From the mingling waves-of-water came mud and slime.
Enshar and Kishar, twin halves of the globe, shone out of them.
*
THE EPIC OF GILGAMESH
The Oldest written story known to man…
What spiritual treasures lie hidden in this, five thousand-year old, Epic?
What can this ancient civilisation teach us about the questions of existence?
Join us on this quest of a life-time, next April, to find out…
* ‘Gilgamesh is among the greatest things that can ever happen to a person.’ – Rainer Maria Rilke.
Fully catered weekend package, including room, meals and workshop: £235 – £260
Traditionally, ancient castles were build where there was trouble… Do we have the equivalent in our minds and emotions? Have we, over the course of our lives, built up strong fortifications with which to repel those intrusions which, as children, we considered frightening?
Our ‘walk and talk’ events are friendly and informal. We ask those attending to bring one or two readings from their favourite books, poems, or other sources of inspiration. We listen and talk… and share. If someone is ready to enter their personal borderlands, we hold their hand and walk with them.
The cost per attendee is £50.00. This is an administrative cost, only. All personal costs and bookings, such as hotels and meals, are the responsibility of those attending. Meals are generally shared in a local…
It is said that a chapel dedicated to St Catherine once stood on this hill, looking down at the little town of Cerne Abbas, below.
The original St Catherine was a pre-Christian figure about whom very little is known. She was associated with the symbol of an eight-armed wheel – the famous ‘Catherine wheel’, remembered now in the name of a firework….
Those visiting hadn’t known of the site’s link to St Catherine when the plans for the Silent Eye’s pre-solstice weekend were created by Stuart and Sue. But the presence of symbols related to St Catherine only added to the power of what would unfold in a hidden enclave, below.
Above: the hidden path down to The Silver Well
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Two women wait in the green-kissed shadows of a path leading down to a holy well. They are both recent graduates of the Silent Eye’s three-year course in Self-knowledge…
The red-winged blackbirds started appearing in my neighborhood about a week ago. In the eleven years I have lived here I have never seen red-winged blackbirds near my home. Now they seem to follow me everywhere. The pair flies across the crossroads of intersections and alights from trees at the edge of the forest. The female looks ordinary and unassuming. She wears the colors of camouflage, like a cloak of decaying earth.
It was the male who appeared in my dream many months ago. Opening his wing of night to reveal the power of red blended with yellow, which he formed into a ball of flame and threw for me to catch.
And now he is here again, with me in physical form. Over the last two days, he has left me three broken wings. Not his own, but those of moths. Night butterflies. Remnants of a feast left behind.
The first wing appeared in the field where I will soon be teaching summer yoga classes. The hindwing of a Cecropia Silk Moth. I heard the song in my head written by John Lennon and Paul McCartney before I saw the blackbird.
The fire-rimmed eye of the hindwing of a Cecropia Silk Moth
Yesterday, a wing from the same moth appeared. A forewing banged up perhaps from traveling the fifty yards or so from the location where I found the hindwing. A little distance away, a nearly invisible white wing of what may have been a Fall Webworm lay like a fairy’s wing on the pavement.
The Three Broken Wings of Moths
Last night was a fitful night of sleep. The left side of my head was congested as though all the turmoiled thoughts in my mind had settled there to block rest.
“Blackbird fly into the light of the dark, dark night.” (lyrics from “Blackbird” by Lennon/McCartney)
We all have our broken wings. Life has a way of breaking them, and the breaks can deepen through past-life wounds we may not even remember. Wings that were, perhaps, meant to be broken so that we may find the true, free soul. The light in the dark, dark night.
I have realized, these last few days, that I have let myself stray from the path of the true self. I have allowed myself to be disempowered and voiceless at the expense of another’s ambitions that do not feel in alignment with my true self. The blackbird has appeared as a reminder of the strength of the soul aligned with Truth. He has left me the wings to fly into the Light.
I dreamt last night of a world I did not want to leave. “Hold me back,” I told my companions, lest I fly up into the wonderous sky above. At that moment I was watching the dance of clouds as they morphed into fairytale forms, yet what was below was as magical as what was above. A child’s playhouse of wonderment and joy. I have dreamed these landscapes before. I have even traveled them in visions only to return to the density of a reality that seems, on the surface, false and formed through the deliberate hands of ego-driven might. By hands shaped by the individual quest for greed.
My soul has not forgotten the true magic of Life. Of untempered Joy. Every so often, it returns me to that state to bring back hope and also Truth. I have walked the broken lands that still hold magic for those who wish to see and feel it. Through the deepest depths of a despair that is not just mine, I have felt the ever-present stirring of Light.
