The Key

Magick, writing and teaching.

The Key Opening the Doorway to Magickal Practice was a labor of love documenting the early exercises, ideas and work that I work through with my over 20 students. While it is not like the personal tailored experience of working with me I believe it is a close second. Right now I am working a lot on my next book which is the follow on but also with the year and a day of work towards initiation.
I love books and and I am avid reader and there are plenty of books on paganism and witchcraft what could I possibly have to say that others have not?
Well firstly these books tend to focus either on spells or rituals or dogma (some all three). Very few show, encourage or describe the work you need to do to get to the place to use these ideas.
They make huge assumptions about the equipment, level of knowledge or abilities of the students. Don't get me started on Idiots Guides, context people, context! Those books are often just a mush of ideas, concepts and symbols.Over the years of dealing with real people I have learned that the place where most students have start from is a place of reading (thinking) but not doing. So generally the first thing I throw at them are not theories but exercises to get the energy, their energy moving. This has mixed results but is always a learning experience!
I have spent a lot of time this week working through assignments and exercises, enough for over 12 weeks of work so far in book 2. It is hard work but I still feel I can teach well. That what I say and can show students is of value because I have the experience of teaching real people.
So while dancing to Beastie Boys, cuddling the dog and catching up with my people on G+ I am still mulling over the next places to guide my book students. I can't wait!
Bright Blessing.

Teaching

Teaching

My students always have the best intentions with notebook and journal work, then as they get into it they let it slide. They don't mean to. They all laugh at the story of past students sitting in their cars outside my house frantically scribbling in their notebooks, then they all do it, or something similar! I have tended to have 3 types of students.

The Juggler. 

They tend to be a little late, but let you know because they have 2 full time jobs and a family, a sick dog and another course they are studying. These folks are organised, work hard when they are there and respect what you do. However sometimes these guys just burn out, break down or lose the plot. They can't help it, every juggler drops something eventually. Yet sometimes they just pick everything up and start again.

The Pooka.

 They look perfect. They say the right things. Sometimes they even do the right things. Yet sooner or later their real faces appear. They want to please but more than that they want to be the centre of everything. They tend to copy mannerism and behaviour. Every outfit is a costume. Every gesture a dance. When they lose it, it is because they are so frightened of themselves, of their ugliness that they can't bear that someone has seen them.

Old Kid Faithful. 

They have something about them. They may have book learning, or not. There is a grace to them. They don't always do the work, and they can't always even tell you why. They were lost in some dreams, or some art. Whether it be gardening or painting. You ask them about something and sometimes they look at you blankly. Then a little later they come out with the most moving and profound thing.

Then of course there are those that are just unique. Those who like a butterfly in a room just pass through.

Being a teacher as long as I have you would have thought I would have learned who was who by now, but I just let my heart guide me most often. This is wonderful but you never know until the mask slips who is who. Who is the Pooka and who is the Juggler?

All images are Wendy and Brian Frouds work. 

Currently Writing

Hello I am here.
I am around and watching, sort of. I am writing my second magickal manual. I know that you guys you liked The Key and are keen to progress. I will also stop writing all the other books I have been working on! The pagan book of baking is just so fun though, as well as my Fey fiction I have been working on!
Please do bear with me. I have so much I want to do!
Keep smiling,
Bright Blessings

The Abyss and Robin Williams

The Abyss and Robin Williams

A great man has fallen. His death seems all the more tragic because he might have chosen to end it himself. Personally I loved his work, but it is not Good Morning Vietnam I think of today, but What Dreams May Come.

Yes Robin Williams was an addict,  addicted to cocaine and alcohol which do not do great things to the body, spirit and mind of a person, but the reason he was an addict was because he was in crippling agony. A spiral of shame, guilt and paralyzing fear. His love of his children made him deal with his addiction but that simply meant his self medication, his crutch was gone.

Maybe his soul sickness went into remission, maybe he just hid it better. Maybe he took medication.

The truth is this man, loved by so many did not know how to love himself. 

How do I know this? I have never meet him. Listened to his darkness late at night when he thought I was sleeping. I never woke and wondered, if today would be the day his pain would suddenly tip over and the need to end the pain would consume him. He has never look straight through me because he is staring into the abyss. I have never wept for him because the talents and joys I can see in him he is utterly blind to. 

