In the House of Darkness

In the House of Darkness

"The poets shut their doors and windows for a day's time, and lie

on their backs with a stone upon their belly, and plaids about their

heads, and their eyes being covered they pump their brains for

rhetorical encomium or panegyric."

   ___ Martin Martin, "Description of the Western Islands of Scotland," in

   John and Caitlin Matthews, "The Encyclopedia of Celtic Wisdom."

   The seventeenth-century traveler Martin Martin toured the west coast of Scotland and reported on the training used in the last of the bardic schools, whose methods of composition had not varied from earliest Celtic times. Students given subjects of composition would go to the House of Darkness: a long, low hut divided into cubicles devoid of light, in which the students lay upon couches alone and worked on each poem in darkness. At nightfall, lights were brought in and the students recited their compositions to their masters before going to their evening meal.

  What is the meaning of this desire for darkness? Inspiration was able to spark more brightly, leading the poet's mind from metaphor to metaphor with a greater assurance. For the one who lay upon the 'bed of reclining,' there was no opportunity to make notes; words were written first upon the memory. There is a more ancient reason also: the early druidic and poetic method of incubating knowledge out of sleep and darkness drew upon the fact that the ever-living otherworld is visitable in dream and inspired soul-flight. This is not a daytime experience, however, but one possible only when it is dark (so that the subtle senses are able to work). Darkness, which so many shun as synonymous with evil is actually an opportunity in which we can respect our subtle senses and give rest to our physical ones. In the darkness shines the greatest light of all: the three sparks of inspiration that run like fire through charcoal and illuminate our own being.

"Choose a subject to meditate upon without light this evening."

[From: "The Celtic Spirit" by Caitlin Matthews]



The Air We Breathe

The Air We Breathe

"World-mothering air, air wild,
Wound with thee, in thee isled,
Fast home, fast fold thy child."
    __ Gerald Manley Hopkins, "The Blessed Virgin
  Compared to the Air We Breathe"


   The breath of life has always had a special, sacred meaning for people worldwide, since it is the mark of mortality. The first and last breaths are marked with particular attention: as air is drawn into a baby's lungs for the first time, the soul is considered to be truly incarnate; as the death rattle heralds the last exhalation of air, we know that the soul is unhoused, free to return to the unseen world. Our continual breathing in and out is a reminder of these two moments wherein we are recreated anew.
   The air that we take for granted is now polluted by industrial production, petroleum fumes, and other unpleasant exhalations. The immensity of this desecration of our atmosphere leaves us feeling powerless, since its cure depends on the whole world cooperatively using wiser strategies to protect the environment from damage. It may mean using our cars less, or switching off the motor when we are waiting; it may involve us in influencing governments and industries to use environmental-friendly solutions, remembering that politicians are in power because they represent the people. But the task that we can each engage  in on a daily basis is a respectful acknowledgment of the sacred breathe of life. The Irish expression for taking one's time translates literally as 'drawing one's breath.' If we make it our practice to spend a short time each day remembering the holy element of air, we restore the original blessedness with our prayerful in-and-out breathing: "Blessed be the precious and preserving air that sustains our life!" 

Meditate upon the air as you draw it into your lungs ad then exhale. Be aware of the whole atmosphere of the earth breathing."
[From: "The Celtic Spirit" by Caitlin Matthews]

Envy

Envy

"From the swift arrows of the slender banshee,
From the envious heart and the eye of evil,
May the herd be encircled!"
   ___ Scots Gaelic herding charm (trans.CM)

  In many lands, envy is known as 'the evil eye," whereby someone looks possessively or jealously at something of his neighbor's. The Celtic peoples had their charms against the evil eye - or 'overlooking,' as it was often know. The herding charm above is concerned not only with the envy of neighbors or strangers, but also with the retribution of the bean si (BAN SHE), or 'the fairy woman.'  Because the Celtic world did not see itself as separate from the otherworld, faery and spirit inhabitants might also be considered sources of envy. It is for this reason that many people, then and now, put out offerings for the faerykind, that they might share our resources, feel included,k and consider us to be good neighbors.
   When we envy today, our eyes and desires are led from our own sphere into that of others; we subtly penetrate the boundaries of other people and commit an intentional theft - not by physically stealing something away, of course, but by undermining another person's essential soul. Envy is not seen as dangerous in our society; indeed, advertising companies do business by inculcating envious yearnings everywhere, vaunting beautiful people with lovely possessions, well-appointed houses, and brilliant skills. Good-natured people of special skill and abilities are often devastated to learn how little their friends think of them, horrified to realize how envied they are. Let us appreciate and admire, by all means, but every time envy surges up within us, let us call back the impulse to possess.

"Make your own prayer against the kinds of envy most often directed against you. Meditate upon the brand of envy that arises within you and pay closer attention to what it indicates about you."
[From: "The Celtic Spirit" by Caitlin Matthews]

The Morrighan's Signs of the Times

The Morrighan's Signs of the Times

"Summer without flowers,
Cows without milk,
women without modesty,
men without courage....."
   Second Battle of Mag Tuiread, early Irish text

   The current signs of the times are there to be read by anyone with an ounce of perception. We notice signs of decay and disorder, thoughtlessness toward the environment, urban chaos and breakdown, famine, and senseless wars. To the Irish Goddess, the Morrighan - a being who often takes the form of a raven overflying the field of carnage - these are all areas of potential scavenging out of which new energy can be born. In her creative aspect, she is one of the holy ones who gave birth to mountains and rivers in her ecstatic union with Dagda, the God of Virile Knowledge. Like the Hindu Goddess Kali, the Morrighan acts as challenger and remembrance of the totality of time: she bids us look not only at the end times but also what leads up to them. By allowing the Morrighan into our lives, we value each living being for itself, enabling it to find its own place, to see the interrelationships between all life forms.
   The Morrighan keeps her ancient place and role in our society, however much we try to deny her. She speaks the end; she utters the beginning; she announces the victory and defeat of our life's struggles. With her far-seeing eye, she comprehends the germination of the acorn and the felling of the oak.

