Earth Wisdom

One of my favourite walks is through the ancient Yew forest of Kingley Vale, near Chichester, West Sussex.

Some of the trees there are estimated to be 5,000 years old. Communicating with these wise and ancient beings is an experience one will never forget. The whole area is evocative of a time when  tribal leaders were buried with honour on the hilltops, and when Vikings invaded from across the Solent.

I am facilitating two walks close to the ancient festival of Samhainn, when Autumn slowly turns into Winter, and the festival reminds us that we will all pass through the invisible veil from physical life into another dimension one day. The Yew is the tree of Samhainn, showing us that physical death is the journey towards rebirth. Samhainn is the time of The Crone, Wise or Elder Woman – named as The Morrigan, Cailleach, Cerridwen, Hecate, Arianhrod – all powerful dark goddesses of the shadows.

There are two dates for the walks – November 5th and 9th. We will be meeting at 10-30am at Kingley Vale. The walk takes between three and four hours, and the journey from Lewes is approximately 1 hour 15 minutes.

There will be some climbing involved to the top of a hill. The walk is worth the climb, as the views are stunning. I won’t be racing up there, so plenty of stops to catch the breath!

We will spend time tuning into the landscape and the trees, and about 30 minutes for lunch. I visited the site on Friday 24th October, and some of the designated walks were closed due to falling branches, but I could still make my way through the undergrowth to reconnect with some old sylvan friends. The soil is chalk downland, which can get slippery when wet, so if you are intending to join me appropriate footwear is recommended.

For further details please contact me.

After weeks of juggling work, family and visiting a friend in hospital I am having a whole day in one of the oldest Yew forests in Europe with Tilly dog. The fungi will be lush, and the petrichor (that intoxicating odour plants give off after rain) will be abundant.

I am going to be repeating the experience on November 5th and 9th, if anyone would like to join me. We will be walking in the footsteps of our ancestors, and connecting to the Dryads (Tree spirits) of these magnificent beings. Photos to follow!

I am looking forward to sharing the magical and life-changing system of Reiki at Equilibrium, Lewes on Sundays 28th September and 5th October. Cost £150-00. Certificated. Please contact me or equilibrium-clinic.com for enrolment details.

Also Tarot workshop – A Dance of Thrones on either 12th or 19th October. Special offer price of £40-00.

I am now offering two dates for the workshop Tarot Tribes – A Dance of Thrones. Please choose either 12th or 19th October.

Also Reiki level I is offered over two days – 28th September and 5th October.

Please check the website www.earthwisdom.co.uk for details.

Looking forward to sharing these with you!

Looking forward to sharing my Magical Language of Trees workshop at The Earth Spirit Festival, Galveston Hall, Horsham today and Monday.

Please come along if you are free.

Details: www.earthspiritfestival.com.

The wild mountains of North Wales made me aware of the contrasting beauty of our land of birth. Not separate nations of England, Scotland, Northern or Southern Ireland, Wales or independent isles such as Mann, Guernsey, Jersey, Alderney etc., but the whole of Albion – the white land of our mutual ancestors. 

Politics and religion, as ever, have made us small-minded, acquisitive and brutal.

We have lost our connection to the land which bore us from her soil. Just like indigenous plants we flourish under our own changeable skies, and strikingly different landscape.

Whether it be the rolling, sensuous downland of Sussex, The flat, watery fens, the spectacular mountains of Wales and Scotland, or the lush, vibrant green of Eire, let us all celebrate our differences, and meld with our birthplace, or adopted country in all her forms. Learn from the rest of Nature, realising, once again, that we are part of, not superior to her.

This weekend I will be visiting Grantchester, near Cambridge, where the poet Rupert Brooke lived in The Old Vicarage (now, unfortunately, inhabited by Jeffrey Archer).

The village has hardly changed since Brooke’s day, and the church clock is permanently set at ten to three, as in his famous poem.

As I was writing my last blog I thought of how this handsome, talented young man met such an ignominious end, far away from his beloved Grantchester, while serving in the great war.

He wrote this poem during this time, just months before his death:

THE SOLDIER

Rupert Brooke

If I should die, think only this of me:
that there’s some corner of a foreign field
that is forever England. There shall be
in that rich earth a richer dust concealed;
a dust whom England bore, shaped, made aware;
gave, once, her flowers to love, her ways to roam;
a body of England’s, breathing English air,
washed by the rivers, blest by suns of home.
And think – this heart, all evil shed away,
a pulse in the eternal mind, no less,
gives somewhere back the thoughts by England given;
her sights and sounds; dreams happy as her day;
and laughter, learnt of friends, and gentleness,
in hearts at peace under an English heaven.

The build-up to the fire festival of Lughnassadh around August 1st always brings up mixed emotions for me.

The heat of the Sun, the joy of spending time by the sea, picnics and camping are tinged with the unspoken knowledge that the wheel of the year is turning towards the darker days.

Already Hazel, Rowan, Hawthorn, Blackthorn, Bramble and Apple are displaying their potential seeding of next year’s offspring.

They contrast with Summer’s last fling demonstrated by Chamomile daisies, Poppies and Vipers Bugloss.

The sacrifice of Lugh, the Sun god, alias John Barleycorn is told in the cutting of the corn – the harvesting of food for the people and animals of the land. His sacrifice for the good of the Earth’s inhabitants is particular poignant in this year of 2014, as we remember those soldiers of the great war – cut down in their prime.

Those young men believed that their sacrifice was also for the good of the land they loved. In honour of their memory can we do just a little more to preserve our precious Earth – our home?

On this Lughnassadh perhaps we can pause just for a few moments to give thanks to those who sacrificed their own lives so we could experience in reality what to them would be their last wistful memories of home.

Envy is the religion of the mediocre. It comforts them; it responds to the worries that gnaw at them, and finally it rots their souls, allowing them to justify their meanness and their greed until they believe these to be virtues.

Such people are convinced that the doors of heaven will be opened only to poor wretches like themselves, who go through life without leaving any trace but their threadbare attempts to belittle others and to exclude – and destroy if possible – those who, by the simple fact of their existence, show up their own poorness of spirit, mind and guts.

Blessed be the one at whom the fools bark, because his soul will never belong to them.

Carlos Ruiz Zafon.

What a beautiful day it was yesterday for the Summer Solstice!

I love my country of birth. We are unique!

Pentacle Drummers and Morris Dancers celebrating the Solstice festival

We also have the most wonderful countryside

We also appreciate wiser beings than we.