Tag Archives: musings

An Enchantress Muses

19 Saturday Feb 2011

Posted by in All Posts, Following Delight, Magic, Reflections

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Recently I’ve been using the label enchantress/enchanter to refer to myself, and the Pixie Kiss project is all about enchantment, so perhaps it is time to elucidate what I mean by this!

What is an Enchanter?

An enchanter enchants; makes something enchanted; spreads enchantment.

Enchantment implies wonder, delight, beauty, joy and magic… and also: seeing what is not there. I grew up being accused of watching things that weren’t there, things which include faeries, magic, wonder and spirit, according to the greyer parts of our overculture. Anything beyond the material realm is not really there…

The glimpses I’ve had of that grey world, devoid of spirit, life, and wonder, are terrible things. Its no real wonder that depression and numbness are strong currencies in the world! The more I see of the world, the more I come to see how this greyness permeates so many lives, and how much this harms people. Disconnection,* that which prevents a life lived fully, comes from disillusionment, disenchantment, distrust and disinterest in the world around us, so let us reconnect, re-enchant and re-invigorate our lives!

If being enchanted allows us to see past the cold hard facts of a world disconnected from its heart, then perhaps seeing what is normally unseen is the key to feeling the warm feelings of love and joy and delight, and being enchanted will fill us with wonder which we can then share!

For me, to be enchanted is to walk in a state of delighted wonder at the magic in the world. Not ignoring the problems, but choosing how we engage with the world and our lives. To be enchanted is to see the beauty of life, and to enchant others is to encourage beauty and delight in the world. Facing the truth is important, and I certainly don’t advocate ignoring pain and betrayal, in the world at large or our personal lives. However, acknowledging the hurt and harm happening and done, doing what you can to help, and not wallowing in the pain but choosing to heal and move on is more helpful than falling into misery.** Recognising that there is wonder in the world even when everything hurts can help us to get through the pain and keep motivated to help to heal the parts of the world we can.

Enchantment does not blind us to the bad, but it does help us see the good. It does not numb us, but it does open us to living more fully. Enchantment is not a way of hiding, it is a way of seeing and choosing where our focus, and therefore our energies, go.

This is what it means to be an Enchanter; to be enchanted by life, and to help others, wherever possible, to be enchanted too.

 

*Pace and Kyeli have written a marvelous document on why disconnection is the root of all the ills in the world, you can check it out here: The Connection Manifesto.

** Easier said than done sometimes, so there is help out there if you are sinking rather than swimming. For those times, ask for help. Acknowledging the beauty in the world includes acknowledging that there are many people out there who can and will help you… and remembering that we can ask for help.

Iron Pentacle – In Closing

17 Thursday Feb 2011

Posted by in All Posts, Magic, Pentacles

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This past week I’ve been writing posts on the points of the Iron Pentacle…

I have spoken of Sex, Pride, Self, Power and Passion in relation to this tool of self-transformation, within the context of the Reclaiming Tradition which has a strong focus on community. Each point connects to all the others, flowing into each other, feeding each other, strengthening each other. Each must be seen in relation to the others as nothing in this world is in isolation.

The 5 points can be meditated and mused on individually and in connection. How does my passion feed my lifeforce? How does my sense of who I am affect how I can act in the world? How does my ability to make choices feed into my ability to act on my passion in a healthy way, and to allow the world to feed me in return with joy?

The Iron pentacle can also be used as a diagnostic tool: throughout the day notice how you are at that moment; are you feeling good in yourself, or worthless, or puffed up with unwarrented self-importance? Are you feeling arrogant or powerless, or do you feel centered and powerful? Are you allowing lifeforce to flow cleanly through you, or are you holding too tightly, or metaphorically bleeding out all over the floor? How do you feel in relation to each of these points? And are they balanced and connected? Does your sense of place in the world reflect how you feel about yourself inside? And so on…

Finally, you can stand or lie with arms and legs held in a star shape and feel the points of the pentacle at each point of the star of your body. Feel the energy of each point and of each connection in your body. There are trances which work with the energy of the earth running along the lines of the Pentacle which you can also use that are along these lines.

