Fall

Fall

"Autumn is a good time for visiting;
During its 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.  This autumnal time is full of the bustling preparation for winter, a task to which animals and birds still pay serious heed. Without their intensive harvesting and harboring in the storehouses of tree and earth, there would be little to 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 goodby 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 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, so we can turn to this expansive tutorial of the year's new term in search of maturity, heart'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 our 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 of 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 restatement 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 Unquiet Mind

"Oh, the mind, mind has mountains, cliffs of fall
Frightful, sheer, no-man-fathomed. Hold them cheap may who ne'er hung there."
    ____Gerard Marley 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 is 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 acute. 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]

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 that 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 gives 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]

Apprehending the Possible

Appending the Possible

"If you escape the narrowness of dimensions

and create a space for all things

to become what they desire to be

you will see the time which is placeless

you will hear what has never been heard

and you will see what has never been seen."

   ___ Dei Hughes, "The Rose and the Atom"

     One of the disciplines used by bardic schools was to enclose the student poet in a darkened room, there to pursue a set subject through the spirals of a metaphor until a poem resulted. This custom was the last remnant of druidic meditational practice, whereby darkness became the womb of light.

     In our own spiritual practice, there must be some similar way of creating space, of allowing the unseen to be perceptible, of putting our little world into the context of the greater universe. Whatever method of meditation we employ, the results of our contemplative experience cannot be compared or shared with anyone else's. When we have stretched time, defied the boundaries of space, walked where the planet was fashioned, and heard the song the sirens sang, then have we passed beyond the limitations of everyday speech and understanding.

     We become part of the larger universe as we allow our fixed grasp to loosen. The power of imagining the possible is great, but how much greater the power of perceiving the possible unfolding in its own myriad, unimagined way! The space where this can happen exists within and around each one of us each time we enter into the discipline of spiritual attention.

"Sitting in the darkness and silence, be attentive to the mystery of the universe rather than to yourself.  Record your findings in words, music, or pictures."

[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 the 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 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 land 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, 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 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, belonging,

boundaries, nationhood, music, beauty and ceremony.