Newsletters

From Imelda Almqvist's School of Sacred Art & Seiðr (Old Norse Traditions)

Please note that I have not (yet) worked out how to create an automatic subscribe pop-up, meaning I add people manually.

If you want to subscribe, drop me a message titled "Newsletter" on imeldadotalmqvist@gmaildotcom - thanks!


Writing these newsletters takes one full working day! 

They are substantial and intended as a very personal offering for the people who choose to subscribe. I keep them pure and free of affiliate links and/or other promotions or advertisements (with the exception of events I myself participate in!)

I sometimes invite other people to write a guest contribution to give my readers access to a wider range of perspectives and expertise.

New courses and announcements generally appear in my newsletter several weeks before I manage to list them on my website. (I need to do better, I know...)

Up to now the links for my newsletters did not appear on my website - but here they are, just scroll down!

I also invite you to connect with me on Twitter  (https://twitter.com/ImeldaAlmqvist) and 

FACEBOOK         

 

 

 

 International Teacher, Author, Painter and Forest Witch in Europe and Globally

 THE MAGIC FLUTE, 1 MARCH 2021

Yesterday morning I was sitting on our London doorstep to enjoy the Sun on my face and have a 'Vitamin D bath' (waiting for someone to collect a painting - safe handover obviously, in the open air by our garden gate!) In other newsletters I have written about synaesthesia: a perceptual phenomenon in which stimulation of one sensory or cognitive pathway leads to involuntary experiences in a second sensory or cognitive pathway. In plain English this means for instance  'seeing music as colors', experiencing the seven days of the week as different smells, or perceiving architecture (e.g. St Paul's Cathedral and/or the City of London) as a symphony (many instruments playing, all at the same time!)

Closing my eyes to absorb the sunshine, London had turned into a piece of music swelling around me. Every Londoner was one note in the music - including every Londoner who had died of Covid-19. The music most resembled a requiem but was a bit more hopeful and uplifting than a dirge or lament. It honored the dead - and preserved their voices and dreams - but woven into that, as a counterpoint to the orchestral overture, was a melody of wild hope, birdsong, new beginnings (played by a flute). - Going on the music, a change is in the air! 

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 International Teacher, Author, Painter and Forest Witch in Europe and Globally

 HEALING THE WITCH WOUND 17 JANUARY 2021

The cultures of Old (pre-Christian) Europe viewed the period of Twelve Nights or Twelvetide as a time of danger. The Old Year was dying and there was a time of risk and reversal (even chaos) before the New Year arrived and solidified. In most countries this period ends with Epiphany (Trettondagen Jul in Swedish, literally the thirteenth day of Christmas) but Sweden adds another event to this calendar: Tjugondagen Knut, the 20th day, the Day of the Knot

The knot that holds the universe together was untied (briefly), so the Wild Hunt could ride and clear the ethers, the energetic realm that surrounds Earth. This brings both chaos (a dissolving of old structures or ideas we took for granted, also a temporary thinning of the Veil between worlds) and fertility: new ideas, new paradigms, and of course babies, a new generation of souls arriving on our planet!  After the Pregnant Hag secures the knot again, a Void Space on the calendar occurs. She disappears for a time to her chtonic realm deep in the Earth (her Cave-Tomb-Womb) only to reappear as a spring maiden. In Scandinavia there is no variant of the Celtic Imbolc - it is so much further North, the land is still under snow and ice during February!

The knot that holds the universe together was untied (briefly), so the Wild Hunt could ride and clear the ethers, the energetic realm that surrounds Earth. This brings both chaos (a dissolving of old structures or ideas we took for granted, also a temporary thinning of the Veil between worlds) and fertility: new ideas, new paradigms, and of course babies, a new generation of souls arriving on our planet!  After the Pregnant Hag secures the knot again, a Void Space on the calendar occurs. She disappears for a time to her chtonic realm deep in the Earth (her Cave-Tomb-Womb) only to reappear as a spring maiden. In Scandinavia there is no variant of the Celtic Imbolc - it is so much further North, the land is still under snow and ice during February!