Best of luck, and remember, these are all areas which can hold a lot of issues, so be gentle with yourself and gentle on the others around you for a while. This is said to be the work of a lifetime, there is no rush.

In Strength and Compassion,

~Halo x

Iron pentacle – Pride

12 Saturday Feb 2011

Posted by in All Posts, Magic, Pentacles

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“We ask ourselves, Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous? Actually, who are you not to be?” ~ Marianne Williamson

The second point of the Iron pentacle, as we move through the body, from the top point, Sex, to the bottom right, is Pride.

Pride is a cardinal sin for the Christian foundation of our culture.

Pride comes before a fall… the meek shall inherit the earth… and so on…

We are warned against getting big-headed, or too big for our boots. We are chastened against pridefulness, for it leads, we are told, to tripping over our too-big feet.

In our world, today, pride is mistaken for arrogance.

The emphasis on false humility, on self-deprecation, on keeping ourselves small, is all so we do  not rock the boat. If we stand up tall, being as big and as bold and as beautiful as we can be, then we can rock the world! Staying small, denying our ability, denying the ways in which we are great, all this does is deny the world of the best of us.

Pride, right-sized pride, in which we acknowledge what we are and have done and are capable of as a good thing, as something to be proud of, comes alongside right-sized humility. When we recognise our own worth, we can recognise the worth of others.

We are special, we are important, we are unique. And so is everyone and everything else.

We all have our places, we all have things we can do like no-one else.

Be proud of yourself, like you would a child who had acheived something wonderful. Encouragement and self-recognition and acceptance is what will help us to be the best we can be, do the best we can do, and to change the world for the better.

Be proud of yourself, take pride in your work, be proud of the world. In doing this you are not being arrogant, instead you are recognising your worth and what you can do for the world. If you refuse to recognise and act on this then you are denying the world of what you could do for it.

Be proud of yourself, and recognise that others are equally as important to the world. If you place yourself over them, claiming to be more important than they, then this is arrogance. Knowing the ways in which you are better at specific things, and recognising that they have thier own skills and beauties, keeps us balanced. Support each other, praise each other, recognise that we all have value simply by existing.

Notice how you hold yourself in the world, how you value yourself and others. Notice if you are prone to self-deprecation, or to cutting others down. Notice when you belittle what you are proud of, or when you focus on what you feel you have done wrong in order to beat yourself up.

Notice these things and try to shift your language, in just one instance each day.

When someone compliments you, say thank you instead of downplaying it.

When someone does something well, offer praise in a positive way, instead of pointing out the ways in which it doesn’t matter in the grand scheme of things anyway.

When you do something well, or something hard, don’t hide it away. Put a little comment somewhere on Facebook or Twitter, or say something to a friend about how you feel you did good. Notice where you get good feedback from, and if you get a negative response, consider not sharing the things you are proud of with that person or forum again.

Recognise your own value, and the value of all the beings in the world, and don’t settle for those that try to keep you small because of their own lack of pride.

Breathe. Every day you live through is a gift, and mistakes are worth noting and learning from, but it is not worth letting them define you.

Breathe and draw yourself up to your full height. Be proud.

“Your playing small does not serve the world.”

~ Marianne Williamson, A Return to Love

Retreats

08 Tuesday Feb 2011

Posted by in All Posts, Art Craft and Beauty, Creative Process, Philosophy

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Every time I come across mention of a creative retreat, I wish I was on one.

People talk of meeting other writers and spending a block of time just writing together, sharing stories and ideas and support, challenging each other and being there for each other. This appeals to me.

People talk of getting together with other artists to carve out a precious piece of time dedicated to creating art, honing skills, and immersing themselves in the creative process. This, too, appeals to me.

I love working with other people around, also working on the same kind of thing. Going on the university run Philosophy conference sets aside time in a beautiful place dedicated to just doing Philosophy and inspiring each other, and means that all sorts of things happen in writing and sparking ideas.

