The Hedge Druid » oak tree

Sickness, Shadows and Swords

Gwas — Thu, 08 Dec 2011 22:27:45 +0000

As the nights draw in here for the Northern Hemisphere countries our lives begin to change in subtle ways. We lose the lightning power of The Sun in the mornings and evenings. As this power is depleted the changes may even be mirrored in our body chemistry, and consequently in our thought processes. For many people “Seasonal Affective Disorder” (SAD) is a fact of life – they get more depressed in the Winter months. Luckily, I don’t suffer from this, however that doesn’t mean that I am not prone to dark influences. Here is my very personal story about how my psychic shield got breached, and I became a victim of my own dark shadow. If ever there was a horror story to accompany a Winter evening, this is one that will chill your bones!

I can’t tell you how difficult this is to write. I am a strong independent person with what I often believe is a will of iron. Once my mind is set I generally achieve what I set out to do. In addition, I am very healthy. Physically I am in peak condition, my immune system is very strong, and I pride myself in keeping myself in good condition mentally, physically and spiritually. That is, after all, my whole reason for being – to keep my soul’s cage in the best of working conditions. So, it is with some level of embarrassment that I found myself getting ill in a number of ways recently, most particularly not being in total control of myself. I was being influenced by a shadow self.

Jung and The Shadow

In Jungian terms I was encountering what the great psychologist termed The Shadow. This concept is so prevalent in film, television, fairytale and mythology that it hardly needs an explanation. We know it as the often sublimated and suppressed urges arising from our usually latent desires and instincts. Almost every horror film is a depiction of the struggle with The Shadow. When it is let loose it has the capability to put the ‘light’ self in a tricky situation, because it does not obey the rules and the established norms of society. In my quest to be a “good person” I may have pushed these instincts too far under the surface, and now they had chosen to re-emerge at a time when I was physically and energetically weak.

I have an inkling now about what triggered it to become dominant, but only because I have managed to dowse it after the fact. The Shadow creeps up on you from behind. What I did know at the time was that I was acting out of character with how I perceived myself, and out of step with my spiritual goals. I first noticed The Shadow emerge in the dream world, where my dreams began to include unusually violent or sexual situations. I put it down to any one of a hundred reasons, and carried on. It would go away.

Next it began to make itself mentally present during the day. My thoughts began to turn to matters that I didn’t usually allow. Forbidden subjects. Deviant topics. If you’ve had these thoughts yourself you know what I’m talking about. I began to wonder what was going on now. How could I be having these thoughts? I hadn’t had thoughts like this since my early teens, the years when my mind was struggling to define itself in its emergence into the world of adulthood, when laws and ethics were being created and challenged with equal rapidity, when I was defining the boundaries of my self.

The final straw came after a few days of The Shadow manifesting itself within me physically. I was now doing things, making things happen in the physical world that my poor helpless moral self was appalled at! Finally, it rebelled with sufficient force as to cause me to stand up and summon the forces of my will power to re-assert control, if only for long enough to decide to do something about it. This had to stop, or my world was going to come crashing down around me and I would be left in the middle of it, alone, wondering what the hell had happened! Hell indeed. Time for action!

The Dark Sword

The reclamation began with dowsing. I began with the unusual step of asking for the involvement of my primary spirit guide. I asked her to ensure that the results I would dowse were not going to be tainted by any other force except the force with which I usually interacted, whatever that might be. Whatever that force is we have established a certain level of trust and rapport, and I needed clear and sure answers for this session! With a feeling of my guide around me I felt more confident, and so began to dowse out what had been happening.

There was a dark shadow in my energy field – around my head
The dark energy had come in via my weakened crown chakra
My chakra has been weakened when I visited Edinburgh Castle
Within the castle there is an artefact – a ceremonial sword – that has been used in black magic rituals
The ‘dark sword’ had drained my spiritual ‘goodness’ even by me being in its proximity and had drawn me to it

From that moment on I was in a weakened and vulnerable state. All the way around the castle my thoughts were on this sword. Only briefly, when I dowsed the Stone of Destiny, did my thoughts move away from it. I hadn’t seen the sword, but I knew it was in the barracks somewhere, and I knew it was the most powerful thing in the castle. Even more so than the Stone of Destiny! Such power! I could feel it. I wanted to touch it! It wanted me to touch it. It attracted my thoughts and with that bizarre moment of lusting for power I let something in via my weakened crown chakra. Something dark and demonic focused itself on me, and from then on I began to develop these dark thoughts. I had formed some kind of link between the darkness and my spiritual centre.

Dispelling the darkness

I called upon my spiritual guide and teacher to assist with finding a resolution to this problem. I asked what I could do and was shown a vision of a hill with an oak tree, and the oak tree was throwing its branches from side to side violently. I knew exactly where that was, but the movement was unusual. I didn’t know what that was about yet. I set a date to go, and then made sure I had the opportunity. I went to get my hair cut in town in order to give myself a “clear head”. It also meant that I had an excuse to wash my head before I left the house too – cleansing is an important preparation for change, I feel.

The sun was shining as I walked up a local hill, and as I walked through the trees that cloak the lower levels and screen the path to the top of the hill I noticed that the wind was blowing a chorus of approval through their branches, making them bow and tilt as though they were excited about the ritual that was to come. I know I was. The walk up was serene and sun-filled, despite the voices of the wind and trees – I seemed to take the path that offered the most shelter and was the quietest route up.

As I came to a break in the tree-lined path I took a moment to look at the sun as it shone through the gap. There, in front of me, was the perfect pedestal for the spiral-cut rock that I had brought with me – a rock that I had bought in Edinburgh. It seemed fitting to charge the rock with positive energy to assist my work. After a few minutes in the sunlight the rock was humming with positive energy as I picked it back up.

I emerged from the shelter of the trees onto the shorn and bleak crest of the hill. The wind howled in strong gusts, shaking the familiar oak tree that was my old friend. I could see that the tree matched the vision I had and that the wind was fulfilling the vision to a tee by stretching the oak limbs and making them wave frantically. Despite the gusty wind I was easily able to light three sticks of incense. With their smell occasionally reaching my nostrils I began to engage with the tree in order to dispel the darkness of The Scottish Sword.

A helpful trusted oak friend on my local sacred hill

After grounding and centering, I took energy from the spiral-cut rock, and then gathered my spirit guides. I felt a slow shower of white light slowly descending, twinkling and tingling all the way down my body. At the end of the first pass a cow in a nearby field bellowed in a short sharp outburst startling me! A sign? I did the procedure again, but this time the pass of showering white tingling sparks was wider, cleansing my whole energy aura. Again, at the end there was a quieter but still lone and distinct lowing from one cow. Definitely a sign! With these signs indicating the end of the cleansing, I filled my aura with the energies of the tree, the elements, the hill and the spirits around me. I felt fantastic again – freed of all this ridiculous dark shadow that had been hanging around me for weeks.

I thanked the tree and unwound all my processes – dissipating the energies, picking the incense up, and taking back the wonderful spiral rock that had been so useful in achieving balance again. It was then that I noticed that the rock’s spiral carving showed not one male or female spiral but a continuous line that became a spiral first one way then the other – both male and female intertwined. The ultimate symbol of a balanced energy form! Afterwards I was so energised that I did a hundred and one things that I had been putting off for a long time. It felt great to be back! Free of the sickness, the shadow and the sword.

Gwas.

The Berth and Death of Scorpius

Gwas — Sun, 16 Oct 2011 19:14:41 +0000

I sometimes find myself doing some very strange things without knowing why. This night was one of those strange evenings, and yet the strangeness would continue beyond this night and lead to an even stranger conclusion by the time I had finished unravelling all of the clues.

I had decided that at some point in the week I would need to go somewhere. The weather was good, so I got out my dowsing rods and began to enquire about a suitable place for me to learn something that would progress me on my spiritual path – the usual request – general and open. The responses I got seemed to indicate that I could find such a place in the county of Shropshire, and that the place existed on the Megalithic Portal, so it was only a matter of bringing up a list of sites in Shropshire and working through a process of elimination to find the site that I was expected to go to. Soon I found it – The Berth – an ancient hillfort and associated pool near the village of Marton a short distance from the main A5 road. I did some reading on the Megalithic Portal about access to the site – not good. Permission from the local farmer is suggested. Well then, a covert visit may be in order given that I would be arriving late at night.