READ MORE

International Teacher, Author, Painter and Forest Witch in Europe and Globally

 THE PEOPLE OF ONE FIRE - January 2021

The year 2021 is here and, here in the UK, it has kicked off with a third national Lockdown. One thing is very clear: we cannot travel outside our local area right now - but most days I see that as a great opportunity for soul travel!  Today is Epiphany. On the calendar of Old Europe this was the feast day of Germanic goddess Perchta or Berchta. Her Italian name is Befana and she is often depicted as a witch. Perchta means Bright One and she has some formidable 'sisters', such as the Slavic Baba Yaga and Finnish Louhi (ruling over the Northern realm of Pohjola).

Having stepped away from my Christian upbringing decades ago, on Epiphany I now honor the Great Goddess (who represents the cycles of Life and Death on Earth) in her manifestation of the Pregnant Hag (and in-dwelling spirit of the Hagal Rune). On Epiphany she appears as the cackling (and rather frightening) witch who inspects distaffs and spinning tools (as they are connected to the precious Thread of Life and fate of human beings!) but then returns to her chthonic realm to re-birth herself. She is closely connected to the Earth in her seasons and reasons. Her great secret is... that she is pregnant! She knows the secret of re-birthing herself... and of Death birthing new beginnings.

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 ALL OF YOU - November 2020

I observe with sadness how our world is becoming more polarized and divided by the day. I so wish that all of us could use our imagination more skillfully (and consciously) to keep our overall focus on sacred unity and commonality, on the fact that we are all members of The Human Family, (introduced in more detail in a FREE recent webinar titled Medicine of Our Imagination). We humans are only a sub-species of a much larger family system including countless other species: The Earth Family. We all belong. We all have our place on this planet.

I do understand and acknowledge that polariZation acts in service to greater understanding and to human consciousness evolving. Like all things "under the Sun" it is sacred. It delineates issues, so we can see them more clearly. It simplifies them, so we can we can engage with them, start grappling and wrestling with them. As a painter I see this very clearly, it is a matter of drawing contours! It creates distinct entities and so aids understanding. This is ultimately an optical illusion, which dissolves when our perception shifts to another level.

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 THE MEDICINE OF OUR IMAGINATION

We are all born with the gift of the human imagination, but most of us do not harness this gift. The default setting for many people is to use the muscle that is their imagination in a rather mindless way.
 
Jack D. Forbes, author of Columbus and Other Cannibals, wrote: “It is always very difficult to live in this life so as not to be a damaged person or one who damages others”. This is one of Life’s greatest ontological dilemmas (the other one is that “other life forms must die If I am to eat”). Without harnessing and honing our imagination, we stand little chance of not living as a damaged person who damages others.
 
The human imagination gives rise to the most beautiful man-made structures and creations on Earth: architecture, literature, theatre, music, art, humanitarian initiatives, moon landings and space exploration, mythology, science – they all require a large dose of imagination. We are all surrounded by the results of the imagination of our peers and ancestors. Without imagination there is no compassion, no moral compass and no progress.

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International Teacher, Author, Painter and Forest Witch in Europe and Globally

OF RADICAL LOVE AND THE UNFORGIVEN

(When Forgiveness alone is not enough...)

For all of my adult life I have made Forgiveness a spiritual practice for all the usual reasons: closing a chapter in my life and being able to move on, putting down an emotional burden, releasing the other person too (no matter if they apologized or not). However, recently I was told, in no uncertain terms, to move way beyond that. The Voice of Spirit said: you must get to a place of actively (radically!) loving every person who every hurt or harmed you! I must have looked a bit nonplussed so they elaborated: on a Divine level, or the level of soul if you prefer, every single person who ever caused you pain, ultimately acted in service to the journey of your soul evolving. You would not be the person you are today, without those acts (or spectacular failures to act when action was called for) and processing their impact on you. Therefore, these people are now part of you! If you are to love yourself fully and unconditionally, you must love (deeply, madly, radically) every single person who shaped your life, in this way.  And the poetic irony is: it is only by loving them unconditionally, wholeheartedly, that you will ever be 100% free! You must own and embrace them, to set yourself free! Forgiveness IS NOT ENOUGH!   

