Strange Times

A huge thank you to everyone who has left 'get well' wishes for me in recent weeks, I really have appreciated your thoughts and intentions. I don't know where this 'bug' came from, really, but it's hit me for six, it really did take the legs from under me. I've been feverish, coughing, sneezing and generally feeling really very unwell. I'm also aware that I have passed it on to at least 5 other people, one being my partner, the rest being work colleagues! Guess who is not exactly Mr Popular around these parts at the moment?!?

This bug, which although called 'Man Flu' by some, really has been rather vicious, has managed to sap me of all my physical energy. I've worked through it, I've not taken sick leave, but when I've come home from work, I've just collapsed on the sofa and I've also been going to bed earlier and getting up later. Consequently, my spiritual practice has suffered somewhat, and whilst I'm not happy about that, there's been little, in any practical sense, that I've been able to do about it. This is another reason why I've not posted here in recent weeks - there's been little to say! I've felt in something of a spiritual backwater, and it's not been a comfortable experience, especially as so much exciting stuff was happening leading up to episode. I guess in a way I'm looking for meaning within it all, but I'm not seeing a clear picture at the moment.

My professional life has also been playing something of a key role in terms of my silence. I've had an a project delegated to me, which has arrived, as ever, on top of my current workload, and it's been taking up an inordinate amount of time. This project, as well as taking up physical time, over and above my normal working hours, has also been sapping me physically and emotionally, as well as having something of a psychological effect. In short - it's been a really tough time work wise! I don't want to go into detail, it would be wrong, unprofessional and indiscrete, but lets just say that the past few weeks haven't exactly been my most favourite period of my professional life! Admittedly, I've taken this project on whilst not feeling in the best of health, and the stress of this project has probably led to the length and indeed depth of this particular episode, so something of a vicious circle - not helped by one week when my manager and colleagues were all on annual leave!

I also have the worry of my father. Regular readers (and I hope there's still a few of you out there!) will know that my father has been poorly. Well, on Sunday 24 November I will be taking him to Bristol Royal Infirmary where he will be undergoing a triple, and possible quadruple, heart by-pass. This is clearly a huge ordeal, and at 76, it's an even bigger challenge. He has the actual operation on Monday 25 and I would appreciate all the thoughts, pagan prayers, healing incantations, protection, spells, anything and everything that your own spiritual practice affords. I know he is going through this operation because he wants to be able to experience more time with the love of his wife (my mother) and family, so I hope that intention is what will carry him through. As a devout Christian, he wouldn't appreciate the sincerity of the spiritual pagan, but I know we rise above such things, so please remember him, my mother, me and my wider family in your practice.

So that's about me at the moment. Whilst poorly I have read 'The Secrets Of Dr Taverner' by Dion Fortune, and, in the character of Rhodes in the stories, I can see something of my own spiritual development mapped out in front of me. This book is a collection of short stories, some perhaps twee, some dated, yet they all contain spiritual truth, magical teachings, admonishments and lessons to the wise. The last two paragraphs of the entire book contain, for me, a vision of where I want to be. It seems that so much is stacked up against me in this mundane world, at the moment, acting as something of a barrier to my own progress. However, the lesson for me here is how I negotiate this series of hurdles . . . yet another lesson, and I still don't feel I have the physical energy, as yet, to attempt this negotiation, but negotiate it I must.

I'll sign off by quoting the final two paragraphs, and I wish you love and blessings:

Above me on the hill the great granite cross cut the stars, a Keltic cross, with a circle of eternity superimposed on the outheld arms of renunciation. The mist had come up and blotted out the low-lying land towards Frencham till I seemed to be alone on a crater of the moon. Cut off from all human influences, high up on the stark heights of the moors, I met my soul face to face while the unseen life that rose like a sea drew back as if to give me room for my decision.

And I hesitated, longing to plunge into that wonderful life, yet dreading it; when suddenly something gripped me by the heart and pulled me through. I cannot describe it better than that. I had passed an invisible barrier and was on the other side of it. Consciousness steadied again, the world was unchanged, there above my head still loomed the great cross, and yet in all things there was a profound difference, for to me, they had suddenly become alive. Not only were they alive, but I shared in their life, for I was one with them. And then I knew that, isolated though I must always be in the world of men, I had this infinite companionship all about me. I was no longer alone, for, like Taverner, Marius, and many others, I had passed over into the Unseen.

Flying Beds

I have a feeling that this is going to turn into something of a self reflective ramble so it will therefore be rather disjointed. This will not surprise regular readers of this blog, but to any newbies out there, my apologies!