The Berth [Portal]

I put on my dancing trousers (well, the fleece-lined ones – it might be cold) and began to journey southwards from Cheshire. Soon I was past the eastern edges of Wales and skirting the western fringes of England. Within an hour I had arrived at Marton in the dark of the late evening and was searching around on a small-scale OS map for the perfect place to park and navigate through the fields to the hillfort. Luckily, without too much fuss, I found such a place down a road marked “Unsuitable for motor vehicles.” No kidding! Good job I was in a four-wheel drive machine.

A map showing The Berth hillfort in Shropshire

I parked at the only place down the narrow country lane that would fit a car. Using my print-out of a low-level OS map I headed off further down the lane. Five minutes later I realised I must have gone past the entry point I was looking for and doubled back. The entry point turned out to be where I had parked the car! When will I learn to trust my intuition? Such a hard thing to do!

Several times I had to stop myself from asking the obvious question, “What the hell are you doing in the middle of nowhere in the middle of the night?“. Luckily, I didn’t allow myself to even try to formulate an answer, but instead began to walk across the fields towards what I hoped was the right place, breathing in the still-warm evening air and wishing I hadn’t muffled myself up because I was beginning to overheat! This is October, right? Supposed to be cold and damp? Instead we are in the tail end of a heatwave and it was still 15 degrees late into the evening. Bizarre weather!

Fortune seemed to be on my side, guiding me towards something whose very impulse and importance I could sense like a scent on the night air.

The light of the First Quarter moon guided my safely along the narrow farm track and out into the open fields. I made a note of my position using a very tall and wide oak tree as a marker. From this point onwards I would be guided hope and a vague sense of direction! I tuned into Nature and walked with confidence towards through the darkness, using only the distant light from farms to provide bearings.

The imposing tree-lined obstruction in front of me must be The Berth, I reckoned. It was the only large protrusion for miles around. I made my way over hoof-rutted dried mud paths until I found an animal track that took me round the base of the tall embankment. It was difficult to judge int he dark but the structure looked to be at least 25 feet high. I used my dowsing rods to find a suitable entrance and soon they were pointing to a place almost indistinguishable from any other, but I trusted that the rods knew the correct way in, so I began climbing up what I soon discovered to be the incredibly steep side of the hillfort.

A large game bird took flight hurriedly from the nearby tree, startling me a little. I guess we startled each other, as it probably wasn’t expecting to see a human until daybreak! This reminded me to put up some protection, so as I reached the crest of the hill I did so, calling upon the forces that guide me to offer their protection as I worked, and creating a cocoon of spiralling energies that covered my body. Even as I put up the protection I felt that it was unnecessary in this place – this place was benevolent towards me, not malign. Nevertheless, I am cautious at new sites.

The Thin Tree

The top of the hillfort looked flat as far as the eye could see, which, in darkness, wasn’t very far! I was going to have to rely on my dowsing rods for some guidance here. I got them out and got settled and prepared – several deep breaths and some relaxation. I asked the rods, “Please take me to wherever I need to be to fulfill my purpose here this evening.” I was leaving the answer totally in the hands of whatever guiding powers were in operation that evening. The rods arced gently to the left and drew me away across towards the north-eastern end of the site. I followed obediently, using all my attention to avoid falling over.

The rods moved certainly and smoothly along a sinuous path across the plateau. With my head down I wasn’t looking ahead, and so nearly bumped into the tall spindly hawthorn tree as the rods turned into its slender trunk to indicate that I had reached my destination. A tree, eh? Yes, the only tree on the plateau from what I could see. There was nothing else poking its head into the skyline except the trees that ringed the edge of the hill. I wasn’t too surprised.

Standing beneath the tree I began to tune into the place. I was ‘feeling around’ for the Spirit of Place, if there was one. I could feel something, something benevolent, and something close by. I lifted the dowsing rods again and asked to be taken to the current location of the spirit. The rods took me one step away and then curled right round to go back to the tree, just a little further round from where I had been standing! I laughed at that – looks like my intuitive senses are getting slightly better these days, eh?

Ariel view of the amazing Berth hillfort

The Scorpion Trees

I sat beneath the tree to mentally prepare myself for connecting to the site and its resident spirits. I could feel a presence which I assumed was the Spirit of Place, and I began to relax into the scenery to embed myself into Nature and become indistinguishable from it. I left behind all pre-conceptions of what I might need to do, and instead asked why I was here to whoever or whatever was listening. Then I waited…

…my eyes opened to look at the trees outlined against the night sky. Due to the background distant lights the trees appeared as dark shapes against a deep blue backcloth. To my eyes the clump of trees ahead of me together looked like the shape of a scorpion – pincers at the front, a body and then a curling tail with a sharp point. It was unmistakable. I turned away – I was not here to make shapes out of trees. I was here to find out what I was supposed to learn that would advance my spiritual progress. Focus, I told myself.

A few minutes of meditation and breathing later I opened my eyes again. There was the scorpion again! Dammit – stop looking at the scorpion! I got annoyed with myself. What did a scorpion have to do with anything – they’re not even native to these island! I put my hand down to stand up and got stung really sharply and deeply by an invisible clump of nettles. Double damn! Now I was in pain. What a sting! Like a….scorpion….The realisation dawned. Here was a sign. Pay attention to the scorpion, something was telling me.

Of course I didn’t listen immediately. It’s never as simple as that, is it? Thinking that I must be here to learn about healing and energy-shaping I tried to heal myself by covering my hand in energy – fail! The sting was as bad as before. Now it was throbbing too. Dammit! Such bad luck! I walked around until it eased enough for me to have another go at meditating. As I went to sit back down I noticed a head-sized white object two feet away from where I had been sitting, directly in line with the trees but somehow I hadn’t noticed it. I walked over to inspect it, and moved it with my foot to see how it reacted. It went “clunk” and I saw that it was a dead cow’s skull – too big for a sheep, must be a cow. Hmm…

Slowly the ungreased cogs in my brain moved around to put the Scorpion with the Skull, and soon a phrase was flitting about in my skull - ”The Death of Scorpio“.

The answer, my friend, is blowing in the wind

I had the germ of the idea, now I needed to fill in the blanks. I turned to the Genius Loci for advice. What would happen at the Death of Scorpio, I asked? The wind picked up suddenly and the trees around me rustled as though discussing the matter and passing on a message from some neighbourly spirits. I felt that I would be challenged to prove my worth in order to rise up the spiral of progress at that point.

So, the Death of Scorpio may be a time or a place – I couldn’t be sure which though. Better ask – is this concept a time? The trees rustled in a short breath of wind. The answer was that time was involved, but this was not the emphatic or definitive answer I was looking for. Was this related to a place, then? A huge whirlwind pushed the tops of the trees to one side and made them struggle to remain upright, then fell back to nothing again. YES, came the simple response, as though picking up on my requirement for a simplistic response. So, it might relate to a place, and possibly a particular time might be related too, but it wasn’t an exact date. Good enough to work with, I felt.

The Scorpius Constellation

I took my leave, thanking the Spirit of Place for its welcome and its advice. I could not have asked for more. I didn’t thank it for the sting in the tail that it left me with, though, and my hand continued to smart as I nursed it, descending the steep slopes of the embankment in utter darkness and barely holding myself upright. What a lesson I had learned, yet again, about paying attention to what I am being shown. How many more times would I need to learn this lesson, I asked myself rhetorically?

As I passed each large tree on the return journey I thanked them all for letting me pass safely, and for guiding my way in the darkness. If not for the large wide oak at the end of the trackway I would have been walking through fields for ages in the wrong direction. As I headed back to the car I could feel the eyes of nocturnal creatures, some animal, some not, touching my energy body with their curious attentions. I was not afraid, but answered their stares with warmth and affection. It was I who was the out-of-place character in their night-time play. I was also still confident in the strong protection I had put up before entering The Berth. It still throbbed with energy, like my hand.

Synchronicity and Research

Interestingly, researching The Berth later I found a link to my “old friends” Graham Philips and Martin Keatman, the authors of books about King Arthur, but whose books The Green Stone and The Eye of Fire I had read only a week or two before this visit. A synchromystic moment if ever there was one! Apparently they had taken part in a TV documentary with Brian Blessed where they had visited The Berth. I would have enjoyed seeing that! Imagine!

