The Hedge Druid

Posts Tagged ‘aura’

There are some people with whom I have a special connection. Kal is obviously one – whenever we work together or even just at the same location, something interesting, even life-changing, always happens. Another special person is my friend Mike. Mike’s psychic abilities always give a totally different slant on the work we do. Lately we have taken to clearing psychic blockages, or clearing away dark areas of energy from sites, in particular at churches. So when Mike came to visit at the beginning of December I knew that something interesting was likely to happen. And I was not disappointed.

I had been investigating a new energy leyA straight line of neutral energy linking two or more sacred sites or other energetic centres. This is often confused with Alfred Watkins’ concept of the Ley Line. Strictly speaking a ley line does not necessarily mean a neutral energy line, only a sight alignmentAlignment relates to the concept that humans have their own energy fields that are oriented or formed in a specific way such that the person is either suited better to one energy source of another. Some people have their energy fields empowered by the direct subtle energy force of The Sun, whilst others are empowered by the indirect subtle energy of The Moon. Due to the historical associations and symbolisation of The Sun with masculinity and The Moon with femininity we designate these alignments as either being ‘male’ or ‘female’ alignments accordingly. We interchangeable refer to people as being ‘sun-aligned’ or ‘male-aligned’ and similarly with the female alignment. between notable places, whereas an energy ley is like a radial spoke in a wheel, with energy flowing outwards across the land in a straight line. It has sometimes been found that the energy ley can be diverted from its strict straight path by changes in the landscape or strong attractors that pull it away from its original course. Energy leys may have inter-twining streams of male and female energies weaving along them, as though the energy ley is an attractor, a pathway or a conduit for the male and female energies. that I believe exists between The Wirral and Derbyshire. Due to the location of the ley and the types of sites that it goes through I have been provisionally calling the line The Royal Line. When I come to reveal it in due course then this will all make sense. This weekend in December was my first outing along the line to determine whether it really existed at the locations that I had theorised that it would. My first stop was a nearby village with its St.John the Evangelist church. Such churches are a common recurring theme along this ley.

St John's Church, Kingsley, Cheshire

Mike and I spent a short while on the car park side of the church noticing a “dark patch” emanating from the corner of the car park. We decided to come back to that later. I wanted to find the ley lineThe term used by many British dowsers to describe an energy leyA straight line of neutral energy linking two or more sacred sites or other energetic centres. This is often confused with Alfred Watkins’ concept of the Ley Line. Strictly speaking a ley line does not necessarily mean a neutral energy line, only a sight alignmentAlignment relates to the concept that humans have their own energy fields that are oriented or formed in a specific way such that the person is either suited better to one energy source of another. Some people have their energy fields empowered by the direct subtle energy force of The Sun, whilst others are empowered by the indirect subtle energy of The Moon. Due to the historical associations and symbolisation of The Sun with masculinity and The Moon with femininity we designate these alignments as either being ‘male’ or ‘female’ alignments accordingly. We interchangeable refer to people as being ‘sun-aligned’ or ‘male-aligned’ and similarly with the female alignment. between notable places, whereas an energy ley is like a radial spoke in a wheel, with energy flowing outwards across the land in a straight line. It has sometimes been found that the energy ley can be diverted from its strict straight path by changes in the landscape or strong attractors that pull it away from its original course. Energy leys may have inter-twining streams of male and female energies weaving along them, as though the energy ley is an attractor, a pathway or a conduit for the male and female energies.. It is easily confused with ley and therefore its use is not recommended by dowsers., if it existed, and the investigate the church’s exterior. I was drawn to a white birch tree with peeling paper bark, the like of which I had rarely seen. It was an outstandingly beautiful contrast to the leaden grey skies all around us, and we admired its beauty before I began to dowse for the ley. Within minutes I had located it. It was easy to find – it ran the entire length of the church and the width of the church was the width of the energy leyA straight line of neutral energy linking two or more sacred sites or other energetic centres. This is often confused with Alfred Watkins’ concept of the Ley Line. Strictly speaking a ley line does not necessarily mean a neutral energy line, only a sight alignmentAlignment relates to the concept that humans have their own energy fields that are oriented or formed in a specific way such that the person is either suited better to one energy source of another. Some people have their energy fields empowered by the direct subtle energy force of The Sun, whilst others are empowered by the indirect subtle energy of The Moon. Due to the historical associations and symbolisation of The Sun with masculinity and The Moon with femininity we designate these alignments as either being ‘male’ or ‘female’ alignments accordingly. We interchangeable refer to people as being ‘sun-aligned’ or ‘male-aligned’ and similarly with the female alignment. between notable places, whereas an energy ley is like a radial spoke in a wheel, with energy flowing outwards across the land in a straight line. It has sometimes been found that the energy ley can be diverted from its strict straight path by changes in the landscape or strong attractors that pull it away from its original course. Energy leys may have inter-twining streams of male and female energies weaving along them, as though the energy ley is an attractor, a pathway or a conduit for the male and female energies.. The ley was balanced at this point and needed no work doing to it to harmonise it. Great. Time to move on.