"What is ending in your life? What is struggling to be born?What is growing and how can you help it to grow?"
[From: "The Celtic Spirit" by Caitlin Matthews]

Spiritual Nomadism

Spiritual Nomadism

"The Holy One is near to all who call:
we have no need to cross the sea to
find God(dess)."
   ___ saying of St. Samthann (trans. CM)


    Spiritual nomadism is a phase that everyone goes through at some time. It appeals to us at those times when everything in our spiritual practice seems barren and stale. At those times, we seek the stimulus of fresh fields and foreign shores; we want out, now! This may take our steps into other fields of spirituality where we can graze at will, tasting and appreciating the differences, taking what is useful for us at one spiritual oasis before wandering on to the next. This phase can take many forms, and it can strike at any time, especially if we have lived many forms, and it can strike at any time, especially if we have lived within the strict restraints of a religious upbringing; it is not undergone only by the young and unsettled.
   Our wandering often brings us to a fresh appreciation of our own spirituality; from a different perspective, we can see what we have been missing or how we can practice in more intentional ways. When spiritual nomadism goes unchecked, however, we do not learn from what we wander through; we begin to fall into a kind of spiritual tourism wherein we travel too fast and too frequently to learn anything.
   In whatever place we find ourselves, we must make sure that our spiritual path is under our feet. It may spiral wildly or meader across different kinds of terrain, but it will bring us to the place just right if we engage continually with Spirit. We cannot separate ourselves from inclusion in the sacred, whatever we do and wherever we go.

"What useful and encourage factors have you gained from your spiritual nomadism? What do you look for in your spiritual expression and practice that is not currently officially on offer? It may be that your spiritual practice has no name or label, but it is still a valid path to Spirit."
[From: "The Celtic Spirit" by Caitlin Matthews]

The Continuity of Society

The Continuity of Society

"Society is a partnership not only between those who are living but between those who are living, those who are dead and those who are to be born."
   ___ Edmund Burke

   At every moment, several generations are simultaneously alive: those just born; children and students; young, middle-aged, and elderly adults, those about to die. As the older generation dies, new opinions and customs replace the old ones. But at one time, there are simultaneously many different generational viewpoints jostling together for attention. The sense of society as a partnership is not always apparent to us as we pass through life. The way to reconnect our society is to keep before us the partnership between those now living and our ancestors and our descendants.
   The ancestral viewpoint is formative to the way society subtly changes over the generations. It helps codify the protocols, procedures, and customs that the present establishment upholds; it also forms a norm against which reactionary and reforming spirits can rebel. These two notions of conformity and rebellion, like two intertwining shoots about sapling, define the growth of the trunk. The influence of our descendants is a more subtle one. We need inheritors to guard what we have established, but we cannot entirely dictate and mold them to our desires. Our descendants will modify and change what we leave them. The continuity of society is woven from many generational needs and influences. Only when we stand at the hub of time, as ancestor, self, and descendant concurrently do we become fully aware of the contract that our partnership involves.

"What are the terms of your contract with the partnership of society? Do these change as you consider them from the standpoint of ancestor, self, and descendant?"
[From: "The Celtic Spirit" by Caitlin Matthews]

The Fruit of the Otherworld

The Fruit of the Otherworld

"Every high and lonely thought that thrills my spirit through
Is but a shining berry dropped down through the purple air,
And from the magic tree of life the fruit falls everywhere."
    ___A. E. (George Russell) "Connla's Well"

   Over Connla's Well grow the nine hazelnut trees of wisdom that drop their nuts into th water. The salmon of knowledge eats of the nuts and is found by Fionn mac Cunhail
(FNN mak KOOL), who, like Taliesin (Tal-eeEssom), becomes omniscient. This experience changes the very nature of perception, retuning the ordinary senses to perceive in more subtle ways.
   This story, in its various permutations, stands as an explanation of how the fruit of the otherworld comes to ripen in our world. The fall of the hazelnuts into the waters of Connla's Well is an image of the abundant generosity of the otherworld to our world. The ideas that come to us in moments of inspiration arrive in our heads so instantaneously that we may be tempted to give credit for their arrival to ourselves. The generosity of inspiration is frequently seen percolating throughout the world. When the nuts of the nine hazel fall into our world, they fall in many places simultaneously, ensuring that the fruiting wisdom will germinate in at least one location in our world. This explains the seemingly coincidental discovery of inventions or the realization of ideas in several places at the same time: the same idea is in the air, ready to be pulled out of the ether. Only the most promising, dedicated, and attentive become the stock upon which the otherworldly fruit is grafted, for the benefit of all.

