The Faery Teachings by Orion Foxwood

I can definitely report that “The Faery Teachings” has been a rich and enjoyable read.  Although touted as an “introduction” to Faery Seership, it does not read or provide as an introductory book.  The amount of knowledge and experience really shines through.  The overview of Faery Seership is broad but very compelling, giving the reader a palpable sense of what the possibilities, dangers, challenges, and gifts that accompany any serious practice of this rich tradition.

The cosmological overview of the Faery Seer’s world is especially intense and full of many possibilities of meaning.  Orion gives the reader a good sense of the meaning of the Three Realms of Celtic lore, Land (talamh), Sea (muir), and Sky (neamh).  The author talks in more detail about what the Three Realms are like, the spirits that indwell them, and more importantly how they are worked with.  The book has a very direct way of talking about the function of the Fair Folk in our world and how we can develop a relationship with them.  Orion does not archetype the Faery Realm to death, and offers a refreshing viewpoint on the reality of other realms of being.  In an excellent chapter on the paths between our world and the Faery Realms he says:

These paths begin in the inner world and lead outward, only to lead inward again.  They feed life essence outward to sustain our world and carry experience inward.  As long as they are active, life will continue in our world.  Should they ever close, it will be the end of life as we know it.  So, for those foolish humans who think that the Faery have died and the hidden paths closed because humanity has strayed away from their role in keeping the roads open and honoring the Faery ones, think twice.  The paths are open, only not to us on a personal level.  They can be again if we commit to re-energize them and seek the deeper companionship of the Elder race.

The author leads the reader through the many different types of Faery beings, and how contact is recognized and strengthened with them.  I found myself absolutely amazed at the depth of meaning and knowledge that this tradition holds.  The author provides some very effective exercises and methods for opening to contact with the Faery realms and the Land itself.  After working with these exercises for a few weeks I can attest to their efficacy on a personal level.  They work.

The author does an excellent job of explaining the use “an da shealladh” or the “Second Sight”.  The role of Second Sight in Faery Seership is paramount and all of the exercises of Faery Seership are designed to enhance it.  He says:

The “sight’ is the primary means by which the seer sees.  It is the mechanism for communication with beings that live in a a stratum of life that is not composed of the base elements that give form, depth, structure, solidity, and substance as we know it. . . Some people are born with it through genetic inheritance, others acquire it through strange life experiences that usually involve trauma or contact with the spirit world and others develop it through training and discipline.

The book is simply a must read for those who plan on pursuing Faery Seership, or for anyone interested in the Faery realms and the beings that dwell there.  Be prepared, this is a rich and very informative read!

Good news over the past few days about two endangered species here in Colorado.

The first report is about a Wolverine tracked entering the northern border of the state on June 1st.  Although there have been unconfirmed sightings before, this is the first confirmed report of a Wolverine in over 90 years here in Colorado!  But here is the interesting part for me.  If there is a remnant population of Wolverines still extant in the Southern Rockies it is quite possible that the radio collared male may find himself a mate and actually breed.  If this were to happen then the Colorado Wildlife Commission (a body basically owned by ranchers, farmers and wool growers) may have their hand forced to implement some kind of re-introduction program.  I will be watching this story with keen interest, and promise to keep you all updated.  Predators like the Wolverine form important foundations to the ecosystem, and seeing as they are endangered through a large percentage of their former range, Colorado could make an ideal place for recovery.

The second piece of good news has to do with the ongoing Colorado Lynx Re-Introduction Program started in 1996.  The past few years have seen a fall in the snowshoe hare population in Colorado, but this year could be different.  The Colorado Division of Wildlife has confirmed finding two litters of Lynx kittens totaling 10 new kits!  This is great news for the Lynx Re-Introduction program here.  Not only are these births good in and of themselves but these kittens are the first born to parents that were born in Colorado not in Canada.  Could it be the population is starting to take hold?  Looks like!

I am blessed to live on a sacred land
Walking a sacred path
From a sacred origin
To a sacred destination

The above prayer/poem (is there a difference?) came to me after performing a Faery Seership exercise in the park near my home.  It is an exercise called the Faery Well that is designed to help the newbie Faery Seer connect more intimately with the land.  It is similar in purpose to the smudging done by Native Americans, just different in technique.  I have had some amazing success with this technique.  It has a very palpable effect on my mind and seems to make me feel more comfortable in harsher weather conditions.  Weird, eh?  Weird but true.  After performing the Faery Well regularly for about a month I had this prayer come to me right after I was done.  I was feeling incredibly open and youthful, and walking on a small game trail that runs through the hills near my home.  These feelings of euphoria were at their most intense when this prayer simply leapt to my lips.  Saying it out loud lead to a feeling of all consuming gratitude for the Faery Seership path, my ancestors, and nature.