Anyway, major topical coincidences aside, I still needed to pin down what The Death of Scorpio meant exactly, so I continued my research, and amazingly I found the answer.

The Death of Scorpio

There is an obvious astrological link. Scorpio is one of the twelve constellations of the zodiac. This was my starting point.

“The Western astrological sign Scorpio of the tropical zodiac (October 23-November 23) differs from the astronomical constellation … (November 16-December 16)” (source: Wikipedia)

It could be said, then, that Scorpio dies on November 23rd or December 16th. Being a fixed sign it also appears to be born and to die each day as it follows the sun’s ecliptic path. The time of its death varies with each day, but it’s cardinal position remains fixed – it is almost exactly oriented South-West at the time when it moves below the skyline. Dowsing confirms that “The Death of Scorpio” refers to a direction and a place rather than a specific date, however the date range may still be important due to its obvious imminence!

The Hunt for The Grave Site

What I understood at this point in the research was that I would need to travel to some place South West of The Berth where I could see Scorpius set on the horizon and there I will meet my challenge. How could I find out where this line would end? Well, I resorted to my usual method – to trace a line using Google Maps and to see whether it went anywhere close to somewhere of significance. I was starting at a place called The Berth (“The Birth”) which was supposedly associated with the death of King Arthur. Would it make sense that the terminus point might also have such an association?

The Berth to Grave connection

I began drawing a line roughly South West. The line went across the country and landed at Haverfordwest in South-West Pembrokeshire. Nothing of interest there, I felt, so I traced the line back up a few miles further inland. Well, well – there was a place I knew well – Mynachlog Ddu. This was the village closest to the site of the Preseli Hills quarry from which the Stonehenge Bluestones had been quarried. A mile away from that was a site I had visited earlier in the year on a quest that was linked to Arthurian sites – it was called Arthur’s Grave.

When I noticed this link I was more than a little startled. Directly south-west from The Berth a line can be traced that leads to Arthur’s Grave. I kid you not. Try it for yourself! In my mind, I knew this was the place I now had to return to. The spiral of the year would be coming round full circle if I re-visited this site at both ends of the year, and I now knew it was THE place for me to be tested to see whether I had truly learned from my year’s teachings. This is now the most important thing I have to do this year. There is something to be discovered at that site at sunset, when the constellation of Scorpius is descending below the horizon, when it is symbolically dying. Now I only have to visit the site at some date between October 23rd to November 23rd to discover what will happen next.

Gwas.

Creating a ward at Alderley Edge

Gwas — Mon, 12 Sep 2011 21:38:08 +0000

It was a fine English summer’s evening, in other words the sun was threatening to appear and it wasn’t yet raining. A good enough excuse for me to go and visit a local beauty spot and see what I could learn. “Every day”, as they say, “is a school day”. I obtained a meagre repast from a mini-market in Alderley Edge and pointed the car up the hill towards the Druid’s Inn car park alongside Alderley Edge forest.

My goal? Tonight, as I began to walk into the trees, I instructed the dowsing rods to direct me towards “something that will advance me on my spiritual quest“. Vague, yet promising. The rods twitched and I began to follow them ‘blindly’, trusting that some other forces understood the directive better than I did and would work on my behalf as they had done so many times before. As I walked I asked a quick question – “Would it be wise for me to put up some protection in the forest?” YES, said the rods. I was already doing it! Only positive helpful influences tonight, please!

I was brought into the forest by the usual path, even though I still don’t recognise it until I have reached the first high point! I was taken by yet another alternate route but the destination was familiar – a small rise covered in pine needles where the rods twirled around on a nondescript spot that I knew was probably full of powerful energies. Could I not sit on the nearby lovely mossy mound, I asked the rods. No, they chided, this was the spot to sit on. I sat.

At first I admired the view, wondering why I had been led to this place, and toying with the idea of ignoring this bit and carrying on. Three or four minutes later I was still wondering, when I realised that I could feel my “modern world” energies being stripped from me, and my senses attuning to the sounds and sights of the forest. I was hearing distant wildlife. I was sensing the movement of the gentle breezes as they played with the higher branches. I was feeling the flavour of the forest. I was attuned! Wonderful. NOW I could proceed.

View through Alderley Edge from a magickal spot

After being cleansed and attuned I felt … really good. I didn’t want to move, but I forced myself onwards with this evening’s work – where should I go next? The rods began to lead me down a familiar off-road track through the dense forest and I was walking on to my next intriguing encounter.

Meeting the Oak Spirit

I was taken off my usual path to walk at the edge of one of the pre-defined paths. Soon the rods were circling around next to a small oak tree no taller than I was. I sat down at the indicated spot and made myself comfortable on the thick carpet of lime-coloured moss. Despite the slight dampness it was incredibly pleasant. I faced the tree and began to tune into the essence of the small oak. As my eyes de-focused a familiar shape emerged from the moss that grew around the base of the tree – there was a set of eyes, a nose and a mouth! I was imagining the dryad of the tree, I felt. Now I was in connection with it I dared to ask a question, “Do you have any information that will help me on my spiritual quest?” I asked as politely as I could. Silence. I tried again. Nothing. Hmmm…I felt I was approaching this all wrong.

I switched tack with the spirit, instead asking it, “Is there something you wish to communicate to me?“. Now I got a response! In my mind I heard two words eliding into and out of each other – “Glyph“, “Ward“. I didn’t understand. “Why a ward?” I asked. “Protection.” came back the response. OK, well it was a lead, and something I could work with, I supposed. I confirmed the idea, “Do you want me to make a ward to protect you?” I asked while I still had the connection. “From Winter.” came the affirmative response. Now I understood, but of course I had no clue how I would do that! I’ve never made a ward before, well, not intentionally!

Wards explained

What is a ward? It is from a branch of magick called apotropaic magic. Yes, those were my thoughts too when I read that. “What?” Apotopaic magick is arguably one of THE MOST DISCREDITED and ridiculed aspects of magickal practise. And possibly one of the few items left in my “loony bin” where I keep a store of ideas that I have instructed myself never to get involved with. Oh dear….I was about to be challenged again! Aportopaic magick is concerned with putting charms and spells on items, or with writing glyphs to ward off evil spirits. Nowadays this is simply ridiculed as superstition, and the whole concept is seen as a bit of a joke by western minds. I was such a western mind at that moment when I was asked to make a ward – I wondered why I would even bother. But then, perhaps I might learn something useful?

After agreeing to the oak tree’s request I gathered my belongings and began walking through the forest in that attuned state of mind again. As I walked I found that I was bending down every now and again to pick up an item that literally insisted itself upon me - either because it was hopelessly and obviously out of place, or it was making itself known to me. Sometimes the object would just appear in my path, or the dowsing rods would spin around making me stop to assess what was around. Soon I had four items :

a white thin Rowan twig,
some fallen Rowan berries,
a sprig of oak snagged in a tree branch,
and a palm-sized piece of sandstone rock.

Four items representing the four elements

Looking at the four articles together I realised I had:

stone for earth,
red berries for fire,
oak for water,
and a white Rowan twig for air.

Well, it made sense to me at the time. I don’t think the correlation has to have any particular ‘recognised’ correspondence to be effective, because all magick is a product of intention, so it was only important that I personally understood and believed the association for the duration of the work.

Interestingly, reading the definition of apotropaic magic in Wikipedia later I would find this sentence:

“To further discourage witchcraft, rowan wood may have been chosen for [the purpose of creating a ward]“. (Source: Wikipedia)

I don’t like this rather glib statement that it protects against witchcraft. It’s such a Christian concept – God is good, the Devil is bad; Vicars are good; witches are bad. Petty dualism. I would have preferred if the author had re-worded that to say something like, “Rowan guards against unhelpful spirit forces.” as this other Wikipedia author states:

“The European rowan (S. aucuparia) has a long tradition in European mythology and folklore. It was thought to be a magical tree and protection against malevolent beings.” (Source: Wikipedia)

Semantics, semantics. I think we get the idea. Inadvertantly I had picked up two items renowned for their warding capabilities – a rowan twig and some rowan berries.