"Give thanks for the fruits of the otherworld that you have received and help ripen. Be aware where the nuts of wisdom are falling into your lap; run with the inspiration!"
[From: "The Celtic Spirit" by Caitlin Matthews]

The Prayer of the Autumn Equinox

The Prayer of the Autumn Equinox

"We should pray before sunrise and after sunset, pray prayers that have for their purposes no personal advantage, but are as native as are the vesper cries of pairing partridges, and as full of natural gratitude as is the heart of a lover."
  ___Llewelyn Powys, "Earth Memores"

   The sun is at its midway mark, halfway between the golden glory of midsummer and the silver secret of midwinter. This is a time of appraisal, and thankfulness, a time when we can be glad of the harvest or work behind us. It is also a time of application and expectation as we look forward to the work ahead.
   The prayer of the quarter days is not one of personal request or self-regarding ceremony; it is our special offering of space and opportunity for and on behalf of the whole quarter and all that is happening within it and inhabiting it at this very moment. Set this day aside as one of meditation, undertaking only necessary and undemanding tasks.
    At midday, stand facing the sunlight. Notice the fall of your shadow is already longer than it was at the same time on midsummer day. Turn and face your shadow on the ground; feel the sun upon your back. The shadow that falls before you is the only mark of your presence that you should leave upon the earth. Meditate upon your shadow; then turn toward the sun again, eyes closed, and bathe in the light. Meditate upon the turas  of the sun at this season. Become aware of the fusion of your body and your soul within you, and open your eyes, becoming present to where and who you are.
    At sunset, tune your heart again to the season: feel within your body the sense of your own turas from midsummer toward midwinter and give thanks for the light and darkness. As you prepare to sleep, be aware of your body's rest and the readiness of your soul's shadow to go forth on its nightly round.

"Make your prayer as suggested above."
[From: "The Celtic Spirit" by Caitlin Matthews]

Enemies of Wisdom

Enemies of Wisdom

"There are three things that spoil wisdom: ignorance,
inaccurate knowledge, and forgetfulness."
   ___ anciemt Irish triad

   Wisdom supports and maintains the universe in every place. Although we now feel that ignorane is largely conquered in our world by better education, it still holds sway in many areas, especially where people are purposely kept away from sources of spiritual wisdom by experts and professionals who prefer to keep them ignorant.
    We live in a world of easily coined and readily accessible facts, a world where true wisdom is contaminated by or mingled with wild supposition, doubtful hearsay, and poor research, inaccurate knowledge arises when people are keen to get the meat but lack the patience to capture, kill, or cook it. A remarkable number of books appear yearly, for exampole, claiming to teach the reader everything about a subject in a month or even a week! It is hard to know where most censure should be heaped: on the hubris of the writer and publisher or on the credulity of the reader. Inaccurate knowledge will not connect use with the living roots of wisdom; only precise knowledge wedded to practical expericence can do that.
    But a far greater enemy of wisdom than either ignorance or inaccurate knowledge is forgetfulness. Wisdom has been warped by forgetfulness, because we have lost both wisdom's contect and its application as our traditional guardians have virtually died off. Few alive now have access to anything more than the theoretical structures of spiritual wisdom. Now we must urgently bring wisdom out of its academic closet,  putting theory and practice into harness together so that the living power of wisdom may be restored to our world once again.

"What are the characteristics of wisdom by which you steer your life? How are they manifect in your actual practice?"
[From: "The Celtic Spirit" by Caitlin Matthews]

The Flitting of the Faeres

The Flitting of Faeries

"The Faeries remove to other lodgings at the beginning of each

quarter of the year.....being impatient of staying in one place and

find some ease by sojourning and changing habitations."

   ____Robert Kirk, "The Secret Commonwealth"

   The removal of the faery folk from one place to another is traditionally called 'flitting' in Scotland. The faeries of any religion - and every region has its faeries - have a variety of homes that they use at different times of the year. In Irish traditions, this movement was usually observed at Beltane and Samhain, when the doors of the si (SHE), the faery realms, were opened. Among humans, the spring and autumn equinoxes and the winter and summer solstices were times when the quarterly rent on property was paid to the landlord. Those who could not pay their dues also flitted.

   Cleaning and cleansing through movement is the pattern of the earth's nomadic peoples. They do not remain long in one place for many reasons, but chief of these is that the land on which they have rested becomes 'worn out' or 'dirty'. The act of moving on, then, is for them an act of renewal and care, allowing the earth to rest and recover from their occupation.

   The spring and autumn cleaning of the house that many people favor is but one side of an orderly life. The visible clutter in our homes reflects a corresponding clutter in our internal life. The wise lesson of the faeries and nomadic peoples is to leave little trace of our passage upon the earth, to leave no mark that mars the wider world. By cleaning up after ourselves, w help lift the impress of our presence upon the earth.

"With attention and intention, clean at least one room of your house this week. As you restore cleanliness and order, be aware of the corresponding spaciousness within yourself, so that your autumn cleaning becomes a meditation in itself."

[From: "The Celtic Spirit" by Caitlin Matthews]

Truths, Lies and Videotape

Truth, Lies, and Videotape

"There are few who kn ow
Where the magic wand of Mathonwy
Grows in the grove."
   __"Daronwy," medieval Welsh poem

   The magic wand of the wise, druidic Math (MAHth), king of Gwynedd in northern Wales, had the property of causing things to appear as they truly were. This was demonstrated when Math interviewing his niece, Arianrhod (Ar-ee-ANN'hrode) for the post of royal footholder.
   The most important qualification for this post was virginity. When Arianrhod came to court, Math stretched out his magic wand and asked her to step over it. Unfortunately, as Arianrhod did so, she gave birth to a child in full view of the court. Math's wand had the effect of accelerating his niece's secret pregnancy to full term, to her great embarrassment (since she was thought to be a virgin).
    We may each be glad that none of our secrets can be so exposed to public scrutiny. There is fortunately no Math's wand that can spill the beans to our embarrassment. But whatever faults we gloss over in the inner grove of our spiritual allies, there can be no concealment of our intentions and actions, however easily we deceive our fellow humans.
   Our allies do not throw such things in our faces, though; they do not rewind surveillance videotape to embarrass us. There is no judgment or condemnation from. Rather, like good friends, they suggest other ways of behaving that might serve us better; they stand by the truth which is the mirror of our soul and invite us to look within and change what we do not like. If we attend to them, they compassionately enable us to make manifest our true selves and our hidden intentions are aligned and balanced.

