The Hedge Druid

Posts Tagged ‘helsby hill’

A few nights ago I got a ‘pull’ to go to Helsby Hill the day before bonfire night. It was late in the evening. Dark, yet with a strange light that allowed everything to be seen easily.

I parked in my usual place and walked up quietly. Something told me to stop part way up just at a bend in the tree line. I thought it was to light some incense, but that didn’t really make sense – that was my rational brain trying to think about why I might have stopped. Second after I pulled some incense sticks out, I saw a torch light coming down the path from above. I walked quickly back down the path being familiar with it I could go quite fast. I moved out of the sight of passers by and waited until they had gone past. I have nothing against people, but I like my own space and peace when I’m wanting to meditate.

When I went to see my favourite oak, the one that has been half cut away by maniac “land management engineers” – or fucking idiots, as I call them, I noticed that the tree had again suffered. One of its smaller inner branches had been snapped (by the wind or by someone swinging on it, I don’t know). I offered some healing and tried to light incense but it was clear that the wind wasn’t going to allow it to stay lit for any useful period of time. I wished I had taken some crystals up too. Must remember that incense and crystals have their usefulness, and that each has their purpose in different conditions.

I wanted to learn how merging with the spirit of Merlin had made any change to me, so I asked the rods to take me to a suitable place to meditate. They took me round behind the line of trees and into a place I had never visited before on the hill, but it was perfect – an oak tree with wonderful spiralling branches and a fantastic sitting place. I spent ten minutes getting to know the oak, and letting it get to know me. I had to get my mind perfectly still and quiet for this to happen, and finally I got my call to come and meditate, having presented my credentials and allowed the tree to verify me.

When I meditated I learned that Merlin’s spirit was simply an archetype within my mind, not the actual spirit of Merlin, whomsoever he may have been. I had been exploring my own mind at Samhain, and recent meditations had been reminding me of that all the time – not to get too carried away with these mythical figures because they were only archetypes that I was working with to unleash powers and thought patterns within my own mind space.

Imagine this but moonlit instead of sunlit

I asked about how the change had affected me I got my answer – hadn’t I noticed how much quicker it was for me to work magic now? Hadn’t I felt that everything of that ilk had become much more innate now? That was the benefit gained by the Underworld journey to recover the spirit of Merlin. My magickal tasks such as energising the land would become much easier to perform.

Something else was revealed to me. When I had completed the linking of various earth energy sites, I should join them up into some form of shape. The shape would reveal a very special sigil that I could use in the future. That was the promise, the enticement, to continue with that particular work, and I was glad that there was at least some end point to it.

As I emerged out of the tree’s canopy I slipped quietly along the tree line. I was in neutral colours and would have been barely visible despite the mysteriously bright moonlight (unexpected because we were practically at new Moon when there should be almost no moonlight! I noticed some lads messing about with what I presumed to be a box of fireworks on the top of the hill. Using my invisibility skills I slipped away unnoticed in the bright clear night, yet I could make them out clearly. Yet again I was thankful for my new-found skills, and so amazed at how easily they could be evoked since my experience with Merlin.

Gwas.

Dowsing Results for 2009

At the start of the year I faithfully followed the proposed dates that aligned with the current Gregorian calendar. As the year progressed beyond Summer Solstice I came to feel that the dates that were marked as celebration dates bore little relation to the times when earth energies were specifically active. The Gregorian dates for the Pagan Festivals in particular felt wrong, and were egergetically unremarkable. I started to align my visits with other criteria. My reasoning was that, for Equinox and Solstice days - celebrations of the sun – then the exact day as stated originally was accurate. For the pagan festival dates I took the nearest full moon date to be the correct day to try to do some dowsing. Often, this didn’t quite work out because I had already booked the Gregorian dates off work and so was often only free to dowse at sacred sites on those dates.