Near Miss Black Spots

As we peered into the road from the churchyard I pointed out a specific spot in the road where I had seen several cars have near misses, and which always made me feel uncomfortable when I drove over it. Mike noticed that there was some red tarmac at that point – an indicator that the local council also thought that this was a place to drive cautiously. In fact, there was a solar-powered “30″ sign there too which flashes at anyone doing in excess of this speed, despite the fact that they are at the lower end of a long downhill stretch, making 30mph pretty difficult to attain.

Mike said that he felt that the line of holly bushes that marked the end of the church’s boundary, and which coincided with the accident blackspot, was hiding a flow of negative energies. We tracked back into the grounds and found that the negative energy was being emitted from a house on the other side of the holly barrier. Hmmm…someone in that house was giving out bad vibes, and this was being drawn along the hedge and into the point in the road where the near misses were happening. Interesting! I was about to dowse some more when Mike began to get psychic impressions about the person in the house. Then suddenly I was getting them too! I knew things about this person – felt how they felt, knew things about their life – it was all very strange to suddenly begin to describe this as though the person themselves were speaking this out loud. Between us we diagnosed the situation. I won’t divulge any more, except to say that the saving grace was that someone else was counteracting the negativity with some positive energies, and this was leaving the energy leyA straight line of neutral energy linking two or more sacred sites or other energetic centres. This is often confused with Alfred Watkins’ concept of the Ley Line. Strictly speaking a ley line does not necessarily mean a neutral energy line, only a sight alignmentAlignment relates to the concept that humans have their own energy fields that are oriented or formed in a specific way such that the person is either suited better to one energy source of another. Some people have their energy fields empowered by the direct subtle energy force of The Sun, whilst others are empowered by the indirect subtle energy of The Moon. Due to the historical associations and symbolisation of The Sun with masculinity and The Moon with femininity we designate these alignments as either being ‘male’ or ‘female’ alignments accordingly. We interchangeable refer to people as being ‘sun-aligned’ or ‘male-aligned’ and similarly with the female alignment. between notable places, whereas an energy ley is like a radial spoke in a wheel, with energy flowing outwards across the land in a straight line. It has sometimes been found that the energy ley can be diverted from its strict straight path by changes in the landscape or strong attractors that pull it away from its original course. Energy leys may have inter-twining streams of male and female energies weaving along them, as though the energy ley is an attractor, a pathway or a conduit for the male and female energies. in a balanced state. Yet, the negativity was still feeding into the road and its vulnerable black spot. We decided to take a different tack and see if there was anything we could do on the other side of the road.

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What do you know?

Wow! I know I have again been lapse in reporting here at Hedge Druid. What can I say? I have to live the life I report about here too. Rest assured some interesting posts are coming up very soon. I just wanted to wet your appetite somewhat and get a post on here to boot.

After about a month in the hinterland of New York. Gwas and I got together for a catchup and general How are ya lad? chat. During the middle of our conversation we noted that our chat had traversed many fields.

• house energies
• tarot cards
• entities
• shades
• ancestor energiesA term I have used to describe the subtle energy imprints left at a particular place of power (a power centre, perhaps) by our ancestors - those family connections from whom we are descended and have a genetic link to.
• quests

And more. It was at this juncture that we agreed again that, truly, we know nothing. After which we agreed that on the subject of nothing we knew a lot. This position allowed some breathing room for our egos.

As I mentioned, having spent the last month in New York, one might wonder what hedge druid wise could be done, learned or experimented with in that brick city? Well, quite a lot as it happened. At least on the subject of energy. So without further ado let me get on and describe some fascinating energy results.

So long and thanks for all the fish

So proclaimed the Dolphins in that, now famous book, the Hitch Hikers Guide to the Galaxy. My reason for bringing up the subject of fish, or a particular fish genus, the Sardines, is that in many cities across the world people often pack themselves neatly into tin cans and traverse to and fro from work. I am of course speaking about the Tube, Metro or Subway transit systems.

If you have ever frequented such transportation means then you would know that invariable people on these systems are very insular. They don’t talk to any other passenger(s) and in most instances even the companions they are with.

Now the psychological perspective might be that people feel uncomfortable being up close and personal with others. This is quite a good answer and one that I will put another way in a moment. Let me start from the beginning so to speak.

