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Halo Quin

~ Author, storyteller, witch

Category Archives: Philosophy

The end of a chapter

19 Saturday Feb 2022

Posted by Haloquin in Creative Process, Following Delight, Magic, Philosophy, Reflections, Storytelling

≈ 1 Comment

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ADHD, Adventures, Author, Bardic, Celebration, Commitment, Completion, courage, Creation, Dancing in Wales, Diary of an Adventuress, disability, elemental magic, Empowerment, Enchantment, Faery philosoper, Festivals, freedom, goblin circus, goblins, gratitude, learn magic, learn witchcraft, Living Life, Love, online course, Pagan, PhD, Philosophy, Plants, Power, Pride, process, Self Empowerment, steampunk, Stories, Storytelling, Strangeness of Life, The Enchanted Academy, Wheel of the Year, Workshop, writing

And that’s it. This month, on Imbolc eve, I finished my PhD corrections and submitted the final FINAL version. This week I got confirmation that it has been accepted!

I’m officially Dr Halo!

The thesis! Yes, I have a theme… “The power of storytelling to re-enchant the world” fits it quite nicely, don’t you think?

I celebrated with a trip to the bookshop, hot chocolate with friends, dinner for one and a movie… Then cuddles from my fella the following night, of course!

I started by letting my brain decompress and dealing with those bits of life that now need dealing with, like clearing out some old books to make space for the new ones! And contemplating where I go from here… With a foxy companion for Imbolc reminding me that spring is emerging from the dark, just like me. 🥰

If you’re on my mailing list you’ll know that I’ve got a whole bunch of monthly discussion based classes that I’m offering through Patreon, or which you can sign up for individually if you’d rather, starting with an online elements of magic workshop next month, on 16th March at 7pm GMT. (And in April I’ll be kicking off a ten week course working with them too…)

Find out more here
Uncover your inner witch - magical workshops in 2023 with Halo Quin - background image of lit candle on a beach at night.

And the Goblin Masquerade is coming together! Last autumn I was chatting with fellow changeling poet Kate Garrett, and somehow got the inspiration to host a goblin market followed by a Masked fairy ball this spring. Everything is coming together and we have music, talks, dancing, and even the steampunk debut of an Ominous Folk of Hopeless Maine show. It’s going to be a lovely day of community and play, and I’m considering it my party for escaping studenthood with a Doctorate at last!

Flier for the Goblin Masquerade in Borth, Ceredigion, Wales, 12th March, from 1pm. Free afternoon market, evening ball £6. Click for more details.

I’ve also been researching ADHD and neurodivergences… There’s so little support for adults with ADHD and we can do amazing things with the right help! So I’m writing occasional thoughts on that over here… On the newsletter “Living with Squirrels” not sure where it’ll go but you’re welcome to sign up if you like.

Living with Squirrels

So I guess I do know where I’m going next… To play with the goblins and re-enchant the world!


PS: If you want to get workshops, extra posts, advance access to material, and more things as and when the goblins inspire me… And support my adventures so I can keep building the academy into something sustainable you can sign up to my Patreon here:

Patreonise me! 😉

Faery Magic; Why Work with the Fae?

22 Friday Jan 2021

Posted by Haloquin in Faery, Magic, Philosophy, Reflections, Witchcraft 101

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Faery, faery magic, fairies, learn witchcraft, Magic, witchcraft

We often live our lives disconnected from our bodies and from the land. The fae folk are deeply embedded in the land and the living landscape and developing a relationship with them involves coming into a good relationship with the land on which we live and with nature as a whole. Simultaneously we realise that we are part of the natural world and we come back into better relationship with our own bodies and untamed selves.

We also have records of people;

  • Looking for faeries
  • gaining healing powers from them
  • seeking treasure
  • honouring their places
  • attempting to summon Faery Queens for power, support or wish granting
  • warding against their ill-will
  • leaving offerings

Among other practices. All of this shows that the fae have power and can help us in very practical ways, or can hinder us if we do not have a good relationship with them. This is mirrored in materialistic terms when we look at how a disrespectful attitude towards nature in general has led to a great deal of pollution and ill-health, and the loss of resources… i.e. wealth! 