Along with this practice I have been working more with my ancestors.  I now have an area on the west side of my home that holds an ancestral altar.  A place that is specifically designated as an interface point between us.  I work with it once a day and have found it to be an invaluable practice.  I have seen more and more that our ancestors are intimately connected with our day to day lives and have been there for me more than I realized.  Working with them in a more conscious way has lead to a plethora of intense emotions and experiences.  I have found, however, that this work can be uncomfortable.  You start to find skeletons in the family closets that have to be faced, dealt with, but ultimately learned from.  When you face uncomfortable facts about your family, you face uncomfortable facts about yourself.  There is no way around it.  But along the way you find riches and gifts that you have access to and become more conscious of.

Ancestral work has been some of the most rewarding work I have yet done.

My last area of focus has been a small succession of waterfalls in the creek behind my house.  I have been making regular visits to this place and use some of the Faery Seer exercises I have learned from both The Tree of Enchantment and The Faery Teachings.  Not only has my connection with this place deepened it actually feels and looks physically bigger to me.  I am not sure quite how to explain this, but it is like stepping into a vast cathedral of leaf, branch, root, and vine.  I feel smaller when I enter, but more connected.  Some of my trance work has yielded brief images but the majority of experiences have been auditory (the water sounds, well, weird) and emotional (intense feelings of euphoria and gratitude).  These waterfalls are starting to feel more and more like a doorway for me into a deeper connection with “the sacred land” and myself.  Very excited!

Claire Small: Ledger

Music is essential to life.  Last year I had the pleasure of meeting Claire Small while on a trip to Austin.  Although I did not have the pleasure of hearing her perform live I did get to have a great conversation with her.  When I got back home to the Springs I looked up her music on iTunes and was very impressed.  Claire puts a lot of passion into her music and I thoroughly enjoyed what I heard.

Tracks like “Rewind” have energy and sparkle with hope that never crosses the line of cheese.  “Citronella” has a moody, sensual sadness to it that you can relate to and savor.  “Numbers” is haunting, honest and has some subtle Middle Eastern flair that I adore.  And then there is “Cryin’ Before Ten”, this one graces my ears at least twice a day.  Claire has been wowing since an early age:

A few years and about thirty songs later, encouraged by parents and teachers Claire responded to an ad from a new local music venue needing regular acts. At the audition her singing and writing style caught the eye of honky-tonker Greg Garing. Though she was only fifteen years old, Garing took her under his wing and made her a part of the mid- 1990’s Lower Broadway revival that included acts such as BR-549, Paul Burch, and Lucinda Williams. In both ’95 and ’96 she was the youngest artist to play at the Nashville Extravaganza “breathing out the music of the angels”, and “wowing a small crowd with technique far beyond her years” as reported by the Nashville Scene.

Give her a listen if you get the chance, you won’t be dissapointed.

I just had the pleasure of listening to one of T. Thorn Coyle’s latest podcasts wherein she interviews John Michael Greer (Episode 15).  One of the more interesting points that Thorn made was regarding the typical pagan ideal of buying land for ceremonial/spiritual use.  She rightly points out that this piece of land is usually envisioned as out in the wilderness somewhere.  Thorn points out that this ideal may end up doing more harm than good considering the amount of existing urban sprawl that we have currently.  Her suggestion is to find land *inside* the cities and restore them, making them a focus for the nurturance of pagan communities.  Brilliant, no?

This comes on the heals of watching the epic “Planet Earth” documentary by the BBC.  If you have not seen this brilliant piece of art I highly encourage it.  The last DVD is, however, a real wake-up call.  Lets face it folks, the planet is at a serious crossroads.  There are, however many signs of success and hope when it comes to environmental restoration, including some very committed and resourceful pagans.  Action is the most effective prayer.  One shining example of this kind of action is Anima Center in New Mexico:

When the Sanctuary property was first purchased in January 1981, what already appeared to be a beautiful canyon was nonetheless seriously damaged. Over the course of the previous 109 years, grazing had eliminated 95% of the vegetation. In dry country such as this, it was only natural for the cattle to seek out the rich grass adjacent to the area’s few rivers, but the result of such concentration was that even plants that weren’t eaten were trampled and crushed. Literally nothing grew among the volcanic outcroppings other than brilliant cacti, stately alders and ponderosa pines, a few large old cottonwoods, and increasingly invasive piñon and juniper. . .

