We regret we are currently not publishing a monthly newsletter. In the meantime, please do enjoy our newsletter archive...

Move
Display 0 | 5 | 10 | 15 Stories

Newsletters

Newsletters


Plant Spirit Shamanism (May 2010)
Making Healing Allies in Nature

By Ross Heaven

 
flower0Since the beginning of human experiences, plants have played a role in the evolution of our species, not only in the provision of food and medicine but in our deepest spiritual experience and the development of consciousness.

 

Their form, beauty, enchanting scents, their healing and emotional qualities, have all provided a gateway to the Great Mystery of Nature, which our Celtic forebears called "The visible face of Spirit."

Though our lands are not longer forested as they were, we try to recreate a sense of their beauty and tranquility in our gardens, parks, and the green spaces in our cities, giving us at least a taste of Nature with which we can sustain ourselves against the soulless backdrop of the steel and concrete jungle that are our homes today.

For many people, plants are still the messengers of divinity, harmony and beauty. They are also the source of our health and well-being, not just as medicine but also in their ability to relax, refresh and excite us.

flower3Some deep part of us knows that the healing power of plants is inherent in what they are as much as what they do. Flowers have a role to play, for example, in all of our most primal celebrations of life and death – birth and birthdays, coming-of-age, marriage, illnesses, funerals and deaths. They are there at the first "I love you", and they are there for our endings too. Even after death our connection to the natural world continues and our spiritual destination in many religions myths is some form of paradise, which is often symbolized as the "Heavenly Garden," or the Garden of Eden.

Archeology shows that plant spirit shamanism has been part of our healing experience for thousands of years, predating other practices by millennia and going back to a time when healers worked in harmony with Nature.

Plant Shamanism is – and always has been – a person-centered approach and incorporates in a holistic way, practices such as herbalism, energy work, aromatherapy, and counseling to provide a unique blend of therapies that is most needed by each individual client, based on the healer's attunement to a state of balance or otherwise of that client's soul. But it is also fundamentally spirit-centered, and all traditional healers – from the Curanderos of the Amazon to the 'folk magicians of Ireland – regard plants as sentient, aware, intelligent, alive and as 'doctors' in their own right.

Plant shamanism involves practices for meeting these spirits, such as shamanic journeying, soul retrieval, rituals using flowers and fragrances, offering to Nature, flora baths for protection, and the use of visionary plants to find purpose, clarity and new directions in life. All of these, to the shaman, are implied by the term 'healing'.

 

Ways of Healing


As a young boy, I was apprenticed to a Welsh sin eater – a 'cunning man,' as they were called in Wales, who used plants and flowers in the healing work. One of the methods was to bury the name of a patient, etched on a piece of bone, in a corner of his garden, next to a patch of sunflowers. Each day he would say his prayers over the flower, consulting with them on the condition of his patient, then squeeze a few petals so their aroma would be released. As the scent drifted upwards, he said, a little more of his patient's illness was carried away until he or she was healed.

This may seem like a strange approach in our culture today, but when I grew up and went traveling I found the same essential methods used in Haiti, Peru, Africa, Greece, America, Turkey.... So it is not an eccentricity or even unique to Wales.

The world over, in fact, wherever shamans work with plant spirits rather than extracts and compounds as Western doctors do, it is understood that plants are alive, aware and willing to teach their healing secrets. Plant spirit shamanism is therefore learned ally - by getting out into the fields and making contact with natural forces, not by reading about plants in some dusty library.

The sin eater communicated with plants in this way and knew several magical uses for them that they had told him of. For example, the sunflower's, he used were actually marigolds, but he called them sunflowers, because they are "bright as the sun" and warmed the soul with protection. flower2It is interesting then, that we find the same belief in Andean Peru, where rosa sisa (African marigold) are also used for protection. Here, they are often planted by the door of a house so if someone should pass by and give the 'evil eye', the flowers will catch these negative energies and protect the soul of the houses from diseases. The petals turned black when this happens, but revert to their bright color when the energy is discharged through their roots to the soil.

The sin eater I knew had never visited Peru and yet the message from the plant was the same: marigolds - sun flowers' – protect.

 

Working with Plants

The key thing with plant spirits shamanism is to establish a connection with the plant. Once that is done, the plant spirits themselves teach you everything you need to know and reveal the many ways of using them in healing, most of which are very unlike the Western medical notion of ingesting them in a tablet or even herbal form.

In Haiti, Peru, Brazil, Indonesia, and even in our own Celtic past, there is a practice, for example, of taking floral baths, where flowers and herbs are added to blessed water. The sick person then bathes to wash away his ailments. These baths are not restricted to physical healing, but can be used to draw good fortune and change your luck (which is regarded as real and tangible force), making you more open to the receipt of money, love and spiritual power.

Other ways of working with plants include the making of pockets, power pouches, containing herbs that remove negative energies, while returning life force to the patient as the pouch is brushed over his/her body. The packet has similarities to the Amazonian chacapa, a bundle of dried leaves which has medicinal powers to rebalance the patient's energy field, and is rubbed over the body in the same way.

The segure of the Andes, a bottle which contains a mixture of plants and herbs in Holy water and perfume uses the same principles of spiritual connection with the plants. Here the shapes, colors or qualities of the plants invoke various powers that the client wishes to draw into his life. Round, golden, seeds attract money, for example, while cactus spines embody protection. The seguro, according to the Andean shamans, becomes a "friend" you can consult with. Every time you speak out your problems to this friend, they are removed, while the powers of the plants draw good energy in.

One rule that comes consistently in this work is that we must treat our plant allies with respect. In Haiti, healers literally pay the plants for their work by dropping coins at the base of the tree they 're collecting leaves from. They are then 'fed' and there is a fair exchange: we charge the plants with energy so they have the power to heal us.