I have spent the last month travelling up and down the New York subway (from Manhattan to Brooklyn) and have spent a lot of the time observing the passenger behaviour. I have noted that people don’t engage with others on the train, even when there are only a few (mark those words). I have also noted that people don’t often talk with people that are with them.

I pondered whether there was an energetic reason for this and found some remarkable (and some obvious) results.

Aura

As many have said we have an aura, descriptions vary, but in essence imagine an egg shaped energy field that surrounds your body at a distance of your arms stretched out (This is a grossly simplified description but enough for my purposes here).

Now, my dowsing confirmed that close interactions (or indeed the overlapping of multiple fields) was one of the reasons for people to be more reticent in communingAn interaction with an invisible and natural sentient force that is independently identifiable, even if it cannot be named or classified. The interaction takes place at the level of a subtle amalgamation of the mind of the perceiver such that a dialogue or transference of feelings may occur between the two sentient parties. The interaction that is ‘communing’ is purposefully initiated by the perceiver for the express purpose of learning or simply to transfer feelings in a sympathetic manner. with their fellow passengers. For some reason this interference in fields causes us to close-off our social desire to communicate and belong. My speculation is that we become a bit energetically homogenized when we are in such close proximity with others, so much so that our separateness desolves. Interesting huh? Consider love making? Two become one.

In other places in this blog Gwas and I have written about how we can change our aura size and in one particular instance, back when we visited the BSD (British Society of Dowsers) conference. I demonstrated on the fly the ability to shape someone elses aura.

Recalling that incident had me conducting some interesting experiments. If I shrunk the aura of a passenger(s) to the size of their body i.e. so that it would not be interfering with other people would they become more communicative?

This was a rather difficult experiment to conduct because I didn’t know whether I had succeeded in shrinking an aura and also whether, if the passengers started talking, it was because I had done so or whether it was just random chance. Throwing scientific rigor out of the window I proceeded anyway.

By the way, I did feel some tinge of ethical and moral pain when I did this, after all I was attempting to shrink people’s auras without there permission. I did ask the dowsing rods what the effects would be, and was assured that after shrinking (if I succeeded) the auras naturally return to the size they were before. Also note that aura size fluctuates all the time too.

The experiment went thus. I would pick a candidate and shrink their aura and then observe whether they communicated with other people more freely. I would also try to shrink the auras of two or more adjacent people to see what effect that would have and finally I would find two people who were together on the subway and were not communicating and shrink their auras to see the effects.

As a correlation, afterwards I would dowse to see if I had succeeded in shrinking auras. I then only took the results from cases where I had succeeded in shrinking the auras.

Conclusions

In general I found the results supported the hypothesis I put forward in that people were more communicative when their auras weren’t entangled. Dowsing also agreed that this would be the case. However an interesting result came out of my dowsing.

As I was dowsing the about the aura interfering with other auras I got an intuitive nudge about the environment that passengers are in.

As you may have read here, the speculation is that ancient shamans used caves to shape their auras and so create profound changes in their perceptive (and energetic) abilities. My intuition was telling me that the metal casing (of the tube train) along with the fact that it was running underground and that it was running through an electro-magnetic field was more influential on the energy of people than that of aura-to-aura interference.

As I dowsed this, I recalled the work of Valerie Hunt. In her excellent book, Infinite Mind, Valerie conducted some fascinating experiments on paranormal feats and EMF. In some instances using Faraday cages. Her conclusion was that EMF had a profound effect on subtle energyA form of energy that has so far eluded scientific definition. It is neither electric, magenetic, nor electro-magnetic, so far as our current technical equipment can measure. It does, however, exhibit many of the characteristics of magnetism and electricity in terms of its effects and properties. It may be a form of either or both of those energies that we have not yet identified. (in some cases this was a positive effect). I would also like you to consider the small bits of evidence for magnetic healing.

These disparate bits of knowledge were popping into my brain and giving my dowsing more questions to ask and a path to follow. The conclusion was thus…

• Aura-to-aura clashes were instrumental in people being less communicative on trains
• The above was severely compounded by the fact that the people were within a strong EMF field
• This was also compounded by the fact that (unnatural) aura shaping was occurring due to the shape of the train

The combination of these was causing people to be more reticent in their social communes. Interestingly I speculated whether this tube-travelling energy shape changing was also why people in the city were less social? The surprising answer was, yes. It seems that the more one travels on the trains the more ones aura is molded into a unnatural shape thus propagating that shape into times when they weren’t on the train.

Further dowsing revealed that a potential remedy for some of the effects was to shrink the aura to the size of the body.

You might be wondering what the effects of cars are on the Aura? I’m looking into it.

