Quizes
Current Favorite Card
Perceptiveness, Oracular powers, Awareness, and Trust.
The Song of the Singer of Intuition carries all of the information there is. Some people believe that this information, often called the akashic records, is like a great filing cabinet or library in the sky that we have to go to in order to get information intuitively or psychically. We needn’t go anywhere. The Song is sung within our blood and flesh and bones just as it is within the rest of the universe.
If, at humanity’s present stage of evolution, we consciously heard the song in all its fullness, we would be overwhelmed, our minds burned out by that energy. A kindly universe has led us to a place in our development where we can consciously hear only bits of the melody. Usually we must develop skill in actively listening for it, but occasionally a few notes resonate so closely with our own being that we become aware of them. These involuntary experiences are what we call hunches or intuition or extended sense perceptions.
We can improve our reception of the song by learning to be very still and to listen in a special way. What we get for practicing stillness (through meditation) and listening (just ask and then listen) is the ability to understand and interpret metasymbols, the symbolism beyond the material symbols of oracles and omens themselves. Stars, omens, portents, movement of stars and mice—these are all part of one piece, the one song, and therefore a part of us as we are of them. Understanding any of the singers truly is just a matter of learning to be still, to ask, and to listen.
Someday, as we evolve and grow, we will be able to hear more and more of this song and to base our actions and choices on greater knowledge. Patience and practice are the keys to all of the subtle clear senses—clairaudience (clear hearing), clairvoyance (clear seeing), clairsentience (clear knowing), telepathy (hearing each other without words), precognition (knowing before, glimpses of a probable future). ~~ Jessica Macbeth
When we travel through the darkness, inner or outer,
We learn the strengths of the Dark Lady.
The Dark Lady is the high priestess of the Mysteries. She understands how to surrender to divine power, to Unity. She had the profound, intuitive knowledge that is only to be found by looking deeply into our own beings and natures. We find her through meditation, in sleep, and within inner peace, ecstasy, and total despair.
She is the guardian of beings unborn, of unconscious ideas, and of seeds sprouting in the dark, cold earth, tender and fragile and as yet unready to face the bright sun and the winds of spring. She holds the embryonic hopes we have not yet realized we have.
The Dark Lady is the mistress of spiritual ritual. The purpose of a ritual is not the power it allegedly has over gods or spirits or faeries, but the very real power it may have over us, putting us into a state of consciousness where we may better connect to our own magic and to otherworld beings. The Dark Lady understands that ritual is something we surrender to and we allow it to enfold us, rather than something we do or control.
When we have been through a living cycle—birth and growth with the Maiden, nurturing and fulfillment with the Bright Mother, releasing and letting go with the Lady of the Harvest---it is the Dark Lady who passes with us through the night of endings and death, whether of the body or of the soul or simply of something passing through our lives. It is she who holds and guides us as we reconceive ourselves and prepare to be born anew. In as simple an act as breathing, we see all four of them—inhaling with the Maiden, the moment of fullness with the Bright Mother, exhaling with the Lady of the Harvest, and the moment of empty, waiting stillness with the Dark Lady.
She is there in our very last moments of deepest grief, helping us to more forward to the stillness and peace of the place beyond grief. Our sorrows are transformed with her. She teaches us surrender, walking with us through the valley of the darkest shadow. She is there as we experience the ecstasy of release. Then she guides us back to this reality, renewed and illuminated. From her come those spiritual awakenings that seem to blossom within us out of nowhere. ~~jessica mcbeth
The Soul Shrinker
Cruelty, Malice, Gossip, Curses, Destruction, Blessing
The distasteful task of the Soul Shrinker is to observe what we say to and about others, especially the mean, nasty, and unnecessarily critical things. By observing our behavior this way, he reflects it back to us, making us more aware of it. This is a bodhisattva (a spiritual being devoted to helping to bring about the enlightenment of all) type job, and it requires great compassion, understanding, and forgiveness if the Soul Shrinker himself is not to be dragged down to our level. If we are just inwardly spluttering, looking for words, he may even suggest to us the words that express our feelings and energy. Then it is our choice—our test—whether or not we say them.