Basically, a good relationship with the Fair Folk is a good relationship with the spirits who share the land that looks after us, and they can support us in our magical work if we look after them in return, just as the land supports us in our general lives if we treat it with respect. This, in turn, helps to heal us, them and the world around us.

Not all of them want to work with us, even of those that are generally of friendly natures. There are numerous stories where one sibling is kind and generous and is given gifts from the faeries they meet, and another is rude to the same beings and comes away much the worse for it. And there are tales of some, like the kelpies, who steal young people away to drown them. In the New Age model fairies are generally beings of light and always willing to grant wishes in return for offerings. In the folkloric traditions some of the fae are powerful allies, but that same power means that some are worth avoiding!

Approaching these beings with respect is thus the foundation of building a mutually supportive relationship and respect gives them a good sense of who and where you are.

A good first step is to reflect on your motivations, and to ask yourself; what can I offer them?


This is an extract from my online Folkloric Faery course, including both theory and plenty of practice. and there are currently spaces on the beta testing cycle available! Come join us!

Originally posted on Patreon. Thank you to my Patrons for your support! If you like what I write then please do consider supporting me as a Patron here. Your support means I can write more for you! And you get the posts early… *tempts*

You can also tip me via ko-fi, it all helps!

You can also Follow the blog, Share this post, and find me on Twitter to join in the conversation for free!

Over to you in the comments… why would you build a relationship with spirits such as the Fae?

(Comments are moderated for spam so may take a day or two to appear.)


PS: You can also read more of my earlier thoughts on the magic of faery and how we can cultivate it in ourselves in my book Pagan Portals: Your Faery Magic published in 2015 by Moon Books.

Sign up to my mailing list here

Faery Magic; What are Faeries?

15 Friday Jan 2021

Posted by Haloquin in Faery, Magic, Philosophy, Witchcraft 101

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Faeries, Faery, faery magic, Faery Queen, fairies, folklore, learn witchcraft, Magic, paganism, witchcraft

 TRUE THOMAS lay oer yond grassy bank,
 And he beheld a ladie gay,
 A ladie that was brisk and bold,
 Come riding oer the fernie brae.

 Her skirt was of the grass-green silk,
 Her mantel of the velvet fine,
 At ilka tett of her horse’s mane
 Hung fifty silver bells and nine. 

~ Extract from The Ballad of Thomas the Rhymer

The tale of True Thomas, or Thomas the Rhymer, is an old one from the wild borderlands of Scotland (in the North of the UK), though working with faeries and otherworldly spirits is certainly older. The earliest recorded version of Thomas’ story is recorded in a manuscript dating from around 1430-1440, and Thomas of Erceldoune, of whom the tale is written, lived two hundred years before that. The ballad which his story is most often told through nowadays was recorded in the early 1800s, and it keeps many of the key images from the earlier manuscript, demonstrating the strength of those images and their value as signposts to encounters with the fae.

“Thomas the Rhymer” is the story of how a bard gained the gift of prophecy from the Fair Folk, and it begins on the bank of a river, under a tree (most often hawthorn), where the Queen of Elfland comes across a sleeping Thomas. She takes him away, across vast rivers and past apple trees. He is taken into her service for seven years and warned to not speak a word whilst he is in Faeryland. At the end of his service to the Queen she gives him the gift of the tongue which cannot lie.

In these images we can find doorways to magical states and magical lands, guidance for developing a relationship with the fae folk and a structure through which we can build our own practices.

What are Faeries? Clues from the Queen

In all my time working with them I’ve come across a great many explanations for what they might be or how they may have come into being.

The description of the Queen in “Thomas Rhymer” as a beautiful lady in green silk, on a fine horse with bells in it’s mane gives us a few clues as to the nature of faeries. The green colour shows her role as part of the green world and the land, her horse shows her power and the bells ring with the music of faeryland. Beauty and music are signs of the way in which faery magic enchants us and conjures a sense of wonder – which encourages an openness to the world. It also reminds us that they are quite capable of showing us what we want to see in order to gain our trust. The specific location and Thomas historical status illustrate that the Fae are often connected to specific, real, places, even while they travel, and the river and the hawthorn tree are also notable as water is often a gateway to faeryland and the hawthorn is said to guard the entrance with it’s thorns, whilst the beauty of it’s blossoms open us to the sense of wonder required for travel between the worlds.