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 International Teacher, Author, Painter and Forest Witch in Europe and Globally

Meet The Pregnant Hag

 I will admit that I sailed through all of Lockdown with resistance to the notion of taking more of my work on-line. I consider myself an in-person teacher and I am passionate about the power held in groups of skilled and highly focused people. I also am the luckiest teacher alive because I have the most talented and committed students any teacher could hope to have! BUT right now continuing to work with my students on all continents means offering webinars. I was forced to 'step up' in terms of tech skills, but thankfully I received help with that, from Valarie Budayr!

FREE WEBINAR
 
I am going to mark the Opening Day with a FREE webinar, at 7 pm local UK time, BST) and some 'Eager Eagle students' advised me that this webinar can only be  dedicated to the Pregnant Hag. Who is She? What teachings will she offer? So the title of this webinar is: Meet the Pregnant Hag! 

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May Collective Grief Make Healers Of Us All!

There is a spiritual teaching in Chinese medicine, (also found in plant spirit medicine), that grief is held in the lungs. Since an air-borne pandemic changed the world and all of us, I have been pondering a link between world events and unhealed personal and ancestral grief. One urgent question then is:

Can (personal and collective) grief make healers of all of us?

Until today people celebrate by building bonfires ("to stop witches from flying off to Blåkulla in Sweden or Mount Brocken in Germany"). I have long felt that there is a long-forgotten but very suspect connection to the burning of witches in the witch trial period. I got talking to some of my students (on my Sweden program) about this topic and they had arrived at the same conclusion. I decided to find a guest article I wrote for my publisher in 2017 (which got dropped off their website along with  much other content due to a 2019 overhaul and 'new look'). I found the feature in my archives and posted it on my own website so people can find it again. I felt very good to "bring my ancestral witches home" (and thank you Sandra Price for giving me a timely nudge!)

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The Unknown as a Mistress of Initiation

I would like to clarify something, related to this blog and global issue. I have seen heavy criticism directed at "spiritual people"  who claim that "This pandemic is a wonderful healing opportunity". Those people feel, with justification, that:

A) The level of deaths, suffering and loss is almost beyond human comprehension
B) Humans (almost) never learn from their mistakes, so of course there won't be any paradigm shift or better world post corona virus

The fact that a crisis contains a seed for Transformation and Lasting Change does not, necessarily, mean that the human race will this accept this invitation and embrace those changes. In my personal perspective we are all living on a precipice right now. There is no "completely fated future we cannot change", just as the future is not completely open or unwritten either (we people alive today and our ancestors have already made may choices which shape the fabric of reality today - and will continue to do so for a long time to come). This is why, collectively, we have a huge responsibility in terms of the choices we  now make, moving forward. The opportunity for healing and a more enlightened world is there - but the opportunity for (even) more destructive choices and attracting cataclysms is there in equal measure!

 

Sacrifice Means Making Sacred

This morning my husband brought me a cup of tea in bed and said: "There is nowhere I'd rather be than right here!"

He intended that, I am pretty sure, as a personal statement of gratitude and appreciation, but (me being me!) I heard his words on a more cosmic level. If we can accept that life serves up personalised lessons and ordeals and that the only way out of those is right through, then any spiritual practice narrows and simplifies to his statement: "There is no where I'd rather be than here! I am in the right place, with the right people and circumstances. And if it is my time to leave this planet today, I can do so with acceptance, dignity and grace knowing that my ancestors will organise a 'welcome home party' for me. Every death in this world is a birth back into the spirit world and the ancestors celebrate our arrival there, (which is how I often perceive this process when I work with people who are close to death). I am (or can be if I so choose) at home, wherever I am, wherever my life, my soul, the Norns (Norse 'Fates'), take me. And if I am displaced right now, I can perhaps focus on being medicine for the place I am grounded in"  (but I will admit that I remain deeply thankful that I did not become an involuntary resident of the US recently, under 'house arrest' for weeks or even months. That in itself would be an interesting experience, but being on a different continent from my children at this time is not my first choice!)                                           READ

The Pregnant Hag 2020 March Newsletter

March 1st is here (well, will be tomorrow!) Did you know that Bulgaria has a special goddess for this day? She is called Baba Marta or Grandmother Marta.  People wear small wrist bands,  and they also make yarn dolls or tassels from entwined red and white threads. In the colours red and white, Life meets Death, Blood meets Bone (or perhaps semen). Those Martenitsas are worn until either a stork or a blossoming tree are spotted, as they symbolise the arrival of spring, warmer weather (and often) happier healthier people. People exchange the following greeting: "Happy Baba Marta"! and the Martenitsas are hung in a tree. It must be quite a sight to see trees everywhere festooned in Martenitsas!