There are two important things about malicious gossip, unnecessary criticism, verbal cruelty, sarcasm, and “scoring off†of others. One is that it demeans the speaker, makes him less, makes his aura darker, and encourages the behavior as a habit, continually eroding the brightness and potential goodness of the speaker. The other important thing is that this is a way that we actually curse others.
Even if the recipient doesn’t hear the actual words of the blessing or curse, even if the words are not spoken aloud, they are carried as discordant notes through the song of the universe, Ekstasis, to the recipient. Fortunately, that is not all there is to it or such behavior would be unforgivably wicked—not that it isn’t pretty nearly that anyway. We all have a choice about whether we accept curses or blessings.
If we choose not to accept it, then all of the energy boomerangs back to the sender, who then gets a well-deserved double dose of it.
Once, long ago, the Soul Shrinker was very beautiful, but listening to and witnessing all of this human ugliness has rubbed off on his appearance, like that of a lovely frog in a polluted pool with skin raw and forming hideous growths. His heart is compassionate and anguished; his heartfelt wish is that we learn “right speech†and “right thought.†Every wicked thing a human says makes the Soul Shrinker uglier. Every time a human learns the lesson, the Soul Shrinker becomes a bit less ugly. As you can see, humanity as a whole has a lot of work to do. ~~jessica mcbeth
Gloominous Doom
Self-pity, Self-defeat, Self-destruction, and taking care of ourselves.
Self pity is the first step on the slippery, seductive slide toward self-destruction. Much of what the Soul Shrinker has to say applies to Gloominous Doom, so PLEASE read about the Soul Shrinker first. It may seem odd to have such a seemingly lightweight Challenger as Gloominous Doom right next to the Soul Shrinker, but they are the closest of cousins. The Soul Shrinker observes the way we curse others, through energy and attitude, Gloominous Doom observes the way we curse ourselves.
In a way, though, that part of ourselves that he witnesses is worse than what the Soul Shrinker sees. When we curse others through sending the energy of malice and ill will toward them, they may reject our sendings. However, when we curse ourselves through self-pity and self-destructive attitudes, there is little, if any, resistance, and the curse takes immediate effect—and continues to act until we change our attitudes.
It’s interesting, isn’t it, how we can see at once that the Soul Shrinker is ugly, but Gloominous Doom has a certain charm, a kind of weird attractiveness. We feel sorry for him! He looks so pitiful. And there is another side of him that others see, Gloominous Doom is underrated as a helper. He can be there for you when no one else wants to know. The sate of self-pity, when all seems terrible, and the whole world is against you, is an important part of the process. We all get down sometimes. Yu could say that we even need it to compare with when we feel good.
“Gloominous Doom is ready and willing to help us explore just how awful it all feels, just how bad it is, and how hard done by we feel—and what has made us feel like that in the first place. It is very important to really get to know these feelings—or how can you possibly let them go if you don’t properly know them in the first place? Our feelings need to be fully acknowledged and understood, or we just tuck them away and hide them from sight—until they appear again, maybe in a different guise.
“Gloominous Doom helps us properly explore our gloomy feelings of doom so that we can be done with them. It is a very important job.â€
The ultimate test here, of course, is to take responsibility for ourselves and our attitudes and to choose a path that is life-affirming, not life-denying. The sorrier we feel for ourselves, the worse our life becomes. Reread that last sentence, please! It is not the other way around. Self-pity makes things worse, and we have a choice, one we have every moment, as to whether we want to make our lives better or worse. And only we can choose that for ourselves.. ~jessica mcbeth
Ritual
I cast the circle-hedge between the worlds;
Be thou the girdle of the Goddess
And a protection against all ill-wights
Holy Hexefus
Hallow this hedge in Dame Holda’s name!
Throgh the World-Hedge Hexe-Power flows hither;
Dame Holda, Veiled Huntress, Grant me hale might.
Wise Woden, Father of the Runes and Wild Host,
Waken the Adder of Wisdom within me.
With the Wand Gambanteinn,
By the Hidden Mother and the Hooded God,
Seith-fire I kindle,
Woodwose-ecstasy I invoke!
Hypster