Visitors to the Center today, some thirty years after its purchase and protection, are amazed at what is now a forest of Cottonwoods over sixty feet high, towering above a thick tangle of twenty-foot willows. Wild grapes hang from many of the trees, and the meadows and shoreline are filled with a colorful profusion of wild flowers with names like sacred datura, western spiderwort, wood sorrel, pink penstemon, flax, cliff and woods’ rose, desert paintbrush, blue eyed grass, fire wheel, mata, four o’clock, globe mallow, morning glory and mountain lover. Resident interns assist with seed gathering and plantings, as well as erosion control and other soil conservation measures, and there are periodic Riparian (River Ecosystem) Restoration workshops.

Although this has transpired in the Gila Mountains of New Mexico it is a great example of what is possible when pagans commit to action on behalf of Mother Earth.  Imagine what it could be like if pagans took this example into urban areas?  I think the possibilities are very compelling.  Another fine example, although non-pagan, is the latest story from the New York Times about a pair of brothers working to destroy levees in Louisiana rather than putting them up.  Thorn has been working on her “Solar Cross” temple project making me wonder if Solar Cross will include urban gardening and sustainability in it’s design as well?  It will be interesting to see.

Action is the best form of prayer.  To that end I have signed up as an Environmental Director with the Clean World Movement.   They are seeking volunteers for every zip code in the United States to organize weekly or monthly litter clean ups for their area.  I plan on organizing monthly clean-ups of my zip code specifically concentrating on Fountain Creek (the main waterway in Colorado Springs).  I am excited to get started!  With sites like Facebook and it’s abilities to create groups, organizing of this type is easier then ever before.  I hope to use the base of support that I receive from forming this community of pagans and non-pagans to eventually do things like start an urban farm, clean up empty lots in the city, sponsor a rainforest park in the Amazon, and hopefully purchase land for mining reclamation here in Colorado.

I will keep you all posted.

Not a serious post this time.  At all.

I must admit that I like to pride and perhaps fool myself that I am impervious to marketing.  I am a learned man after all and listen to public radio and all that.  I occasionally spend time listening to ads on the radio or watching someone else’s TV and mocking various ads.  Like the sexy man parading with ripped abs, whoring himself for the Gap or some such.  But I have just seen an ad that made me salivate and crave Tullamore Dew, one of the favorite Irish Whiskey’s.  I feel humbled by the sheer advertising brilliance of these two ads, and sufficiently cut down to size.  If there was a good description of the Otherworld, I think it would be a lot like a Tullamore Dew ad.  Although the glaring omission of the Fair Folk is unforgivable here. 

Well I just had to do a little bragging.  As some of you may know I have been working with Faery Seership as much as possible lately.  Well the system has impressed me so much that I managed to get in contact with my new favorite author and teacher, Orion Foxwood.  After some correspondence I was able to do some giving back of my own.  I made for him a brand spankin’ new website.  And you know what?  I think it looks pretty damn good. 

Here is the link for anyone interested:  http://www.orionfoxwood.com

I can also say that speaking to Orion is a real pleasure.  He is down to earth, funny, wise, and a very supportive teacher.  I encourage anyone who is even remotely interested in working with the Fair Folk, and the Otherworld, to give his writings some serious consideration.

You all may think I’m crazy.  But here goes . . .

I want to kiss the hag at the well.  I want to embrace and lie down with the Cailleach and transmute her into the beauty of the goddess of sovereignty.  This morning when I was working out, I had a flash o’ imbas.  “You have to embrace and love the pain!”  Now to anyone who works out this may not seem like that much a of a revelation.  After all, we all know the old adage, “No pain, no gain”, right?  Well this morning I understood this concept in new ways.  This last year has included both the death of my Mom and big problems in my marriage.  There have been times that I just lost it, and screamed at the gods, “Holy fucking shit!  Just back the fuck off!”   To deal with it I have tried whiskey, sex, exercise, changes in diet, and a whole host of other distractions.  I can say that exercise, and changes in diet, have probably brought the most healing, but even they are not enough.

How limited we humans are in our view.  This is not an insult, but a statement of compassion.  Free will allows us to make our own decisions, but it also gives us a feeling of separation from each other and the whole of Creation.  My limited view has been the “good” and “bad” labels attached to experiences over the last year.  The down side of this view is the constant energy I must expend to keep the bad memories at bay.  But just like working out a muscle, my Spirit is the same way, it must deal with and embrace the “bad” experiences in order to grow and evolve.  In other words, what you resist persists.