Yet I have loved many that do. Many have been addicts in one way or another, alcohol and cocaine tend to be their poisons of choice. They choose these not only because they are easy to obtain but because they effect emotional pain very quickly. Cocaine numbs it. Yet it makes the rot even deeper. Alcohol feels warm and comforting, but you are still freezing to death. 

It is easy to judge. Yet I want you to imagine the greatest pain you have ever been in. I want you to imagine that it hurts to stand, to breathe, to think. I want you to imagine that you feel like you have no skin. That everyone's words hit you like cold sharp rain. Then some bright sparks will ask you to "smile".

They will tell you that this pain "isn't real". That the agony you are experiencing is nothing. Some might shame you. Might make you feel guilty for being in this pain you never asked for. Might refuse to acknowledge your bravery, and call you a coward. This shame and guilt of pain can make people go to crazy lengths to hid how bad you are hurting. This pain is medically called depression. A dip. A dimple. How odd? It sounds like nothing and feels like a yawning chasm of darkness. I have only been through this level of pain once in my life. Yet I live and love many with this illness? Disease? Agony? What do you call it to give it the weight it deserves? 

They all tend to be smart, talented, funny and kind. Some have tragic childhoods, not unlike my own, yet some don't. Sometimes the not knowing where this darkness started only adds to the guilt and shame.

I have seen these friends shamed and blamed by loved one. Seen them rage against what they believe is themselves. Watched as the joy drained from their lives and faces. See how all was ash in their mouths and they kept trying to smile or make dinner. Watched my lovers hate themselves for needing support and love. Seen my husband writhe in the agony of his own existence. All haunted by the people they pretend to be, wished they could be, knew they could become but for the abyss inside them.

So I don't wonder why Robin Williams took his life, I marvel that he lived so well, for so long. I applaud his courage, his humor and grace. I will cherish his legacy in films. From aliens and artist, doctors and villains. For me, he is a hero. 

When my step-brother took his life earlier this year I gave his daughter this poem and she read it to him,  smoothed his hair and placed it into his coffin. I do not know what comfort it could give Robin William's family, but as I light a candle for him later in his honour I will speak these words.

Lay in Rest

Goodnight, goodbye my friend

I pray you lay in rest.

Lay in happiness and peace

Lay in the light of your love

Let those who nourished your being

Liberate you in peaceful death

For all time, undoing all sorrows.

Goodnight, goodbye my friend

I pray you lay in rest

Lay in hush and comfort

Lay in the gentle dream of tranquility

Let those who sustained you in life

Liberate you in unity

For all time, lay in true rest.

Here come the drums!

Here come the drums!

 

Last night was a wonderful ritual. Nothing too complicated.  In circle was TK, mini-witch and N as well as myself. I got everyone to help cast a circle (which is more difficult than it sounds as you need to get everyone to visualize the same or similar things). I called the fey spirits and then we sang down the moon. Each of us had a drum. As it began slowly. A simple rhythm, a simple chant. Then gradually, organically we all joined in. It flowed and ebbed and built a trance like state we were all part of. Then as naturally as it started we all stopped together. Then began the study of sage. Nothing special or rare just the study of the kitchen sage. We brewed only one teaspoon in the pot and wrapped it well to keep in the heat. We would all taste and observe the tea, make notes and observations on flavor, colour, dryness, mouth feel and smells and tastes that were similar. We circled the cup round each tasting and describing as we went along. TK and N by about the end of the second cup, beginning of the third were feeling "drunk" or "high" TK especially. Mini-witch and myself were not. We experienced a clarity and calmness.
At about this point I stopped the tea study.
We began to drum again. It was good but none of us achieved the connected trance we had managed the first time.We sang and drew down luna energy and charged our crystal balls and crystals. Then bless the cup and the cake (lemon again, it was lovely).
Then I released and gave leave to the spirits and we unwound the circle all together,
I had very deep sleep and extremely vivid dreams. Golden children, a cafe, a strange spy story interjection, tree houses, and much more that have now become fragments or photographs.
I have had lovely peaceful morning and think I might hit the flicks later for my geek quota (though everyone like super-hero comic stuff now).

Hope, Faith and Joy

Hope, Faith and Joy

I am busy making things this week. I have made 4 different heart charms. Charms for the broken-hearted, cold-hearted, those in need of self-love and then spiritual love. I am also making a Goddess charm.