Here were the dates that I had written down as being the days to test for subtle energetic potential:-  

• Imbolc – 1 Feb (First Quarter moon)
• Spring Equinox – Thu Mar 20 5:48 GMT
• Beltane – 1 May (almost First Quarter moon)
• Summer Solstice – Sun Jun 21 0:59 BST
• Lammas – 1 Aug (six days from Full Moon)
• Autumn Equinox – Mon Sep 22 16:44 BST
• Samhain – 1 Nov (Full Moon)
• Winter Solstice – Sun Dec 21 12:04 GMT

You will notice that I have used the original Gregorian dates rather than those that I shifted eleven days prior to these trying to account for the calendar shift in the Middle Ages. Here were my original propositions and thoughts as a reminder of what I was trying to do:

We’re going to have to dowse on those days as we go through the year and see what happens. When does it feel right, and when are the energies particularly active? … I would hope that the male energies would be more active on the days of solar worship such as Summer Solstice, or the Equinoxes. If we get sun in Britain on those dates then we have a chance to test this theory out by visiting some of the sites we went to over this Winter period, when the energies seemed distinctly quiet and weak, with no evidence of male energy activity at all. On active solar days we would expect to find the qualities associated with maleness – protection, transformation through initiation, and the manipulation of energy.

The festival dates when the moon is very present coincide with the lunar festivals of the cross-quarter days (Beltane and Samhain) this year. That’s lucky for us and we can report on the status of the female earth energies at sites on those dates. We expect that the traditionally female aspects will be in evidence on those dates, that is fertility powers, sanctuary and healing.

We hope to be able to answer whether the times of year of the festivals correlate to a particular quality of the powers of the moon or sun at that time. The White Virgin (the first stage of the goddess) is linked to Spring. Are fertility powers stronger at Beltane and Spring Equinox? May Day was always seen as a fertility festival. Imbolc is associated with Brigid and healing. Are the healing energy frequencies strongest at this time?

Not all dates were able to be tested due to circumstances or time restrictions, but where they could then I have recorded the results. My conclusions will be compared with my expectations as recorded at the beginning of the year.

I am very unhappy with the quality of the results for this experiment. There were notable times when we didn’t take any measurement of the relative strengths of the energies and this has made the results quite inconclusive. Therefore, I will endeavour to be more rigorous this year and to try to capture the information more reliably and objectively. Therefore, please consider these results as an “indication” of what might be the case.

I also believe that there are some factors that have come to light this year that affect the results, i.e. the position of various planets at that point in the year, the position of the sun and moon, how clear the skies were, and to take into account the strengths of male and female energies separately, as well as differentiating between earth and radiant energy strengths.

Therefore, all in all, I feel the results from 2009 are of purely subjective value. However, I am including what data I did gather so that I can compare this year’s information with it to see if anything at all does begin to form a pattern.

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IMBOLC – February 1st

Actual visit date(s): February 1st & 2nd

Moon Phase: Almost First Quarter

Location: Dyserth village

Sites visited: St.Bridget’s Church, Castle Dyserth (quarry where we made a stone circle), Graig Fawr hill, Dyserth Waterfall, Gop Hill

Dowsing results: A significant change in the strength of the male energies from 1st to 2nd February. As there was significant cloud cover I could not attribute this increase to the appearance of the sun.

Activities: Only dowsing. Nothing relating to energy specifically.

Post Link: Dyeserth 3

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SPRING EQUINOX - March 20th

Actual visit date: March 20th

Location: Bryn Celli Ddu, Anglesey

Sites visited: Bryn Celli Ddu, Penmaenmawr stone circle

Dowsing results: The energy “felt” balanced. We were not inclined to dowse much at all. What dowsing was done turned up a perfect balance between male and female energy strengths. Was this purely suggestive, or was it real?

Activities: Attuning ourselves on top of an ancient mound, healing a stone circle with positive balancing energies.

Post Link: A Balance of Light & Dark

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BELTANE – May 1st

Actual visit date: May 1st

Moon Phase: Almost First Quarter

Location: Helsby, Cheshire.

Sites visited: Helsby Hill, Woodhouses Hill and a modern man-made mound.

Dowsing results: Again, we failed to measure the relative strengths of the energies. Energy was successfully sent from one site to the next, however.

Activities: Lighting incense and manifesting energies from hilltop to hilltop.

Post Link: Firing Manifestations

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SUMMER SOLTICE – June 21st

Actual visit date: Jone 20th and 21st

Location: Glastonbury, Somerset,

Sites visited: Barrowbridge Mump, Wearyall Hill, White Spring, Glastonbury Tor, Gog and Magog trees

Dowsing results: Very strong male energies, overwhelming the female energy (which wasn’t weak either). Strongest male energy of the year.