We must also treat plants kindly. Research shows that they have feelings, intelligence, language – even the ability to count and make music! – and they can sense our intentions and respond to our actions. If we treat them with love, they flourish and grow. If not, then their spirits die and we do not have the healers we need.

flower4

Getting Out of Our Minds

One of the biggest challenges for the Western mind is learning how to work with plant spirits is our cultural fascination with science and measurement. This socialization into 'scientific thinking' is hard to overcome because as part of it, we have been taught to stifle our dreaming and imaginative selves. Luckily, however, there are also plants, which have a spiritual intention to re-establish our connection with the spirit-universe and open us up to the true nature of reality.

One of these is guayusa. In the Amazon it is known as "the night watchman's plant" because of its ability to bring lucid dreams and dissolve the boundaries between wakefulness and sleep. Thus, the night watchman can take guayusa and nap, while remaining alert to the sounds and sights around him as he watches over the tribe.

The shamans say that in every country we have plants to cater for our own needs; thus in Europe, it may be difficult to find guayusa, but a tea made of vervain, valerian and chamomile will achieve similar effects.

Another way of getting 'out of our minds' is through a special state of trance consciousness known as shamanic journeying.

To take any shamanic journey, find a time and a place where you can be alone and undisturbed for 20 minutes or so. Then dim the lights or cover your eyes, lie down and make yourself comfortable. Most journeys are taken to the sound of drumming, which encourages 'dreaming' patterns to emerge in the brain, taking the shaman deeper into a more holistic experience of the world in its fullness. You can drum yourself, have a friend drum for you, or use a drumming tape to guide your journey.

Expressing your intention and keeping this in focus is again important, Intention is the energy that guides the journey and enables you to engage with the mind of the universe so it can work with you.

You can try this yourself by setting your intention to meet with a plant ally - the consciousness of a plant that will guide you into the world of the collective plant mind. You do not need to have a specific plant in mind. Stay open instead - to whatever comes.

As soon as the drumming begins, imagine yourself entering a place, which connects you to the earth in a way that is meaningful to you, and then allow your imagination to take you where you will. All you need to do is to receive. When your plant ally appears to you spend some time in conversation with him or her (in the imaginative world, most plants take a human form). Enquire about its healing gifts and the way these properties manifest in the plants themselves, Ask how you can work with this ally and the plants that embody him or her.

Visit your ally often in this way and you will learn more about the world of the plants, the nature of reality and indeed, about yourself, as part of this vast and beautiful universe.

flower1Ross Heaven is the director of the Four Gates Foundation and the author of 10 books of the psychology of empowerment, shamanism, plant medicines, healing and love and relationships, including Plant Spirit Shamanism: Traditional Techniques for Healing the Soul. Ross also teaches Plant Spirit Shamanism workshops and medicine retreats in France, Ireland and the Amazon Rainforest. Details of these are available at www.thefourgates.com or email This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it .

 
Conscious Agreements in Your Body and Our World (Apr 2010)

Shesat through Norma Gentile

vertigo

So often in New Age circles, we speak of illness as “dis-ease.” It is true that there is usually a sense of discomfort in illness. It is not always in the exact location where physical disease may eventually manifest, but it may instead be felt as discomfort or imbalance in the lifestyle or emotions. Very often the physical body registers discomfort at a subtle level. This happens long before the disease has manifested in the body. The physical body registers sensations of what is going on all around us kinesthetically, two, three, four, five or six feet away from us. Often times when something begins to register as illness or noticeable discomfort, we look at the body itself. We forget to look outside of the body, where it is probably coming from – the subtle energy field two feet, three feet or more outside of the physical body.

In these surrounding spaces, we intersect with other people. Our energies intersect with those groups of people we have agreements with, such as our biological family, those who live in our neighborhood or city, coworkers and people we know from the school we attend or the sport we participate in. Most people have easily a dozen primary agreements between themselves and a group of people in their life.

These soul-level agreements are typically unconscious. But sometimes, particularly in groups we meet with daily, such as work partners, a group will bring to consciousness an unconscious agreement that does not serve the group well. For example, if an employer has allowed someone at work to behave poorly towards other employees, there will be pressure upon the unconscious agreement among the employees that allows this behavior. Either the agreement will be brought into consciousness and addressed, or the one who brings it into consciousness might be fired. The outcome depends on the agreement and soul’s journey of all those involved. It is not about one side being right and another wrong. It is about setting up situations that our soul desire can learn from.

We can see this play out on a national level as well. All those in form in Canada manifest a certain quality of energy. Those in form in the United States have a different quality of energy. People residing in these countries have agreements to resonate or tune their bodies to some portion of the energetic signature there. There are also agreements between these two larger soul groups as to how these energies will interact – or may interact – in the near future. Each person’s soul has an agreement with their own national consciousness and their soul has chosen a quality of energy that reflects its agreement with that larger national consciousness. Therefore, whether they live in Canada or the United States or China, each person’s physical body resonates with some aspect or national consciousness and each person affects that consciousness.

Generating Stillness

By simply being in a human body, you carry an agreement about the quality of energy that you will manifest. As long as you are in that body, the quality of energy that you have agreed to bring is present. The quality of energy resonated out and is perceptible to everyone. When you take time to sit in stillness and do nothing, you have the opportunity to turn within and find the vibration that your soul has agreed to bring into the Earth plane on behalf of humanity. In many cultures, this concept of simply being and allowing your presence to radiate out is not spoken of or thought about. Yet it is the most powerful way to be a resonant factor that has an influence upon events in the world. Take, for example, the rising use of adrenaline in your society. In the last twenty-five years you have embraced a lack of sleep into your culture and the addition of caffeine into your diets. Coffee and chocolate are ubiquitous. There is nothing wrong with it; it is a direction that has been chosen. But as a result, fewer people possess the ability to sit and feel the subtle energies. Ironically, just as the awareness of Spirit and healing energies has increased, you have also increased your intake of substances, that, when used beyond moderation, decrease your power to access to these same energies.