Maybe, then, instead of trying to set aside time to study each day I can plan a ‘private conference’ for myself, where I listen to philosophical podcasts, hunt down articles and offer up ideas for comment soemwhere like Facebook. Perhaps doing this will inspire me to dive back into my studies, and interacting with others will help me keep motivated?

Perhaps I could invite others over for creative afternoons, even if we just connect through Skype and blogs and Facebook? And perhaps, if no-one else is available, I can allow myself time for specific projects that I can get excited about in the anticipation-soaked wait… so half the reason, the retreat side of retreating, can at least be pressent.

I could join in on Play-date Tuesday, or workless Wednesday.

I could join the One World, One Heart giveaway to focus myself.

I could solicit interest here and now… Anyone up for getting together sometime? Either digitally or, even better, in person? Bring your creative project and I’ll bring mine, we can picnic in a park or make forts in a living room! Any other philosophy students out there? We can share interesting online talks, share summaries of our current pieces for inspiration and support, maybe even *gasp* get some discussion going?

Anyone else interested?

In the meantime, I’m going to experiment with reframing ‘study-sessions’ into ‘private conferences’ or retreats and see if I can get back into my studies by imagining they’re as fun as they are!

(I enjoy my studies while doing them, its getting started that I’m struggling with… bribery, time-limits, and making a schedule hasn’t helped so far, lets see if making a game of it will!)

Feyhearted – Pixie Kiss #4 – Trees and Spaces

25 Saturday Dec 2010

Posted by in Faery

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This is the Fourth of a series of suggestions for re-enchanting your life, one pixie kiss at a time, originally posted here. The introduction is here, and you can watch the path unfold here.

 

From Thomas Moore’s Re-Enchantment of Everyday Life:

“Every patch of ground that has a tree growing in it echoes Eden and is a reminder of our origins in an enchanted garden. Once we stop taking trees literally, we begin to see how they frame the world we look at every minute of our outdoor life… Eden is always with us, unless and until we narrow our vision, forgetting myth and disregarding aesthetic perception, and the trees of Eden are also always with us, full of mystery and implication.”*

 

Trees are central, in so many ways, to our lives. We know that they provide oxygen, and soak up CO2… its like we breathe with the plants of the world, we breathe out as they breathe in, they breathe out and we breathe in.

Continue reading →

Snowy Solstice

21 Tuesday Dec 2010

Posted by in Magic

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Standing in the snow in my pyjamas as the clouds lining the sky lightened with dawn, I breathed in the beauty of the Solstice morn.

I gazed at the orange sky above, lit by streetlamps, and smiled at the branches, dark under the snow. I used to climb this tree with a book, just to spend time in its branches.

The sun is beginning its yearly return today, and though its cold and dark now, I know that each night will be shorter, each day longer… much as I love the night, I appreciate being able to walk home from work in daylight!

I’m thinking about goals, desires, choices.

I’m thinking about the movement from the dark into the light…

I understand now how thoughts slowly germinate in the dark, projects and understandings mull over in the depths of my mind until they rise into the light and a decision is made…

Its a slow process, knowing deep down what must be done, and waiting for that deep knowing to become strong enough to grow into choice and action.

It took five years of knowing that I would become vegetarian to actually doing it, because that knowing had to seep into my bones, had to become right on every level, had to become so ingrained in me that my conscious mind accepted it. There are ways to speed this process up, magic, spellworking, NLP, the ‘One Command’… and there is also space for this process to slowly unfold within me. Sometimes, this is the right way.

I am often impatient, and I am finally coming to know, in my bones, that its ok for things to take time, to become strong before they are exposed to the light. If that choice to become vegetarian hadn’t rooted in my bones, I’d have crumbled in the first week when I had to face family and travel and a funeral. If I don’t nurture that hope, that I express but cannot yet state, until it is so strong I cannot deny it, then it will fade in the harsh light of day.

Sometimes things can be acted on right away. Sometimes they need to germinate. And sometimes they germinate for too long and never grow.

Its a fine balance.

I hope I get it right.

How do you do it?

Always enough…

15 Wednesday Dec 2010

Posted by in Magic

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I learnt from Mum that there is always enough money.

Enough.

No more. And no less.

