The Hedge Druid

Posts Tagged ‘full moon’

You may have noticed the lack of podcasts this year on Hedge Druid? There’s a reason for that. In the first half of the year the reason could be put down to a mounting pressure of “work”. Mostly this was spiritual work, and with all the good weather we have had in England this year then the Great Outdoors claimed a large part of my time, and this was reflected in the amount of time-consuming podcast work that I could do. Right, that’s my pathetic excuse out of the way. Now, what about the recent months? I did intend to re-establish the podcast once the weather got worse. It has worsened, but still I don’t feel inclined to get back into the studio to record and edit an hour’s worth of audio. Why not? I think there’s a deeper and wider reason.

I have been noticing that other pagan blogs have also begun to falter in their regularity and their commitment. Could it be that we all expanded too quickly, and pushed ourselves too hard to produce content? Possibly, but I think the real reason is due to a difficulty in maintaining momentum when this year has been out of synchronisation with itself. Let me explain.

The Moon, The Sun and The Earth sources

Last year our blogs flourished. Mostly these are blogs that are talking about magickal work, mystical happenings and spiritual progress. What general effect has happened that could account for the difference between last year’s ease and this year’s difficulty? Simple. It is the synchronisation of the phase of the Moon with the Celtic Festival dates. Last year the high points in the solar cycle were matched by high points in the lunar cycle. In other words, at the major lunar festival dates the Moon was also usually in its Full Moon phase.

Celtic Wheel of the Year

The Celtic Wheel of the Year is a cycle that records the high points of the year’s energies. It tells the pagan watcher when the Earth itself is producing the most energy in its co-operative cycle with The Sun. In my experience, and I speak only for myself here, I do not use The Sun as my primary magickal power source. For me it is The Moon. Last year was therefore a “bumper year” in terms of the number of coincidences between the Solar and Lunar high points. Magick was abundant and easy. Motivation was plentiful, and so a great deal of work flowed, and many posts got produced. Blogs flourished that dealt with these subjects.

This year the story has been completely reversed, and how dispiriting must that have been to many of our pagan friends whose magickal sources are Moon-dependent? This year the Full Moon phases NEVER coincide with any of the Solar Festival dates in the Celtic Year. Only Spring Equinox came close. The result of this, goes my tenuous hypothesis, is that motivation has taken a battering. Magickal people must have found themselves either doing Sun OR Moon work, but never being able to being the two together.

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The Old Moon – the name for the first full moon of the year – occurred on the 19th January. As a moon-aligned person (Do you know if you are moon or sul aligned? Why not go check using dowsing rods?) I always take the opportunity to bathe myself in the energies that the Moon reflects down to Earth. I tried to find some information about what the Old Moon energies might be like, but there’s simply none available online. Maybe some old books record it, but it’s not available on the web, so I had no reference point to know to what purpose the energy has historically been put. I would be making it up again.

I engineered a little bit of time for myself on the way home from work and had a feeling that I should head to a hilltop that I had visited before. I wasn’t really kitted out for such a visit (I knew there were probably cows in the field below the hill). Nevertheless I took Kal’s approach to this – Nature would see me right and I would be fine. Ahem.

I drove towards the hills near Frodsham but as I turned into one of the back lanes I came across an unusual sight. I saw the full moon rippling gently on the surface of a pond. This pond I knew was a regular haunt for local fishermen. Tonight it was a perfect mirror for the glory of the Old Moon in its full glory. Not a cloud spoiled the view. I had to pull over.

Full moon's reflected stare

I parked and walked quietly around the edge of the pond towards a clear bit. In the moonlight everything was clear and I could see the best position to be – at a small outcrop that hung over the ponds slightly and which was in direct 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. with the moon’s current position. I settled there, in a fashion, but there was much more car traffic than I imagined there would be out here “in the middle of nowhere”. It seemed to have become a thoroughfare just at the moment I wanted peace and quiet! Where had all these cars come from? I tried my best to ignore them, and to ignore the occasional shouts and barks emerging from one of the only two homes nearby.

Looping the Moon

The way that the moon and its reflection were positioned in front of me seemed to form a figure of eight in my mind. As I connected ot the energy of the land and sky, my energy seemed to be drawn towards the moon. I let it go, watching as it looped around the moon and then back down to the moon’s reflection in the pond. The invisible energy loop now began to circulate all on its own – looping around the moon and then down in the opposite direction to its reflection. With each loop I felt stronger, more empowered, and I wasn’t in a hurry to move.