Tuned to the forest

I sat eating my tea and energising with an incense stick and the sounds of the forest. Of course I was sitting on a power centre. Why woudl you sit in an ordinary place when you can power up on a power centre? I never just sit somewhere these days. It has to be somewhere special. I was feeling really attuned to the forest as I munched an apple when suddenly there was a completely incongruous blast of air through the nearby tree-tops right above me. I knew this was an air sylph, and probably a warning that the weather was about to change. The air felt a bit damp now, and was cooling slightly. Ahead of me were bright blue pathces dappled with white could. Behind me there were darkening brooding rain clouds.

I continued to eat, but thanked the sylphs for their warning. I began to pack as I ate, getting ready to move soon. I got my coat ready to wear. Two minutes later there was a longer and louder, more violent thrust through the tree-tops and I stood up to acknowledge the warning, thanking the sylphs again. This time I packed everything away and put my coat on. As my zip reached my chin the first heavy droplets of rain hit my coat. Just in time! It was time to head back to the oak tree with my booty and fulfil a recent promise of protection.

A small oak tree asking for protection

Returning to the small oak tree I placed the four elemental items on the cardinal compass points around the tree in turn, dedicating them and requesting the help of the elemental spirits to protect the tree though the Winter months. As I placed each of the four elemental objects I made a brief but heartfelt intonation to whatever forces were listening:-

From the sandstone rock I asked for stability from the earth to hold the roots of the small and vulnerable tree
From the red Rowan berries I asked to keep the spirit of the tree alive in its withdrawn sap until the first rays of Spring rejuvenate it
From the acorn sprig I asked that life-giving nourishment be given, not too little and not too much. Don’t flood the tree over Winter, I asked.
From the white Rowan twig I asked the air elemental to pass over this tree and to ignore it when they wanted to play with the forest trees and their limbs. I asked them to be gentle to it, and I felt a little shield go up around it.

As I looked at the twig I realised it symbolised the small oak tree if it were stripped of all its leaves and branches. This stuck me quite forcefully. Then I stood back and put love and gratitude into the work, thanking the elementals for their co-operation in protecting this special little tree.

For making this ward I got a re-ward. I learned that I could create wards, had a method now for how to do it, and understood that they were useful to protect anything form the ravages of the elements providing I went through this exact process again – the finds must present themselves to me, and I must place the around the thing to be protected selflessly, without thought of reward.

The dowsing said that all was done, so I left the forest a happy druid. I was, however, left with another example of a difficult philosophical question: Should the spiritual practitioner learn from experiences, or continue to let themselves be guided along the path? Was I being guided to learn about wards, or shown that I could be helped to create one whenever I asked? I’ll leave that debate for the comments section.

Gwas.

Helsby Hill – A Lesson on Archetypes

Gwas — Fri, 12 Nov 2010 17:17:09 +0000

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.

Gop Hill: Waking the sleeping lady

Gwas — Tue, 23 Mar 2010 16:57:50 +0000

March 11th, 2010: waning crescent moon.

There I was, firmly ensconced at home and beginning to plan for the Spring Equinox outing that is coming up next week. Rather foolishly I asked the dowsing rods whether there were still any sites that I needed to awaken in the intervening week. The answer came back: TWO. Two? Where was I going to find the time to visit two sites in a week, and especially considering that I knew it was going to be a busy week with little free time anyway? Two!

I decided to take them one at a time. I dowsed as to whether they were new or known sites. KNOWN. Which countries were these sites in? Both in Wales. So, I opened up my list of sacred sites and began working my way down the list asking the dowsing rods to identify the two I needed to visit. The first answer that came back was Gop Hill. Gop Hill? I couldn’t imagine why this site would be on a list of places that I was particularly linked to, I mean, nothing particularly interesting had ever happened there before. Still, when I double and triple-checked – yep, Gop Hill. Well, at least it was fairly close. I got myself ready to go in the middle of the night. No rest for a working druid!

What follows is a very detailed description of the process of awakening this site. I hope you will find some value in the method, although I have found that each site is subtly different, even if the general principles are consistent.

"..the largest man-made cairn in Britain, Gop Hill, reputed to be the burial place of Queen Boudicca."

A Gentle Surprise

How wrong could I have been about Gop Hill? Answer: none more wrong. I knew as soon as I was within ten feet of the base of the hill that there were some strong energies here on this hill this evening. It was like walking into a wall of subtle jelly! The bonus of being out here in the middle of the night in such an infrequently visited site is that I had to place to myself and I felt at home straight away. Tonight, the hill was mine alone, which meant I had the freedom to dowse and do druidry as I saw fit. I walked around the front edge of the hill and stood in the hollow of the centre, watching the cars pass on the road below for a few minutes. listening to the other sounds around – distant voices in the village below, traffic on the A55, noises from the woods surrounding the hill. I breathed in the place through all my senses and relaxed into being there.

I looked for a place to sit down. There was a shallow pit of flint chips near to the centre and despite this looking like the most uncomfortable place to sit I deposited my staff and bag there. Out of the bag I got my dowsing rods. Right – where was the best place for me to sit? The rods turned back on themselves to lead me back to the place where my staff and bag were – the shallow flint pit! Looks like, yet again, I had picked out the right place to be without the aid of the rods.

Whilst I had the rods to hand there were some things I wanted to check. Where was the most magical place to be on this hill? It was a shallow round depression at the back and top of the hill. OK. A question that often arose relating to sacred sites was to do with “primal” water, so I did my duty and checked it out. Was there a blind spring at this “magical” spot? No. Was there a blind spring anywhere on, in or under the hill? No. Was there any water affecting the energies in this mound? No. OK – bored of all that now. These questions always seemed to be a resounding “no” for most of the sites we visit. Only a few have every registered any water affecting the energies. I remember Lundin Farm Circle in Perthshire had some water affecting the King Stone, but that was all I could recall.

Assessing the Gender

The only other dowsing I wanted to do that night was to find a the strongest male and female power centres.

If you’re a regular reader you’ll be beginning to see a pattern form here about how I am assessing these sites, obtaining only the information I need to perform my druidical activities these days. I haven’t updated the sacred sites page for a while now, and I’m aware of that. I’ll do the work on the mapping of the energies of more sites this year when the days get longer and warmer, I promise.

I asked to find the strongest male power centre and was led back to the steep side of the hill close to the path through the forest – the usual side to approach from. The power centre itself was a scar on the edge near the top of the hill. I stood looking at it for several minutes. Something didn’t feel right about it, so I asked if this was the strongest male power centre by design – no. It was only the strongest by dint of the fact that material had come loose by people walking there! (Imagine how many questions that took to dowse that answer!). Where was the male power centre that was originally designed to be the outlet for male energies – just a few feet behind the small flint scar, in a small depression. Again, a small circular depression, like the last one over the other side of the hill that I had found minutes before. I entered the male power centre in a long winding clockwise spiral. I felt I was following the course of the energy within it.

I asked the rods to take me to a female power centre and was led back to where my staff and bag were – I had sat there automatically. We’re doing this more and more now.

View from Gop Hill

I began the process of discovering how I might awaken the energies of the site. As I had done this many times during the “season” from Imbolc until now, I was familiar with the line of questioning I should employ:

Was it possible to awaken the energies of this site? – YES.
Could I use incense to assist me in this process? – YES.
How many sticks of incense should I use? – I counted until the rods crossed at FOUR.

I checked my bag – the packet of incense had four sticks remaining. A beautiful coincidence that made me smile. Although I was used to using my dowsing rods to discover the pattern of behaviour required to awaken the energies, tonight I felt like I should begin to feel my way through the process somewhat as well. I decided to only use the rods for finding the spot to place things. Any other work I would do without them.

Walking in circles

So, to recap, I had identified three power centres so far. The first was a female centre that was a cut-out area that was roughly body-shaped that was in the middle of the top section of the hill. The second was a male power centre that looked very similar – a hollowed-out area at the tip and edge of the hill that registered as the most powerful male centre. Then there was the original male centre – the one “designed” or created by the makers of the hill, and which was a few feet further back from the edge, at the highest point of the hill and in a slight hollow circular depression.

I sat in the female centre first. It felt more “homely” and natural to do so, despite a carpet of sharp flint that dug into my softer portions. I simply moved them around a bit until I could lie back comfortably. As I did so I noticed that I was enclosed in a head-shaped area. I felt the earth right next to me head – I smelt it. It was in my hair. It was up my nostrils. I felt the hill, it’s essence very close to me. As I lay there I cleansed myself (dissipated any external energies I may have brought with me) and then drew this female energy from the hill.

