The Minute and Miraculous

After the long, lagging winter, the season of singing is at last upon us. Fuzzy buds and blossoms burst from the trees and shoots come burning up from the ground in a colorful profusion.  Minute wonders surround us, yet they are so easily overlooked. The petals of magnolia or bluebells when examined closely reveal how they draw and translate their beauty from water and light – into prismatic glory.

In these signs of vernal renewal I find a kind of counter balance issuing from Nature; an answer to the human-created chaos unfolding around the globe. We wage war, poison Earth and sea – yet still, she sings. The exquisite trills of robins, spinning out like dewdrops along a spider’s silken line are, just like the flowers, awash in light. 

In spring perhaps more than any other season, we sense reminders of the divine all around us.  This ancient, eternal dance of renewal brings into perspective this current blink of history, overshadowed by the rage of homo sapiens. Flowers and birds were here first and in one form or another, they shall endure and in this, there is a certain solace. And for those so inclined, invitation stands, that if even for a few moments, we may set down the human drama and “be as the lilies” – discover to our delight, that there exists a place for us within the symphony.

Leah Lemieux is an author and lecturer who works on dolphin protection, education and conservation initiatives. www.RekindlingTheWaters.com

April

The tree that the Celts traditionally associated with April was the hawthorn, a tree of love and fertility. But the hawthorn does not usually flower until May which is why it is also called the May tree. The blackthorn flowers now, around Easter. Its soft white blossom is in stark contrast to its harsh black thorns. Known as the crown of thorns, the blackthorn tells us of the difficult tasks that must be faced, indeed, that cannot be avoided. This is the place of shadow that must be honoured before the fullness of spring can be enjoyed.

In the mythology of hawthorn, we hear more of these difficult tasks. The hawthorn goddess Olwen was the daughter of Yspaddaden Pencawr or Giant Hawthorn.  She was known as ‘She of the white track’, for white blossom sprang up wherever she walked, leaving white tracks across the land, just as the flowering of hawthorn in the hedgerows does now. The nephew of King Arthur, Culhwych, fell in love with her and was set by her father countless impossible tasks before he could claim her hand. He was helped by the Knights of the Round Table and won his bride.

So Olwen’s white track becomes the bridal train leading us across the land to the place of union. Here where the sun and earth are joined in the marriage that is spring, where the masculine and feminine within us become one, this is our inner alchemical wedding. April is the time of preparation for this, where the sacred tasks are set.

But just as the hawthorn does not blossom until the end of April, it can be hard in the early part of the month to discern our white track from all the others available to us. Its whiteness, as it were, is not apparent yet. The white track is not a road of oughts and shoulds, it is a path of heart. We may not recognise it until we feel it. Stepping onto it thrills us to the core.

Ian Siddons Heginworth is an environmental arts therapist, founder of the Devon-based Wild Things community programme and author of Environmental Arts Therapy and the Tree of Life, Spirit’s Rest Books. www.environmentalartstherapy.co.uk

March

The ash tree is the tree that the Celts associated most with the month of March. In Norse mythology, it was Ygdrassil, the World ash. This ancient and shamanic image illustrates three levels of consciousness, as well as the journey of a human life.

The roots of Ygdrassil are found in the underworld, the unconscious self. Because it contains all the material that we have chosen to repress it is also our past and in particular our childhood. It is our foundation, the place that we are growing from. In the myth, the world serpent gnaws incessantly at these roots. As a symbol of the dark feminine, the wounded feeling self, this is the gnawing of our wounds demanding attention. This dark material is the compost from which life blossoms.  The alchemists call it the prima materia, the dark lead that lies heavy on our hearts.

At the beginning of March, down among the dark roots of the World ash, we can connect very deeply to this prima materia and feel it as raw and intolerable once again. Up among the branches at this time, the buds of the ash tree are black as lead.

The trunk of Ygdrassil is the here and now, this world that we live in, the present. It is here that the alchemical transformation of the prima materia takes place. When we allow ourselves to be in relationship with our feeling self we begin the transmutation of our wounds, changing the lead into gold. This is conscious adulthood, our life work. Here the trunk of the tree becomes the sealed container in which the process unfolds as naturally as the spring.