Activities: Meditating at various sites, being intuitively led to them, and instinctively having our chakras opened at those places to receive an influx of positive inspirational energies.

Post Link: The Opening of the Chakras

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LAMMAS - August 1st

Rejuvenated forest clearing

Actual visit date: August 1st

Moon Phase: 5 days from Full Moon

Location: The Sandstone Trail, Cheshire.

Sites visited: Beeston Castle, Peckforton Castle, Utkinton, Delamere Forest, Frodsham.

Dowsing results: Finding healing white energy spirals (composed of female tree and earth energy).

Activities: Drawing energy from the land (energising), healing,

Post Link: Llamas and Lammas

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AUTUMN EQUINOX – August 22nd

Actual visit date: August 19th and 20th

Location: Wiltshire and Oxfordshire

Sites visited: Alton Barnes White Horse, Wayland’s Smithy, Uffington White Horse

Dowsing results: Unusually strong male and female energies that were well balanced. The sun was glorious for these two days, and I felt completely relaxed, to the point where I was “spaced out” by being at sites – this “good feeling” was due to the “white” energy of the balanced and combined male and female energies, I believe.

Activities: Using sigils, following intuition, a pilgrimage of ancient sites, balancing chakra energies, transformation process.

Post Link: Trail of the White Dragon

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SAMHAIN – November 1st

Actual visit date: November 2nd

Moon Phase: Full Moon

Location: Wiltshire.

Sites visited: Silbury Hill, West Kennet Long Barrow.

Dowsing results: Stronger response than first visit I made some months earlier. The energy was male energy atop this mound. It was so strong it made me dizzy! I felt highly charged with subtle energy, and I could draw upon both male and female forms. Dowsing response was incredibly strong under the full moon.

Activities: Meditating, shamanic flying, empowerment of energy fields.

Post Link: None.

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WINTER SOLSTICE – December 21st

Actual visit date: 21st December

Location: Anglesey

Sites visited: Bryn Celli Ddu, Bryngwyn Stones, The Soar Stone, Lligwy Chamber

Dowsing results: Stronger female energies surrounding Bryn Celli Ddu; minimal male energy coming only from the stones. Male energy at Soar Stone restricted to close to the stone. Weak in nature. Male energy at Lligwy was confined to power centres, whilst female energy was again enclosing the central stones, as though protecting them? Our normal alignments (m/f) were reversed for this day – Kal went for female energy whilst I sought out male energy.

Activities: transformation, shamanic flying, empowerment, balancing of chakras.

Post Link: Anglesey Winter Solstice

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CONCLUSIONS

There are hints within this set of information that various factors such as the time of year, and the position of the sun and moon, all affect the strengths of the subtle energies at sacred sites and elsewhere. However, the poor quality and consistency of the information I gathered does not allow me to make any clear statement to that effect. Therefore, this year I will try to take more accurate, consistent and objective records of this data, including the new factors that I believe may be relevant including the influence of planets, and whether the sun or moon are visible when the dowsing takes place.

Watch for this post next year to see if I can get anything that might be approaching a conclusion!

Gwas

May 1st, or May Day, is the ancient Celtic fire festival of Beltane. It traditionally marks the appearance of the Pleiades star cluster in the constellation of Taurus, an event linked to the start of the farming calendar (which ends at Samhain, or All Hallow’s Eve). It is a fire festival in recognition of the rise of the fire element (i.e. the power of the sun) at this time of year in the Northern Hemisphere, and so solar deities and mythical royal figures are linked to this time in the year. They are said to flourish in their youthful phase, starting at Beltane when they begin to rise to prominence. I planned to mark this by lighting a small fire or a stick of incense at each site to ceremoniously mark this event. I hoped the spirit of the year would travel with me as I journeyed from one site to another, linking them through energy work and fire.

The beautiful Pleiades

We decided to keep our work local today. I wanted to visit a familiar haunt that meant something to me, as well as discovering a new one, so I planned three sites: Helsby Hill, Woodhouses Hill and the site of a structure that looked like a hill fort close to Frodsham. The two hills had hill forts marked on the Ordnance Survey map of the area. They are the sites of ancient hill forts. I say ancient, because the hill forts, I suspect, are a much later addition to sites that had some spiritual and energetic significance long before they were fortified or stocked with invading Roman soldiers. A tourist sign in Helsby village reminds us that the archaeology has dated the sites to having habitation since the Iron Age – approximately 800 B.C.E – 42 C.E.