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The Return of Ritual and Ceremony 2020 January Newsletter

Today (the day this newsletter goes out) is a key day because there is a Penumbral (partial) Lunar Eclipse, of the Wolf Moon, and it coincides (or prepares the way for) the Day of the Knot (Knut's Day) in Scandinavia. I wrote a blog especially for this occasion, to raise collective awareness about both the Opportunity and Risk inherent in that (flips sides of the same coin!) and astrologer Susan Rossi wrote a guest contribution explaining the astrological configuration in detail. Here is the link:

TJUGONDAG KNUT - WHEN THE CRONE TIES THE COSMIC KNOT!

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 Twelve Nights - Reversal and Danger 2019 December Newsletter

"My American colleague Susan Rossi and I were teaching The Wild Hunt in the US just recently. We were fortunate to have a beautiful and powerful group of people who embraced this work on a very deep level. Susan brought a marvellous collection of (what I like calling) her Kitchen Witch items to this course (ranging from Coyote bones, herbs and poison plants to Moon Potions and Thunder Water). The students loved "running wild with this" and for me it reinforced my dream of being a full time Forest Witch! I have now discovered that the crucial missing tool in my kit is a cat syringe!!"

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 Apprentice of the Winter Goddess 2019 November Newsletter

In my previous newsletter I wrote about Autumn having arrived in the Northern Hemisphere, of Persephone preparing to descend to the Great Below, and of "dreaming grief dreams every night. As the trees prepare to drop their leaves, I am (apparently) working on releasing dreams, memories, illusions, old paradigms and old pain in the dream state."

Every loss, every disappointment, every illusion shattered is a small death. In embracing those small deaths, perhaps running towards them and surrendering to the process of free fall, something is worked deeply within me and the hour of my physical death holds less fear. Every such successful "escape" is actually an opportunity lost:. However, now I am discovering that we all do this. Within myself I observe a desire to run from pain and loss. This is the human condition.  READ

 

 As the Winter Goddess approaches, holding her bow and  icy arrows, hungry wolves yapping and howling at her heels, I become her apprentice. In Celtic cosmology she is the Cailleach, in Neolithic Scandinavia this Ancient Being was Omma, the “Kælling”/“Kärring” (The Old Woman) or Beinakarling (The Bone Woman). A younger  (Viking era) version is the goddess Skaði.

 

 The Goddess of Equinoxes, September 2019 

Here in the Northern Hemisphere Autumn is upon us and I am dreaming grief dreams every night. As the trees prepare to drop their leaves, I am (apparently) working on releasing dreams, memories, illusions, old paradigms and old pain in the dream state. My youngest son cheerfully reminded me a few days ago that "In exactly three years time I will have no more children living at home". In recent dreams my three children are babies again, riding on my hip, their legs gloriously fat, their kisses gloriously sloppy. In other dreams I live the choices I did not make in technicolour: I study medicine or become a full-time cellist, I stepped out the front door one minute earlier and another life unfolded as I met different people and ended up living in different locations.

Within myself I observe a desire to run from pain and loss. This is the human condition, we all do this. However, now I am discovering that every such successful "escape" is actually an opportunity lost: every loss, every disappointment, every illusion shattered is a small death. In embracing those small deaths, perhaps running towards them and surrendering to the process of free fall, something is worked deeply within me and the hour of my physical death holds less fear.

Another painful dimension of this same process is unlearning: as my understanding of this Great Mystery called Life  continues to evolve, so many of the things my own teachers taught me, so many things I used to perceive as rock solid components of my life, are crumbling and resonate no longer. Once again this is a process of free fall - of letting go and not knowing where I might land. But dive I must!      