When I felt sufficiently “powered up” I picked up my ash staff and walked to the ‘designed’ male power centre. It felt right to do so. I tuned into the flow of energy there and soon I was walking around in a sun-wise fashion working my way inwards. At the centre point I walked back out, on a “female” path, if you like. Suddenly I had the feeling that doing this right on top of the male energy spiral was mixing the two forms of energy. So I went back in on the male spiral and back out on the female spiral again and again – mixing the two frequencies of energy as I went (if that’s possible). The more I walked the stronger the wind blew around me, and I noticed this. When the wind died away I moved out of the male power centre and walked back to the female centre again.

In the female, where only minutes ago I had been lying down, now I circled around in an anti-clockwise direction, feeling ym way along the natural path that the female energy formed there. Reaching the centre I reverse the path and walked outwards on the male clockwise line. Despite being in a dip, out of the reach of the full force of the wind, I could hear it increasing again as I walked back and forth around these paths. I felt this was a good sign that ‘power’ was increasing in those centres as the energy was being mixed.

The Candles On The Cake

So, I had mixed the energies between the two opposing power centres and now I felt they were flowing back and forth between each other. What next? I had four incense sticks left, and so I wondered about getting the rods out again to check where I should place these sticks. I was unsure…did I need the rods? I decided to do the first one and see if I could intuit the rest. I dowsed for the location of the first stick of incense and was led up to the ridge that runs along the back of the hill. The first location was a circular depression that looked just like the male power centre I had just come back from.

It's your birthday!

Having established the type of place that I should put the incense I walked along the ridge at the back in the dark feeling for where the next stick should go. I came across another circular depression close to the gap in the ridge that led to the central gully. I placed an incense stick there, the moved on. Another such circular depression existed at the same distance on the other side, so I place one in that too. When I came near to the end of the ridge, close to where the “new” male power centre was I felt ‘tugged’ towards the old male power centre. I placed an incense stick in the gap in the rocks that formed the back of the circular depression there. That was four sticks in four circular depressions – another interesting coincidence, because that was all the sticks I had, and this was all the circular depressions that there were along this back ridge! I realised that when I had placed and lit each one there had been a gust of chilly North wind which blew past me and rustled the grass on top of the hill. All more stupid coincidence, of course.

I went back to ‘my’ power centre. I felt it was the best place for me to call upon the spirit of the place. I quickly dowsed some questions – was there such a spirit here? YES. Was it male or female? FEMALE. Then definitely this was the right place. Rods away, back to working without them. I picked up my staff and lay with it along the length of my body. I connected with the site in a deep and energetic way, then called upon the spirit of the place to awaken – to work with me, to enliven this site, to make it special again, for us to be able to work with Nature to improve the environment…all these things I implored this spirit to respond to.

After a few exciting minutes I had an urge to get up and to dowse for a sigil – the form of the spirit of the place, the genius loci. I picked the rods up again eagerly and asked to be taken to a place suitable for dowsing this sigil. I was led to a clear space at the front and top of the hill – here the grass was flat and clear of obstruction. Useful! I asked to be shown the sigil shape and began to dowse a sort of ‘U’ shape. I expected it to turn back upon itself, but to my surprise it continued back towards the very centre of the hill in an unusually direct straight line – very unlike most flowing sigil shapes. Then I recognised what it was - it was the shape of my staff!!!

Well, that blow my mind. I was totally stunned. I had to leave at that point because my mind was in bits. I packed and left. As I stood at the top of the edge of the hill in the (new) male power centre the wind blew quite strongly making the trees whisper and rustle before me. It was quite a sight, even in the dark, yet strangely easing and I felt ‘cleaned out’ by the wind. As I descended the hill I made a sweeping movement with my staff and felt as though I had annulled the energies and connections I had made that night. I returned to the car and drove home in absolute silence. It would be a few hours before I could pick up the loose ends and try to make sense of it all.

Tying up the loose ends

The lady's curves

When I got home later that night I dowsed more about what had happened:-

Have I awoken the spirit of place of Gop Hill? – YES.
Is that spirit now associated with my staff? – YES.
Is there some energy from that spirit in my staff? – YES.
Is the whole of the spirit in my staff? – NO.
Is it some spirit energy that wishes to work with me? – NO.
Is it some energy that I can utilise? – YES.
Is it a similar concept to the Crogen Oak energy (when healing energy from the broken tree transferred to my staff) – YES.
Is this like a gift for waking the energies at Gop Hill? – a strong YES.
Is the Gop Hill energy different in the way it can be used to Crogen Oak healing energy? YES.
What type of energy is it? Is it death energy? NO. Life energy? YES. Is it male/female/neutral – NONE. Elemental? – NO. Spirit/aether energy – YES.
Was the spirit energy at this site related to Queen Boudicca? …..NO.

Whoever Boudicca was there was no evidence via the dowsing rods that she was associated with the hill, or that her energies still influenced the place. Whoever the guardian spirit of Gop Hill is, it isn’t the energy form that we recognise as Boudicca.

I tried to pull all this together. This energy I had received into my staff was a kind of gift from the female spirit of Gop Hill. It is a magickal energy that can be turned to a specific magickal purpose, which I have yet to discover. I guess my quest now is to find out when I can use it, and to use it wisely.

Gwas.

The Pontfadog and Crogen Oaks

Gwas — Tue, 23 Feb 2010 14:19:22 +0000

I had heard via the BBC news web site that there was an ancient oak tree that had been split by the sharp cold spell we have had recently in the UK. being a “tree friendly” sort of bloke I was a bit distressed by this, and so decided that I should go and visit it – if only to stroke it and say “Bad luck, old chap!“. From the article it would seem as though some local tree preservation types had made predictions of its impending demise, and this made the visit seem more necessary than mere curiosity.

Before the weekend of the 13th/14th Feb I did some dowsing to see what was awaiting me.

Was the split oak irreparably damaged? – YES.
Would it die from this damage – YES.
Was it going to die in the next few days? – NO.
Would it take a few weeks to die – LONGER.
Was the energy associated with the tree still present? – YES.
Would that energy die off with the tree? – SOONER.
Am I able to capture some or all of that energy? – YES, using the Ash Staff.
Would the spirit of the tree be around for long? – ONLY DAYS.

Of course I am re-interpeting the results for you. Each of the questions had to be posed such that only a YES 0r NO response could result from it, but the outcome I have re-expressed to demonstrate my line of thinking. Only days left before the energy associated with the tree began to dissipate or leave, eh? Better get there soon!

Off I jolly-well trotted in my ’new’ old car (the trusty old Peugeot is now in the hands of a trusted friend). I was heading for Pontfadog, a village on the outskirts of Chirk town. Chirk is a lovely historic town that I’ve visited before on my motorcycle. It’s the kind of place that keeps history alive, and the place seems to have a special quality about it. It has a lovely castle with large grounds on its edge, and despite having a factory nearby it feels quaint and timeless.

As I drove to Pontfadog I kept getting diverted off the main road. Ooops, I missed the turn-off (despite having SatNav guiding me!). Oh dear, this road is being diverted because of roadworks! Oh, a police car is blocking that road! Another closed road diversion a few miles later. And so it went on and on until I ended up on a tiny back road into Pontfadog village, a road which had those sinuous qualities that one associates with ancient roads that used to be trackways, possibly following male earth energy paths. At various points along this diversion I would encounter a bird of prey sat on a gate-post, or low in a tree, watching me as I passed. This is now becoming a common sign that I am on a special journey, and so I acknowledged each occurrence. It doesn’t do to get your rational brain involved in trying to work this out – just ride with it and take it for what you apprehend it to be!

TIC and Swan Inn - Pontfadog

The Pontfadog Oak

The village of Pontfadog has a relatively new car park next to the bridge over the river than runs alongside the main road. You can’t miss it if you go there. A short walk away is the hub of village activity (well, on a Sunday in Rugby season anyway) – the Swan Inn. What an absolute delight that place is! The landlord was incredibly helpful, and knew his ales from his elbow too. Refreshment had to be quaffed before continuing. Good job I did too because the route up from the back of the inn to the Pontfadog Oak is steep! Ten minutes later I was walking along a path leading to a farm on the Pontfadog hillside that was reputed to contain the oak. Indeed it did, and the farmhouse owners were only too pleased to direct anyone to it.