Is this not a bit funny? Caffeine allows you to purposely work in a linear fashion. Spirit works in more of an upward spiral. As you have greater access to the energetic tides of Spirit, the rise of consumption of caffeine continues. And even while you feel the impulse of honor the spiral creation of Spirit, your over consumption indicates a choice to create a linear fashion. Perhaps this is a last minutes rush to function outside of your connection to Spirit. However, I see that those things built in a purely linear fashion will not stand. They will not last.

Allow yourself to wonder. What is it that you have done in this linear fashion? What is it that you have simply pushed through, using your own will, rather than listening you how Spirit wanted to co-create with you? When we allow ourselves that quiet place to simply sit and listen to Spirit, what we manifest appears to take a little longer to complete, but the result is permanent.

Linear Creation Versus the Spiral Path of Spirit.

As more and more people within the Earth have embraced a linear way of creating, they have also embraced the idea that they can utilize their own personal energies to bring forth what they desire. This type of linear manifestation has led to rise in “trouble waters.” Spirit has to navigate these troubled waters, and in doing so there is not always an easy flow in its creation process with others. Any time the flow of creation is troubled by anyone manifesting in a linear fashion, it makes it just a little harder for us to easily hear what Spirit is suggesting as our next step. We become so accustomed to the troubled waters around us and to the constant subtle static in our bodies.

Continuing to force the body into linear behavior that is simply not in alignment with the soul and spirit eventually brings much tiredness and fatigue into the physical form, depleting the adrenals and kidneys. Because we are preoccupied with the success or failure of our other doings, we may miss the fact that our inner quiet is no longer really quiet. And it is this constant static that block our ability to heard deeper levels of what Spirit wants to give us naturally and easily. This block continues until we choose - - or we are forced – to take action that releases our insistence on moving linearly, we allow Spirit to move us along with it its own spiral path.

My guides remind me that peace is the result of inner stillness, connection to Spirit and knowing oneself. When we spend time being who we truly are, we generate a quality of stillness that makes peaceful actions more appealing to us than violence. Our unique quality of stillness resonates through our shared human consciousness and through that living quantum space within the atom of all form.

Allowing Spirit to Flow Into Religious Conflict

Many religions have arisen within the Middle East. Over and over, each of these religions has veered slightly from its original intent. Whether it was to help manifest cleaner bodies (Judaism), or whether it was to help to safeguard the integrity of the divine feminine (Islam), with linear creation there has been a misconstruing of the various religions. As we look now upon the Middle East, we see that something different might arise. Yet this one is one of the principle power points of the Earth. Eventually, something will resolve. The creative stroke of your own artistry and your ability to sit steady presence of Spirit.

Being reactive means you are not within the scope of Spirit. As you sit quietly and see the entire reaction-taking place now upon the Earth, being still within the body center, that stillness within you is then offered to whatever you behold. Each moment, each issue, each obstacle as you behold it, can no longer stand in the way of the flow of the creative waters.

Stillness Brings Remembrance

For many people, particularly women and men who are very sensitive to their feminine aspect, emotions play a huge part in how we create our reality. More and more, the outer reality that we observe can be affected by the inner reality that we experience. Your own stillness draws forth a remembrance of stillness from those involved in conflicts, wars and battles. It draws that remembrance of home through them, within the atoms of their bodies. Your stillness awakens the soul within their body, and reminds them of the communion they share with you as humans here upon the Earth.

In this manner we do not aim to force peace or to inflict an artificial straight line of resolution to conflict. Instead we offer that service of remembrance that each might be nourished and fed, simply because there are those who sit in silence and sit in alignment, which is true peace.

A Stillness Mediation

Even as you read these words, you may choose to allow your own stillness to move out to all those in your life. Let the still vibrations of who are move through you and therefore be audible to all those with who you have agreements in your neighborhood, your city, your country, and throughout the world. Do not inflict the stillness, but simply find it within your body, and so offer it as remembrance.

Know that as you listen in silence, what is truly your soul’s journey is dawn out from within you. As you meditate, know that your next step might be to the side rather than directly in front, following the spiral path of Spirit. Our blessings upon each of you.

Printed with permission from Norma Gentile

Thank you

Norma Gentile is a professional recording artist and singer. Considered one of the leading specialists in the performance of Gregorian Chants of the 12th Century mystic and Abbess Hildegard von Bingen, her performances are of the sacred sound and healing.

Norma: I believe that singing, chanting, toning, prayer and healing are the same. We are creative beings, responsible for our bodies, emotions, thoughts and minds. What we give attention to – we give energy to. By connecting consciously and intestinally using sound, we discover ourselves as co-creators.

www.healingchants.com
This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it

 
Wheels of Light (Mar 2010)

By

Mar de luz

Angel of Renewal (pastel on paper, 2009) by Marlene DruhamThe Mother Earth has Her own Wheels… Her cycles. Some of them last so long that no human ever sees all of one cycle. She is always changing Herself. Sometimes, she added, “Mother Earth decides to change many things at once. She pushes up mountains, or makes mountains flat. Rivers disappear, prairies become lakes - everything changes.

We walk in two worlds - the outer and the inner world, the seens and the unseen – and they are in a constant state of evolution. This basic tenant of shamanism, that ancient, earth-tied belief system, is pervading our consciousness in these times of “walking between the worlds.” What we behold and regard is beholding us. The process of seeking experience and knowledge is actually becoming us, and we cannot separate ourselves from what we see and participate in. We are cogs in the wheel of tremendous, unprecedented change.