Hope and Faith are not always popular words in the world today. If you manage a positive outlook people tend to look at you with a distinct amount of wry eye rolling. Being positive, hopeful and having a belief in yourself, and in the world's ability for figure it out isn't naive. The thing is the idea that if we expect the worse we will surprised by the good just isn't true. If you radiate it, that is what you get. If however, you roll with the punches, know that you will make it, you always do. This doesn't make us immune to bad things, it does mean we see it as part of a learning curve. Part of something not the whole.

If people had more faith in the positive, in the good inside themselves and others imagine how amazing the world could be! If you live in your healthy joy only good can come. I don't mean just sit and get high or run away from the world. I mean follow your passions for helping others, for creating beautiful things.

The radical idea that you should spend your days doing what you love instead of what you feel you should do seems like sense to me. Yet from the youngest age we prime ourselves and our children for following their miseries instead of joys. Do something sensible. Do something practical. What about a back up? What about _____ to fall on? There are "hobbies" and "jobs" and "careers" and those who define them don't seem to care that those lines are of their own making. We talk our children out of astronaut, or mega-star and wonder why our children are miserable!

Not everyone can be ______ (add something here) but not everyone wants to be. I thought I should be an actor like my Dad my whole life and I worked my ass of at it. Until I figured out that it made me soul crushingly miserable! That magick and massage and writing make me happy. The thing is with the technologies we have today one person can do the work of 30 or 40 people! So what do those guys and girls do? Grow vegies? Design gardens? Build custom cars? The world is changing and if we can we can change the world for the better! With some hope, some faith to follow our Joy and make the world brighter.

Bright Blessings.

We are Pagan We are Proud

We are Pagan We are Proud

 

Most of Lucy Drake&Co attending the national PaganPride parade and event in Nottingham yesterday.

I met a ton of amazing new people. I met the UK openly pagan magistrate. I met Robin Hood (Tony, nice guy). I met funny grumpy hungover folks who had been to the Inkubus Suckubas gig in Leeds the night before. I saw folks I knew from MBS fairs, and folks who where also not LARPing! TK took the pictures, and therefor is not in any of them. Yet he and his Wookie backpack will be much remembered I imagine!

Stopped traffic!
I have never been in a parade before but it was great. From being in about 500 people shouting WE ARE PAGAN WE ARE PROUD gave me goose bumps. We waved at tourists, firemen, and some random dude who rushed out of bed to film us in his dressinggown. You could feel this odd connective energy to all these people and a sense of being part of something much larger than yourself.

Stalls+Shops
Everything was extremely well laid out and well organised. Even the ladies loos at the park, though the queue was massive, volunteers came in and cleaned and made sure there was enough loo rolls and so on. Some stalls had the usual stuff on but others had books and took cards! I didn't buy anything for myself except food and ice-cream. The food vans were a mixed bunch and the 2 best ones being both reasonably priced and quality food had huge lines. Other were charging a fortune for a bottle of pop.


Kid friendly
There was so much that was kid friendly, though Sassy didn't do loads, she was painted (purple dragon scales on her arms) and decorated (and ate) her own biscuit! I wish that there had been more for her age group (12-14) as the older kids had bands and music (none of which were to her taste) and toys that were aimed much younger. She said she would have liked a bellydance class for girls (and boys) of her age.

Hanging around
We hung around being organised by folks for an age! Luckily we were very close to the loos and had a great bunch of people near us to chat with and so on. Somewhere between an hour or so of just standing around was a bit rubbish but the guy shouting about SATAN was moved on by the police. We had the bright idea of going top Costa Coffee for tea and food before the parade as we were just a little early. Turns out this was genius.

All the Things
Like a kid in a sweet shop I was so overwhelmed I don't think I took full advantage of everything there because I couldn't decide what I wanted. There were written programs but I think for me they made it worse as I knew what I was missing! In the end I feel like I didn't hear the lectures I wanted to hear but I did have a great time anyway. I will know better for next time!

Too hot. Too Tired.
I am glad of the parasol I had, it was definitely needed and not for the show as although clouds looked threatening from time to time the weather was hot and sunny. I imagine for the normal folks it was pleasant and great. I am, however, a natural ginger and I struggled with the sun and heat. I certainly couldn't join in the bellydance classes in the full sun!  My kidneys were not happy with me and I couldn't have carried the amount of water that would have been right for me to drink. I am suffering somewhat today. Still I am sat with my feet up (swollen and rather sore) and already think about next year!