Kal Malik – exploring the beyond

PS: My girfriend picked up the rather unusual habit of plugging in here iPod when we were on the subway train together. Am I that boring?? Anyway, I decided to try aura shaping on her (without telling her of course) and in a few cases, literally moments later she was talking to someone (admittedly in a few of these instances it wasn’t me

In the final part of my South Wales posts I will be telling you about the amazing chamber of Tinkinswood, and how dowsing revealed some intriguing explanations for the usage of the chamber and how it was powered by Elemental Masters. What are ‘Elemental Masters’? Good question. Read on!

We parked at the entrance to the field with the sign pointing towards the Tinkinswood Chamber [map]. We had only gone slightly out of our way – entering the edge of Cardiff itself – before we realised our mistake and doubled back. Once we had our bearings finding the chamber was relatively easy, with some helpful brown tourist signs along the way near to the village of St Nicholas. Tinkinswood chamber itself was also easy to get to with a short walk down into a shallow valley and back up into the next field. As you rise up into the field the chamber hoves into view like some neolithic battleship.

The site is beautiful, surrounded by trees (although they had been severely cut back when were visited, which made us wince a little). The only other blight is the nearby electricity pylons, but they don’t seem to be affecting the power and quality of the energies at this site. Possibly they are just far enough away not to affect it. There really does not seem to be any geographical reason why the pylons were brought anywhere near to the site, but that’s the way it is.

Side view of Tinkinswood chamber

The sun was beginning to near the horizon as we arrived, and the early evening light lent the scene a mystical quality that backlit the chamber in a fascinating way, and made the sun twinkle through the trees around the site. As we approached the chamber neither Kal nor I felt any need to go into the chamber itself even though it was incredibly open and inviting. For some reason we both completely avoided going into it throughout the whole visit. Possibly we do not need the initiatory energies that lie inside it?

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In the second part of the tale I tell of how Kal and I went looking for a cave that was in the Parc Le Breos site near Parkmill, Swansea in South Wales. The idea was to begin the process of consolidating the information we had learned so far this year. Caves are ideal for this purpose, I believe, and so I was going off to prove this to myself and to Kal. He was completely unaware of my dastardly plan.

As we walked up the main path we scanned the nearby shrubbery and tree-lined hillsides for caves. Within fifty feet of the burial chamber I saw a path going up the hill to the right. It looked narrow and rarely used. I walked on. My intuition rang a warning bell, but I ignored it. Overruled by my rational brain, I’m afraid. In another fifty yards there was a much wider and recently used path. It was muddier, but it looked like it led somewhere, so I called Kal’s attention to it and we went to inspect it. On arrival we found it to be quite muddy. Kal backed away, unsure. I persuaded him it would be fine. As we ascended he grumbled about slipperiness and I made comments about inappropriate footwear. The path got steeper and muddier. As we reached the top we saw our destination only a few feet away – it was a chicken coop! Damn!! We turned around and went back down the slippy, treacherous path. I cursed my rational brain.

We marched onwards, but now the sky was closing in on us and threatening rain. In another hundred yards we felt the first spots of rain and ran for the shelter of the trees at a crossroads. Had it not rained I’m sure we would have picked one of the adjoining paths and carried on walking, but now we were pinned to the spot by a torrential downpour that would have soaked us in seconds. After five minutes the rain eased and we decided to head back to the car instead of continuing our foolish quest for the cave.

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I have been doing a bit of research on thresholds. For the purpose of this post we can consider a threshold to be the separation of two places of ownership or being, rather than a distinction between two type of energy (although the one does not exclude the other).

Examples of a threshold are the aura of living beings, a home or demesne of a person/family. One area that I am particularly researching is that of a Genius LociGenius Loci means 'spirit of the place' and refers to the geological/gaian spirit of place. It is transfixed to a place – being an embodiment of the collective intelligence of the place.. My use of this word represents a bounded area and the intent/wish of all of its inhabitants.

A crude analogy might be the notion of the “United Kingdom”. This isn’t a single thing, nor is it necessarily a piece of geography. It is a collection of people, place, ideas, laws, identity that holistically combines to create the “United Kingdom”.

Thus it is with a Genius LociGenius Loci means 'spirit of the place' and refers to the geological/gaian spirit of place. It is transfixed to a place – being an embodiment of the collective intelligence of the place.. A Genius LociGenius Loci means 'spirit of the place' and refers to the geological/gaian spirit of place. It is transfixed to a place – being an embodiment of the collective intelligence of the place. of a sacred site for instance would be the earth energy, any aware energies/entities that reside within. Indeed holistically speaking it is everything that is within the bounded area.

Where is your heart?