From both my experiences and the stories in which they feature I have come to the conclusion that the fae not simply one kind of being, but are a collection of related beings and powers, or spirits and energies, who embody (but are not limited to) the magic of the land and the natural world. They can be guardians of places, they are most often part of the green world or the water or stones, and they are very closely related to spirits of the dead. As spirits without bodies they are shapeshifters and so appear differently at different times, they are not limited as we are but they have a definite consciousness. They appear to me to have grown out of the earth and the land, much as we have. They make choices, have names and hold their own ethics and rules which differ from ours. 

The categories of “spirits” are impossible to define with any absolute authority, however, as the lines between spirit beings do not seem to be as clear-cut as we like to describe them. There are tales of how the fair folk were once fallen angels, or gods, and some may be becoming deities again… The spirits of the land are often considered of a different ilk, and yet they share commonalities, and our own ancestors can sometimes be found among the elves. Some traditions describe elemental spirits as faeries, and others use the term to indicate the spirits of plants. 

The common thread is that they are spirits; the magical, untamed, others who hold the magic and wisdom of the otherworld in ways which are reflected in their form. They are mutable and powerful, and, if we’re really lucky, they might just lend their power to our cause…


This is an extract from my online Folkloric Faery course, including both theory and plenty of practice. and there are currently spaces on the beta testing cycle available! Come join us!

You also can read more of my earlier thoughts on the magic of faery and how we can cultivate it in ourselves in my book Pagan Portals: Your Faery Magic published in 2015 by Moon Books.

"Your Faery Magic" Book cover

Originally posted on Patreon. Thank you to my Patrons for your support! If you like what I write then please do consider supporting me as a Patron here. Your support means I can write more for you! And you get the posts early… *tempts*

You can also tip me via ko-fi, it all helps!

You can also Follow the blog, Share this post, and find me on Twitter to join in the conversation for free!

Over to you in the comments. How would you describe faeries?

(Comments are moderated for spam so may take a day or two to appear.)

Sign up to my mailing list here

Faeosophy; Faeries and Other Spirits

08 Wednesday Jun 2016

Posted by Haloquin in Enchanted, Faery, Magic, Philosophy, Reflections

≈ 1 Comment

Tags

Alfar, Faeosophy, Faery, Feyhearted path, Landwights, Magic, musings, pagan theology, paganism, Philosophy, process, Spirit work, spirits, Thealogy

Faeosophy – the philosophising of and about faeries and fae-ness.

Back in this post I shared some questions I’ve been pondering in my development of a Faerie philosophy. I began with asking who and what the Fae might be, and, based on the approach that I take to Fae-work, the Fae are spirits, our experience of them mean that they are a real part of our world (for those of us that share our world with spirits or whose world-view allows for spirits, at least) and they exist in a world populated by spirits generally. In which case;

How do the Fae relate to other spirits?

(There isn’t a straightforward answer to this, really, so what follows are some of my thoughts in exploring this!)

… “Spirits” is such a broad term, and under that label of potential spirits to work with I’m including;

  • Ancestors and beloved dead

    A dark skinned lady sat holding a honeysuckle flower, with skirts covering her legs. Clothed in greens and deep red.

    There are many kinds of spirits and none of them are clear-cut… it is more like finding families of related beings with similar energies and functions than defining them strictly.

  • Deities
  • Angels
  • Totems
  • Power Animals
  • Guides
  • Guardians
  • Genuis Locii/Spirits of a place/Landwights
  • and so on.

I also often include living beings on that list, mentally, as incarnate spirits. The Fae are generally not incarnate, not in this context anyway, so I’ll focus on discarnate beings for today!

When we start to explore these categories we find it gets even more complicated;

Ancestors; dead humans and other species, once incarnate, now not. You’d be hard pressed to find a tradition that doesn’t work with or honour the dead in some way.

