A beautiful gift on this special day

Wanted to share these incredible mandalas.  A gift from my lovely daughter today.

They hold wisdom in every tiny  detail.

The medicine of the deer brings stillness, the foxes remind us to run with the pack and not isolate ourselves from friends and family, the small boar feeds us the medicine of courage to face our fears.  With the unicorn bringing us medicine from the angelic realm.

Gratitude for the gift, and for Danielle Barlow who painted them………….

Click on the images to enlarge

shamanic Mandala – Deer for finding stillness

Shamanic Mandala – facing fear

Shamanic Mandala – for healing deep trauma

to all women

if you were here I could say so much about your gifts as a mother, you are on another journey now and still think of you every day.

I love you, Mother, I have woven a wreath
Of rhymes wherewith to crown your honoured name:
In you not fourscore years can dim the flame
Of love, whose blessed glow transcends the laws
Of time and change and mortal life and death.

Christina Rossetti

To all mothers, mothers to be, mothers not to be, all women

The Winter Solstice

The shortest day, the longest night, as from today the light returns, the sun will bathe the earth for a little longer each day and the darkness will awaken from its slumber.

Slowly, slowly,  Mother earth will be coerced into movement by the warmth of the sun and together they will bring a magnificent union.  In that dark, moist mysterious place under the earths surface, magic happens.  Seeds  of our becoming will be slowly stirred into life, seeds of hope, seeds of love, seeds of compassion and they will grow strong roots and fertile shoots will forge up thought the earth, beauty will abound…………   Until then we can slumber in the winters dark night and dream of worlds we are going to bring into being.  Rest and replenish ourselves in readiness for the abundance to come………………..

Today is the time to honour the return of the light.

For me its a time to return to my work and practice.  A place that feels like returning home

 

Let the new unfold

Let The New Unfold, Have No Preconceived Ideas About It

Let the new unfold, have no preconceived ideas about it. No one person or one
group of people have the whole picture of the new.

It is a vast jigsaw puzzle, which will gradually be formed as each individual contributes his individual part of the picture. As each piece slips into its rightful place, without being forced
and without a struggle – for remember every piece fits into its rightful place
perfectly – so will the New unfold. Slip into your rightful place and there wait
in perfect peace, allowing every other piece to find its place. It is a glorious
future that is unfolding, even if you are unable to see what it is just yet.

Simply accept

 

Eileen Caddy

 

 

HRT- the modern lunatic asylum?

Your words rang out to me loud and clear especially “Maybe Marie Stopes was right, it is all in the mind. Well our minds are made up by our influences and personal paradigms- so, if we shift the influences and create a society where women are supported – not cut, drugged or locked up for going through something natural then we can change our personal paradigm. Our experience of the menopause may even become something to look forward to, rather than fear.” keep on writing your words of wisdom.

Are you interested in experiencing the Medicine Wheel?

 

Two dear friend of mine are facillitating a series of workshops over the coming months, I urge you take a look and if you feel drawn to work with the medicine wheel, then please book a place on the first workshop…………

WORKSHOP ONE:  Saturday 20 to Sunday 21^st April 2013

SOUTH

 The Way of the Serpent: Truth and Beauty

In this workshop we learn about our birth, our connection to the Mother and about our living home, Planet Earth.  We learn how to make deep, intuitive and energetic connections with Nature and begin to understand what it means to be part of the Living Cosmos.

We work with the archetypal symbol Serpent, sometimes feared, sometimes revered in the contrary World of Men.  We explore Serpent’s essential female nature and beauty, her Earth-bound wisdom, her life-giving properties and the Medicine she offers us:  Truth and Beauty.  With her Medicine we dive into the depths of who we are, we are confronted with who, through the years, we have become and she teaches us the Way of Beauty through the constant practice of Letting Go.  She shows us how to shed our past and all the things we have clung onto the way that she sheds her skin: all in one piece.  She thus shows us that life is an endless series of deaths and rebirths as we learn to come to terms and celebrate who we are and what we have right NOW, in this moment.

DAY ONE (Saturday 20^th April)