There is a physical and spiritual aspect to all things on Earth, even thought forms. All reality is based on polarity that is the male and female energies that circulate to create all life. As we learn to abide and walk peacefully through everyday life, we learn to walk within ourselves and awaken the inner landscape, and every day that we awaken, we have the choice to blend with the harmonies of nature or to swim against the tide. This is evolution and what the Hopi Elders meant in their message released in the early 1980s:

“ The river is flowing now very fast. Is is so great and swift that there are those who will be afraid. They will try to hold on to the shore.”

“The river is always the river because she knows how to change.” The patriarchal world view of clinging to outmoded beliefs and fundamentalism is yielding to an open minded view that perhaps that Earth Mother knows more than we do. She is much more complicated than our scientists and politicians can even fathom, and if we could learn to just stop and listen, as indigenous peoples have done for centuries, then we would understand not to fight the river of Earth’s paths, seasons and cycles of renewal. She will seek balance at any cost and has always communicated to those with eyes to see and ears to hear.

Wheels of RemembranceHeart  Seed (pastel on paper, 2010) by Marlene Druhan

When a human embryo forms, it grows from the heart outwards, drawing the heart back into itself as it develops into a fetus.

In this way, everything contains a heartbeat, like a star at its center that emanates in circular wavelengths outward and then back in again. It is a perfectly balanced and symbiotic system that absorbs energy patterns from orbiting spheres and the redistributes them back into the universe. Because we walk in two worlds, we are starting to realize that what we behold and regard is beholding us. As we gaze toward the winter sun or visualize the stellium at the heart of our galaxy, we are regarding our nativity and gazing at ourselves.

This is the same principle at work within the central fire councils of the Iroquois, passed down through some forty to fifty generations. The fires of their matrilineal tribes were circled by native people of both sexes and all ages. No one was considered less than anyone else, and everyone had his or her say in prophecy, healing and ceremony. Even those who we would consider to have mental illnesses were regarded for their insight. They gave to the fire their offerings, prayers and sacred rhythms. The fire gave them heat and spoke vision to their hearts, which assured their survival. This is where the lesson of preparing for the next seven generations came from; the fire wisdom taught them that what we do today reaches both our ancestors and our children.

The feminine understanding of the circular movement of time and space permeates shamanistic understanding as it has for, perhaps, hundreds of thousands of years. What began as a spark or dream in the heart of the Creator became the heartbeat of creation and the created world became the heartbeat of creation, and the created world blossomed like a flower. She poured herself into oceans upon planets and rivers amidst the stars. She stirred the light like embers to glow in dark places where the desire of life has never been felt before. Then when the light had tired and the need for dreaming outweighed the need for growth, she gathered the spirits of her children close to her and inside of themselves like seeds to weave a new journey through distant winds.

This is the greatest love story – the story of Father/Mother God and how worlds blow in and out of mythological grasp, carrying the embryonic seed of each preceding reality to a new place in the Sun. Memory circulates eternally; nothing is ever lost or wasted, and everything is connected to everything and on its way to becoming a part of everything else and always.

Tilting on the Wheel of Time

The evidence of life born and carried from love is found in circular archeology and artifacts; “wheels” that reveal matriarchal spiritual teaching such as campfires, peace pipes, baskets, rock and stone m monuments, Meso-American, Egyptian and Celtic calendars and so on. Time, itself is a circle. Some wheels of light in distant galaxies that we gaze at through the Hubble telescope are wheels of life that have long vanished, similar to the spiral petroglyphs carved on Anasazi rock face throughout the Southwest. And what we look at, digitally, on our watches is actually based on the Earth’s movement around the Sun.

So time is a wheel and implies a measurement of distance and travel, but that travel repeats itself in ever increasing, mathematical progressions. The fact that the long-count Mayan calendar is based on a date some 13,000 years ago tell us that we are approaching another monumental time in Earth’s history. We are approaching a monumental time, yes, in our Earth’s journey around the Sun and the Sun’s journey around our mother galaxy, but even with known cycles of time travel through space, this is a hard concept to grasp. Time is a spiral – it grows and develops – and even with all the artifacts, tradition and teachings that we know as the end of the Mayan calendar December 21 2012, the truth is that we have never been there before and will have to rely on our instincts and trust in the cycles of Earth mother to guide us.

There is intelligence in the cycles of the Earth Mother that only a few regard; it is being lifted to consciousness during the “end of time,” as the Maya refer to the present days. The tilt of the Earth that affects our seasons has a life of its own. The axis of the Earth has a wobble, much like a spinning top slowing down The slow rotation is referred to as the procession of the equinoxes and has to do with the drifting of the equinoctial sun backwards through he zodiac over thousands of years. For example, the Sun will be rising on March 21 of 2010 at the spring equinox is grazing the last degrees of the constellation of Aquarius. Approximately 2,000 years ago that same rising Sun grazed the waning degrees of Pisces. Hence the “precession” of the Piscean Age to that of Aquarius.

The Scales Tip

We are slowly waking to the realization that the rising equinoctial Sun carries ancient memory and consciousness of the civilization of Atlantis that came to closure some 26.000 years ago. This too, was a time of Aquarian sun, and the Earth has come full circle in its memory of a civilization that gave birth to our current indigenous tribes. The consciousness of that historic society now pervades our consciousness, and the same perils of life imbalanced by computers, high technology and scientific probing now challenge our concept of progress.

Fusion (acrylic on canvas, 2002) by Marlene Druhan

We can make the same mistakes and overstep our human desire for domination over nature, or will we heed the warning of our native people and seek balance between our heads and hearts? The answer is, and always has been, flowing quietly in the peaceful waters of our sacred land. That is where we were first stirred to life in the womb of our Earth Mother, and with or without us; she will keep the sacred balance.

We are approaching a time of enlightenment, a time of remembrance and a time for allowance of conscious change as our equinoctial Sun inclines ever more towards the center of the galaxy. The scales tip between darkness and light on the winter Solstice 2012 when the portal between heaven and earth floods our hearts and minds with the light of a thousand winter suns.