I walked up Helsby Hill in the mid-morning sunshine hoping for a clear day to do some energy work. My intention was to try something that Hamish Miller had suggested: that manifested (i.e. visualised) patterns can be imprinted onto a place, then they will appear in a more complex form at a connected site. By connected I assumed he meant a sacred site that had some kind of energetic connection to a nearby site. I wasn’t going to rely on that though: I had some ideas in mind to make that connection myself by forming an energetic bridge from one site to another.

Atop Helsby Hill I dowsed to find the location of ‘The Spirit of Helsby Hill’. I didn’t know what that actually might mean, but it seemed a good thing to ask for, as it would involve the co-operation of Nature in my work. I found a circle of lush grass just back from the cliff edge. There I asked to dowse to formation that was the symbol of the hill’s spirit. I traced the following shape: a serpent-like curved zig-zag shape that ended in a sphere. It reminded me of a caduceus symbol without the wings, or at least one half of that shape. I meditated until I felt that I had a connection to this spirit, then added a circle around the symbol as my own identifying mark.

Then I projected that image to the next site, even though I had never visited Woodhouses Hill. I simply looked at the map and sent the image to that place. I formed an energetic link by visualising a bridge of energy arcing from one place to the other, and then imprinted the symbol at the other side, and hoped for the best. Woodhouses Hill was a couple of miles’ walk so off I trudged, with Kal in tow acting merely as an animated observer to this energy-play. Most unusual that he didn’t want to participate today, but that he was having too much fun prancing around pretending he was 30 years younger!

We climbed the very steep sides of Woodhouses, taking the most direct route up to the hill fort site at the top. All along the route crows had been flying around Kal, seemingly accompanying him on his journey. Often I pointed them out, sitting in tall trees that marked our route, or hovering on the wind just in front of us as we walked. Kal just laughed at this. He has come to accept their presence quite naturally, and is beginning to try to tune into any significance they might have as signs or omens. Certainly they have become his totem bird.

Kal’s not one for heights, but he danced up and down the hills that day as though he were unafraid and on springs! Since a recent episode with a tree (post coming soon about that) he had gained a little voice that informs him that he will be just fine when he finds himself on the high edges of paths. A year ago he would never have even come up Helsby Hill, never mind the run up the dizzying sloped of Woodhouses Hill! How we have progressed since starting this journey. We have both overcome things that would make our former selves squirm in fear! ‘Fortune favours the brave’, I believe the saying goes.

We stood now in a beautifully varied and pleasingly-spaced wood at the top of the path, looking around for signs that we were actually in a hill fort – only the slope of the ground would indicate that we were. I dowsed to find the location of where my Helsby Hill circled half-caduceus symbol might have ‘landed’. A minute dowsing through the trees and I found it in a circular clearing between some birch trees. Kal was busy touching trees and occasionally muttering things to them. ‘Edge Wizard’ indeed! He was turning distinctly ‘druidy’ so I ribbed him about it. Of course he protested!

I dowsed for the symbol as Kal watched, It was looser than the original, but it was the same shape, circled strongly by my additional energy. It’s at times like this that you begin to doubt your sanity. Had I just found that because I wanted to find it? Who knows? There it was, responding to the rods whilst I tried to maintain a clear trance-state to be as objective as possible about it. I checked it several times. It was as ‘there’ as anything I had ever dowsed. I was convinced. Kal was surprised and childishly delighted too. I spent a few minutes sending the same pattern on to the next site, just like last time. Again, the destination was not somewhere I had visited before, although I had passed it many times. I could visualise it generally, but not a specific ‘landing site’ for the energy. I wondered what would happen?

We headed off down the slope heading for the back of Frodsham Hill. As we descended the back of Woodhouses Hill we met a man surveying the earthworks that ran along the hill. ‘What are you surveying?‘ we asked after introducing ourselves. The earthworks apparently, to construct a 3D map of the site. Great! All good information that might reveal something interesting, and may add to our understanding of its age and the ways of the people who spent time here.