"What areas of your own hidden life would be revealed by Math's wand?"
[From: "The Celtic Spirit" by Caitlin Matthews]

National Self-Esteem

National Self-Esteem

"When a country is out of love with itself the whole of life conspires."

   When a people is out of touch with its nation, it is usually also out of touch with the mythic being and consciousness of its land. The self-esteem of any nation stems from the relationship of its group-soul to the soul of the land. Tradition, customs, and memory all play their part as touchstones and thresholds of meeting in this relationship. But when we no longer come to those thresholds, instead sealing ourselves off from the mythic meaning by engaging in shallow living, the group-soul no longer receives its nurture. When there is no meaningful correspondence between the land and its people, a strange and undefinable malaise springs up.
   When a land is out of love with itself, many people want to leave it and live elsewhere, sensing that something dynamic has gone out of the relationship. But, just as in marriage, the first signs of fracture require deeper attention and better communication, not just a parting of the ways. This is the time to remain and work hard at the brightening of the relationship between ourselves and the land.
    The contract of nationhood is not drafted in bigoted, nationalistic displays of patriotism; rather, it arises from the deep, mythic engagement of lives lived in the context of a land. This requires an ongoing communication with the archetypes and love affairs that preoccupy the spirit of the land. By becoming active lovers of our land ourselves, we learn to sense and see the things that injure our beloved's good, as well as perceiving the things that make it glad. When enough people engage in this way, the self-esteem of the nation will rise.

"Test the pulse of your own country's self-esteem by going to the threshold between nation and land in meditation. What is the nature of the contract between your people and its land?Where is it failing?"
[From: "The Celtic Spirit" by Caitlin Matthews]

Wanderers, Nomads and Outcasts

Wanderers, Nomads and Outcasts

"Alone in the greenwood must I roam,
Hollin, green hollin [holly],
A shade of green leaves is my home,
Birk [birch] and geen hollin."
   ___ "Green Hollin" anon. Scots ballad


   Among the Celtic people, young warriors were temporarily outcasts from their tribe as part of their rite of passage into adulthood, under the guardianship of elders and teachers. Some of out young people today purposely choose to enter a period of nomadism during which they can learn the freedoms and hardships, learn the self-sufficiency, practical wisdom and unfettered vision of the 'uncivilized.'
   The choice of the wanderer to live a nomadic and unsettled life is often bewildering to those who are settled. Before civilization, many lived in encampments, while others followed the movements of animals. Settled folk have often denounced nomads as low-class, uneducated, and suspect - easy scapegoats upon whom accusations of murder, theft, and black magic might be lodged.
  In our own era, we see new patterns of nomadism emerging as civilization begins to swell and become unwieldy. Those who no longer 'fit' either become exiled from settled existence as outcasts or choose to 'drop out'. The outcasts of civilization roam the streets in homeless vagrancy. Some have merely fallen through the cracks, others have chosen to scavenge the society in which they cannot succeed, and still others are natural nomads or solitary hermits who need a concrete wasteland or a natural wilderness to encompass them.
   We who are settled do well to consider the strengths of the nomad, to honor the wisdom and freedom of having no roots, to respect another way of living that we may one day need to learn.

"Monitor your own attitudes toward nomads and wanderers. What part of your own being and beliefs is nomadic in character?"
[From: "The Celtic Spirit" by Caitlin Matthews]

Authentic Spiritual Traditions

Authentic Spiritual Traditions

"The Druid system forbade learning from books.... and insisted
on oral and meditational communication with other people and
Nature,,, sustaining spiritual Tradition through individual relationship with the Infinite, rather then by ready-made recitations from previous people's findings."
   __W. G. Gray, "Patterns of Western Magic," in  R. J. Stewart's
   "Psychology and the Spiritual Traditions"


  Genuine, living spiritual traditions arise from our own life-context, not from our adoption of other people's experiences and teachings. This rather startling revelation is the received tradition of the Celtic realms and of traditional societies  worldwide that rely upon oral rather than written sources.
   Today, when so many people are seeking to appreciate their ancestral spirituality, there is a hunger for 'authentic sources.'  Unfortunately, many seekers gravitate to poorly researched or speculative commercial works that have no basis in any kind of practical spirituality.
   Our individual relationship with Spirit has to be personal and immediate for it to have authenticity. It cannot be gained by reading books. In every place, in every time, with every person, Spirit communicates in its own ways. Those who advance their spiritual lives by spending time in nature, in meditation, and in practice learn the eternal knowledge which is the heritage of mystics in every tradition. To simply make repetition or to blindly accept the findings of others, without personal perception and understanding, invalidates our spiritual path.
   The truly authentic spiritual tradition is the one we are actively practicing: while it may indeed correspond with that of many other people, there will always be features within it that arise unquietly from our own living context, which we know to be authentic to the very core.