As you can imagine, since a Genius LociGenius Loci means 'spirit of the place' and refers to the geological/gaian spirit of place. It is transfixed to a place – being an embodiment of the collective intelligence of the place. is ‘imagined’ bounded area. It is the commune-er, i.e. the person on the outside looking in who determines the boundary (to some extent). For instance, I could commune with an energy being that resides in a sacred site. Then I could commune withe Genius LociGenius Loci means 'spirit of the place' and refers to the geological/gaian spirit of place. It is transfixed to a place – being an embodiment of the collective intelligence of the place. of the site, which would include the resident aware energy, then I could commune with the Genius of the hill that the site is on, which would include all of the above…and so…to the point where I could commune with the Genius of the Earth (often mis-referred to as Gaia).

Thresholds then are not so much the boundaries but the doorway through which we enter or commune with other beings.

On a simple level communingAn interaction with an invisible and natural sentient force that is independently identifiable, even if it cannot be named or classified. The interaction takes place at the level of a subtle amalgamation of the mind of the perceiver such that a dialogue or transference of feelings may occur between the two sentient parties. The interaction that is ‘communing’ is purposefully initiated by the perceiver for the express purpose of learning or simply to transfer feelings in a sympathetic manner. with another human requires them letting us access there being. Whether this is the mundane simple verbal communication to the energetic. For example when doing energy healing on someone it is important to gain their consent. I dowsed the following…

• How effective is energy healing (such as Reiki) on someone who hasn’t given their explicit consent? 10-15%

People often ask (say on social media sites such as FB) for healing to be sent to them. I asked How effective the healing that was sent to them was? 35%

• Was this because they hadn’t specifically given access to through their threshold? Yes.

Please note that by effective I mean the healing energy effecting them, this doesn’t mean that a cure was achieved. It just means the “mail getting through”.

I recall back in the day (3 years ago) when Gwas and I practiced some distance work on each others homes. It was surprisingly difficult until we realised that we had to let the other in, energetically so to speak.

An interesting question that I asked was…How effective is negative energy being sent to a person? I got a weird half-half answer to this (which as you know means that I was missing something).

As a side note. I have really started to like the “there is something missing” response. It gives your intuition a sharp kick.

What could be missing? I wondered whether negative energy could be sent to a person at all? Yes, was the response. My thinking was on the lines of someone hating another person or seeking revenge or malicious thoughts. It seems that these ‘do’ have an effect on the other.

I pondered some more and finally thought of something. Belief is a powerful tool and from the teachings of Don Juan (ala Carlos Castaneda) I recalled that the power of disbelief was equally as powerful.

My thinking went thus…if a person believes in the whole energy thing then they would be affected by negative energies going their way, more so than someone who doesn’t believe.

My results concluded that a person who had no belief in intention and energy had virtually no effect on an equally disbelieving person. It appears that their has to be a strong belief and intention for the energy to get through as it were. On the receiving end it was a similar affair, the more one believed the more the effects got through. Up to a point though! If the threshold of the person was secure i.e. they hadn’t invited specifically the other person to send energy then the effect was severely limited.

If your asking a lot of questions…what about this, that and the other. So was I but this is just a prelim report if you will and the topic is Thresholds.

The threshold of a home is created by the love and presence of the people with in. Equally though the absance of one or both of these pretty much destroys the threshold. Any foreign energy can come and go as it pleases. Like auras, the threshold of a home takes its characteristics and strength from those who live in it. Even a strong threshold won’t stop someone physically entering your home and doing damage, but it will certainly limit the energetic damage they can do, both from without and from within.

An important note that most energy aware people should know is that of treating someone as a guest. If you feel that a person has negative intent towards you then it is best not to invite them into your home, for any reason. And if you have to then make sure that you limit their access to the rooms (remember rooms too have a threshold). Also make sure that you cleanse after them and intentionally close the door behind them in an energetic sense. Above all one should avoid giving anything to such a person, even as simple as a drink of water.

The reverse is absolutely true also, inviting an emotionally/energetically friendly and good intentioned person into your home strengthens the threshold. Generally speaking the protection forded by a threshold is proportional to the love of your home. For instance, do you feel that your house is your home?

Well that about wraps up this appetiser on thresholds. I will be reporting back with a lot more details about thresholds and how to create and protect them.

Kal Malik exploring the edge.

Since I learned that my task for this part of the year would be to “free spirits” I have been trying to absorb as much information as possible about this subject. I have been listening to related podcasts from the British Society of Dowsers, from books on the subject of spirit rescue, and from discussions with friends who have experience of these subjects from a lifetime spent studying the paranormal. At this point I feel confident about providing some background theory that will make the remaining posts of the year make much more sense!