Fate, however, determined that I should. A big rumble of a 4×4 grew to a roar alongside me as one of the inhabitants of the only other house nearby chose that exact moment to nip out for a pint of milk from the local shop several miles away, or something like that. My connection broke and I awoke to the smell of the two incense sticks I had lit to accompany the special moment. I decided it was time to go home.

Old moon – new crystal energy

At home I felt there was still some use to which I could put the full moon energies. I laid out all of my current sets of crystals (I will post shortly on how those are composed this year) on a table underneath the full moon that shone through a skylight. I drew down the moon’s energy and asked that the crystals be cleansed and re-energised by this reflected moon energy.

Using the full moon at its peak

I then dowsed about whether such a process was under way. It was. I dowsed about how long the crystals should be left and I got the answer that the crystals should be taken out of the moon’s light at midnight. I wondered why, so I logged onto the Internet to find out when the moon would be at its peak – midnight! Back to the dowsing – do the crystals have to be removed after that time because of the moon’s waning energies? YES. So, it seems that the crystals, whilst being charged up by the moon would also be then drained by it as it waned. They level of energy in the crystals was a reflection of the energy that the moon had at any particular time, unless they were removed from its influence by being hidden from its light.

At the same time as charging the crystals I took my ash staff and put it outside in the direct moonlight. At its tip I placed a single prism clear quartz crystals to focus the moon’s energy into the staff. Again, I did a simple intention to draw the moon’s energy down and through the crystal into the staff. Again, I removed this arrangement after midnight.

This had been a most enlightening evening in many ways. I felt energised and empowered, and my ritual tools had likewise been cleansed and re-empowered by this clear full moon. What a good start to the year’s moon-watching!

Gwas.

Due to the “freak” weather in England (we had a slight bit of snow – the kind that Canadians laugh at) I was unable to get back from Canada as planned. My plan was to return before the Winter Solstice so that I could spend that day going out to a sacred site, 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 my favourite ancient yew tree, and getting some guidance on the activities for the next part of the Wheel of the Year. All that was scuppered by a few inches of snow at the major European airports and so I was delayed by several days. I could have been far worse, and apparently was for many people, so I accepted our lot and bunkered into the Calgary airport hotel at the expense of the Dutch airline KLM. Thanks KLM – you did a great job.

This opened an opportunity up for me that I hadn’t realised, though. It was widely reported in the Canadian media that there would be a lunar eclipse on the night of the 20th December, going into the 21st. This was an opportunity not the be missed, and despite the fact that I would be flying for 11 hours the next morning at 4:30am I decided I could sleep on the plane instead of miss this great celestial display.

Whilst my wife slept (sensibly) I stood alone outside the Delta Hotel at Calgary Airport at 11:30pm waiting for something to happen. As I stood there several things came to mind in that quiet (quiet? aircraft were taking off left, right and centre!) space as I waited…

1. It was the first total lunar eclipse on a Winter Solstice for over 450 years
2. It was the Winter Solstice when the eclipse would occur – a special day in my calendar and a day of special energies
3. The moon would be full when the eclipse occurred – a prefect time for a magickal encounter

I began to take pictures at ten minute intervals in order to capture the event in a sequence. Here are the pictures from that night:-

Sequence of solstice lunar eclipse

Click here for a time-lapse video of the event.

As the eclipse unfolded, one of the chefs from the hotel came out occasionally to join me. He introduced himself as Davide, a French ex-patriot who now lived in Canada and we chatted in the minus 20 degree night air. I explained the significance of the phenomenon to Davide, and he began to get increasingly excited as I explained the trinity of alignments: date, full moon, and eclipse.

When he couldn’t stand the coldness any longer (I was dressed for it – he was in his kitchen whites) I was once again alone to ponder the event as it reached its dark climax. I called upon my spirit guide to see whether anything could be revealed about what actions I should take in the next part of the year, fully expecting a message along the lines of “Take a rest now, consolidate the year’s work, and don’t do anything until Imbolc.” That wasn’t the message I got!

In my head I heard the phrase “Celebrate Death“. Perhaps this was in response to the “death” of Winter and the moon that night? On my return home this message would be hammered home in two significant ways.  Firstly there was a note form my father-in-law who had been minding our house during our absence: our dear old neighbour Dolly had passed away a few days before the solstice. I also noticed that the old beech tree that had been standing at the end of our neighbour’s drive and which gave us such resplendent view through the seasons had been cut down! Nothing now remained but a stump. I’ll tell you more about how that came about soon in another post, but needless to say, although we knew it might happen it was as shocking as any human death to me.