"Recognize at least three principles discovered from your own life-context by which you spiritually steer."
[From: "The Celtic Spirit" by Caitlin Matthews]

The Song of Recovery

The Song of Recovery

"And there came three birds who began singing such a song that all the songs they had previously heard were without harmony compared to this."
  ___Branwen, Daughter of Llyr, from "The Mabinogion

  When the remnant of a British host returned from a disastrous war against  the Irish, bringing with them the remains of their great leader Bran, they   entered into the otherworldly sequestration. Rhiannon (Hree-ANN'on), the British goddess who eases the burdened soul, sent her three birds to sing their melodious song.
   This period of temporary forgetfulness of all that had passed was a wonderful recreation for Bran's followers after their dreadful defeat. Their leader was able to speak with them, easing their sense of loss and anxiety. They remained in the otherworld until one of the men opened a door that had been forbidden to them; when it opened, serial time began again for the survivors, and they continued their journey in full remembrance of all that had happened.
   The birds of Rhiannon still sing to us in times of loss, illness, or crisis, bringing their gifts of tears, forgetfulness, and laughter. These three gifts are central to any recovery or restoration. Tears help us discharge our pain and sorrow, so that there is room for healing to enter in. A period of forgetfulness or sleep enables the fraught soul to cease its mental turmoil and find rest. Without such a period of respite, the anguish could become overwhelming. The gift of joy and laughter reconnects us with the everyday world once again and is a real sign of life.
   The resumption of everyday life often seem to us as sudden as the opening of the door in the otherworldly island of Gwales. Time runs, life is lived, and past events take their place in the treasury of memory once again.

"Ask your spiritual allies to remove from memory some burden of your remembrance."
[From: "The Celtic Spirit" by Caitlin Matthews]

The Seasonal Thresholds

The Seasonal Thresholds

"This has been our way: Spring for plowing and for sowing; Summer for strengthening the crop;
Autumn for grain's ripeness and for reaping; Winter for consuming it goodness."
   ___ "Cath Maige Tuired," from Caitlin Matthews, "The Celtic Book of Days", (trans CM)

   The gifts of each season creates thresholds and doorways of opportunity for us as the year turns. The circuit of the earth about the sun is like the turas (TU'ras), or revolving walk of a pilgrim about a sacred site; at each point of the circumambulation, there arises a different symbology in the changing weather and in the correspondences of the growing world. As we become more sensitive to the annual turas of these changes, we can become attuned.
   When the first spring flowers emerge, the winter may still hold sway, but we sense the time of beginning; we struggle, like the young plants, to bring ourselves over the threshold of emergence. When summer's heat encourages us to leave off our warm clothing, we pass through the threshold of confidence and action. When autumn leaves drift from the trees, we look for the threshold of gathering. When winter fastens its grip on the world, we cross the threshold toward reflection and stillness.
    Through every station of the earth's revolution, we pass through a kaleidoscopic variety of moods, expectations, and opportunities. Everyone has preferred seasons, accepting their gifts with pleasure. Those seasons that we actively dislike may be offering us opportunities to come to terms with aspects of our own annual distress - with depression, impatience, anger or fear. If we can live each moment of the year as it is happening with attention to the seasonal thresholds and their gifts, we may discover a new resourcefulness that will enrich our lives with special joy.

"Consider the gifts and opportunities that you receive from each season."
[From: "The Celtic Spirit" by Caitlin Matthews]

Conversation

Conversation

"What is sweeter than mead? -- Intimate
conversation."
   "The Wooing of Ailbe"  early Irish story

  The kindling of mind upon mind, the flame of word upon word, is the essential fire that brings hearts gladly to the hearth of friendship. In the charmed circle of intimacy, friends lean together at nightfall. In our separate revolutions in time and space, we sometimes become like planets, solitary and aloof from all others, unable to bring ourselves into the fold of intimacy, able only to preach portentously from a high pulpit, uninitiated into the vulnerability of the truly human.
  But in our special relationships, we can enjoy a wonderful exchange when we take time to draw together, to share and to listen, to quicken to the ideas and viewpoints of another. In intimate conversation, our thoughts and opinions find a yoke-fellow who will help draw them nearer to manifestation. In deep converse, our uncertainties and anxieties can be uttered fearlessly, and just as trustfully received and allayed.
   An intimate friendship passes beyond the intimacy of lovers; the shared currency is not physically sexual, although it can prove just as intoxicating. As ideas cascade and themes are tracked to their very source, a heady ferment fills the cup of friendship. It is in the quiet times of intimate talk that we really come to know each other and realize how much we share.

"Make an opportunity in the next month to have a really good, deep and intimate conversation with a close friend."
[From: "The Celtic Spirit" by Caitlin Matthews]

Protecting the Boundaries

Protecting the Boundaries

"Cuchulainn's geasa were that no woman should leave his land without his knowing of it, that no birds should feed upon his land without leaving something for him; that no fish should leave his waters unless he had caught it; that no warrior from another tribe should be upon his land without his challenging them."
   ___"The Adventures of Nera," early Irish text (trans CM)

   The untranslatable Irish word geis (GEE-YES -- the plural form is geasa) means a binding obligation that has to be upheld at all costs; it is sometimes also used in the sense of 'taboo,' something forbidden. The concept of geis, in the ancient world was very much tied up with one's honor, and the obligations or prohibitions it entailed were often pronounced by seers directly after a child's birth or at her initiation into adulthood. We each have things we must observe and actively do, as well as things we must strictly avoid. Our geasa are our boundary protectors. If we observe them, they will ensure our own survival and integrity; they will keep us from harm.
    Our geasa increase or evolve as we ourselves grow. Self-chosen geasa - "I will always dye my hair red." or I will never eat meat" - are joined by geasa that are laid upon us - "My employer requires me to wear a black suit" or my religion enjoins me never to make war on others." These may be followed by stronger and more binding gesa - "I pledge to keep faith with my country" or "As an addict, I must never use alcohol."  Our identity, talents, and integrity all have their own special obligations and prohibitions.
   We do not choose all our geasa; those that are laid upon us are often highly inconvenient, restricting our freedom. Yet they protect us and remind us of the boundaries of our honor; and, as the contracts of life itself, they maintain the boundaries of the universe in a special way.