Let me start by elucidating a paradigm that might help to frame the definitions that I will provide below. If we consider that in this earthly plane of existence a person is composed of three elements:

• physical body,
• energy body (aura)
• animating force (animus)

I believe that in the next level of existence, when the body dies, what remains are the animating force and its energy body together. There is then a further disintegration of the energy body, leaving the animating force to move freely, unconstrained, and with its original animating energy only remaining.

I must point out that I am not using the Jungian context for the word ‘animus’. In that context the animating force is split into two forms – anima and animus. Anima is the female force within the male, and animus is the male force within the female. I am using the term in a gender-neutral context, and when I say ‘animus’ I am referring to its more original meaning of being an animating force.

Each of these forms – body, aura and animus – will now be explained more fully.

THE BODY

The body is the strongest of the forms – integrated to such an extent that it is present, physical, and perceivable by other humans.

Example of proprioception

Far from simply being a wrapper to consciousness, the body has an intelligence of its own which is an automatic form of intelligence. When our body works without conscious direction it is employing this bodily sentience. Psychologists attribute this to the ‘subsoncscious’ which they believe to be an aspect of mind that is hidden from our waking consciousness, however they have not demonstrated yet how this intelligence works, or how it can be contacted.

One form of body intelligence is “proprioception” – your sense of where your body is. Here’s a link to an article explaining its importance in the world of dance. Body intelligence, awareness and memory may be linked to the phenomenon of “phantom limb” cases, where limbs that have been removed may still trigger psychological responses in the brain, and may also record spacial placement despite having nothing physical to sense with.

THE AURA

The aura is less integral than the body – it must be, because if it were more coherent then it would be integral to the body and would die with it. This is not what happens, as reported by a great many mystics, seers, yogis, mediums, clairvoyants and people who have had near-death experiences. Such a weight of evidence demands a better concept to validate such experiences.

How the aura can appear

Let’s consider that the aura is a diffused subtle energyA form of energy that has so far eluded scientific definition. It is neither electric, magenetic, nor electro-magnetic, so far as our current technical equipment can measure. It does, however, exhibit many of the characteristics of magnetism and electricity in terms of its effects and properties. It may be a form of either or both of those energies that we have not yet identified. form that is invisible to normal perception, although visible to some as a coloured form extending beyond the confines of the body. I have been trying to see this for several weeks and have recently done so – with practise this mysterious force can be seen in the peripheral vision. The aura can be detected by most people at a subtle level, and we all react to it daily when interacting with other humans when we recognise someone’s “personal space”, which is a measurement of the edge of someone’s aura and its strength. If someone is generating a lot of energy their aura becomes more easily detected by those whom it touches or encompasses. Some say that it can be photographed using the Kirlian Photography method.

The intelligence and memory of the energy body is held within the human aura, perhaps in a holographic format. This is the space within which we store memories and in which we form our intelligence, out sentience, our perceptions. We create this store of knowledge, wisdom and attention via our bodily sensory organs. When those organs no longer exist, we are still able to see – such as when we perceive during our dreams. The sensory perception available in the dream state is not as acute as in our waking state because we are perceiving without the extra input of the physical sense organs, which add to the ability of our innate senses, clarifying, dividing, specialising, and extending their capabilities.

The energy body seems to have some degree of synaesthesia in that some perceptions are muddled, and sense perceptions are apt to moving between the normal senses. In some ways this allows a better perception, but when our mind attempts to understand the perception then the sense that is requested to report the effect may report ‘muddled’ or incomplete information. Thus, our dream body appears not to be able to distinguish things clearly in dreams, and sometimes we feel things rather than see, hear, smell or taste them.

Some say that the aura also reflects the health conditions of the host, and previous traumas (not necessarily from this current existence) can be perceived in this aura. Certainly it is possible for someone conscious of their subtle energyA form of energy that has so far eluded scientific definition. It is neither electric, magenetic, nor electro-magnetic, so far as our current technical equipment can measure. It does, however, exhibit many of the characteristics of magnetism and electricity in terms of its effects and properties. It may be a form of either or both of those energies that we have not yet identified. field to be able to manipulate their aura to extend or contract it, or to express a state of mind (in the form of colour) within the aura.

THE ANIMUS

Finally there is the animus intelligence – the creative force and its “soul memory”, which is the memory of its former incarnations. The animus is impossible to perceive using human senses. Some psychics and mediums can make contact with an animus, but only if the animus is making an effort to be detected, otherwise the force is too diffuse to be recognised as an integral or independent entity.

The animus is a similar concept to that employed by the Spiritist and Spiritualist organisations in their description of Spirit. Here’s a definition from Allan Kardec’s book “The Spirits’ Book”:

Spirit – In the restricted sense of Spiritism, “spirits are intelligent beings of creation, populating the Universe outside the material world and constituing the invisible world“. They do not belong to a special creation, but they are the souls of those who lived on Earth or in other planets (spheres) and who leave their material envelope. (source: Spiritist Vocabulary)

In some cultures the animus is synonymous with the concept of the soul. That term has been so widely used and abused that I prefer to re-term the concept as Animus, because that establishes the idea that the thing that is being discussed is the animating force, the life essence that gives motivation, creativity and purpose to the being whose body it inhabits.