So I can see now how this Winter Solstice event was symbolic of Death – the death of The Moon and the death of the Year 2010. I was being asked not to mourn for the deaths that had occurred, but instead to celebrate them. This is what I did on my next visit to a sacred site, but I also found out that my quest was not what I thought it was, and that the celebration was to be a one-off, not part of the Wheel of the Year after all. More on that soon.

Gwas.

Chelmorton, Derbyshire – 20.11.10

A pale and wan full moon hung over us as we strode eagerly up to Five Wells chambered cairn. The coming dark forced our pace as we knew that time was scarce, and the eagerness of a new site made us giddy as though short of oxygen up on those windswept Derbyshire hills at the back of Chelmorton village, just off the main A6 road near Priestcliffe (with its huge round barrow). It seemed appropriate to me, one who is so overly concerned with balancing the forces that Nature provides, that the sun and the moon should be both visible and purposeful at that moment, both radiating with equally weak but welcome rays.

As we approached I felt the edge of the site’s aura and stopped. As usual Kal confirmed my feeling that this was the edge of the aura using dowsing rods. He nodded in agreement, so I got my own rods out and dowsed for the ritual path – the most respectful and energetic way of entering into the site. This in itself has become something of a ritual now. It feels right to approach in this way, especially to new sites whose guardians have not yet become accustomed to us, or who haven’t yet accepted our presence. It’s a way of showing them that we “mean business” and know what we’re doing in these sacred spaces. We’re not casual tourists!

I walked a curving female zig-zag path on the right-hand side which led me to a hollow. Little did I realise at the time that this would mimic a similar male zig-zag path on the entrance side of the chamber, which I would dowse days later. We settled in the near-side hollow, at what is the back of the chamber, on the right-hand side of the line of paired stones. We had seen similar stone rows in Merrivale in Devon earlier this year. For some reason only the right-hand side of the chamber’s hill seemed “attractive” to us. I never walked on the other side at all, and I don’t think Kal did either, except perhaps to quickly move back to the right-hand side again.

I lit some opium-scented incense and placed three sticks around the pit where we had settled. This was our sanctuary, should we need one, and I mentally cleared the space. Kal spotted that the Moon was visible in the darkening light and went off to the chamber to meditate. I couldn’t settle, however and mooched around dowsing occasionally as thoughts come into my vacuous mind space….it had been a long and draining day, and despite this being a new and exciting place, I felt that there was little for me to do here today.

Perfectly aligned to the Moon

Kal wrapped himself up in his meagre clothing (doesn’t this man feel the cold?). He did some meditation work, aligning himself with the full moon and having a wonderful experience by all accounts (you usually have to wait a bit for his write-ups, but they usually arrive eventually).

Meanwhile I had found a 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. running through the centre of the chamber and on through the pairs of aligned stones at the ‘back’ of the site closest to the point at which you enter the area via a small gate. 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. was being marked or guided by the entrance stones, and then the line of stones at the rear of the monument were further indicating its direction. As I looked up I saw that the Moon was perfectly aligned too tonight, and Kal returned soon after excited about the same 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. of astral and earth-based elements.

We left shortly after that because I had a pressing engagement, but I knew that I needed to come back and spend more time here. Luckily, a combination of my increasing myopia and the tiny cooking instructions for some fishcakes resulted in me having to take the first day off sick from work in living memory, and this seemed like a pre-ordained opportunity to recuperate in the bracing air of the Derbyshire hills. Oh, Dame Fortune, how you smiled as I retched brown bile, knowing this would lead to me returning to Five Wells!

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I really admire the work that water diviners do in countries that have been stricken by drought. It’s really something for them to go out of their way to bring a village back to life with a source of clean water close by. This kind of activity is strongly promoted by the British Society of Dowsers, which is a worthy activity indeed.

So, when England was recently bathing in sunshine for an inordinately lengthy period, almost unprecedented in my memory, then I began to think about how I too could find water. Crops were suffering under a hosepipe ban, and the surrounding countryside was parched. I began to think about water – the subject kept arising wherever I looked or listened.