The most ancient oak in Wales

According to the accompanying plaque at the base of this ancient oak tree:-

“Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II has designated The Pontfadog Oak one of the Great British Trees.”

That’s nice of her. So did one of her predecessors, apparently:

“In Pontfadog lives the oldest oak tree in Britain which was spared when King Henry II had his men cut down the Ceiriog Woods in 1165. Fortunately the woods recovered, as they have done since being permanently covered in dust from the quarrying of the 19th century.” (source: www.ceiriog.co.uk)

I noticed that although the tree was hollow inside, it wasn’t split, so I went back to the people in the farmhouse garden to ask about it. Was this the tree that had split and had been reported about? Oh, no, came the response – that was another ancient tree in the valley. Surely I passed it along the road coming into the village? Well, I might have done, but I suspect my little “detour” had made me miss it. How peculiar! Was I “meant” to visit this tree first? Why?

I had the urge to leave my ash staff alongside the tree. I pretended I was doing this as a measure for my photographs, but actually I wanted to allow the staff to absorb any energies from this mighty tree. I walked its girth, photographed it, and generally stood admiring it until some parents arrived with a troupe of children. Looking like the Von Trappe’s I decided that I should head off to the ‘correct’ tree that I had come to see in the first place!

The Pontfadog Oak - my staff shows size

The Crogen Oak

I had no trouble locating the split tree I had intended to visit. It was just behind a wall on the ‘main’ road into the village, about 200 yards before the Trout Fishery and Shop place. Indeed it stood in marshy boggy ground next to a brackish stream and I began to see how the water could have been responsible for making the tree split.

Th split Crogen Oak

The Crogen Oak – “The Oak at the Gate of the Dead” (or more likely ‘The Oak at The Pass of the Graves’) is so-called because of its association with the Battle of Crogen. One of the trees that witnessed that battle and was spared from being felled was this oak tree, which became the guardian of the dead slain in its presence (is my re-telling of the myth). It has certainly witnessed many things, being estimated to be around 1500 years old.

The tree was certainly attracting a great deal of interest. Whilst I was there two couples with dogs, the parents with the troupe of kids, and various other families with awe-inspired wild-eyes kids were crawling all over the oak, quite literally. I tried to connect to the tree but it was far to noisy and the tree was too old for me to do so successfully in those circumstances. Instead I contented myself with the feeling that I could place the ash staff in its heart. The dowsing rods confirmed this for me. If I left it there then something magickal would happen (if I intended it). Which I did!

Empowering the ash staff

I thought I should probably put some crystals around the tree to focus the energy. Or light some incense too, perhaps? I asked the rods about the crystals. NO. Oh! What about incense? Hmmm. A quite inconclusive answer. I decided to try anyway and got some prepared for lighting, but then couldn’t find my new windproof lighter that I had just recently filled with gas. What? How?…never mind. Abandon ship! I asked the dowsing rods if I needed them anyway – NO. Why hadn’t I just asked that to start with?

I circled the tree three times clockwise to charge up the staff, for some reason tuoching the tree all the way around as I passed under its split bough and low-hanging branches. As I walked around, thinking about the staff taking on the energies of the tree, I noticed some lovely white snowdrops pushing their way through the tangle of dry grass stalks that matted the surrounding land. How delightful – signs of Spring appearing – I felt much better already.

A hint that Spring is not far away

Finally, I reclaimed my staff and walked up the nearby hillside to see what was round about. I passed more old oak trees and realised that this area was rife with ancient shrubbery and arboriality. I asked the rods one final question – had the ash staff absorbed anything from the tree? YES. Good.

I drove home and later got the rods out again to find out more about what the staff had taken on board. After a good number of questions had been batted away I came across the answer: the staff now had a name! It had been given a name by the energy of that old dying oak tree! How wonderful. I set about finding the name, and soon had it. Things are already getting more interesting this year.

Gwas.

Samhain – transformational energies of the elements

kal — Tue, 03 Nov 2009 09:51:50 +0000

The complexities of life often catch me by surprise. The mix is so varied, meaningful and relevant that it is difficult to describe where a particular chapter (of your life) begins. For me it seems quite common that the web of life interweaves multiple phenomena, experience and whatever was left over from last night’s cooking into the mix to create a new day that seems unique and individual and yet if one takes but a single thread and follows it (down the rabbit hole) it leads to truly unexpected and to what I original thought of as unrelated phenomena.

Humbling is a word that begs for deeper meaning when I traverse such tunnels of thought and speculation. I am not going to enter the debate of intelligent design, god, gods or indeed evolution. I am certain of one thing, if you think you know anything (and I mean anything) think again!

Today, being the third day in the trinity (for me) of Samhain, the festival of fire (see Gwas’s post here) traditionally marks the end of harvesting and the beginning of a period quietude and reflection. Alas, as is my wont I am going to have to differ somewhat with the traditional view of this dividing day. This leap of (semi) rationality can be forgiven I hope since we (most of us) do not reside in the world of harvesting (fantastic though it may have seemed a hundred years ago) technology has given us the ability to have any harvested product at any time of the year.

A new interpretation of Samhain may be that it is a period of flux (I love that word). A time that can be utilised by any who have the means, belief, understanding and (the essential ingredient) desire or intent.

For me (please note that ‘for me’ bit) Samhain festival was divided into three components. You may ask, why three? I can only answer that it was a mix of intuition and divine (by this I mean divination using the rods) answers. So it was an event(s) that encompassed three days Saturday 31st, Sunday 1st and Monday 2nd. Furthermore – an indication of each days activities was that it would follow the pattern of:

Preparation
Transformation
Confirmation

The promise (or result) was that should I not mess it up (the divine indication was that it was highly likely that I would – cheers!) Anyway the promise was of invisible blocks to be released and pathways cleared of obstructions.

A strange promise to honest, because at this present time in my life I am feeling that anything and everything is possible. Indeed and therein lies (or rather lay) the rub!

Spirit

Gwas and I had planned to be out together on Sunday and so I was left in the preparation phase to my own devices. Now, very recently my dear mum passed away, and whether it is real or a method of comforting myself (what does it matter which?) I have been in commune with her of and on as the days have waned into weeks and months. Strange it seems to me that such energetic commune seems more effective and solid(?) when at her graveside.

As an aside, you must realise that my belief in life after death wanders from believing to not believing constantly – this paradox doesn’t really bother me – in fact it’s refreshing.

Prior to my visiting my mum’s graveside I had no notions of the above trinity or anything else on the matter of Samhain. However whilst in meditation at the graveside (I’m not really a prayer-for-the-dead kind of person, and frankly on the days that I believe in life-after-death I don’t really think the departed need it). I digress. So there I was meditating with some incense burning away. When I got the message that the following two days could be utilised to great effect should I not dawdle and make a mess of it.

Okay, you may be asking where this message came from – I will be honest, it was my mum. Now, you may think it was just my imagination – and if it helps you any, I will think that too. Again, who cares what and where it came from? Surely its reality is only defined by whether you do anything about it? And since I did, the message was real, even if the originator is unknown or suspect.

The day this occurred was Saturday, A nice, warm and pleasant early afternoon. After receiving it I consulted the oracle of the divine i.e. the rods for further information and was given to understand that a visit to the sea would be of great advantage as the Preparation phase of the Trinity.

Water and Wind

A random point along the coast of Wales had me sat in between some boulders watching and listening to the music of the waves rolling in. A few months ago I had an very humbling experience with, what I am going to call Poseidon, but you may as well call it the sea, ocean or water, I guess.

Poseidon conjures up a nice vision for me and perhaps we create our reality based on our beliefs and thus my containing whatever I was connected with into that image, that is what it became.

On this particular occasion I was very humbled by Poseidon, it is something that is not to be messed with – I guess one might say the traditional view of the sea as being a tempestuous spirit was coming to truth for me. Or…tempestuous is wrong, it was…”beyond approachable”. My attempts at being recognised where in vain.

After a while, the wind slowly rose and I pondered whether there was any significance to the winds change?

How does intuitive knowledge come to you? One particular means for me is just a gentle pondering, answers come when beckoned. To trust or act on these answers is the prerogative of the listener I fancy.