Funnily enough thats always been the case… at the points I think I might finally have managed my finances for long enough to start saving, or an unexpected bit of cash comes in, then something happens, and that little bit of extra money I was hoping for goes on that.

And conversely, when I set my heart on something, I say ‘this is what I’m doing, even though it’ll take me over what I’ve got coming in’, then just enough extra cash comes in to cover whats needed.

I’m currently living in my overdraft, over by a month each month. I’m doing better than several people I know, and many people country-wide. Though there is no real reason I should be living a month behind my wages, spending what I’ve earnt in the month I earn it. This is how it is, though I was previously spending all of what I earnt after I’d been paid it, its only been the past year that my overdraft has begun feeling like money – coincidentally this happened alongside my having to live out of it on a regular basis, so I’m not sure which came first!

So I always have enough. And I’m grateful, very very grateful… it’d be nice to shift this thinking though, to something with more of a safety net, and to see if my finances follow my thoughts.

I’m curious about how many other people have noticed this kind of thing in their own lives? What are your patterns of thought around money (or something else) and how does that match what happens… and, if you’ve tried it, has shifting your thinking helped?

Time for some spellworking, for sure! Time to shift how I think, and invite some money in…

The Effect of Magic

04 Saturday Dec 2010

Posted by in Magic

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I have a long history with magic… as a child I was always wandering off with the fairies, I prayed and I learnt stage magic (and bored/enchanted my family at the tender age of 6 with a full magic show). As I hit puberty I stumbled across Paganism, Witchcraft specifically (the books on UFOs and ghosts held little interest, but the ones which spoke of connecting with the natural world, and learning to affect change in your life, those I devoured!), and I found my feet on a map, one with many paths all roughly leading in the same direction.

And I’ve continued, honing my approach, finding my way, wandering along the edge of paths and trying to find people who think like I do.

The important question here, though, is why? Why do I keep on this path? Why do I hold seemingly-irrational beliefs? Why do I keep a space for the Gods in my home and my heart? Why do I spend time, energy and money tracking down events which speak of these things?

What, in short, are the benefits?!

Well, aside from the rare spellwork I do having rather literal outcomes (which could be coincidence but my pattern-making mind likes to think of as related), its had an effect on me as a peron.

I was blessed with loving parents who brought me up to believe in myself and have confidence to go with the intelligence I inherited. And a touch of arrogance. Thanks Dad 🙂

I’m also naturally fragile, shy, quiet, and suffer horrendously from stage-fright even when not on stage. Or I used to. The magical work I’ve done – reflection, meditation, energy work, self-examination and subsequent development of relationships between all my parts, constant attempts at self-awareness, ritual-work… all these things and more – helped me to feel sure in myself around others. I might not know what to say in daily social situations, but I do know that I’m a person in my own right who doesn’t need to make small talk to be accepted. My friends accept that I’m weird, and I accept that they are too.

Its helped me to recognise when arrogance or insecurity threatens, and to know that that is whats going on. I can then use that information to act in a way of my choosing (at least, I can sometimes, life-long processes here, you know?).

My magical work has helped me to map out the locations I want to pass on my journey through life, and has taught me that I want to experience each step.

It also taught me that I’m not perfect. Important for a Leo to know. And, it taught me that thats ok. I have the confidence to speak out when I think something is wrong at least some of the time, and I have the humility to know that sometimes the other person has a point, even if I still disagree with them!

I guess what I’m trying to say is that I have greater self-awareness than I used to, and I value that. I also have tools to deal with situations where I notice I’m behaving in ways that don’t feel right to me. I’m gaining integrity, and I’m stronger. Still soft, and yet more able to cope with knocks. I cry less, am happier in myself, and can ignore people who are simply being mean without taking their words personally.

Magic has also encouraged me to challenge myself, so, for example, I took drama A-level to face my stage-fright, and it worked.

In all the ways magic has touched my life, it has helped me to grow, to become more whole, to engage with the world and my own life. It has helped me relax my need for control over my life (somewhat, I still panic when I’m feeling powerless) and has helped me to find more power in myself in my life.