In 1985 Kate Bush released her “Hounds of Love” album. I loved one side of it called “The Ninth Wave” (sides of albums – remember those?) but some of the more commercial tracks I didn’t get. One of those tracks was “Cloudbusting“. I had no idea at the time what the song was about. The video didn’t make the subject any clearer to me. Much later I learned about Wilhelm Reich’s Cloudbuster machine and suddenly the whole thing made sense – she was praising Reich’s esoteric genius – he was a rain maker – a weather controller – using a machine that incorporated crystals as its ‘engine’. No wonder he was pilloried and hounded to death! Which of us has the right to change the weather? That’s a question I should have spent more time contemplating…

Herb Leonard's 'Cloudbusting' picture

Calling the rains

I was ‘called’ to the top of a local hill. It felt like one of the many times I had been called there before, but when I arrived I couldn’t work out why I had been asked to visit. Nothing looked unusual at first glance. I walked to my usual haunts – an oak tree, 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., I looked around for signs of disturbance or anything unusual. Then it struck me – the issues was all around me – dry grass. Every ounce of green grass was now a pale yellow husk. It was heart-breaking to see everything struggling like this after such a long dry spell of weather – it must have been almost two months since we had a decent amount of rainfall. I felt something needed to be done.

Some dry grass, but you knew that.

Luckily I had everything I needed with me – some incense, lighters, crystals, my staff. All the paraphernalia. I went to my favourite oak tree – would it be alright if I did something about this? I seemed to get a positive response as a slight breeze rustled the branches. I love that. It’s a great trick. If it had been a negative response then I would probably had a bird startle me, or something.

Sitting on 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. I detuned and blended the external noise until it formed a hum in my head. I tuned into the ground around me, to the sun, the moon and felt connected. I rose and placed three incense sticks around the edge of the 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. – one for the earth, the sun and the moon. It felt like the right thing to do. I then held my staff in the centre of 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.. I began to walk around clockwise, pulling in male energies – the kind of energies that come from the sun, active energies, energies of change. Having begun to make the change I needed the balancing female energies to assist with this work too. I began to walk around in the other direction, anti-clockwise, drawing in the female energies from the invisible moon and the plants around me. All the time I asked for the rains to come in, the clouds to gather, the weather to change.

The next day nothing much had changed. A few more clouds, but it was still hot and humid. The day after I had to go abroad for a week working. Ironically, it was to a North African country where the weather was incredibly hot! I came back even more tanned than I was already. When I got back I flew through grey clouds. Oooh! What had the weather been like, I asked people? Terrible! Wet! Floods and torrential rain! I smiled. Well, it was a good thing that Nature was being re-balanced at last.

But it didn’t end there. The rain kept coming – for weeks. I felt bad. The rain wouldn’t stop! If I had in any way helped trigger this change in weather then surely it was beholden upon me to help revert it to a more balanced state? For ‘balanced’ read ‘drier’! I went back to the hill, where I did the spell again in a different place (because other people were up on the hill in the full moon!!) and the next day the sun broke out in full bloom. Amazing! It IS possible to do this kind of work. I have amazed and astonished myself. Of course, it’s simply coincidence…..

However – the change in weather only lasted a day. I knew when I did the ritual that it was not being done on the correct place, but I couldn’t get to where I needed to go – other people were out that night too, and I didn’t want to disturb them, or have them disturb me. The lesson I have learned is that the correct place for doing energy work is quite crucial to its success.

What I have seen since is that my triggering of events has had consequences far beyond that I had imagined could happen, and this has not been a necessarily good thing. Trying to influence forces as large as a weather system can muster forces that are way beyond the scope and scale of a human. I thought I was doing good, but in fact I probably was at least partially responsible for ruining some people’s holidays in the local area. Sorry about that! I’ve learned a lesson about working with very large and complex systems. Some things are beyond our total control.

Gwas.

Saturday 29th May - Four Knocks, County Meath

On the morning of Saturday 29th May I roped Kal into one of my crazy ideas. We would spend the next two days on a modern pilgrimage, just like we had done at Glastonbury the year before. We would find a starting point and then let the dowsing rods direct us from site to site. For me, I would set my intention for this pilgrimage to be to work on each of the seven chakras and to see what came out of trying to do that. For Kal, he would just do what he does – see what happened at each place and go with it. So, with the help of the iMegalith iPhone application and my SatNav system we trekked off to the starting point, which I had determined would be a henge and mound close to Four Knocks.

We didn’t get very far trying to find the henge and mound. The mound was visible in a farmer’s field, but the supposed henge had been… well, let’s assume it was removed and ploughed out of existence! Not a good start. Was there anywhere else we could pick up the quest? Our dowsing showed that nearby Four Knocks would be suitable. As soon as we got the rods crossing we kind of knew that this had actually been the right place all along, but something had been preventing us from dowsing that from afar. We sort of had to be in the area to zoom in on it. Perhaps we had prevented ourselves from ‘finding’ Four Knocks prior to actually being there because we knew you had to obtain a key in order to get in? Who knows. We obtained the said key (by the way – the directions are not very clear – but we found the house eventually and got the key by leaving a small deposit with a nice lady) and went to discover this famous mound’s secrets and begin a quest.