Will you join us in welcoming the unseen worlds to our earthly realm? With all this entails the appearance of the masters, the angels and the nature people, the release of the spirits of our ancestors trapped in the Earth due to war, climate and catastrophe and the reuniting of ourselves with our progenitors, the space brethren? Some tribes may be preparing to walk into a new dimension as all of creation takes a quantum leap. Some of us may choose to cross over to the spirit world without experiencing physical death. You can feel it, can’t you? Our world is stirring, like mist surrounding a mountain lake. We walk in two worlds with a river in between them and our hearts are the bridge.

Keeping The Sacred Rhythm

Tsunami, volcanic, earth vibrations and earthquake predictions will become commonplace, and we will all start to perceive these events prior to their likelihood, like native people and animals do. Sensations of suspended time will increase. These are kickbacks from the times of Atlantis when we could suspend time and space at will for the purpose of healing. Many new healers will emerge at this time that remembers the art of suspended state of healing trance. Remember to concentrate on breathing deeply from the solar plexus, which will always bring you back to the present moment. These are crossover episodes, stepping in and out of the fabric of reality through rifts in the fabric of the space-time continuum.

Sensitive people may see blurred energy in the shift between the worlds, as in a blurred photograph. Don’t worry, you are not crazy and you are not alone. You can tell people you are just magnetically challenged. The key to everything is to try to keep in sacred rhythm; communication and relationship to the Earth. These who do not regard her voice or do not choose to live in moderation will risk losing their sanity.

We will start to remember unconscious conditions from past lives, including remembrance of past life trauma. This is part of the Aquarian influence on our psyche that begins to free us of everything that we no longer need. Past life guilt, shame and self-denial can begin to fall away as we walk into the light of a new reality. That which we no longer need can be replaced with self-love, confidence and renewed abilities. This is the beginning of shedding earthy karma that will liberate us to our true life’s purpose. Yes, it is possible to actually get off the wheel of karma and to change your imprint, so to speak, or the astrological map that you came with. It is all part of the search for inner meaning that begins with self-forgiveness. Unresolved trauma will be dealt with in dreams and dissipated with the light of every new day. Possibilities to heal old wounds and lionesses abound.

A Time for Allowance

Microcosm (pen and ink on paper, 2006) by Marlene DruhanThose who practice the art of conscious dreaming will experience unlimited opportunities and abundance in their lives and will help to teach others to do the same. This is a time for allowance. We are opening up to the realization that whatever we can visualize for the greater good is tantamount to materialization. The object is not to underestimate the creative powers of the human heart and to use the power of love that is all around us. Allow yourself time out to dream, and dream big! Look for repetition and synchronicity, especially in dreams. Messages from the natural world will normally repeat three times is important. Become alert to your natural surroundings and the elements.

The more conscious we become, the more we will open up to that which we do not know. Super-consciousness is the door to true intelligence and the realization that we don’t know what we don’t know. That is to say, our leading astrophysicists don’t even know what questions to ask about the universe as her secrets unfold at an alarming rate. This is a humbling experience and necessary to keep our minds curious and childlike. It is as simple as that, so expect the unexpected.

Everything we do comes full circle. It is not for us to change the Earth or alter the processes of nature that we don’t understand. It is not our right to violate the rights of any living creature or to deny others a peaceful, fulfilling life. It is not for us to perpetuate war or genocide on other people or to subjugate those that we feel is less valuable or entitled than ourselves. When we do this, we only do it to ourselves. We must each sit alone in the darkness to weigh our own richness and self-worth. But don’t believe a word I say’ search and come to know it for yourself.

As I finish this column I am reminded of the words of John Denver who wrote the following words:

Now his life is full of wonder, but his heart still knows some fear

Of a simple thing he cannot comprehend

Why they try to tear the mountains down to being a couple more

More people, more scars upon the land

And the Colorado Rocky Mountain high

I’ve seen it rainin fire in the sky

I know he’be a poorer man

If he never saw an eagle fly

Rocky Mountain high

It’s a Colorado Rocky mountain high

I’ve seen rainin fire in the sky

Friends around the campfire and everybody high

Rocky Mountain High, Colorado.

John left the earthy world to begin a greater journey October 12. 1997.

rocky_mountain

Printed in the Sedona Journal December 2009
With permission.
This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it

Artwork by Marlene Eagle Druhan
www.marlene.embarqspace.com

Thank you

 
Connecting the Missing Link (Feb 2010)

Connecting the Missing Link

stonehenge

An Interview with Zecharia Sitchin
by Siron Knight and Michael Starwyn

 

Considered the father of alternative archeology, Zecharia Sitchin has a profound knowledge of modern and ancient Hebrew and many other Semitic and European languages. This knowledge has enabled him in his research of ancient cultures in Sumer, Egypt and Mesoamerica.

Sitchin has written a series of intriguing books including The 12th Planet, The Wars of Gods and Men, When Time Began, Stairway to Heaven and Lost Realms. These books deal with Earth’s and humankind’s history and prehistory and are based on information actually written on clay tablets by the ancient civilizations of the Near East.

Born in Russia, raised in Palestine, educated in England, and a leading journalist and editor in Israel for many years, he now lives in New York. In a rare interview, we had the opportunity to ask Zecharia Sitchin about his transformational journey, which has led him to the well-researched and documented discovery that our ancestors came from the stars.

Question: When and how did your search or quest in what is now termed “alternative archeology” begin?

Zecharia Sitchin: When I was nine or ten years old, studying the Old Testament in its original language of Hebrew, we reached chapter six of Genesis. This chapter describes the beginning of the deluge – the great flood, which includes Noah and the Ark. Only when you read it in its original language do you understand what it really says.