Properties of the Animus

Lifting off from ground zero

Some of the properties associated with the Animus are the ability to travel outside of the body linked by a silver cord. There is also the ability to move, as though in a dream, beyond the normal boundaries of the earth-bound body’s perceptions of space and time. This is akin to the tribal shaman’s ability to travel in the spirit body, to step out into another world in order to save souls, retrieve knowledge and heal psychic wounds.

When I travel out of my body (the classic OOBE) I feel the contact with my physical body. It feels like bi-location – being in two places at the same time. I have a faint awareness of my physical self (much as one is aware of one’s own heartbeat) yet my awareness, my thinking self is elsewhere, travelling through impossible space and time contortions, being wherever and whenever I imagine that I could be. Here’s a link about how to make this happen for yourself.

In both astral travel and lucid dreaming there is an auric body with the Animus present. The physical body is left behind (or usually below) whilst an energy body goes ‘beyond ‘, empowered by the Animus. The link between the two world is maintained by the silver cord that links between planes of existence (I wonder if this is similar to the Near Death Experience “tunnel of light” if you are travelling inside the cord, rather than outside of it?)

The Animus is the sentience within all these forms – physical body, energy body and spirit. It is therefore the continuing force, the link between worlds, between existences too, some say. Despite its continuity it is highly flexible under the right conditions – able to move between forms with sufficient energetic will to make the shift. People have literally willed themselves to remain living, or to die – to make the switch between physical and energetic forms. It is the shaman, the druid, the magician who seeks to make this shift when required, rather than when circumstances insist upon it.

Let’s see now how these terms bring us neatly to a definition of the different forms of being that inhabit this world and the human Underworld. In my next post on this subject I will be explaining my understanding of human ghosts, shades and spirits.

Gwas

It’s not often that we encounter like-minded folk on our travels – even at stone circles. When we do it is always a pleasure and rarely a chore. On Saturday 20th November Kal and I headed out to Derbyshire again. Kal had come back for a weekend of fun and frolics, so I put a stop to all that by insisting that he accompany me to some special places for old times’ sake, and because it was a full moon. We chose Nine Stones Close, Doll Tor, Bakewell Church and finally Five Wells chambered cairn. This post will discuss the serendipitous outcome of the Nine Stones Close visit.

I apologise now for my lack of detail. I tend not to store facts and figures these days – I don’t see that they have much use – and so I won’t be able to tell you the names of those involved, nor the details of their social interactions, nor many other details that one might consider to be the normal amount of information gathered from a long discussion. Didn’t get any of that. What I did retain was the interesting stuff, and that’s what I’ll report in this post.

For this trip I had taken everything including the kitchen sink. I knew that I would need incense (and I had stacks of it) and for some reason I felt I needed to bring crystals. So I brought around three different collections which all have different purposes. I also dug out a set which Kal had mistakenly left with me and I was determined to give them back to him, which I did. This set was a chakra balancing set of stones with a varied assortment of useful crystals. When we met I explained the mistake and Kal accepted them crystals back again.

A Casual Query

As we walked up me were hailed by a man in a wide-brimmed Australian bush hat with a south midlands accent. He asked if we were local, to which we replied we weren’t, but nevertheless I asked him to ask his question – we might be able to help. He said that he thought there was a hermit’s cave roundabouts and would we know where it was? We did indeed know, having been up there recently having found the cave eventually. Despite visiting many times we had only found it after being a bit curious and wandering way out of our way – thankfully it was a kinder month than November and we were rewarded by finding the cave and some significant other places that were power centres for us to work in should we ever need them. So we directed the man and his two young lady companions (nice work if you can get it, eh?).