Deities; a tricky one when it comes to definitions. Different traditions define deities rather differently, ranging from archetypes in our unconscious mind, through to independent beings with personalities and lives completely separate from ours. This is a whole branch of study in its own right, but for the purposes of this post I’ll broadly describe them as non-incarnate beings which hold more power than we do, normally linked to a particular kind of energy (eg. love, knowledge, painting, etc.) or a range of related energies. They generally have their own story/stories and manifest in various ways for different people.

Angels; cosmic messengers or intermediaries between ourselves and larger beings/powers. Normally within the Judeo-Christian traditions as I understand it, but not limited to them.

Guides; this describes a job rather than a type of spirit – i.e., a Guide is a spirit-being that has the role of guiding people in some way.

And so on…

The Fae seem to me to be most similar to Genius Locii or Landwights – spirits belonging to or expressing the Being/existence/essence of a particular place. They may be more or less approachable. Some of them act as guides. Some deities have Fae characteristics, such as Rhiannon, a magical woman of the otherworld who appears near a particular place (Gorsedd Narbeth). Faeries are not necessarily tied to a specific location, however, so perhaps some Fae are spirits of a particular place – those that are beings of particular lakes, trees, hills and so on – but others are not.

There are travelling Fae, that troop across wide areas, those that act as guides and those that live among us. Perhaps, though, they are simply connected to counties, countries, or families, rather than a single rock or tree.

The land of the Fae and the land of the dead

The land of the Fae and the land of the dead are often seen as the same place, and often described as reachable through water or mounds, into the earth itself.

There are also stories that conflate the Faery Realm with the realm of the Dead. The Nordic myths describe Frey as the Lord of the Alfar, and the Alfar as both Elves and Ancestors. In Irish myth Faeryland and the land of the Ancestors were both called “The Summerlands”. I take connection to mean that they are a similar energetic vibration to ancestor spirits, close enough to the material realm to overlap with our existence, hence their roles as manifestations of the non-human natural world. Perhaps the Fae are the ancestral spirits of the non-human realms, as viewed through our anthro-centric filters to allow us to relate to them?

For me this all ties in with our nature as somewhat-fey, or potentially so. We are part of nature, we are domesticated, but underneath that is the wild magic. If the Fae and our ancestors are connected, that points to be to their relation to us as part of nature.

Returning to the question at hand, however, the Fae and other spirits seem to me to be parts of a spectrum. Goddesses can be Faery Queens, Faeries can be ancestors or Genius Locii or both, and so on. Although some would, many deities would not be described as Fae, even if some would… and angels generally aren’t considered to be Fae. In some of the stories of the fall of angels, however, faeries were the angels that got left behind on earth when Heaven closed its gates and Hell became full, and those angels took up residence in the land and became Faeries. So Faeries are spirits that are intimately linked to the land and the natural world. Not all spirits that match that description are faeries, but that’s a pretty good place to start.

In short, my answer to this question is that they are a type of nature spirit, and that “spirit” covers such a wide range of beings that Faeries can fit into many categories. In terms of spirit working it will be linked very much to the land, to relating to and responding to natural currents and generally working outside of strict structures that are imposed over those currents. More often than not I define some being as Fae based on a feeling, but the pattern that has emerged for me is that that feeling often links in to the “natural” or “untamed” roots of those beings, so I try to track those connections and draw a map that makes some kind of sense!

I’d love to hear your thoughts on where Faeries sit in your understanding of spirits.

And next time I post it will be a little shorter than this!

Happy thoughts,

~ Halo x

Pwyll’s Descent – Welsh Mythology and some Faeosophy

19 Thursday May 2016

Posted by Haloquin in Enchanted, Faery, Magic, Philosophy, Stories, Storytelling

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Annwn, Arawn, Faery, fairies, Feyhearted path, Mabinogian, Magic, musings, paganism, Philosophy, Pwyll, Rhiannon, Stories, Story

My work has risen from my experiences with spirits and magic, my theories have come from exploring the stories and putting the tales and my experiences together… So something I’m working on is weaving the theory back into context of the stories for the talks and workshops I have coming up this summer and I thought my lovely readers here would enjoy a taster!

On 5th June I’ll be co-teaching a workshop on working with the spirits of the land and this little video introduces the first part of the story and some of the ideas behind this work.