In the branches of Ygdrassil, we find the future and those elders who having worked their alchemy are now harvesting their gold. In the myth, the lower branches are the home of deer, which graze upon the leaves while the eagle, the higher self looks down from above. As symbols of love and gentleness, the deer are an indication of the nature of this harvest. We may strive for material wealth, but it is in the fruiting of relationship, both with ourselves and others, that we find real gold. This is a harvest of the heart and it can be there in all our futures.

Ian Siddons Heginworth is an environmental arts therapist, founder of the Devon-based Wild Things community programme and author of Environmental Arts Therapy and the Tree of Life, Spirit’s Rest Books. www.environmentalartstherapy.co.uk

Photograph: Ash Tree Marmit www.sxc.hu/profile/marmit

February

As the days grow longer and warmth returns, that which has been frozen begins to thaw and feeling returns to the Earth. 

The month of February begins with the ancient festival of Imbolc. Meaning ‘in the belly’, Imbolc marks the first stirring of life in the womb of the Earth. Dedicated to the goddess Bride, it is the first fire festival of the year. 

Bride, or Bridie, is the virgin goddess and all brides represent her as they walk towards union with the solar masculine. Hers is the new, soft body of the Earth as the water begins to flow again and the soil becomes the womb, dark, moist and enveloping. As she nurses the seed within, it begins to reach out to her.

As feeling returns we too find ourselves again in a womb, but one of our own making. The life that has contained and sustained us until now becomes the soil from which we must spring

The tree that the Celts associated with the month of February is willow. Known as the Queen of the waters, the willow is the most feminine of trees. Its Celtic name Saile, means to leap or let go, which is why the leap year falls in February. Willow calls upon us to make this leap, but the only way is to release feeling, to grieve for all that has passed and so cut the ties that bind us to the past. As we do so, life changes and we surge ahead.

To go willingly into grief, to learn and develop its ways as a practice for life, is a great gift to ourselves and to our children who then learn not to fear it as we did. Once the practice of active grief is learnt, we can feel our way all the way back to our beginnings seeking out the grief that was held there and releasing it now. Letting go, letting go, letting go. Each time we cut the strings that hold us back and bind us into familiar patterns and self-fulfilling prophecies, we take a leap. We leap into the unknown, into a place where anything is possible and long forbidden dreams can manifest themselves at last.

Ian Siddons Heginworth is an environmental arts therapist, founder of the Devon-based Wild Things community programme and author of Environmental Arts Therapy and the Tree of Life, Spirit’s Rest Books. www.environmentalartstherapy.co.uk

Are you a good guy or bad guy?

Almost nobody likes to think of themselves as a bad guy. Whether an embezzling politician, a soldier in Rowanda, a Japanese dolphin hunter or just the average person on the street, we fool ourselves with stories of necessity to justify and cover up any of our less noble acts. But where does a clear-eyed look at the role we play in this world leave us? A few questions to ask yourself:

Are you in it for the money? 

Is your job, or whatever takes up the majority of your days, something you are doing out of love, care or compassion, or is it simply something to pay the bills?

How much and how often do you give?

What do you offer the world, or those in need, free of any charge? This could mean time, effort, skills or support that is monetary, spiritual, physical or emotional.

Is this once a year? Once a month? Once a week? Every day?

How aware are you of the potentially harmful impact of your daily actions on other people, animals and the environment and how much do you care?

For many, honest answers may start to paint a less than pretty picture.

Example: I know a geologist working for a mining company. He enjoys his time in the remote, rugged pristine places, examining rock samples for traces of precious minerals. He writes songs about the beauty he beholds and he makes a lot of money at this job. He has a young family to feed. But when, and if, the desired deposits are found, the company moves in and utterly despoils the once beautiful wilderness to claim these ‘natural resources’.  But by then, this geologist is already far away at the next site….

In the eyes of the world, in the eyes of the Earth, is he a good guy or a bad guy?

If we cannot view Nature with the same concerned care we extend to our own families and loved ones, if we cannot make this change, we have no future. 