In a recent conversation with my sister, she reminded me how, as children, we would play what we would call ‘Flying Beds.’ This was simply a childhood fantasy, where we would imagine that our beds had secret powers and would, at our command, take us anywhere at all, by taking to the air. We would soar, far away, in our imaginations, to places and people that we would create, painting on the canvass of young minds, uninhibited and unrestricted. As I have reflected upon this I have come to appreciate the longing for freedom that I have always sensed, deep with me. This is a desire to be free from the limitations and restrictions of the physical body and a deep conviction that there is more to life than that which presents as physical matter. I’ve never been fooled into believing that all I see is all that exists.

What I have come to see, in recent months, is that this longing I felt then was the voice of my Spirit – what Dion Fortune calls the ‘immortal spirit of man’ - that part of me that is of the One Divine Life and which seeks to make that divine and eternal connection. The immortality goes two ways. This is the God/dess within me, if you like, that part of me which makes me divine and which seeks communion, meaningful relationship, with the One Divine Life. This is a hunger that has always been there, it’s something that I’ve always known, and these whispers from Spirit, to my spirit, although expressed through various traditions along my somewhat complicated spiritual journey, have always been there, even at the times in my life when my communication receptors were rather ineffective or seemingly non-operational altogether! The One Divine Life has never let me go, even when I could be seen running at full speed in the opposite direction! And trust me, that has happened!

I don’t consider myself to be particularly psychic. I don’t see the aura’s of people as they’re walking towards me in the High Street, and I hardly ever seem to remember my dreams. I rarely see visions (although I have a few times) but I do find that I have a highly tuned intuitive nature and this has often shown itself when I’ve been reading tarot for people. Somehow, I just seem to know. I’ve been working with people, using the tarot, and somehow Source has spoken directly into their lives through me, often with dramatic results. This has often worked at its most powerful when I have allowed the cards to speak directly to me, not always following the established interpretation of the card as detailed in the accompanying book. This is a gift I’ve not used for some time, and is something that I would like to see develop. However, I use the tarot a few times each week for my own personal use and I’ve always found this to be really effective and meaningful. So the tarot, for me as well as for others, has been one vehicle where I have been able to fly from the restriction and limitation of this mind and body into a different place, with positive results.

“Confusion is the beginning of wisdom” says Dr Taverner to Rhodes in the Dion Fortune book ‘The Secrets of Dr Taverner’ and I’ve been feeling that way myself in the past few days. Don’t get me wrong, it’s not a negative thing, I’m not throwing my arms in the air in some kind of doubting fashion, but I do have a feeling of ‘the more I read the less I seem to know’! Does that make any sense? I think this is because I have moved from the starter to the main course! I so relate to this Fortune quote because to me it speaks of being open, honest, and transparent. No one will ever grow on their path if they assume a kind of ‘know it all’ pretence and, sadly, I have spent too much time with people of this ilk during my spiritual journey. I am in a place now where I dare to ask the questions and whilst I know I have a firm foundation, this is not where I want to remain. I’ve not come this far simply to tread water. No, I want to build upon this foundation and establish something wonderful and lasting. So I am in a place of mild confusion at the moment. I feel like a chap who has just purchased a flat pack kitchen and can’t quite work out how to bring it all together. I have all the parts I need, I have the tools in the house, somewhere, if I can get my hands on them, but I’ve not yet quite connected the tools to the appliance! I remember feeling this way when I started a new school. Everything around me looked somewhat familiar, the routines were similar, but I was also painfully aware that I was the ‘new boy’ and I simply had to get on with it. That’s how it feels right now in the sense that I know I have some serious learning to do.

I think this is because I am seeking a way of bringing magic into my pagan practice in a real and meaningful way. I have been working with my gods, working with their energy, and therefore using magic in the sense of it being a gift from my gods and flowing from their energy and vitality. For me magic has to form part of my devotional practice. The object of my magic is to bring my manhood into my Godhood, to become more like the person I was created to be, before name and form, by allowing my Higher Self to manifest within me so that it is my Higher Self who looks through my eyes. I don’t see my magic as a way of obtaining ‘things’ necessarily, but I do see it as a way of transforming myself.

“Magic is more than waving a wand” says Dr Taverner, and this is obviously not news to me. I’m done with the fluff, done with the bubble gum, candy floss ‘buy a spell off the shelf’ mentality. I’m moving on to deeper and more profound things and in many ways it scares me! I’m far more aware of what I don’t know than what I do, I also know that I am a bear of very little brain! Part of me longs for a teacher, but at the same time I am aware of how I have learned so much over the years directly from Source. And this is objective of my quest, to get ever closer to Source. I don’t want fame or riches; I simply want to know, even as I am fully known.