It begins not with the story of Noah himself and what happened, but with a preamble of some eight verses that are obviously remnants of a much older and different text than the ensuing story of Noah and the Ark. These eight verses have been the delight of Sunday preachers because they talk about the reason for the deluge and why God became angry with humankind. It says that at the time just before the great flood there were giants upon the Earth who married the daughters of men and had children by them.

In class I raised my hand and said: “Excuse me, teacher, why do you say giants when the world is “nephilim,” which means “those who have come down or descended” – because it speaks like they were sons of the gods, who came from Heaven to Earth.” I was expecting to be complimented for my linguistic acumen, but instead I was reprimanded harshly. The teacher ordered me to sit down, and not to question the Bible. I was not questioning the Bible. On the contrary, I was trying to bring out the need to understand precisely what the Bible says.


Question: It sounds like this search for which the “nephilim” were became your life’s work.

Sitchin: It became an obsession with me. What did the Bible mean by “nephilim?” Later on, when I began my Biblical and archeological studies of the ancient Middle East, I realized another verse among these eight verses is even more explosive, because it talks about them as being the sons, plural, of the other gods, plural, which is very odd in a Bible totally devoted to monotheism. The search, which began when I was a schoolboy, lasted about thirty years, and took me through all the various mythologies of the ancient peoples, back to the first place or civilization that had written records. All so-called later myths have been written down on clay tablets. These were the people called the Sumerians, whose civilization blossomed about six thousand years ago in what is now Iraq – then known as Southern Mesopotamia.

 

Question: Wasn’t it while studying the Sumerian tablets that you discovered the Anunaki: the Keepers of the Secret?

Sitchin: Yes. The Sumerians called “those who descended from heaven to Earth” the “Ananuki.” The term in Sumerian literally means “those who from Heaven to Earth came.” Due to my ability to read the Sumerian clay tablets, I studied and reported the findings to my readers. The tablets said the Ananuki came from another planet in our solar system that comes into our vicinity ever 3,600 years, sometimes a little less, sometimes a little more. They started to come and go between their planet and our planet about 450.000 years ago in search for gold, which they needed to protect the atmosphere of their planet.

In addition, they needed manpower, so they jumped the gun on evolution, combining their genes with the genes of humanoids. They combined their genes with females already on Earth and as a result of evolution brought us about. So no wonder the search for a so-called missing link that connects Homo sapiens has proven fruitless. The link is missing because it was jumped over artificially through genetic engineering. And why were they losing their own atmosphere? Was it a matter of environment? We are facing some of the same issues right now on our own planet.


Question: The link came from another world?

The Sumerian and Biblical Data involves Acknowledging the Existence of Extraterrestrials.

Sitchin: Every planet is a world. The question is, where did their planet come from, because according to the Sumerian texts – which I take as scientific data – their planet was thrust out of another solar system. So in a way, we are the product of a cosmic connection. I can tell you my next book, due in Fall of 1998 is titled The Cosmic Connection. We are genetically a combination of the evolution of humanoids on Earth and of those visitors. This is an eternal chain. They brought it to us, and we will bring it elsewhere.


Question: I am going back to ask you about this concept of the human hybrid. It seems like we are all at that point in our own evolution where we’ve mapping out the DNA helix and starting to do our own genetic engineering. It’s almost as if we are taking on where our ancestors, the Anunaki, left off.

Sitchin: It’s really interesting if you come to think about it, all these scientific advances in genetic and space travel are happening almost at the same time. It is as if the cycle is going back to our beginnings, and we are on the threshold of going out and doing to another planet what was done to us.

Comment: This accounts for some of the changes and transformation happening in the world today.

Sitchin: Yes. I appreciate the back issues of Magical Blend. I was reading over and over again the statement of purpose of the magazine. It says that Magical Blend accepts the premise that society is undergoing a fundamental transformation, and a new world view is being born. The magazine intends to deal with where we are going and how everyone may or may not have some input.

The brought to mind Arabic folk story that dealt with two travelers who were walking from one town to another town. After a while, they reached a crossroad. There was a pole with pointers to the left and right, bearing the names of the various cities. The pole had fallen down. One of the travelers sat and started to cry, saying: “We are lost. This directional pole has fallen down and we do not know where to go and we are lost.” The other traveler said: “”Oh, no, we are not lost.” He took the pole and pointed it towards the town from which they came. When he did this, all the other directions fell into place. He told the one who was crying: “So you see, my friend, in order to know where you are going, you have to know where you came from.”

This, I think, is the moral of my writings, because I really feel a kinship with the past. This is what happened so many millenniums ago. Here is what the Sumerians wrote down, and this is what the Anunaki who came did; they did this and that. They gave this knowledge and that knowledge: the zodiac, etc. The value of this knowledge is that in this information lies the clue to the future. So while I am supposedly writing about the past, I am really erecting the poles with directional signs for the future.


Question: You point out in our books that we are entering a New Age, moving into the Age of Aquarius. Why is that so important?

A Sumerian Cylinder Seal depicts an Astronaut on Mars, The Sixth Planet and an Astronaut on Earth, with a Space ship between them.

Sitchin: A Sumerian Cylinder seal over 4,500 years old depicts an astronaut on Mars, the sixth planet (counting from outside of the solar system in), and an astronaut from Earth, with a space ship between them. There is a date on this, which is Pisces. That encounter took place during the Age of Pisces. The zodiacal cycle returns to exactly the same spot every 25,920 years. So we are now leaving the Age of Pisces. Enki was the prototype god of Aquarius. Whether this means that it is all going to happen again the Enki is coming back, I don’t know There are a lot of signaling and signs that all point in that direction.


Question: The way you correlate temple dates and uses with changing times is intriguing. What was the purpose of the ancient structures such as Stonehenge?