My answer was that it was the element of Air combining with that of Water. I sent out a thought to the Sea “Will you come with me tomorrow and help?” I got back an echo of the question. I had to laugh – I was so far down the scale of things that I wasn’t even something that would (or indeed could) be acknowledged. Still I felt from the combined wind/water a sense of…yes.

Divine (this word is going to get popular) knowledge said that preparations were complete for part one of Trinity. It also added an addendum – that my Solar plexus and Crown chakra energies would be worked on in the coming day.

Wind and Water Companions

Sundays arrival was marked with rain and wind. As I went for milk in the morning I remarked to myself that a sliver of Poseidon was in that air. I arrived at Gwas’s in the early afternoon with a gentle breeze and a few raindrops in tow.

A long drive filled with discussions about Gwas’s adventures in gathering spirit forms had us arrive at Nine Stones Close. As we walked through the fields Gwas’s intuition decided on a different path than normal and we found ourselves climbing up a rocky hill. As id often the case we split up and followed our own energetic paths through this new territory.

I am often surprised at our ability to go-off and do different activities at these sites and then return with individua tales to tell.

My path led to a place where the boulders had fallen in such a way as to create a cave like structure. I sat in it for a while feeling its shape before pointing it out to Gwas. Once we moved away from the cave we walked further around the hill only to have to come back on ourselves a little so as to find a path to the Stone circle.

Often we have foundthat recapitulating upon experiences results in little connections that were at the time missed. For example – upon reflection – it seems to me that the deviation in our path was to find that cave and for me to sit in it, Gwas didn’t. Which becomes meaningful in a moment.

As we approached Nine Stones Close the wind was a surprising gust and my spirits rose. I am really connected to that site because of a beautiful Oak tree that is there. Fortune had a particular smile for us today as the neighbouring field was devoid of its usual cows. Cows are the bane of dowsers! This absence allowed me to climb into the next field and become more acquainted with the Oak tree.

Divine knowledge guided me to the best place to stand and I stood with my back to the tree, my hands were positioned with palms facing the tree and behind me. As I stood there for many moments the wind whipped up into a strong breeze continually changing direction. Even though it was quite cold, I found my hands warming up behind me. It was as if the tree was warm.

Fire

After a while I felt myself filling up with warmth from the tree. But it was more than just inside of me, it seemed that it was my aura filling with orange flame. Communing with the tree gave me to understand that the winds frenzy was necessary to ensure that my aura would contain the flame otherwise it would be released. It was also at this time that two other realisations dawned on me.

First, was that the Solar plexus chakra is associated with Fire and second, that my understanding of the use of cave structures is to shape the aura. Thus only a few minutes ago I was shaping my aura and now it was being filled with flame. Of course these are all coincidences right?

Upon completion of this filling, I was given a small seedling from the tree, which I transferred to my pocket and minutes later we were done and moving off upon our normal path back to the car (completing ‘the’ circle). Upon the return walk to the car I found a white feather which I also pocketed. White feathers are rare – I’m usually a Crow feather man.

Addition: Just to note that Gwas’s and I checked the trees aura and found it to be a healthy size. And again – why do I do this? I decided to follow the shape of the aura around the tree and found that it had some strange shape and twist to it. Further divination revealed that several head sized rocks had fallen of the wall and were interfering with the aura of the tree. Gwas and I quickly divined that this was not a good state for the tree and returned the rocks to the wall.

A ten minute drive later we arrived at the Nine Ladies circle just as dusk was approaching. Clouds were ominously covering the full moon. Again as we approached the circle we divided off into our own little projects. I went and greeted the Oak whilst Gwas meditated on the circle.

With the wind howling away and Gwas’s news that he had to wait until complete darkness before his work could begin. We spent a leisurely hour or so watching the moon rise.

Earth

When the time came Gwas and I entered the circle and began to do our individual work. I was only moments in when it became clear that the power-center in the circle was Gwas’s area. I was told to embrace the wind. Who am I to argue? So I was up and off, following the wind to its source. I was led to the King-stone and sat down upon it. I’ve never actually sat on it before and found that it has a comfortable little niche in it.

A few minutes of quite reflection and the wind quieted down followed a few seconds later by the clouds clearing and the full-moon’s spotlight felt like it was falling directly on me and the King-stone. As I sat there wondering what would happen next I felt the Orange flame seep out of me into the King-stone and follow the energy tracks down to the stone circle, flow around it once and dissipate into the ground. I felt deflated and was wondering whether the activities of the night were completed when I felt that a blue flame was filling me up, but not from the ground up at before but from the top down. It was coming from the Moon! Blue moon energy?

The blue flame filled me up and again it filled my aura to the brim (my aura was about 2 feet outside of the physical me – or so it seemed).

The right way

I knew then that it was complete and stood up from the stone. As I looked down to the circle I knew I had to come down and walk once around the circle (widdershins as Gwas had divined earlier). So I walked back to the circle and completely forgot to walk around it!! Instead I headed for the Oak tree and a second later – Wham! a branch had hit me straight in the right eye!

Funny isn’t it, as Gwas noted later “I didn’t hear you cry out” – it’s because I didn’t. As soon as my senses returned I stepped back andheaded around the circle! Point – literally taken! The funny thing is that I didn’t have the usual “kicking the tree” reaction that one might expect – instead I thought “Hey how lucky is that – I could have had my eye out!”

Thanking the Genius Loci of the place we both felt that the nights adventures were complete and I wondered whether Monday’s divination would reveal success/failure.

Sunny kinda guy!

It is unquestionable that I am a “sun” aligned guy! Although I love the moon and its creative juices. I just love the sun energies. Which I have to say doesn’t have anything to do with lying on a beach any place – definitely not!

As an aside I have to say that I am a star person too – which kind-of makes sense to me because they after all are suns too!

Upon returning home on Sunday night I was shattered! I came in and went straight to sleep, which is definitely unlike me, I am a midnight at least person.

Monday, I awoke and wow! The sun was shining and the sky was blue and the wind was gone. There was only one element around this day. Sun.

I got up and changed and hit the outside – I just walked and walked taking in all that sun energy. I sat in my garden in the lunch time sun meditating upon the Trinity. What puzzled me was why I was filled with Blue – the colour for the Crown which is what I would have expected – if I had expected anything is Violet.

But divination revealed that I had it right. I was filled with blue flame. Now my intuition took me in this direction:

Blue -> Throat Chakra -> Understanding and Communication

Then in my meditation I got the urge to go and write something on my computer and before I knew it the words were flowing like – well – like they used to before I lost my muse when my mum passed away. I wondered…was that the block that had been removed? The divine answer…one of the smaller ones. Just wait til you re-alise (re-align) one of the bigger ones that is gone! I’m still figuring out what that one is!

And so it is that that the following was also released into the world today!

Kal

Nine Ladies stone circle: Dancing in the dark – Part 3

Gwas — Sun, 30 Nov 2008 00:07:35 +0000

3rd November 2008

This is the last part in the account of our time at the Nine Ladies stone circle in Derbyshire. In this part I relate how we attempted some psionic experiments, I get to talk with the Wishing Tree, and we stumble upon the haunt of some exponents of sacred geometry. Oh yes, it’s all going on in this part of the tale! We really start pushing it now!

PART THREE

At the end of the last post we had been trying to figure out the unusual response (one rod straight ahead, one turning to point back at you, or swivelling round). We were thinking along the lines of Kal being attuned to male energies, whereas I was more attuned to female. On this full-moonlit night it seemed as though I was finding it easier to tune it to some of the features of the site in particular.

We decided to begin some experiments. We asked for the best place to do some energy work, and were each directed to a different power centre. Oddly, Kal was standing on the one where he had planted his umbrella, which I had taken to be the one I would go to. Oh no. I was directed to stand in the one that Kal had been sitting in, and had dowsed into a spiral earlier. So be it.

Nine Ladies stone circle

We decided beforehand that we would try to get into a state of mind where we might be able to connect to each other. The two power centres were linked by arcing neutral energies, connecting male to female, and travelling over and under in a vertically circular trajectory. We hypothesised that we may be able to send each other images. I tried to relax on the power centre, but I had a Kings of Leon tune running around in my head that wouldn’t shift. It kept repeating the same refrain. This was not funny! I was trying to work here! No good. I was mainly ‘awake’ and could tell my focus was wandering – what was Kal imagining, would it be a shape, or an animal? Oh, dear. This was hopeless! Despite the stillness of the dark night I kept dropping out of trance at the slightest sound – a distant rumble, a passing car on the hillside, a hooting owl, a gust of wind.