• Introductions and opening of Sacred Space
• Working with the Energy Body: a practical session learning how to access the energies of the Upper World and Mother Earth to support and strengthen one’s own luminous field
• Despacho: a traditional Andean prayer mandala to invoke the tutelary spirit of Sachamama
• A guided journey to the Middle World:  the Sacred Garden.  This journey takes us to the pristine rivers, forests, meadows and mountains of the untainted Middle World which was given to us by the Creator to enable us to delight in the pleasures of being human.  Here we encounter two Trees: the Tree of Beauty and the Tree of Truth representing an essential duality of human life.
• The Medicine Bundle: an introduction to the Shaman’s toolkit and how to work with sacred stones to track energy and facilitate healing.
• Sand Painting work: learning how to use objects from Nature to create an individual Mandala to come to understand who we are and where we source ourselves from.  We will return to these sand paintings throughout the workshop to help process different experiences over the weekend.
• Sachamama, Great Serpent: story-telling and movement will help us understand the essence of this mythical, archetypal being who will support our work throughout the weekend.
• River of Life:  we will each create a sacred “timeline” to represent key moments which have shaped our lives.  This will help us “see”, from a shamanic perspective, who we have become and where we source ourselves from energetically.
• Sachamama’s Journey: a guided journey, supported by Sachamama, to take us down our Rivers of Life and to begin the process of shedding the past.
• Fire Ceremony: we learn how to build a Sacred Fire and then how to work with this most powerful of the four elements to support our work.

DAY TWO (Sunday, 21^st April)

• Fire Breathing and the Three Centres of Power: we learn how to stoke our internal fire and how to awaken the three centres of shamanic power that reside within us.
• Walking Meditation:  learning how to walk in harmony with nature and how to exchange energies with one of the most powerful of Nature’s beings: trees.
• The Twin Trees: within our Sacred Space we use ancient Andean techniques to help us create a web of energy between two trees which will represent the essence of our work in the South: Truth and Beauty.
• Creating and performaing ritual: here we learn how to bring ceremony and ritual together in order to engage directly in the weaving together of Truth and Beauty, supported by Nature and assisted by our Power Animal for this workshop, Sachamama.
• Infinity Dance:  as we dance in Sacred Space, between the Twin Trees representing Truth and Beauty, we begin to understand how this is really a Cosmic Dance.  And through dance, we begin the process of transformation and awakening.  We become initiates in the Shaman’s Way.
• Closing ceremony with Talking Stick

COST

£100:  This includes all teaching, evening meal on Saturday, overnight stay, breakfast and lunch on Sunday and also includes £15 booking fee payable in advance (see “To Book” below).

 

FACILITATORS

Neil Brocklehurst and Ali Rabjohns are experienced shamanic practitioners who have trained with Alberto Villoldo and the Four Winds Society and with Juan and Ivan Nuñez del Prado and run regular workshops and healing sessions for groups and individuals. You can find out more about Neil at www.peruvianenergyhealing.com and Ali at www.lucidhealing.co.uk

 

VENUE

Abney Scout and Guide Training and Residential Centre, Newlands Road, Cheadle, Cheshire, SK8 2PD  http://www.abneycentre.org.uk/AbneyMap6.pdf

HOW TO BOOK YOUR PLACE

To book your place please phone Healthy Spirit on 0161 434 6784, or call in to the shop at 37 Barlow Moor Road, Didsbury, Manchester M20 6TW. You can find out more about Healthy Spirit at www.healthy-spirit.com You will be asked to pay a £15 deposit per workshop and make this payable to Healthy Spirit.  The remaining balance of £85 per workshop will be payable either in cash or cheque to the facilitators one week prior to each workshop.

 

MORE INFORMATION:

Please phone Neil on 07985 211975 or visit his website www.peruvianenergyhealing.com

Acceptance

Serpent’s gifts are practicing non attachment, non judgement, seeing everything just as it is…………..

Walk the beauty way, see beauty in everything, everyone, every situation…….  think of a world where everyone holds space of acceptance and love; a family.

I came across this video today, you can skip to 1.50 and then just sit back and listen about family and acceptance, this is walking the beauty way with serpent

The beautiful illustration of serpent is by GEORGIA PERRY, look up her website she has some amazing things CLICK HERE

connection to the true wild

 

 

 

 

 

A friend posted this  quote from Clarissa Pinkola Estes this morning, I wold like to share with you these wise words to remind you  to listen to that call from the wild

 

The way to maintain one’s connection to the wild

is to ask yourself what is it that you want. 

One of the most important discriminations we can make
in this matter is the difference between things
that beckon to us and things that call from our souls.
When we are connected to the instinctual self,
to the soul of the feminine which is natural and wild,
then instead of looking over whatever happens
to be on display, we say to ourselves,
“What am I hungry for?
” Without looking at anything outwardly, we venture inward and ask,
“What do I long for?
What do I wish for now?
What do I crave?
What do I desire?
For what do I yearn?”
It takes spirit, will, and soulfulness
and it often means
holding out for what one wants.

 

Clarissa Pinkola Estes

Tranquility in snow

My snow Mandala

 

 

Velvet Shoes

Let us walk in the white snow

In a soundless space;

With footsteps quiet and slow,

At a tranquil pace,

Under veils of white lace.

 

I shall go shod in silk,

And you in wool,

White as white cow’s milk,

More beautiful

Than the breast of a gull.