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 Shamanic teacher, painter and author in the UK and the world

 Ancestral Wisdom Teachings, July 2019

Tradition is not the worship of ashes, but the preservation of fire
 

A symphony must be like the world. It must contain everything.
- Gustav Mahler, composer

I have some Dutch students at the moment and for me this has, gently but certainly, encouraged me to look closer at the pre-Christian heritage of the Low Lands, my place of birth. I am currently working with both the Frisian runes and pagan deities that were honoured in the Low Lands. I cannot do the work of immersing myself in Old Norse material without committing to the labour of love of mapping (and ultimately reviving in some way!) the soul landscape of the place that birthed  me in this lifetime. More about that in the future - and expressions of interest (and any contributions of valuable snippets) are always welcome!

READ

 

 Ice Age Shaman, TV program

The next episode going out on The Smithsonian Channel is ‘Ice Age Shaman’ on Tuesday 18th of June at 8 p.m. (British Summer Time).

In this episode of the Mystic Britain series I am the shamanic practitioner who models a Stone Age antlered head dress from a museum in York - and takes presenter Clive on a time travel adventure to the Stone Age, to see if he can experience shamanism in the Mesolithic Period through the process of direct revelation. (Not easy when several cameras are trained on you and you are trying something for the first time!)

Life is never dull in our house!! My children were hiding upstairs when the film crew was here, for fear of "accidentally appearing on TV"!   

Read

 

 Mind The Gap! June 2019

My colleague and dear friend Michael Stone invited me as a guest on his show recently.  The topic for our dialogue was: "Inner Work Is Activism Too"

The demon we really need to wrestle with (as Jacob did in the Bible) is not the serial killer or mass murderer (those are best left to law enforcement and the FBI) but the toxic belief that there are "two kinds of people"; good people and bad people, superior races and inferior races, people like me and people different from me: "US and Them". That way of thinking has caused some of the greatest atrocities in human history. Unless we police our own consciousness and activate our Inner FBI (as it were), all of carry within us the seeds of such things occurring again.
- Imelda Almqvist in her upcoming third book: Medicine of the Imagination: Dwelling in Possibility (comes out in 2020)

 As our conversation unfolded and people from all over the world listened in and participated, Michael said something profound: "If something is not working or hurting in your life - YOU MUST LOVE IT!" He explained that we spend a lot of time engaged in negative self-talk. We have laundry list of things we don't like about ourselves. We have the idea that we will love ourselves more if only we lose weight, find the perfect romantic partner, change jobs. learn a foreign language - and so forth. In this way we create splits or gaps within ourselves. This is also how the (so called) "Shadow" is created in the human psyche: from an early age we receive messages about which aspects of us are acceptable (hopefully even adorable!) and which aspects are "awful" and better hidden from view. So we end up living from only a very limited (and heavily edited) version of ourselves. A lot of our personal power is lost  (locked away) along the way and along with it is our innate sense of wholeness, of knowing that we are loveable and divine in origin. To heal that rift within ourselves, Michael suggest we wrap love around ALL that we are...                                 Read


 Where Shamanism Meets Art, March 2019

For most of world history all art was sacred art!

Creative blocks do not exist, or rather need not exist, working the spirit-led way

Your own life is the greatest piece of art you will ever make!
 

Art does not reproduce the visible; rather, it makes visible.

- Paul Klee  (1879–1940), Swiss painter, The Inward Vision (1959)

 Please share my moment of great excitement! Today is the formal date of publication for my second book: SACRED ART: A Hollow Bone for Spirit (Where Art Meets Shamanism).  It can now be ordered from all quality bookstores - or online. 