"What are the geasa of your life? What obligations are you bound to perform? What prohibitions must you observe in order to be safe?"
[From: "The Celtic Spirit" by Caitlin Matthews]

Cuttung Through the Celtic Twilight

Cutting Through the Celtic Twilight

"Facks are chiels that winna dig."
[Facts are things that cannot be]
   ___ Scots proverb

   The reappreciation of the Celtic tradition in the nineteenth century led to an overly romantic view known as the 'Celtic twilight.' Professor J.R.R. Tolkien once remarked that 'anything is possible in the fabulous Celtic twilight, which is not much a twilight of the gods as of the reason.'  It is a very dangerous place to inhabit, this twilight, as the poet W.B. Yeats discovered; he, who had himself been instrumental in the formation of that twilight, hit the hard iron of reality during the savage Irish civil war, writing in "The Stare's Nest by My Window":

"We had fed the heart on fantasies,

The heart's grown brutal from the fare,

More substance in our enmities

Than in our love."

   Many of the popular myths and fantasies that have been woven around the Celts - some self-fabricated - have been designed largely to mantle the unpalatable facts of conquest, colonization, and cultural diminishment. Romantic traditions are tales that both colonizers and the colonized spun after the event. The living transformative myths are those that speak to us in all eras and conditions. But the minute we listen to romantic traditions with their victimhood and inadequacy thinly veiled by bombast and boast, we mire in a quicksand that will suck us out of reality into a jealous cauldron where bitter nationalism and retributive terrorism can be brewed.

"Take a hard look at the romantic traditions concerning your own people. What enemies to the common good are lurking behind them?"

[From: "The Celtic Spirit" by Caitlin Matthews]

Homecoming

Homecoming

"Come you in and sit you down,
What you lost shall here be found.
Bowl and cup shall slake your lack,
Cast the bundle from your back.
No more wandering, no more war,
Come you in and close the door."
  ___Caitlin Matthews, "The Wanderer's Welcome Home"

   The annual sense of settling down to things as the year turns toward winter makes us appreciate our home at this time. Home supplies us with roots, it nourishes us and makes possible all that we do, holding and cradling us when our activities are concluded for the day.
   Yet there are many for whom the family house is no home: young people who yearn to fly the nest and who are dissatisfied with their parents' way of running things, for example, and relatives who have to live with their family as dependents because of age or infirmity. And there are many who are without a home of their own, who lodge uneasily in inconvenient apartments, in temporary accommodations, in dirty alleyways or on draughty doorsteps. For wanderers and travelers, the home is wherever they lay their heads.
   The home that lives in our hearts and mind forever calls out to us to come and be where we are most true to ourselves. It is a strong spiritual calling to our soul to inhabit our body in the fullest sense. When the spiritual concept of the soul's home and our desire for a place to live becomes confused, there is remarkable upheaval, even war.
   People move from one land to another, seeking a home of their own. When we acknowledge and welcome the soul within, we come home to truth: we can jettison the burden of expectation that we have been carrying this long while and, for the first time, come home, really home.

"What or where is home for you?"
[From: "The Celtic Spirit" by Caitlin Matthews]

The Blessing of Story

The Blessing of Story

"If poet's verses be but stories,
So are food and rainment stores;
So is all the world a story;
So is man of dust a story."
  __ "Amra Columcille," early text


    There are many traditional Celtic texts and stories that have their own blessing upon the reciter or listener. At the end of the Irish story called "The Fosterage in the House of the Two Pails", the reciter blesses the people about to embark on a long voyage with safety, those about to be wed with fertility, those about to open an ale-house with peaceful business, and kings who are threatened by destruction with a peaceful reign; if further promises to bless prisoners with freedom!
     Here we see the therapeutic blessing of story as a healing agent to certain conditions of life. The receipt of story by eyes or ears was regarded as a vital pathway of blessing, if the reader or listener were in a state of proper attention and respect. Those who merely siphoned the words off the page like a vacuum cleaner, those who sat inattentively, mentally wool-gathering, did not receive the blessing. Our own saturation with printed materials sometimes renders us insensible to the sacred blessing of story and its many gifts. That blessing flows past our eyes and ears without impact.
   But when we memorize a story, its blessing works at a deepest level within us. It is then that we enter fully into its workings; it is then that we become the story. When we become garments of story, we are able to clothe others with blessing.

"What is the story to which you turn again and again for nurture? What kind of blessing do you derive from it? How is that story akin to your own life? Write a blessing that seems to derive from this other readers or listeners to benefit from."
[From: "The Celtic Spirit" by Caitlin Matthews]

Fall

Fall

"Autumn is a good time for visiting;
During the short days there is work for all...
There are sweet acorns in the high woods,
Cornstalks are kind over the brown earth."
    ancient Irish poem of the seasons (trans CM)


   After the labor of the grain harvest, the people of the Celtic world looked forward to a more sociable time together, although they by no means stopped work.  Their autumnal time is full of the bustling preparation for winter, a task to which animals and birds still par serious heed. Without their intensive harvesting and harboring in the shorehouses of tree and earth, there would be little sustain life in a very few weeks.
    As the garden begins to look straggly and unkempt, the work is to uproot, to collect seeds from the clustering seed-heads, and to dig up the ground in preparation for the winter ahead. Autumn's many-colored intensity begins to deepen and wrap us round as this season makes its royal progress, shouts its long good-bye to the growing time. Trees lean together in more contemplative coteries, their summer dancing stilled until the strong winds begin, when their leaves will tear loose to be blown about in the world in wild jigs and solitary war dances.
   There are those who find autumn a time of melancholy, reflection, a reminder of death and decay; but the world is a wiser place if we attend closely to its turning. The cycle of our years is annually enriched by the lessons of the fall: as students return to school and college, as we can turn in this expansive tutorial of the year's new term in search of maturity, heath's sharing, and the work of our dedicated living.