We tried. We failed. We weren’t even close. And it was because I couldn’t get into it. Was this another effect of the grounding stone? Had I not charged myself back up, or something? I pondered on that for quite a long time before heading off to the Wishing Tree for a drink. Time to get back to dowsing to reconnect with the stone circle. We headed to the grounding stone again, as it seemed to be the hub of the action this night. Hoping to get some answers I dowsed the stone again asking,

“Do I need to clear myself through this stone to regain my connection (with nature and the circle)?” I asked. The rods crossed for a ‘Yes’.

I put the rods down again and placed my hand on the stone instead of sitting on it I started to tune in. My mind started to gently swirl around like someone had taken the sink plug out and my brain was draining its water into the stone! Then it got faster. The vortex in my head reached such a pace that it sent me dizzy! I spun away from the stone, but kept turning around and around, staggering like a drunk whilst laughing elatedly at the madness of being spun around. My head was swimming in a really fun way, like having spun yourself around a broom handle and then tried to walk in a straight line.

Kal just stood looking on curiously as I waltzed around giggling and laughing. I asked something, anything, to give me a hand here! Couldn’t something help me to get out of this tailspin? A split second later I was prodded forcefully right in the back of the neck by one of the Wishing Tree’s branches! I jumped – woke up – and stopped spinning, thankfully. “Thank you!” I responded with genuine gratitude. I felt a warming under the tree’s canopy the air got lighter and more friendly. We had re-established a connection! That was just great. Now I was really happy, not giddy.

Back to the dowsing. Time must have been drawing on, but really I didn’t care what time it was. It wasn’t important. I had to know more before we left the site. Rods in hand I walked back to Kal in the circle to continue trying to locate some connections and flows. The first thing we found were the male and female spirals coming out each stone. Just like many other sites, but with the male spirals on the inside, and female spirals on the outside. Other sites have it the other way around.

Next we located the neutral lines that went between the stones. I went for the concept of opposing stones being connected and found a connection for each pair. Oddly, all of the lines were perfectly straight except for one, which bent back into the circle stone in a short curve. Was it going bending in order to avoid something? It seemed to coincide with the avoidance of the location of the two power centres we had been standing on. Noted anyway, if not understood. Kal, however, had found a few connections that were not a part of this perfect ‘spoked wheel’ pattern. Some stones connected with others that were not directly opposite. We vowed to return to map them all when it was lighter and we could draw them out.

Whereas our sketches of energy patterns at sites are representational (and not always to scale) you should compare them with those of StoneDowser on his site (listed also in our links section on the right hand side of this page). Mr. Ian Honeygood, now sadly passed away, was quite precise in some of his diagrams, although he only seemed to recognise two types of line: a radial spoke and a ‘ritual path’, which he surmises was the path taken by the worshippers at the sites. Well, that concept doesn’t convince me, I’m sorry to say, but that’s a discussion for another day. Either way, he has done some accurate and helpful diagrams to show those two types of energy formations.

StoneDowser’s ritual path is what I would call the unwinding of the nemeton of the site. Like Hamish Miller we often find three (he finds more, but then he’s like that) circles of male energy enclosing sites, and this energy trail then comes into the site to spiral to a point which we usually confirm as being a power centre for one of us (i.e. male or female oriented energies dwell in or emit from these points). Each time around the three outer spirals of the male nemeton energy the path gets closer to the stones. At Nine Ladies it started about three feet away from the stones, going to about one and a half feet, then six inches for the last time around. The path then turns into the ‘entrance’ of the site before looping into a spiralling energy centre.

On my last visit to Nine Ladies I had dowsed a link between the Wishing Tree oak and the main power centre, coming into the site via the ‘entrance’. I decided to verify if that was still present or not. It was. Exactly the same path, same entrance point, same power centre, same direction of spiral, everything. Good. Consistency was being achieved in some of this dowsing now.

As we were near the tree Kal decided to try his luck in doing a bit of communing with it. Now, I have already recounted my own difficulties with this species, and particularly this tree. It is amenable to contact, but it has to be handled very carefully and with great patience. Kal is, how can I put this, not one for such finesses! In all openness and in his usual hearty style I watched him outstretch a metaphorical hand of welcome. And then I watched him knock his head on a low branch and stumble over a tree root. I pretended I hadn’t noticed this blatant rebuttal. He tried again, complaining to it that he was trying to be nice. Nothing. What did he expect? He was not one for the patient building of relationships that such communications often insist upon. His talents lie elsewhere, I guess. I tried to wipe off my wide smile. “Give up, mate!” I implored. He was fighting a losing battle, it seemed.

One thing we both noticed about the site that night was how slow the energies were. As we dowsed them we walked slowly; as we circled the site the energy plodded along with us but didn’t overtake us as it has at other circles in sunlight, or my time at Moel-Ty-Uchaf. The Genius Loci was docile this evening. Nocturnal nature, however, was wide awake. Occasionally we would get a hint of agreement at just the right time whilst dowsing or communing – a sudden gust of wind, or a hooting owl would chime in at just the apropos moment.

Things had gone well. We had learned useful things about the way that energy was being transformed in the circles by specific stones. With this, and more, still buzzing in our heads we retreated one last time to the Wishing Oak to pack and leave. On my way there my eye was drawn for a fourth time to a twig of laurel lying by the north side of the circle – the moonlight made its dark leaves shine with an odd tint. I picked it up, and placed it inside one of the many crevices formed by the oak’s roots, and left it with thanks and good wishes to the tree. It gave enough out often enough – why not have some back?

As we wandered back to the car I asked if we could try to see what kind of place might be benefiting from the flow of energy that I knew went down the cliff edge via a steep gulley. Kal was game, so we drove down a side of the hill that I had never been down before. Kal said this was the way he often came up, so I was confident we could find our way back to the Bakewell area pretty easily soon enough. Ten minutes later Kal was saying, “Well, I’ve never been in this bit before!” as we trundled curiously through a small town that suddenly arose next to a river.

We passed a pub called “The Square and Compass” and that struck a chord – that was a masonic sigil. It would seem that Darley Dale, as the place turned out to be, was home to at least one group of people who were interested in ancient secrets! Societies are not for me, however. My path is mainly alone or with Kal, and my progress is swift because of that, I feel. It’s my path I’m treading, not following someone else’s agenda.

There was a lot to think about, and it kept us in conversation for several weeks afterwards. To recap, we learned:-

a) The rules of the collaboration with Nature must always be followed to get good results – a quiet mind is essential; good strong intent; a clean body (not caffeine-fuddled, tobacco doesn’t help the cause either); be prepared for fun, but do your work seriously and focused.
b) The double helix appears at several stone circles, possibly many more, linked to an outlier stone, which is identified as a main feature of the energy field system at a stone circle
c) Moon energy is slower, possibly weaker than sun energy. Certainly it is less vigorous.
d) A stone in or close to the circle, usually flat, acts like a solar, lunar and stellar panel that absorbs the radiant light.
e) In moonlight, on the correct power centre, we were both unable to experience any intuitive responses either between each other or towards any external location. The EMF was supposedly low, as it was night time. A lecture by Serena Roney-Dougal taught us that at times of low EMF are more favourable for telepathy and remote viewing. I blew that experiment by not being able to quieten my mind.
f) Although StoneDowser didn’t dowse this site (to our knowledge) his ‘ritual path’ was present – a spiraling line coming from outside to inside the circle. The radial links between the stones that he drew at other sites were also there. We thought that the lines bent between some stones sometimes, and that there were more links than simply those that were opposing stones.

It would seem that manifestation patterns can be willed into a particular shape, although my intention got transformed whilst I was forming it in my mind. Is this due to an interactive collaboration between human and nature, or was I simply unable to hold a shape using my willpower? The shape dowsed as increasingly complex when Kal came to verify it. I also verified Kal’s shape too. “Thaat be a pentangle, and no mistake, zurr.” What is it about wizards and their five-sided shapes?

Don’t phone in – it’s just for fun!

Gwas.