Sitchin: Stonehenge was not the only astronomically-oriented, megalithic structure at that time. For example, there is a kind of Stonehenge on the Golan Heights in Israel. The structures are similar and have similar orientations. Around 2200 BC, the conflict arose between Enki and Enhil and their two sons about who was supreme on Earth, and they used nuclear weapons. They had to do this with the changing of Age of Taurus into the Age of Aries. The spaceport at the Sinai Peninsula was destroyed and the observatory structures were built. These were not structures for use by the Anunaki, but to enable humankind to follow the celestial cycle. There were two different kinds of temples, ones that were oriented by the equinoxes, called eternal temples, and ones that were oriented towards the solstices. The solstice temples were not eternal, because over a period of years the axis changes and shifts. By measuring the shift you can tell when the solstice temples were built.


Question: Why do we feel scholars continue to misinterpret the written records?

Sitchin: There are two prime reasons. One reason is we are all captive of our technology. For example, there is a depiction of two eagle-men saluting a rocket on one tablet. A hundred years ago, if I were asked what this was showing, I would have said two men saluting a pencil, because I would have never heard of a rocket. Some of the Sumerian tablets are so complex they look like computer print-outs. It is quite possible that someone will go back to the texts and say, “How come Sitchin didn’t realize they were talking about this or that?”

The second reason is that accepting the Sumerian and Biblical data involves acknowledging the existence of extraterrestrial. There is a text that describes how Enki leading a group of fifty Anunaki splashed down in the waters of the Persian Gulf, wades ashore, and established the first base on Earth. Then he assigned tasks to his personnel. Privately, many scholars tell me that I am right, but publicly they have to protect the status quo. Even so, my books are being used in many colleges and university courses. They are called alternative archeology. So changes are happening.


snowmtnshore

This article was printed in the October 1998 Issue of Magical Blend.

 
Jupiter in Pisces (Jan 2010)

Jupiter in Pisces

January 2010 – January 2011

pisces

By Julie Loar

“When you come close to the edge of all

the light you have, and must take a step into

the darkness of the unknown, either there

will be something solid for you

to stand on,

or you will fly."

Patrick Overton

The constellation of Pisces resides in the “watery” portion of the sky, which also includes Aquarius, the Water Bearer; Cetus, the Whale, and Pisces Austrinus the Southern Fish. This group of stars has been associated with fish in all ancient cultures. The two fishes of Pisces are depicted swimming in opposite directions but connected by a cord. The alpha star of the constellation is Al Resha, the “knot” in Arabic and this star symbolically binds the pair together.

Pisces is sensitive and emotional and feels things keenly. Take to extremes, Piscean sensitivity can result in self-inflicted martyrdom. Pisces is also the most collective of the signs and has always been associated with those in society who suffer or who have been disenfranchised in some way. This includes those who are imprisoned, repressed, rejected, or mentally ill. The humanitarian response of Pisces springs from a spontaneous desire to ease the suffering of others because of a deeply felt empathy for their anguish. Pisces is connected with those who withdraw, or who choose to live an alternate life style such as mystics, poets, artists and recluses. This group includes those who just don’t fit in for whatever reason. Through their separation or isolation, they can offer great art on the one hand or drain society’s resources on the other.

Astrologically, Pisces is the twelfth and final sign of the zodiac and therefore represents the final stage in the hero’s journey and the last phase of evolving humanity on the path of return. The final stage is the transcendence of the self, or ego-based personality, through renunciation of self centered motivations. Therefore, compassion and willingness to sacrifice are hallmarks of conscious Pisces.

jupiter Jupiter

Jupiter is the fifth planet from the Sun and the largest in our solar system. Along with Saturn, Uranus and Neptune, Jupiter is classified as a gas giant. It is the third brightest object in the night sky after the Moon and Venus. However, at certain points in its orbit, Mars can briefly exceed Jupiter’s brightness. Known since prehistoric times as a bright “wandering star,” Jupiter is twice as massive as the rest of the planets combined. The famous Great Red Spot, which is larger than Earth, is actually a giant storm that is known to have existed since the 17th century. Jupiter has a system of faint rings; but unlike Saturn’s intricate and complex ring patterns, Jupiter’s simple ring system is composed of an inner halo, a main ring, and a faint Gossamer ring.

On July 19, 2009, something hit Jupiter and no one saw it coming. Thought at first to be another storm like the Red Spot, astronomers now believe that a comet or asteroid, as large as several football fields, impacted the giant planet. The object emerged from darkness, unknown and not cataloged; and before anyone could photograph the body intact, it had shattered and became a cloud of debris. The new spot on Jupiter is now called the “Wesley debris cloud” after the amateur astronomer who first observed it. The collision released 2000 megatons of energy. If an object that size were to hit Earth, there would be widespread devastation.

Mythically the Rome Jupiter was the earlier Greek Zeus and the Egyptian Mon-Amon, King of the gods. Zeus was the authoritarian sky father who appeared in many cultures around 1,800 BCE. Zeus was the son of Cronus, or Saturn, who escaped death because his mother Hera wrapped a rock in swaddling cloth and fed it to Cronus. Cronus has already gobbled up the rest of his children to stay in power. To protect him, the infant Zeus was hidden in a cave on Lykos and fed milk from one of the horns of the goat goddess Amalthea of ancient Crete. He horn was the origin of the cornucopia. In one myth, nectar flowed from one horn, and ambrosia, the drink, which gave the gods their immortality, flowed from the other. Later, her skin became Zeus’s aegis, or shield of protection. Amalthea was immortalized as the constellation of Capricorn, and the related goddess Aega became the bright star Capelle, “Little She Goat.”

Astrologically, Jupiter is larger than life and difficult to contain, but he is uplifting, and aspires to greatness. Jupiter is thought to bring abundance and prosperity and to have an expansive and preserving influence. Jupiter helps us look on the bright side and adds a generous does of humor. As a god of light, Jupiter is said to deal with the realm of super consciousness, and therefore he can be a widener of horizons. His domain includes religion and philosophy and he supports an expansive view of life.