Pwyll is the “Prince of Dyfed” and, whilst out hunting, he finds himself on a strange adventure to the Welsh Otherworld, Annwn. Later he will meet Rhiannon, but first he had to prove himself worthy of honour from Annwn and its denizens… 

 

This story is from the first branch of The Mabinogian, a cycle of stories written down in 12th-13th Centuries and compiled together (and translated into English) by Lady Charlotte Guest. Because of the time they were written they are couched in terms of medieval society and social structures, but the magic shines through, carrying with it evidence of the oral culture and understanding of the world in which these tales were born. Tracing the patterns of the myths and stories can teach us a lot about the relationship we humans have had with the land and its spirits, and what we had learnt (and have recently mostly forgotten) about how to navigate those relationships for the benefit of both worlds.

I believe this is so important I wrote a book on how to get in touch with your own connection to the otherworlds, and you can see more about that here, and I’m constantly exploring new ways to share that understanding and the skills that worked for me with others. Bringing it back to where I began, rooted in the stories, where we learn best, feels like and important thing to do now.

I’d love to hear your thoughts!

Faeosophy; Are Faeries Real?

06 Sunday Mar 2016

Posted by Haloquin in Enchanted, Faery, Philosophy, Reflections

≈ 5 Comments

Tags

Faeosophy, Faeries, Faery, Faery philosoper, fairies, Fairy, Feyhearted path, Magic, musings, Pagan, paganism, Philosophy, Stories

Faeosophy – the philosophising of and about faeries and fae-ness.

Back in this post I shared some questions I’ve been pondering in my development of a Faerie philosophy. Of the questions listed I though these were a good place to start:

“Who and what are the Fae? How metaphorical are they? How metaphorical is our relationship to them?”

enchanted-grove-header-small.jpg

On the path of working with faeries, it’s useful to know what they are…

When working with faeries this is a kinda fundamental question on the one hand, and completely irrelevant on the other. My bottom line is that this work works for me, and it works best when I act as-if they are real. From a pragmatic perspective, then, I will continue to act as-if, and to believe that, faeries are literal, non-metaphorical beings.

One other thing – your mileage may well vary. Just because I encounter Faeries in this way does not mean that this is the only way of doing it, or that I’m right! Faeries are notoriously tricky to pin down. They are known for living in liminal spaces, for being betwixt and between, for leading us astray. They are perfectly capable of being kind and cruel, tangible and otherworldly, here and not both at once.

In which case – one answer to the question “what are the Fae?” is “paradoxical, illogical and variable.”

That’s not quite the kind of answer I was looking for though, so I’ll try again.

Little Lilith

They are the magical consciousness of nature.

In the stories they are a people with a different ethic and attitude to us. Or they are creatures intent on leading us away from human civilisation. They live in wilder places than we are used to. They can offer us help and unexpected wealth. They are uncompromising when their rules are broken. They are powerful, but subject to certain rules. They are beings of the natural world, but beings with magical powers.

 

In which case, they are the magical consciousness of nature.

But is this just a metaphor? Are they actual beings or are they stories we tell ourselves about the natural world but actually we don’t mean it?

When we encounter anything we have an experience, which we then understand in a certain way. We hear laughter – soundwaves are generated by someone, they enter our ears and are interpreted by our brain as laughter – just as we feel that something otherworldly is at play in the depths of the wildwood. When the laughter does not come from another human but we still hear it, echoing like bells over the waves, or when we are unsettled and certain something fae is watching us, whatever the tangible facts, we are experiencing faeries. The experience is not a metaphor, it is very real.

And, as I’ve said before, when I act as-if, when I believe that something more than what I would expect is possible, magic happens. I see or hear things that don’t make sense until I tell myself the story of faeries. They are a real something, there is a reality to them, and they make the most sense to me when I approach these experiences as faeries.

If they were just metaphors, however, they’d still be useful. If I told you a tale of dryads as a metaphor for the ways in which trees communicate through fungi and care for seedlings and stumps, and if you listened to that tale and treated trees better for it, then the metaphor would have given you a healthier way of relating to the world.