Leah Lemieux is an author and lecturer who works on dolphin protection, education and conservation initiatives.

www.RekindlingTheWaters.com

I Make, Therefore I Am

I worry about the society we find ourselves in today. Many people have become spectators of life rather than participants and as a result, find themselves disconnected and struggling to find a purpose.

While there is no ‘one size fits all’ solution there are, in my opinion, things that can be done to provide us once more with a sense of being, doing, contributing and probably most importantly, with that sense of purpose while we are here and knowledge of leaving our mark for when we’re not; something that speaks of our existence and identity.

Today the media is full to bursting, of programmes and articles dedicated to the tangible achievements of the past, where experts extol the virtues of craftsmen and craftsmanship. They talk about the detail, the design, the skill, the workmanship and the fact that many of these items are still in working use, literally hundreds of years later.

We are fully aware of the significance and importance of those exertions, which I repeat; we celebrate on a regular basis. However, we have forgotten that manual occupation is still one of the best ways to satisfy this primeval need and there is nothing wrong in going to bed tired, maybe even aching a little, knowing that the day has been used to its full advantage and there is something to show at the end of it. We have become obsessed with jumping the gun, to get to the destination without going on the journey, let alone enjoying it.

We have become obsessed with the idea that physical struggle is wrong and bad, so much so that we are desperately trying to eliminate it (in the western world at least) to our cost. What we need to realise is that a certain amount of physical exertion, struggle even, is necessary in every human life. When that is not present an emotional as well as a physical vacuum is created, which as we all know, must be filled.

Are our lives any ‘easier’ today?  I doubt it. We’ve simply replaced physical struggle with mental anxiety. I would argue that a lot of that anxiety occurs because we are not satisfying that innate need to be manually and creatively occupied. Art, Craft and Manual Production satisfy that need on every level.

Using our hands and indeed all our faculties to create things of beauty, use or both, is of immense value. Using the raw materials we find around us, where a battle of wills ensues between maker and material, grappling and tussling with that material, until a truce – a compromise and an understanding is achieved and something beautiful emerges. It is this struggle that helps define us as human beings and we need this affirmation, pretty much on a daily basis, to keep us sane and healthy.

Gillian Montegrande, is founder of Made by Hands of Britain which is dedicated to showcasing the heritage, traditions and contemporary interpretations of British craftsmanship. 

We must not be bystanders!

We face the biggest crisis in human history. It is not the financial crisis. It is our failure to live within the limits of mother Earth and in harmony with each other that will lead to catastrophe. Don’t be fooled by politicians endowed with excessive self-confidence. We cannot depend on governments to do what needs to be done. They do not focus on the most important issues or grasp the radical solutions that are needed. Nor do they offer the bold, inspiring leadership required for a great transition.

There are 6.7bn of us throughout the world. We have immense power if we use it wisely. We have to campaign and educate politicians and demand that they do what is needed. We will not find the answers by listening to combative politicians or a media that keeps us entertained with hot air, transfixed by consumerism and novelty, yet feeling powerless. We need to inform ourselves about the abundant wise thinking and exciting possibilities for a great transformation. Some of the urgent changes can be brought about by individuals and communities. But the major part of it requires action by governments at every level – from parish to United Nations. We need inclusive and fully representative democracy, not dictatorship by a party or coalition that gets the most seats in Parliament. 

Our role must be to campaign, lobby, demonstrate and insist.

There is a growing consensus about what has to be done. It is not only a matter of transforming the global economy so that its purpose is to bring greater well-being to everyone. We need to end the obsession with growth, privatisation, unlimited globalisation and free trade. We also need to transform the costly and unstable debt money system and unsustainable, unjust and unnecessarily complex taxation. Government must accept the need for prosperity without growth. It must protect citizens from the abuse of power by large corporations. We have to demand these changes. To do so we must be well-informed.

Bruce Nixon is author of A Better World is Possible – what needs to be done and how we can make it happen, available free on his website http://www.brucenixon.com/betterworld.html. It provides full information and ways forward on all these issues.