We arrived at the final site. It turns out it is a man-made long construction, with locked trapdoors in its roof. Was it one of the many World War II bunkers that peppered the hillsides around here? It certainly felt like one, but it was huge – a hundred metres in length and about fifteen metres wide, by about five metres tall. Who knows how deep it went into the hillside? This was no hill fort site! Nevertheless, I wanted to see whether I had sent the symbol onwards as I had done at the two previous sites.

Somebody else thinking of patterns around here?

I dowsed in the strong winds that buffeted the now rain-sodden grassy bunker roof and found a pattern some ten metres away from where we had sheltered behind one of the many turrets. It was a circle again. Inside the circle was the snaking three energy curves, and the sphere at the bottom, but the rods continued on a different path! They rods wove back and forth in ever-longer sweeps to form a snake pattern that was exactly the opposite of the original form. Now I had a whole caduceus symbol of opposing energy paths coming together at the circular base (or head) of the formation. Wow! Like Hamish Miller had experienced – the manifestation had complexified from one site to another. What did that mean?

I felt that the experiment had been a resounding success. Perhaps I even missed at trick when dowsing the formation at Woodhouses? I couldn’t be sure. However, the main objectives had been achieved. It is possible to send energy from place to place, both a symbol from the land itself, and my own energy formation too in the shape of the enclosing circle. Perhaps next I should see if I can draw a formation from another site that has a manifested energy pattern?

Gwas Myrddyn
Following a local path, for local people.

Well, my faithful (i.e. full of faith) sidekick Kal has beaten me to the punch! Posting about manifestations! Mind you, this has been lounging around for a few days. You can’t rest in this pursuit! So, here’s the post he referred to.

Last weekend I took the opportunity of some fine winter weather (what a good dry spell we’re having recently – unseasonable) to go up Helsby Hill. The view was stunning – you could see clear across the River Weaver to Liverpool and Southport, and to the end of the Wirral. Although there were the usual “viewers”, passers-by and dog walkers up there I decided to find a spot for some dowsing experiments.

The view

I found a place with my trusty L-rods designated as suitable for producing manifestations and began a test of whether images that I pictured could be produced as energy patterns around this found clear spot (which was conveniently away from any path, but close to the cliff edge). Here are the patterns I tried to produce:-

1. A square

Success. Perfect square. Consistent form as I dowsed (not larger or smaller). Cleared it away for next experiment successfully.

2. Long triangle (imagined an electricity pylon shape)

Failure. I had set my eyes upon two points ahead of me as though to fix the tip of the triangle before dowsing. As I dowsed those two points became the extent of the radii of two circles which formed both in front and behind me around the centre I was standing on.

When I tried to clear the pattern ready for the next session I was lazy and I half-thought that I had only swept the pattern to either side of the existing shapes. When I dowsed to check that it had been cleared it registered as oblongs, whose sides had extended as far as I had imagined clearing the patterns! I had stretched them, not cleared them. Went through clearing process again.

3. Equilateral triangle

Tried to imagine a single equilateral triangle, but my mind kept overlaying it with a second triangle forming a six-pointed star instead. When I dowsed, however, I didn’t find the star. Instead I was sent around the centre point on long paths that seemed to have no discernible pattern.

4. Twelve-petalled flower

Tried to imagine a 12-petalled flower, but when I imagined the shape it kept transforming into a triangular shape where each point had a circle on the end of it so that it looped back on itself before going to the next “point” in the triangle. A sort of Celtic design, and fractal. It was an image that had many (sub-)cultural references for me – the Cream night-club logo, crop circle designs, a psychedelic but geometric paisley pattern.

Didn’t argue, but dowsed for that pattern. It was there, and kept expanding slightly as I dowsed. This pattern seemed to resonate with me strongly, and I enjoyed walking around it.

5. Six angled lines

A real test now! Could it produce six 45 degree angled lines that didn’t join together, that had no other connections? To be honest, I wasn’t sure how I came up with that idea – was it from me or elsewhere? I was beginning to doubt the degree to which I was controlling these mental images! I imagined the lines and then dowsed. They were there. All six. They went off into the distance in either direction, dead straight.

Gave up to go and think about it some more….

I know what you’re asking yourselves: “how did you clear them?” Well, it was simple visualisation of water being dropped around me, spreading across the ground and clearing the energy that was formed there. Perhaps this needs a bit more work, or maybe I need to apply some intent to it in order to be able to do it properly. On the whole it worked, so I’m sticking with the visualisation for now.

Gwas.