary deck from my pocket and asked her to shuffle it whilst holding he question to mind. She did so and I took it back from her and laid out three cards…

1. Ace of Cups
2. Three of Cups
3. Judgment

I let my intuition interact with the drawn cards and gave her a reading. I was quite surprised when it correlated highly with what her question was. Indeed all 3 cards not only hit home but the words that I used to describe their impact also had synchronous overtones with my friend.

After I had left my friend I thought about the reading process and what it meant. Of course the cards create a random (or not) element to the result and then the reader brings his/her intuition into the mix. So why not have a random imagined set of cards that are drawn? After all I didn’t ask my friend about her question until the cards had been drawn. In any case, it was a fascinating little experiment and brought about another consideration.

What are you needing a permission slip for before you act?

Kal Malik

The WIldWood Tarot set

After my Ireland Ancestor Quest I had one obvious question: “Now that I have recovered them and successfully fought to keep them – what can I do with them?”

Some tarot card readers say that they can’t do reading for themselves very well. I seem to be able to. In fact, my own readings are so spectacularly accurate that they really spook me out every time I draw the cards. So, when I did a tarot spread to try to discover the answers to this question I should have been ready for the unerringly accurate and uncanny cards that were drawn from the repeatedly shuffled and cut deck.

This tarot spread was the most unbelievably accurate and useful draw I have ever done. Of course it was using the wonderful Wildwood Tarot, a superb deck for druids. For me, it proves beyond any reasonable doubt that tarot is a means of interfacing with some form of intelligence that operates outside of perceived time, and with whose grace it is possible to obtain incredible occult knowledge of the past, the present and the future.

Before we examine the cards that answer this question, we must first re-visit the tarot card layout that I drew just before I went to Ireland to begin the quest. You will see how important this initial reading was, and how it correlates so much with the subsequent reading.

IRELAND ANCESTOR QUEST READING

I asked for two cards to show which energies I was taking in to the quest, and three to show what would happen during the quest

• Two energies in – Page of Bows (Stoat) + King of Vessels (Heron)
• Three events that would occur – Queen of Vessels (Salmon) + Knight of Vessels (Eel) + The Shaman

If you have read the series of posts on my Irish Ancestor Quest then you will know how accurate those cards were. Now it was time to see what I could do with the energies that I had ‘downloaded’ from my spiritual journey could be used for, and how I could access them. As well as being a practical lesson these cards were outright confirmation that divination is a powerful tool for the spiritual seeker.

Read the rest of this entry »

This post describes my investigations into the powers of my staff. – an incidental tale whose only relevance  is that it shows what can be done with a combination of intuition, divination and dowsing.

After the Spring Equinox I was left with a starting point for how I should proceed along my path for the next few weeks. The instruction was suitably vague yet clear: “Determine the powers of your staff” was my guidance. How I was supposed to do that was for me to work out. Whenever I encounter uncertainty I first turn to my tried and trusted resources. In this case I turned to the Wildwood Tarot deck for inspiration.

Before I did a draw of cards I needed to ask the dowsing rods to assist me with creating a framework for doing the draw. For example, how many cards would I need, and why? What kind of a layout would this suggest? I began to dowse for some initial answers. As is often happening these days, when I blank my mind to get into “dowsing mode” the answers are placed in there even before the rods have been brought into action. It is then a question of using the dowsing rods to confirm the information that Intuition has provided me. This is a potentially dangerous step away from pure objectivity, I know, but anyone who thinks that dowsing is a purely scientific approach is deluding themselves in any case. It is merely a means to interact with an interface to knowledge that we label as “intuition”.

NOTE For me at this stage of my development, the use of psychic/intuitive responses is becoming a valid information source. Still, I treat the responses with as much scepticism and testing as I do the dowsing response. Oh yes, dear readers, even at this stage both Kal and I still often double or triple-check our results. Nothing can be taken for granted!

The Wildwood Tarot deck - a boon for divinatory druids

 Therefore, it will not surprise you to learn that as I began to ask questions concerning the source of the powers in my staff the answers began to emerge – from memory, from my ‘subconscious’ or from elsewhere – I cannot say for sure – yet they arrived. Here were my questions and their answers:-

1. Is my staff imbued with some form of magickal power? Dowsing rods said, “Yes”.
2. Is there a single source for these powers? Dowsing rods said, “No”. Further dowsing said “Two sources”.
3. How many powers were contained in the staff? Dowsing suggested FIVE separate powers.
4. What are the sources of the powers, I wondered…. The Elemental masters, and your Spirit Guide, was the intuitive response. Dowsing confirmed this.
5. Was each power aligned to a specific master or guide? Dowsing confirmed “Yes”.

It seemed that I could therefore draw a set of five cards from the tarot deck, and ask that each one show me some information that would guide me to an understanding of the powers contained in the staff. Seemed logical? A simple elemental cross with a central card for the spirit element seemed like a sensible layout. I did the draw, and the results sent such a shock through my system that I had to leave the room and walk away from the cards for a minute to calm down.

See why….! Read the rest of this entry »