This is different to saying they have a reality independent of our stories – I and others have definitely encountered something when we’ve gone looking for faeries. When I say “I’ve seen a faery.” I don’t mean I’ve seen a flower do something I can’t explain, or that I’ve run across a natural process which I’ve needed to respect according to it’s rules. I mean I’ve had an experience, a real experience, which I understand as seeing a faerie.

Waiting for the Sun

The have a reality which is based in our personal and direct experience and so they walk alongside us, as family.

When I say “Faery”, I’m not talking metaphorically, I really mean “Faery”, because that is how I experience them. Ultimately, there is a reality here, it is my reality, and it works for me.

And perhaps that’s part of the magic of faeries; our relationship with them, our connection to them, is inherently and essentially personal and direct. We meet them, for the most part, one-to-one. They are not distant beings directing things from afar, they are walking beside us through the woods. Those that work with us are holding our hands, tripping us up, pointing out shiny things… like cousins ready for a giggle at our expense, but also, often, ready to be our family.

 

Some Faery Philosophy

04 Thursday Feb 2016

Posted by Haloquin in Faery, Philosophy, Reflections

≈ 1 Comment

Tags

Faery, fairies, Honesty, Imperfection, inspirations, Journey, Magic, musings, Pagan, pagan theology, paganism, Philosophy

Pandora's Box by JW Waterhouse

In my heart of hearts, I’m a philosopher, which means that I like to have thought through logically the reasons behind my beliefs. (This is sometimes like opening Pandora’s box… so here’s a disclaimer; these are my beliefs and thoughts, so I don’t expect everyone to agree with me by any means, I’m not out to convince anyone! I do find it interesting to hear why people think and say what they do though, so let’s have a discussion!)

In my last post I talk about pondering Faery Theology (there has to be a better word for this… any ideas?) so, by way of preliminary thoughts, here is an extract from chapter 3 of my book “Pagan Portals; Your Faery Magic” wherein I ponder the nature of faeries (as I see them) and the value of working with them.

 

If we look at the stories of Faeries, all the myths and legends, we see a common theme; they are all very strongly connected to, or embodying, nature. They are not, however, merely the plants or trees or forces they embody, they are beings that are inherently magical, beyond limits. Faeries are natural magic and, as part of nature ourselves, the magic within us is fey.

Humans are lured into Faeryland by beauty. Beautiful music, beautiful visions, beautiful food. And this beauty, once we return to earth, we pine for. So Faeryland is that place within the world, and ourselves as part of nature, in which the sense of magic, wonder and beauty lies, the natural core of our being. The heart of the world we reach through connecting to our Faery Heart.

If our hearts, at their untamed core, are places of beauty and magic, then following the call to Faeryland will open our hearts again to the beauty of the world. If we learn to touch the fey parts of ourselves then we can move through our lives open to the beauty that surrounds us and so we can reconnect to the natural world, with the other beings on the Earth as our brothers and sisters and kin.

…

And, of course, we recall the other parts of the stories of the fae…the wilder parts…the dangerous parts… They are untamed and not human and so their ethics are a little less strict than ours tend to be. In our heart we are natural beings, just like them; we have learnt really wonderful human skills, such as compassion and language, but in our search for order we have tried to tame our essential Selves and instead we have locked them away. These parts of ourselves hurt, so each day we die a little inside.

Here we choose to walk down a path that will lead us back to the parts within us that hold who we truly are. We seek all our parts, those that are good at communication, at compassion, and those that are good at standing up for us and being free. We do not have to give up the gifts of humanity in order to find our Faery Hearts and heal our lives, we can free ourselves of those things that do not serve us, release those things that hold us back and fly, carrying both gifts of humanity and gifts of Faery. We can choose to be both human and wild. That is what it means to be fey.

Fey means free. Free of the locks we’ve used to keep ourselves acceptable and free to choose to move in compassion and beauty. Fey means to be free to be our real Selves, to live our lives without unhealthy compromises, to dance to Faery music so we are filled with love and joy and deep feelings of connection even in a business meeting or on a busy, grimy underground train.

Fey means so full of shiny, happy, beauty, that you cannot help but share it.