Entrance to Four Knocks

We opened the iron door up (iron – aaargh!!) and began to settle in. I needed some stuff from the car that I had forgotten, and by the time I got back to the mound it was swarming with a minibus-load of tourists from various parts of the world – America, Japan, Australia….all over. Their guide had clearly gone off to get the key without realising that we already had it. Ten minutes later he was in the mound beginning his guided tour of the place, which I earwigged into, of course. Hey – it was free for me to listen!! And jolly interesting it was too, although I could see Kal twitch every now and again, and I was biting my tongue at some of the speculative leaps the guide was making to fill the gaps in the archaeology with fantasy and pure imagination. He was very careful to preface everything with “My guess would be...”, or “Perhaps they might have…”, and even in the dim light I occasionally caught Kal swinging his dowsing rods behind the guide, shaking his head as though to say, “Nope!” It’s funny how dowsing can sometimes make you feel quite confident about being able to find out hidden knowledge, and yet later in the day that confidence would be completely reversed, but we’ll come to that in a later tale.

I don’t know if this is the traditional position but at Four Knocks we have the female on top and the male underneath. Yes, on top of the rounded mound there was female energy all over it. All around the outside of the mound was a male energy lineThe direction energy takes when moving. It may be straight or curved, in several dimensions and be composed of one or more different types of energies, i.e. negative, positive or neutral. Energy lines can be found at standing stones and ancient sites but are a general feature in all energy fields., waving and running around in a sunwise direction. Kal was spending quite a time outside, pacing around and around, working something out, but I decided to get myself inside to take some pictures of the rock carvings and to try to work out what I might have to do to work on my Root Chakra – the first part of my modern pilgrimage. That was the intention, but instead Four Knocks had its own agenda for working my chakras!! I will explain in a moment.

Inside there was more than the usual amount of decoration. Many of the swirling circular shapes were familiar to us, but there was an abundance of zig-zag lines and lozenge shapes carved into the lintels of the recesses in the mound that seemed to be quite unique to this particular chamber, or at least rarely seen in such quantity elsewhere.

Zig-zag lintel decoration at Four Knocks

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Stanton Moor and Eagle Tor, Derbyshire, February 27th, 2010.

Our little adventure in the Derby shire hills began on the first day of the Full Moon. Both Kal and I had felt its influence the previous night – for me it meant a sleepless night and a tight head. I love the Moon but it makes me pay for being so sensitive to it! Apart from the Moon we were astrologically unaware of what was around in the sky. All we were aware of was that  it was a Saturday, there was a full moon today, and we had an intention to awaken the energies of an ancient site.

Muck and Pandemonium

A brisk walk up the hill past Robin Hood’s Stride brought us into sight of the four remaining stones that still form Nine Stones Close. There never were nine stones, by the way. We got asked that by some passers-by. There were five, maybe as many as seven. I am sure that there is a stone missing on one side (opposite from the tree), but the tree side was very difficult to determine – the rods were “hazy” on that, which is a most unusual and disconcerting response. I think the word “Nine” is a corruption of an older word relating to “Noon”, or the high point of the sun. Given our findings at the site this day, it may well represent the low point of the sun too. But we’ll come to that soon enough.

When we arrived the first thing I noticed was that the field has been spread with manure – the stones were covered with it! Nice. And we had already struggled through patches of mud to get there too. Roll on Spring and Summer, I say! Terra firma is required, and some warmer longer days too, please!

A misty day

The first thing I did, after waiting for truckloads of schoolchildren to traipse through, was to go through some of my dowsing checklist. I think of it as a kind of warm-up exercise now (almost literally this cold misty day), as well as feeding into the Sacred Sites section of this site (eventually). Here are my findings for this day:-

• The site is energised by the position of the Sun at particular times of the year, for example Summer Solstice.
• The site was energised by the peaks of the Moon too, so was nearing a maximum again on this day.
• The site has an energetic 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. with Saturn – which signifies transformation.
• There is no 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. at this site – it is devoid of external spiritual activity

Looks like we had times our visit right going there at midday on a full moon, but what of Saturn? On my return I decided to see what significance Saturn had. I started by looking at the celestial events around that time. Notice, from the quote below, that Saturn is making itself prominent in the sky on March 1st,

Sunday, February 28

 Full Moon (exact at 11:38 a.m. today EST).  