 

We shall walk through the still town

In a windless peace;

We shall step upon white down,

Upon silver fleece,

Upon softer than these.

 

We shall walk in velvet shoes:

Wherever we go

Silence will fall like dews

On white silence below.

We shall walk in the snow.

 

Elinor Wylie

 

cast all the old away to make room for the new

Be Transformed in a New LifeCast all the old away to make room for the new. Open your eyes and behold nature all around you: a tree has to rid itself of all its old dead leaves before the new growth can spring forth in its full glory. The seed must break through its old skin before it can grow and flourish; it has to leave all the old behind to wither and die away. When a baby chick hatches out of its shell, it does not cling onto the old shell but leaves it behind forever and is transformed in a new life; so with each one of you. Leave all the old behind as you advance into the new. Never look back or hanker for anything of the old even if at the time it seemed very good. There are far more wonderful things in the New so never be afraid or reluctant to leave all the old behind. this piece was sent to me from FINDHORN this morning, though I would like to share this with you the painting is one of my creative endeavours

How to grow a mandala from seed

this is such a wonderful thing to do……………..  watch and try

 

As Above So Below

A huge big thank you to everyone who came to our 3 day event in Malta, what an amazing journey we shared of sound, movement, ritual and ceremony A memorable experience indeed, so much positive feedback feel quite overwhelmed.

 

New books by my dearest friends

two greats books just published by two dear friends.   Both fabulous and I thoroughly recommend

Find it on Amazon CLICK HERE and to find out more about Luitha follow this Link

http://lktamaya.co.uk/

Find it on Amazon CLICK HERE 

To visit Julia’s website here follow this link

http://aynishamansshop.co.uk/epages/950000339.sf/en_GB/?ObjectPath=/Shops/950000339/Categories

As Above So Below

A shamanic workshop for a new world

Pleased to announce that I shall be back in Malta for a new  3 day workshop from Friday February 8th  1oth

Neil, Kat and I are joining forces again and very happy to return to this very powerful island.

As the Old World order continues its decline and disintegration, we are experiencing the birth of a New World, one prophesied by indigenous peoples across the globe. Whilst we need to continue to work on ourselves as individuals in body, mind and spirit, the focus is increasingly on working together as groups and even more widely as part of a global, and potentially cosmic network. The Inca talk of this time, which they call “Taripaypacha” or “time of rediscovering ourselves”, as a time when “ayni” or harmony will be restored between peoples and between the worlds. This will be a time of new ways of working collectively, in tune with the Cosmos. This workshop, the sixth in a series of occasional events which began in 2008 in Malta, will utilize a beautiful and powerful set of shamanic processes and ceremonies to support and guide participants on a journey from self, to group and finally to the collective. In doing so we will be modeling the way we wish to be in this New World. 

Whether you have been with us before, or are new to this work, we are very keen to connect to as many people as we can, so please join us

the first day of a new year

The New Year has dawned, that is if you look at this date in terms of our calendar ………

However, for me the New Year started at the winter solstice, not that long ago, but at a time when we honoured the suns return on December 21st.

On that morning I went for a walk, honoured the trees around me, especially the oaks that stand strong and powerful and line my route through the forest.   Their majestic limbs embody the seasons, the turning of the wheel of life, through the winters restful healing, the fertile freshness of spring, the joyful magnificence of summer and the abundance and wisdom of autumn.

Nothing stays the same, everything changes, some life cycles are short some are extraordinarily long, think of a butterfly, think of a sunflower, think of the two legged and the four legged, the finned and the furred, think of consciousness, think of our world, think of the universe and the galaxies, ever changing, miraculous and magical, unfolding in front of our very eyes, every second of every day.

It would seem that 2012 is marking the end of a huge cyclical process of consciousness, nobody knows what this year will bring although there are many who prophecy apocalyptic change.  Change is afoot, there is no doubt, but what it will be, nobody really knows.  For me I am setting my intention to live in abundance in all areas of my life, in spirit, in love, in community, in grace, in wisdom and in courage…………..

Embrace each day and let if unfold with grace and courage, live it, love it, give love and live from the heart.  The thinking mind can aid us but our intuitive mind; our intuition that comes from the heart is our true wisdom, our instinctual wildness, follow it.  Follow the wildness that speaks to us all, don’t tame it, diminish it or ignore it, find the courage to embrace it and let it lead you to pastures new.

The image I have posted here was originally a photograph taken on the solstice morning; it was of an old gnarled ivy vine that had wrapped around an oak tree.  After I “played” with it, so much was revealed.  The two magi that stand sentinel to the vulvar opening or our mother earth, and sitting atop is the butterfly of transformation.  What is mother earth birthing?  What hidden mysteries lay in the depths of her womb that are yet to be revealed?