Faeries are the conscious manifestation of the wild magic of the natural world. At our untamed core we are also part of the world, so part of our heart belongs to the realm of Faery… in which case, those of us that find our hearts singing with that wild magic? We are Fey. And when we allow ourselves to express that magic in ourselves we feel happy and we can share that happiness with the world.

It is always important in the stories to be respectful and to cultivate a good relationship with our “Good Neighbours” with whom we share a kinship, and the stories are where we first learn how to approach this people. In the same way we must learn to respect the wild world around us, to take only what we need and not deplete the land and her resources.

Growing up I was taught that the trees are conscious and aware. I was taught that the plants have feelings which deserve to be respected. I was taught that non-human animals are people just as we are. I learnt that the world around me was alive and the spirits dwell within everything. I have to eat to survive, but that doesn’t mean I don’t need to say thank you.

We are given masks to wear in our lives, but I have seen that we are much happier when we learn who we are under the masks and choose which masks to use and which to discard… and when to cast them off entirely and dance under the starlight with our friendly cousins.*

Book Cover YFM

 

*And it’s good to know which cousins bite, or don’t want to dance with you! You might swim in a river you know well, or cuddle your childhood canine-friend but you wouldn’t swim in a storm-tossed sea, or pick up a wild-wolf-cub with mamma wolf about to pounce, now would you? The Fae are the spirits of the wild, with all that entails.

 

Brewing Magic

31 Sunday Jan 2016

Posted by Haloquin in Enchanted, Faery, Philosophy, Reflections

≈ 6 Comments

Tags

Author, Beliefs, Enchantress, Faery, Fairy, Feyhearted path, Imperfection, musings, neo-paganism, Pagan, paganism, Philosophy, process, Suggestions, Theology

This last year I’ve been dancing and storytelling and studying more than I have been writing.

I’ve been brewing thoughts, and allowing them to percolate. There have been many challenges, and a whirlwind of changes: Two house moves, marriage, turning 30, publishing my book, learning to dance.

Pen and Ink - Dances with Trees

My love and I now live in our own caravan! It is a static caravan rather than a mobile home like I dreamed of, but I think it’s better for us. Wales is our home and it is good to have a foundation here. Roots. I’ve been putting down roots, I suppose, choosing where I stand. Reflecting on who I am and where I am.

In my book (Pagan Portals; Your Faery Magic) I talk about some of the thinking behind my beliefs, I philosophise on Faeries and the Feyhearted Path. This is only scratching the surface though! And for a while I’ve been pondering questions, like;

Who and what is The Faery Queen – how does She relate to deities, archetypes, spirits? How does she tie in with the many goddesses that hold the title Faery Queen? She isn’t an archetype, though “Faery Queen” is also an archetype… so what is She? How does she manifest throughout the year? Does she change or it is constant… and what does that mean for her nature?

Who and what is the Faery King? Am I just falling back on my early neo-Wiccan reading when I want to bring Him in too? (Most of the books I got hold of when young and just finding my way were neo-Wiccan, and many of the books I see now are heavily influenced by that, whilst it can be a very useful structure, I don’t want to force energies and beings into a pattern that doesn’t serve them, or me, so what patterns belong to them?) Or is there a good reason for bringing Him in explicitly? (Aside from the fact that he turns up! But just because they come, does that mean we should work together?)

How do these powers/beings/deities(?) relate to deities that share the titles which seems to be their names?

How does this Enchantressing path relate to the Craft? To Priestessing? What are the differences? How do they overlap? Are they all words for the same thing or distinct practices?

What is the purpose of what I do?

How does this honour the land? How does this help my community?

How does my work fit within historical practices and traditions? What is my “lineage”? I’m clearly deeply rooted in neo-pagan structures, practices and attitudes, but that isn’t the only influence. And what does it all mean?

Who and what are the Fae? How metaphorical are they? How metaphorical is our relationship to them? How do they relate to other spirits? Is Faery-work just a form of spirit-work?

And so on… Alongside continuing practice I’ve been mulling theory, and I’m feeling the urge to start sharing again. I make no promises on how much or how often I’ll post, but I hope that some of these questions are interesting to you, and perhaps you can take them and apply them to your own practices and beliefs for an interesting think! (If you enjoy that kind of thing… not everyone does!)