The map is not the territory, many magicians say. Well, no, but a good map helps when you set out on an unexplored path, and each life is exactly that… and magic is a tool kit for navigating the terrain, a tool kit with many maps…

Not only that, but it has a phone which you can use to call for help, or guidance with, or that you can be called on when you need a good kick up the arse.  At the other end are the Gods and guides and Guardians. For which I am grateful, even though I’m not quite sure what they want from me yet!

5 Minute Post – Lucid Dreaming

03 Sunday Jan 2010

Posted by in Philosophy

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(Topic suggested in a comment by philosophe007, here. Feel free to comment with suggestions for more topics!)

5 minutes, 1 topic… get set: go!

Lucid Dreaming

I’ve tried lucid dreaming before, but I’ve always gotten locked into dreaming that I’m dreaming lucidly and should try and do one fo the cool things that can eb done in dreams, like fly, or be invisible, or something. But I always end up dreaming that I’ve become lucid, and then just dreaming that I can try and fly, without actually becoming conscious of whats going on… and then the dream shifts and it all changes.

There’re lots of questions I could ask about dreams: what if they’re really being awake, and being awake is asleep? What if dreams are another life we step into when we sleep? What if…? But none of these seem interesting to me anymore,* I’m rather more interested in how we dream. How is it that we build up these worlds so vividly, and can have coherent stories that we are completely immersed in, and yet they somehow have a different quality to them to waking life?

Technically I assume dreams are built up by the brain playing, but then why aren’t the images just random flashes of things, rather than actual narratives (albeit often fragmented)? Maybe because the impulses follow particular patterns through the brain, ok… but then why do dreams have a different quality to waking life, if its all just what happens when impulses fire?

Could it be that life actually is more than just impulses, that the quality is actually embodiment, say?

We are more than just neurons, and life is more than just what happens when impulses fire, more than the experiences we have because neurons have fired… life is embodied experience. (Perhaps.)

*Post-5-minute comment: these questions are less interesting to me now because I’ve spent several years in academic philosophy classes in which ‘we might all be dreaming’ is an all-to-often recurring thought experiment, and they don’t make sense. We not awake because ‘awake’ is classified as the bit we call being awake, ‘reality’ is the classification of the bit while we’re awake (although certain versions of ‘awake’ and ‘reality’ can be argued for other than the everyday ones) and we are, it seems to me, creatures that live and move and do, and part of that is being embodied. As we don’t take our bodies, which lie sleeping, into dreams with us (or do we?) then its only a part of us that go into that dream-life…  so the interesting questions there, I suppose, are about what makes us us, whether that can be disembodied and if we are still the same people we are when embodied if disembodied, or instead are in part the same, but are different? I mean, don’t we experience the world as embodied beings? And if we’re experienceing the world differently, then how can we be the same kind of being, and thus the same person? Identity, identity… the question of dreams brings these issues up.

(And so I cheat and this becomes a 10 minute post!)

Charcoal Sketching

29 Tuesday Dec 2009

Posted by in Art Craft and Beauty

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I’ve had a brown papered sketchbook since the summer, and charcoal for about forever… and yet neither have been used.

I’ve been drawing from my imagination for ages… and often avoid faces because they just never look right.

Putting these two thoughts together and deciding to do something about it, I spent this evening doing these:

Wonder

Thoughtfulness

And they’re ok. Or rather, they’re pretty good, really. I’m just having trouble not seeing all the slightly wrong bits that make them not quite right. Its the old problem of seeing all the faults that most people really won’t notice at all. I’m quite proud of my efforts, especially when I remind myself that its an unfamiliar medium, and an unfamiliar kind of drawing… I just wish I was better already!

Gotta laugh at myself really.

In fact, that warm feeling of finally having tried both charcoal and faces… I might do another one! The longer its been since I did it, the less I feel like its something I’ve done, which is a feeling I get with other artworks too. I look at things I’ve made a month ago and its like someone else made them, which is great because it means I’m happier with them! Does anyone else get that, or is it just me?

Sketches drawn from photos found through Flickr’s interestingness, find them here and here.