We headed on up to the stone circle…

Kal dowses his favourite circle

We did some preliminary dowsing and discover that today is a good day to do some work. As usual I spent a lot of my time in my particular power centreA place where a person of a particular alignmentAlignment relates to the concept that humans have their own energy fields that are oriented or formed in a specific way such that the person is either suited better to one energy source of another. Some people have their energy fields empowered by the direct subtle energy force of The Sun, whilst others are empowered by the indirect subtle energy of The Moon. Due to the historical associations and symbolisation of The Sun with masculinity and The Moon with femininity we designate these alignments as either being ‘male’ or ‘female’ alignments accordingly. We interchangeable refer to people as being ‘sun-aligned’ or ‘male-aligned’ and similarly with the female alignment. (see ‘AlignmentAlignment relates to the concept that humans have their own energy fields that are oriented or formed in a specific way such that the person is either suited better to one energy source of another. Some people have their energy fields empowered by the direct subtle energy force of The Sun, whilst others are empowered by the indirect subtle energy of The Moon. Due to the historical associations and symbolisation of The Sun with masculinity and The Moon with femininity we designate these alignments as either being ‘male’ or ‘female’ alignments accordingly. We interchangeable refer to people as being ‘sun-aligned’ or ‘male-aligned’ and similarly with the female alignment.’) feels particularly comfortable and empowered. The place is an energetic centre where a particularly beneficial combination and formation of energies is formed into a pattern that is harmonic with the person for whom it can be called a power centre., and found that I could do some meditation to find out more about which direction I should take my research into spirits and death energies. Kal indicated that he would be working with his favourite tree but instead of it being him healing the tree, this time the tree would be involved in healing him! Most mysterious, and I hope he posts as to what that was about.

I lit some incense and began to prepare to do some meditation, but the group of three arrived interrupting this wok before it got started. We got talking – the girls attracted to the nimble toned physique of Kal (he wishes), whilst the middle-aged gentleman was lumbered with me. I soon identified from his terminology that he was a pagan of some variety and so I mentioned druidry and he responded positively. This was followed by a lengthy account of the Scottish sites we had both visited – he telling me about the wonders of the Orkney Isles, and me responding with my limited repertoire. He recommends that I visit during the Midwinter Solstice. A lovely idea, but it’s a long journey, even from the North of England. One day.

Meanwhile Kal was offering the girls some of his newly re-acquired crystals. Moments later one of the ladies (did I say girls? I was being a gentleman) came over asking her male friend to identify the crystal. He almost said “Lapis lazuli” and I helped him to recall its name, but Kal interjected – “It’s a blue sodalite.” The lady almost fell backwards exclaiming, “That was the crystal that Chinese healer told me I needed to heal my throat.”

For Kal this was a meaningful coincidence – getting the crystals this day, then the lady picking the perfect one out. It was certainly fortuitous.

Our unexpected guests

Kal did some energy healing work with the nearby tree (this time it healed him) and I finished my meditation at my usual stone in the circle. Then I picked up my staff, which I had propped up in one of the stone’s long grooves) and I went to stand in the “unusual” stone’s aura. Which is the unusual stone? Well, it’s the one that we initially picked up bad vibes from, and which seems to have a strong connection to Robin Hood’s Stride – the nearby sandstone ridge. This particular stone is also a funny shape, being wider at the top than at the base. Standing there I got a mental picture of bright aquamarine or topaz – a sort of phosphorescent bright green with just a hint of blue. I tried to meditate again, this time asking whether there was anything else I should be working on – the answer was “Merlin”.

As I stood by the unusual stone I was quivering with energy and asked Kal to dowse me. He found that the energy I was receiving was a new form of energy! We haven’t yet found out what that is or what it might be for. I went back to my power centreA place where a person of a particular alignmentAlignment relates to the concept that humans have their own energy fields that are oriented or formed in a specific way such that the person is either suited better to one energy source of another. Some people have their energy fields empowered by the direct subtle energy force of The Sun, whilst others are empowered by the indirect subtle energy of The Moon. Due to the historical associations and symbolisation of The Sun with masculinity and The Moon with femininity we designate these alignments as either being ‘male’ or ‘female’ alignments accordingly. We interchangeable refer to people as being ‘sun-aligned’ or ‘male-aligned’ and similarly with the female alignment. (see ‘AlignmentAlignment relates to the concept that humans have their own energy fields that are oriented or formed in a specific way such that the person is either suited better to one energy source of another. Some people have their energy fields empowered by the direct subtle energy force of The Sun, whilst others are empowered by the indirect subtle energy of The Moon. Due to the historical associations and symbolisation of The Sun with masculinity and The Moon with femininity we designate these alignments as either being ‘male’ or ‘female’ alignments accordingly. We interchangeable refer to people as being ‘sun-aligned’ or ‘male-aligned’ and similarly with the female alignment.’) feels particularly comfortable and empowered. The place is an energetic centre where a particularly beneficial combination and formation of energies is formed into a pattern that is harmonic with the person for whom it can be called a power centre. and sealed the energy in like a battery storing it for later use.

Charging my staff

Now we headed off to nearby Doll Tor. Luckily now we are familiar with how to get to and park at these places. Kal was wittering on about how marvellous he felt and singing a single note of awe at regular intervals. I advise him he should stop before he got a staff rammed down his throat! What the hedge druid gives with one hand, he takes with the other. Balance, see?

Gwas.