"Take a walk where you can best appreciate the turning season. As you walk, commune with the spirits of the plants, trees, and animals that you encounter and learn from them the message of fall."
[From: "The Celtic Spirit" by Caitlin Matthews]

Healing the Violation of Theft

Healing the Violation of Theft

"The children of the wicked
In storm and in wind
Lie in the heather,
Their blood on the field,
Their shafts by their sides,
And their quivers full."
   __Scots Gaelic song (trans CM)

   In our society, theft, robbery, and burglary are very real threats, causing us to take many arcane precautions. Theft - even if it happens when we are out of the house - is a terrible violation of our space and causes great insecurity. The fact that someone has taken our things is almost swallowed up by the thought that a stranger has been in our space and touched our surroundings with his malice.
   It is clear that of thieves there will be no lack till the world's end. Whether theft arises as a result of envy, greed, or need, the one who suffers theft will be just as shocked and violated in the end. So how do we restore a sense of safety or security afterward?
   The healing of such violation as theft requires a ceremony that reconsecrates ourselves or our surroundings. Such a ceremony involves a statement of facts, an expression of anger or frustration at those facts, an actual and a symbolic cleansing of the violation, a reinstatement and marking of our own or our home's boundaries, and a reconsecration affirming our home's sacredness. All these aspects can help reweave the violation after theft.

"Create your own simple ceremony to reconsecrate your home, your car, or yourself after a robbery."
[From: "The Celtic Spirit" by Caitlin Matthews]

The Unquiet Mind

The Unquient Mind

"Oh the mind, mind has mountains, cliff of fall
Frightful, sheer no-man-fathomed. Hold them cheap may who ne'er hung there."
   ___Gerard Manley Hopkins, "No Worst, There is None"


   As social pressures to be all things to all people increase, so does the prevalence of mental illness. It has been customary to think of such illness as an unfortunate heredity problem suffered by others, but it becomes clearer every day that it common to all of us.
   Signs of mental disquiet are not usually apparent to others and do not impinge upon others' lives until the person's behavior is affected. Behavioral changes do not have to be labeled as madness to draw our attention, however. We may realize that our partner's failure to make good decisions results from his inability to shift his received expectations, for example, or that our friend's addictive behavior is based upon terrible insecurity. We may even notice signs of creeping paranoia in our own lives, a fear so great that we avoid any occasion to notice it, a truth so frightful that we spend our lives projecting it upon everyone but ourselves.
   The ability of soul-friends to recognize the early stages of such states of mind is often acuite. With our own friends, we can keep a watchful eye out for signs of disquiet, offering reality checks, asking questions and giving opportunities for help to be requested. It is not generally our place to treat the early signs of mental disquiet, but it is always our task to encourage, support and befriend in times of turmoil.

"What are your own current 'cliffs of fall'? How did you get there? What help is available (or could you seek ) to help you down?"
[From: "The Celtic Spirit" by Caitlin Matthews]

Ceremony

Ceremony

"How else but in custom and ceremony are innocence and beauty born?"
   ___ W. B. Yeats, "A Prayer for My Daughter"


   Ceremony enables transition. Rituals of initiation, such as baptism and graduation; seasonal rituals, rituals of prayer and remembrance; dedication rituals, such as marriage; protective rituals in which we invoke our guardian spirits - all these help create a sacred link between us and Spirit, conferring special grace. Ceremony does not have to be dramatic or wordy, and it need not involve a cast of thousands. The constituents of a ceremony are simple:
* The need or impulse for ritual
* Space and time dedicated to the ceremony
* The intentioned, sacred use of objects, elements, and expressive and apposite means of music/speech/silence/meditation
* A role for everyone participating, if appropriate
* A space of silence or emptiness in which divine interaction can happen
* A clear statement of the purpose at the beginning and a thank-you afterward
* A point at which celebrants remember and include the rest of the universe, especially those who share their needs.

  Ceremony can happen in any suitable place: our own home is our hearth and shrine, and as such is quite suitable for personal ceremonies. In times of transition, new ceremonies that meet the needs of a society are urgently needed, so that innocence and beauty - the currency of Spirit - can flow into our lives.

"Choose a real need in your life. Devise a short and simple ceremony that will address that need practically. (Examples of needs include beginning a new job, preparing for retirement, cleaning the home after a burglary, adjusting to children leaving home, and entering the hospital.)
[From: "The Celtic Spirit" by Caitlin Matthews]

The Tune of the Cosmic Dust

The Tune of the Cosmic Dust

"Human beings, vegetables, cosmic dust, we all dance to a mysterious tune, intoned in the distance by an invisible player."
   __ Albert Einstein, interview


   Those who, like Einstein, come daily into contact with the physical laws that order the universe cannot help but catch the strains of the great dance in which we are all whirling. Whether it be in the intricacy of cellular formation, or in the flow of currents, or in the vast patterning of the stellar orbits that illuminate the heavens, scientists are privileged to see into the structure of that dance.
    The inapprehensible motion of life escapes our daily awareness, as does the tune of the cosmic dust that orders us all in one great dance of life. We do not hear it playing until we come to a point where our ordinary and subtle senses are aligned together. Then we come into harmony and awareness of both worlds at once, the apparent and the unseen worlds in conscious communion within us. These privileged moments cannot be sought; they come unbidden, surprising us into mystical vision. It may be that when we interrupt a walk on a high place at evening to admire the view, we apprehend the revolution of the earth as a physical motion beneath our feet; it may be that we become aware of a rhythm that weaves about the steady beating of our own heart, as if it were a partner in the dance.
   The resonances to which we respond and the relationship between ourselves and the music of life give us the only clues available about the nature of the invisible partner - clues reassuring enough that we can trust the source of our music.