Jupiter’s positive qualities include a jovial expansiveness, a sporting approach to life and unquenchable optimism. The glass is definitely half-full, and it is large vessel. Exaggerated, or used unwisely, the same qualities can become extremist in viewpoint, wasteful and disregarding of resources, trusting too much to luck. Because Jupiter always wants to take the larger view, there is a risk of dismissing details as insignificant.

jupiter_in_pisces Jupiter in Pisces

Before Neptune’s discovery, Jupiter was seen as the ruler of Pisces. Therefore, the giant planet maintains a co-rulership with the sign of the Fishes. So Jupiter’s presence in Pisces is comfortable and familiar. Here, Jupiter’s expansiveness energy operates in the emotional arena and on the challenging side of things can stir the feeling nature to an exaggerated expression and blow emotional response out of proportion. Acting in his role as a god of light and wisdom, however, Jupiter can bring insight into the deeper and unconscious level of our feelings, illuminating things hidden in the shadow side of the psyche.

As ruler of wide-ranging Sagittarius, Jupiter wants to look through a telescope, exploring far and wide, expanding his vast knowledge and eventually gaining wisdom through diverse experiences. Therefore, as he aims his lightening bolts into the deep waters of Pisces, a search for a deeper meaning is possible. When we gaze at the night sky in a place removed from the light of the cities, we can see about 2,000 stars with the naked eye. This is symbolic of our limited vision and scope before technology expanded our view of our solar system and universe. Jupiter expands the nature of whatever sign he visits, so this is an apt analogy for Jupiter in Pisces, shining light into formerly unseen places and causing us to reach for the stars.

Jupiter wants bigger of everything. As a planet of opportunity, he gives the ability to prosper; however, this can lead to excess if not constructively channeled. In Pisces he broadens relationships and expands consciousness, bringing his light to our collective existence. Here we are seeking wisdom and the evolution of consciousness itself, not just an increase in knowledge. Here Jupiter is receptive, impressionable and has the capacity to heightened imagination and mystical states. There is a desire for peace of mind, rather than exaggerated stimulation and a quick adrenaline rush. There is a potential for expansive introspection and a capacity for devotion. The combined energy wants to understand the meaning of life, not just explore for the sake of it.

The archetypal combination creates an energy of healing which engenders a desire to act for the public welfare. There is a spirit of sympathy and charity in this synergy, which could offer a conductive influence for health care reform. Jupiter in Pisces is seen as the quintessential good Samaritan but prefers to act from behind the scenes. However, this blend of energies can be overly sensitive to the point where common sense disappears in a well of self-indulgence. There is unwillingness to compromise integrity for material gain, so this influence may also help with the healing and reformation of current financial conditions, potentially providing a higher principle to aim for.

Jupiter orbits the Sun in about twelve years, so the transit through Pisces marks the end of a full cycle through the zodiac. When Jupiter enters Aries in January 2011, a new circuit will begin. Jupiter will move into Aries during the summer of 2010 for a short time, giving us a preview of this energy, and then Jupiter will retrograde back into Pisces until January 2011. While in Aries in 2011, Jupiter will join Uranus and become part of a cardinal T-square. This will create a three-way face-off between Jupiter and Uranus in Aries, opposing Saturn in Libra, while all three square Pluto in Capricorn. This will from an intense energy, which challenges the status quo, and has the potential to deconstruct outgrown paradigms. It is a tremendous growth opportunity.

Star Lore

Early in February 2010, as Jupiter reaches 4 degrees of Pisces, he will conjoin Formalhaut, one of the four Royal Stars of Persia, bringing the god of light into alignment with one of the great stars of the sky. Formalhaut is the alpha star in the constellation of Pisces Austrinus, the Southern Fish, and is one of the brightest. Formalhaut is the only first magnitude star in the autumn sky of mid-northern latitudes and is a solitary brilliant beacon in an otherwise unremarkable part of the sky.

Formalhaut made the news in November 2008. This star is at the center of a solar system with an extra solar planet. This was the first planet outside of our solar system to be seen with visible light and photographed. The striking image, showing the planet orbiting just outside Formalhaut’s debris ring, was captured in Science in November 2008. The planet, now known as Fromalhaut b, orbits its parent star once in 872 years at a distance of eleven billion miles. Astronomer Paul Kalas of Cal Tech thinks there might be other planets in orbits between Fromalhaut b and the star, possibly even a planet with liquid water.

The name derives from the Arab fum al Hut, ‘The Fish’s mouth.” The star’s influence is generally considered beneficial and has been associated with eminence, fortune and power. Said also to heightened awareness of the suffering of others. Formalhaut will infuse Jupiter’s energy with added power and compassion. Martha Evans Martin in the Friendly Stars, says Formalhaut suggests only sweetness and serenity. Astrologer Diana Rosenberg says this star gives a longing for utopia and a search for the ideal forms of human relationships.

Certain ancient traditions, such as Tibet, believe that stars are vastly evolved and conscious beings, each having their own great and unique nature. Some occult traditions teach that the planets act like lenses to capture and focus the energies of the stars. A planet in conjunction with a star blends and concentrates their light and radiates this towards earth like an intensified frequency. Considering Formalhaut’s lore, this star’s power, combined with Jupiter in Pisces may offer a glimpse of heightened wisdom, giving us a chance to sense what is best for collective humanity. Like a flash of lightening in the darkness, this vision illuminates the landscape. The light may be momentary, but it can reveal the path and gives us hope and a sense of direction.

www.QueenOfCups.com

decoration

The secret of the Philosopher’s stone is to look with the eyes

And see with the heart.

Petrus Bonus, Alchemist

 
<< Start < Prev 1 3 > End >>

Page 1 of 3