It being Imbolc over the next few days it feels good to be seeing the seedlings sprout and these questions begin to find the light of day. My Queen wears white now, as do many goddesses at this time of year, and she beckons for us to awaken to ourselves and dance among the snowdrops and hailstones as the light grows and the land begins to stir.

Back to working on my Thesis now…

 

Book Cover YFM

The new book!!! (Click to buy 🙂 )

Book Release Date! Your Faery Magic

17 Saturday Oct 2015

Posted by Haloquin in Enchanted, Faery, Following Delight, Magic, Philosophy

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

book, Enchantment, Faeries, FeyHearted, Publication

It’s official! Your Faery Magic is on its way!!!*

Release date: 11th December 2015

Ready for pre-order with Amazon now!

This is a book for beginners on the Faery path, it is for those of us who loved the tales of flower fairies but felt more at home with the goblins and dryads, carving our own wands and brewing up our own potions. This is a book for finding your way towards a faery path of your very own. It is the book I wish I had found when I began in paganism, and I hope it will help guide many feet towards uncovering their own relationship to the spirits of nature.

It has been described as gentle and mature, non-prescriptive and fascinating.

This is the official blurb:

“Have you ever felt that you were ‘different’? That the Otherworld was closer for you than it is for other folk? Have you ever wondered how you can tap into the wild, untamed magic of your own faery heart? Then this book is for you. Once upon a time ‘Fey’ meant both the spirits of the natural world and the nature of those humans that were in touch with that magic in themselves; the seers, the spirit workers, the ones who walked between. This is your guide to finding that Fey magic which sings in your heart. Through this book you will meet your guide, visit faeryland, learn about the beings of the faery worlds and develop your own faery craft to work in harmony with the power and cycles of the earth by unlocking the nature of your Fey spirit. Time for you to become the Fey you truly are.”

I’m SOOOOO excited!!!

*happydance*

*I’ve been offline since moving house… and the release date, book cover and advance copies all arrived whilst we were offline! So technically this news is a little late, sorry!

Musings on Queenship

12 Tuesday Jun 2012

Posted by Haloquin in Faery, Following Delight, Magic, Philosophy, Queenship, Reflections

≈ 2 Comments

Tags

Beginnings, challenge, Commitment, creativity, Determination, Faery, Faery Queen, Feyhearted path, Heart, inspirations, Journalling, Journey, musings, Queenship, Strangeness of Life

I was challenged, given a quest, to become Queen of my life. First I want to know what that means… so I asked. What does it mean to be queen? A Queen, but not to hold power over other people… to be sovereign in one’s own life, I suppose…

My studio. My temple. My Throne? Where I make magic, where life is understood, where change begins. Art allows me to be fully myself. When I paint, I come home. If being Queen is having sovereignty over one’s life, then this must be the heart of my realm.

What would it mean to be Queen?

Queen of my life? My heart, my art?

A Queen rules her realm

My realm is my self

A self, a realm, a life.

To rule

To lead

To protect

To hold within all that belongs to one…

I rule my self.

Queen of my life, my heart, my art.

There is space for what I love

And I am responsible for making what I wish come true.

No waiting for another.

I am Queen of my life.

Whatever I wish

I must command it so.

No other may

No other can

In my realm

I am the sun, the moon, the stars

And each who I encounter is sovereign in their realm,

As I am in mine.

I rule my self.

Queen of my life, my heart, my art.

I hold the power of my realm

Only I

I choose

I cause

I create

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Meet Halo

Snow Pixie

Welcome to my world!

Halo Quin is an author, a storyteller, and a practicing witch with a lifelong relationship with the spirit realm (faeries, deities, and the primal powers of land, sea, and sky, specifically) who aims to share magic through experience. Halo lives in wild West Wales, right by the roiling sea, and loves to sing, dance, and otherwise enchant through performance. She also runs the local storytelling circle, and an ADHD resource centre, and ultimately encourages self-knowledge, self-acceptance, self-healing, and self-enchantment through everything she does... leading to:

Beauty ~ Magic ~ Delight

Re-enchanting the world, one story, one song, one spell, at a time.

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