So what does this all mean for me?  Well I am going to continue with exercise and eating well, I will also be doing daily Faery Seership practices (that have helped tremendously).  Along with this however, I plan to sit down everyday and bring up a painful memory from this past year and embrace it.  I want to kiss the “hags” of my experiences and see what comes of it.  After all She seems to be beckoning to me right now anyway, so why the hell not?

Since the death of my Mom at the end of February, well, a lot has changed.  I was blessed to be able to hang out with my grandmother and my family yesterday for Mother’s Day, but it was a hard day that brings with it a certain emptiness now.  Her death has completely transformed my experience of what it means to honor one’s ancestors.  Until my Mom’s death I looked at ancestral contact as largely a one way street.  During times of stress I often prayed and left offerings to my ancestors and asked them for help.  When I was having troubles with my business I would pray to my Grandfather Don to lend me a hand in whatever way that he could.  I figured this appropriate since he was a small business man himself, I knew he could relate.  Whenever I went on a plane trip I would toast my Grandfather Jack and drink a Gin martini (his favorite drink) then ask him to keep me safe on the plane ride.  I get rather nervous when I fly and he was an outstanding Air Force pilot.  Who better to ask for help on a plane ride than a pilot?  The list could go on.

When my Mom died, my attitude towards my ancestors changed.  Not long after her death there were some signs that her transition from this world to the Otherworld may be going a little rough.  I will not go into what those signs were exactly, but even the most Atheistic members of my family admitted that something strange was going on.  It was right around this time that I started to do Faery Seership work.  Faery Seership work starts, ironically enough, with ancestral contact.  So I set up and altar specifically as a place of communion and communication with my ancestors.  I now sit down every night before bed and pray for my Momand all my ancestors.  I prayed that the gods and goddesses would aid her in her crossing, that her father, and all of our ancestors would help her and receive her with open arms, music and laughter.  For some reason it had never occurred to me that our ancestors may need our help just as much as we need theirs!

I have been amazed at how powerful the practice of working with my ancestors on a daily basis has been.  Specifically this practice (in combination with some others) has enhanced dream contact in some very startling ways.  Not long after beginning this practice I started to have regular contact with my Mom in dreams.  Again, I will keep these dreams to myself, but suffice it to say that the gap between this world and the next seems a lot thinner to me than before.  Although I have had no dream contact with her for a few weeks now, I do feel connected with her, this has been tremendously healing for me.  I “know” this contact has been healing for my Mom as well.  Our relationships with family do not end after they (or I) move on to the Otherworld, they continue.  And sometimes they still look to us to fulfill dreams and goals that they did not get a chance to complete.  I believe that our ancestors are intimately and constantly involved in our lives, and regular prayer and contact with them makes it easier for them to impact us, and for us to impact them.

Within this ongoing dialogue about my own spiritual intentions, I have come to see that I don’t want to “reconstruct” anything.  A Celtic Recon over at Felmac is starting a new online journal about Celtic Reconstructionism (hereafter CR).  I may be getting myself into some trouble here, but as I read through the basic description of the forum I had to shake my head.  Don’t get me wrong here.  I am not trying to slam anybody for their beliefs and spiritual practices.  The following critique is meant to outline why I personally have decided to no longer call myself a Celtic Recon.

“Celtic Reconstructionism is a methodology to restore and revitalize the pre-Christian worldviews and polytheistic systems of the various Celtic peoples in the context of contemporary yet traditional Celtic cultures.”

This is a nice basic description of CR.  I have come to see, however, that for me this is the wrong approach.  Ever since my education in anthropology and my readings of some of the writings of Alexei Kondratiev, I have had to accept that my direct experience of Celtic culture is almost nil.  I am a Coloradoan , and an American.  These are the cultures I was raised in (and I say “cultures” for a reason, trust me growing up in Colorado is totally different from growing up in Missouri for example) and the ones that shape the majority of my cosmology.  Frankly I think it is not realistic, nor honest, for any American to claim Celtic culture nowadays.  We simply don’t know what we are talking about, as we have no direct experience of it.  We can be inspired by Celtic culture and belief, but that is as far as we can go.  That is not to say that for many American families that Irish or Scottish (or Welsh etc.) heritage and culture is not a major influence on them, simply that it is an influence that is heavily influenced by Christian belief and culture since the days of Patrick.  As much as many neo-pagans would like to pretend that the era of Celtic Christianity never happened, it did.