Monday, March 1 This evening Saturn shines left of the great big rising Moon, which is just past full and just past perigee. By dawn Tuesday morning they’ve shifted way over to the west-southwest, and Saturn has turned to the Moon’s upper right.

The exact wording about the position of various bodies is not what struck me. What made me jump was that we had spent the weekend discovering that Nine Stones Close was being influenced by Saturn, and here was Saturn about to loom large in the environs of The Moon at its peak. Energetically, I felt this was significant, influential even.

Preparations for Pan

So I look around and Kal is jigging about beneath his favourite oak tree. He invites me to record him on his phone doing this, so to humour him I do so. Right. Er…is that normal? I enquire as to his state of mind. “I feel the urge to dance. This site is invigorated by dancing energy.” he states. Of course it is, I think to myself, of course it is. And continue with some preparations for my real purpose at this site today – to awaken the site’s energies. This has been the theme of the Imbolc to Spring Equinox period – to awaken the energies of the sites through human intention.

My preparations involve placing my ash staff in its proper place to focus and collect the energy generated, and for me to place four sticks of incense at appropriate power centres on the inside of each of the four remaining stones. There are more power centres at this site (six – which leads me to think there were originally six stones) – but the other two centres are not required for this awakening. Then I place my hand over four of the cup-marks in the Key Stone (as I’m calling the cup-marked stone).

Kal looks over at me as I break off from this ritual declaring it complete and says to me simply, “Pan!” We make a connection between the dancing, the Trickster god so beloved of Kal and the return of Nature spirits to the newly awakened site. Interesting! I dowse to see what this means and come up with the idea that a Nature spirit, a Pan (not THE Pan – they are multitudinous) is preparing to return to the site. We wonder when this will occur but don’t dowse for a date – it doesn’t seem appropriate to do so.

Kal ignores tricky questions concerning his certifiable behaviour

Saturn, Pan and the Solstices

As if by magic, Saturn appeared! What I mean is, having dowsed for the energetic influence of Saturn I researched the associations. Pan is associated with Saturn because Pan is the name we have given to one of Saturn’s moons. OK, interesting coincidence, but what did it mean for Nine Stones Close? We had prepared the way for a Nature Spirit (Pan) to return to the site. There was once 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.at Nine Stones Close but it left over a thousand years ago because no-one believed in it any more. When I say “believed in it”, I think I mean, “maintained its presence energetically” – a process of feeding human energy into the site through intention in order to attract and retain the presence of a Nature Spirit. This is a more intense relationship that “worship” which can be done without any knowledge or interaction with The Other (the Nature Spirit) – more intense because it involves purposefully giving energy to maintain the correct ambiance.

Saturn, in mythology, is the god of agriculture and vegetation. Well, here we were in a field, recently manured, expecting the return of vegetation and in the midst of agriculture (surrounded by farmland). Nine Stones Close is particularly linked to agriculture, as it stands in a currently worked field. Not a stunning link, but a link. Saturn is also associated with the astrological sign Capricorn, and thus the Winter Solstice. My dowsing results showed that the position of the Sun was significant to the energies of the site, so I could see how the Winter Solstice position would be a significant time. Oddly, when I dowsed for an astrological symbol, I couldn’t find one. I don’t know why.

Stones covered in cow crap

The final piece of interesting information was dowsing for a sigil. Despite the fact that I knew there wasn’t 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.here (yet) I asked whether I could dowse for the sigil that used to be here representing that spirit. The answer, fortunately, was YES, I could. So I asked for the best location to do that and was directed to an area right next 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.. The shape that emerged was this double spiral shape, also called the Cornu spiral:

The sun sigil, or Cornu spiral

I have seen this spiral before – it is the double-headed spiral that is engraved on the entrance stone at Newgrange in the Boyne Valley in Ireland, and many other megalithic sites too; some well beyond these isles. According to one researcher, this double spiral represents the pattern that is traced by the path of the Sun as it moves across the heavens in relation to our Earth. It is a kind of universal pattern that emerges out of the patterns of Nature herself. It is Pan’s symbol.

Newgrange entrance stone showing double-headed spiral

Having prepared the way for the return of a Nature Spirit we left for the next site in high spirits. We had only intended a fleeting visit to Nine Stones Close, but again it had delivered a mystical and profound experience. Next, to a new site for us – Doll Tor stone circle on the hill opposite Robin Hood’s Stride.

Gwas.