We all walk the landscape of magic, whether we are aware of it or not. At each moment we can choose whether to become the trapped victim of fear fed by that greedy hand lusting for power and dominance, or we can find that ever-present state where the river of Life flows to the frequency of Light.
Here is where the inner-child resides, waiting to dance to Truth. We call her the inner-child because she holds the key to Life. She never forgets the “child-like” state of wonder that is the magic of all existence. The embodiment of true Joy, she resides in all of us. Tuned to her frequency, the world around her shifts to match the rhythm of her dance.
For so many of us, including those who are not yet adults, the inner-child is already lost in a long-forgotten place. We may know she is there. Sometimes we may even feel her inner core of light, but we have forgotten who to get to her. It is as though we reside in a labyrinth that takes on a maze-like form because the light within us is filled with broken lines created by pain and fear. These shadow lands impede the natural flow of light, which is that magical life force energy that vibrates to Truth. To Joy. To Love.
As one well-intended individual has pointed out, the labyrinth that appears in my first book in the Warriors of Light series does not resemble the labyrinths seen throughout ancient cultures, and which is now used in “New-Age” healing modalities. The labyrinth I chose, or rather chose me, is a maze of lines that unite the above with the below. Those who are familiar with esoteric teachings will recognize it as the mystical hexagram, the Star of David, or the Merkabah . Its origin predates religion and division. Two triangles overlapping in union, connecting the above with the below in perfect harmony. The true self, that “inner-child,” can be found always at the center. The seat of the soul. Of Truth. Of Light. Un-changing. There can be many individual journeys to get there, but we all, eventually arrive at the same place.
The book will be out soon…I had a minor glitch in formatting, a glitch which is turning into a gift to allow a more beautiful expression of the book and the vision that is being held to assist and support children young and old reconnect with the inner-child of Truth.
My son has a sick fish in his pond over which we are both worrying. The trouble with pond fish is that they have many places to hide if they are unwell, and you only usually see them from above, so unless there is an obvious and visible problem, they can quickly deteriorate.
There is not a great deal left for us to do, as we know that by the time a fish reaches this stage, the end is almost inevitable. If there were a fish vet locally, and if the sensitive golden orfe would survive the trip, and if there were any reasonable hope… a lot of ‘ifs’ for a fish, but he has been with us a number of years and, along with the forty others with whom he shares the pond, he is part of the family. So we do what we can, making sure the water…
Last night I dreamt I was flying. I was in a sporting good’s store, and on my way to the check-out register, but let me back up a bit. Before I started flying, I had been with Ann and Margo, two characters from my memoir, A Girl Named Truth. Briefly, I was fourteen again, and I could overhear my two former friends gossiping about me. Instead of keeping silent, though, and internalizing my hurt, I spoke up. “I know what you’re saying,” I told them, “and I really don’t care.” And, truthfully, I didn’t. Something inside of me had changed. I had become detached from the weight of their words, realizing they did not define me.
As I walked away, my feet began to lift off the ground and I began to fly. Effortlessly, and with a joy that defies gravity, I navigated my way to the front of the store where I found a queue of individuals who were waiting to “check-out.”
“It is not difficult,” I told them as they looked up at me with awe and doubt. “You can learn to do it too.”
In my forthcoming book, The Labyrinth, there is a thirteen-year-old character named Dell. She is one of the six “warriors of light” protagonists who must overcome their inner fears and challenges to use their gifts for a larger purpose. Like me, Dell was once bullied by her two former best friends.
Playful by nature, Dell is filled with an inner joy that is difficult to destroy. It is almost as though that very joy, that light, is what her former friends are afraid of and seek to diminish. Perhaps they do not realize that same light resides within them too.
We all have a Dell aspect of ourselves. The inner child who represents our true selves resides in each of us. I don’t believe there is anyone on the planet who has not faced adversity, causing their inner light to be overshadowed in some way.
Adversity rises to test the light. It throws a deliberate shroud over its source, and sometimes those who find themselves inside of its darkness lose hope of connecting to that inner joy again. Many of these people are still children themselves, like Dell, on the cusp of adulthood who have already forgotten they have that innate gift to soar.
They may feel broken, lost, and alone. In a world that chooses to reflect more darkness than light, that hopeless can spread throughout the channels of light that reside in all of us, leading to the despair of disconnection.
If you look at the cover of The Labyrinth, you will see the network of light leading to the center. If you look closely, you will notice that light has been cut off by darkness in many places. Dell and her five friends stand at the edges, each carrying the light of their individual selves. A pillar of unwavering light rises from the center. Each warrior, each individual who stands on the edge of the darkness, has the power to reach that inner beam of light. And, as these six discover, we never have to walk that path alone.
Above: the hidden path down to The Silver Well 
The Light Behind the Story 