"Attune to the cosmic tune and rhythm of life; stand and dance."
]From: "The Celtic Spirit" by Caitlin Matthews]

(the image above is The Fox Fur Nebula

The Service of Beauty

The Service of Beauty

"The concern of the Primary Imagination, its only concern, is with sacred beings and sacred events. The sacred is that to which it is obliged to respond; the profane is that to which it cannot respond and therefore does not know."
   ___ W. H. Auden, "The Dyer's Hand"


    We each have an instinct that informs us when something is aesthetically pleasing; we are aware of the interplay of order, balance, and harmony. When a house or an object is ill-conceived, when a garment or a plan does not sit well, we have a strong sense of physical discomfort or agitation.
   The 'primary imagination' reveals to us the hidden beauty and order of the universe, giving us a sense of the sacred. Unfortunately, our society now seems to foster a stronger instinct to acclaim the profane, to deviate from the sacred simplicity of harmony and beauty as a 'fashion statement.'
   The difference between sacred and profane is this: the sacred includes all that can be conceived of in the history of existence, while the profane excludes everything except what serves our present craving. The profane can be easily spotted because it lacks beauty and harmony. The primary imagination will not dance to the profane: it is a servant only of the sacred.
   The sacred is often narrowly defined as pertaining only to religious institutions, but the service of the primary imagination runs in every aspect of our lives. We ourselves are not exempt from the service of beauty. The way we furnish our homes, the objects we buy, the kinds of theories we buy into - all these are subject to this sacred service.

Look around your home with the eye of the primary imagination. What grates upon your sense of harmony and beauty? How can your home better reflect the service of beauty?"
[From: "The Celtic Spirit" by Caitlin Matthews]

Kinship of Nature

Kinship of Nature

"One touch of nature makes the whole world kin."   ___William Shakespeare, "As You Like It"

  As we walk through the countryside at this time of year, it is easy to feel our symbiotic connection with nature. The rich profusion of colors and the abundant seeding and fruiting of the land in preparation for autumn all beckon us into a wider family circle. We return home after such a walk, perhaps to the city, brimming with a sense of belonging, but this feeling fades sooner or later as we are immersed once more in the daily running of our lives.
  We place reminders of nature's beauty about our home. Driven by recognition that our kinship with nature is slipping, we surround ourselves with 'natural' or 'organic' things. While such things may remind us of our wider relationship, they do not truly connect us, since kinship must pass beyond strictly visual reminders if it is to be authentic.
   It is in the touch of nature that connection is most strongly made, for it is at the most physical levels that recognition of kinship is triggered. We engage with our kindred when we are in physical contact: whether we tend our garden, groom our dog, or receive the kiss of rain upon our skin. These moments of precious contact are opportunities for loving thankfulness, in recognition of the fact that we are wholly akin to a greater family. When we live our lives open to such moments, we enter a wider embrace that includes us all.

"What relationships do you have with your natural kin, apart from other human beings? What trees, animals, rocks and places call out to you as kindred? Become more aware of these precious kindred and the way in which you yourself are included in the relationship."
[From: "The Celtic Spirit" by Caitlin Matthews]

Landmarks

Landmarks

"We can have inherited no single syllable from the names given by Paleolithic hunters, but never since their day have our landmarks been without them, without some sound to enrich and confirm their personality."
     ___ Jacquetta Hawkes, "A Land"

   The abiding landmarks of our country have personality, quality, and emotive properties. Landmarks - features of the and that speak to us of the ancient sculpting of the earth in distant eras - recall the coming of humankind, who raised and shaped the land in new ways; and they embody the myths, deeds, and actions that have happened there.
   The process of naming places in the land began in ancestral eras too distant to imagine, but we can guess that our ancestors, like us, saw the broad outlines of gigantic figures - the jut of a giant's knee, the rocky profile of a noble face, the upturned breasts of a goddess, the vast cauldron of a river-filled canyon or valley.
   Every natural landmark is redolent of the myths and legends of the land. Even in seemingly featureless places, those stories still run like veins of golden song beneath the sleeping earth. The utterance of the landmark's name can be a magical evocation of its stories and remembrances.

"Recall the features of the landscape around your own home. What would they be like without manmade structures upon them? What stories, traditions, and songs abide in your land? If your land was once occupied by other peoples, what was its name in that time, and how does it preserve that meaning?
   When you next walk in your locality, be sensitive to the spirit of the place. Name the area; get to know it; let its story be told again."
[From: "The Celtic Spirit" by Caitlin Matthews]

September

Month of September - benign are the planets;
Tending to please, the sea and the hamlet;
Common it is for steeds and men to be fatigued."
      ___ anon. Welsh poem

The month of September sees the fruit and berry harvest, and the turning of the trees to their many
colors. The meditation themes for this month include appreciating the harvest, home, wandering,
belongi9ng, boundaries, nationhood, music, beauty, and ceremony.