MARCH 2019 NEWSLETTER


 

 Wild Wolves - Feral Children - Evolving Humans

I am in awe of Imelda Almqvist’s work. Imelda is listed on www.shamanicteachers.com. Imelda is making a powerful contribution to our global community through her books and workshops. Her work with children is phenomenal and is getting huge global attention.
--Sandra Ingerman in her Transmutation News for February 2019

One big event here this month was filming an episode for The Smithsonian Channel about the Mesolithic site Star Carr in Yorkshire and circumpolar deer shamanism. To my very great surprise and delight, the producers of this upcoming TV series titled Mystic Britain walked through my door with a deer headdress from the Stone Age. The archeologists and anthropologists at the museum in Yorkshire had agreed to allow some items to travel to London "on loan", for me to talk about on TV. I was speechless: "Am I allowed to touch them?!" - "Not only that, we want you to model them and give us a reading now how Stone Age shamans might have used them in their ceremonies and rituals!"  I have never had the ambitions (or looks) to be a model but this is the kind of modelling I dream of doing! Imagine placing a Stone Age antlered headdress made from a deer skull on your head!!

FEBRUARY 2019 NEWSLETTER

 

Shamanic teacher, painter and author in the UK and the world

 Mother Christmas, Winter Solstice 2018

What I find an astounding piece of intelligence (found in circumpolar tribes all over Northern Europe as well as Siberia and Mongolia) is that an ancient deity called The Reindeer Mother was said to carry the Sun in her antlers. The reindeer is the only deer species where the females are bigger than the males and they retain their antlers in winter. On the night of the Winter Solstice The Reindeer Mother flies up in the sky. It is likely that she set the blueprint for our “Coca Cola version of Father Christmas flying around in a sleigh pulled by reindeer”. She was Mother Christmas! (Reindeer love eating fly agaric mushrooms, the red ones with the white dots. Reindeer herders are said to collect and drink their urine, as a safe way of ingesting the holy mushrooms and achieving altered states of consciousness). - I honour The Great Deer Mother especially on Mothers’ Night (or Modraniht - see my blog!) and ask if I may accompany her on her journey to retrieve and return the sun! I much prefer this magical mystical experience to listening to Jingle Bells in shops filled with unneeded plastic tat!

WINTER SOLSTICE 2018 NEWSLETTER

Shamanic teacher, painter and author in the UK and the world

 Winter Nights December 2018

December is here and we are entering a period called Winter Nights in the Northern European Tradition, vetrnætr in Old Norse. In medieval Scandinavia vetrnætr referred to "the three days which begin the winter season". 

Þá skyldi blóta í móti vetri til árs, en at miðjum vetri blóta til gróðrar, hit þriðja at sumri, þat var sigrblót.

Extract: Autumn 2018 has brought some fascinating dialogues with students. Some people from the Netherlands (also Germany and Belgium) have flown in for my courses and that has opened a dialogue about roots, ancestors and honouring heritage. The following question was asked: could you imagine ever teaching in The Netherlands? Is there is region-specific material in the Northern European Tradition, meaning Germanic and Frisian material indigenous to the Netherlands and immediate surroundings? Will you ever teach indigenous shamanic material in the Netherlands, in the Dutch language? - These are the kinds of questions that knock me for six. Like any human being I like my comfort zone! I am well-versed in the Scandinavian material and I read a lot in Scandinavian languages as research for my courses and future books. I left The Netherlands nearly 30 years ago - but my fatherland and mother tongue have not left me... . It is now conceivable that one day I will act on this and put the material together in workshop form. 

DECEMBER 2018 NEWSLETTER


 Shamanic teacher, painter and author in the UK and the world

 Initiation Means Beginning, October 2018

The word Unknown contains the word "now"
- Words spirit gave me for a sacred art student recently

When falling, dive...
- Old saying

Extract: I cannot host experiences of initiation for others without constantly moving through initiations myself. Those journeys into the Unknown (being fully present to the Now) are often exhilarating, at times devastating and always (ultimately) liberating. I once posted the question on a global shamanic teacher group I belong to: do we shamanic teachers have the obligation to initiate our students? - My own answer will always be yes. If that puts you off - please choose a teacher who operates more within your comfort zone (but you are likely to learn considerably less!)

OCTOBER 2018 NEWSLETTER


 The Witches of Pendle Hill, July 2018

“All witches [völur] are descended from Widening Wolf 
All transsexual sorcerers [Seiðberendr] from the Tree of Intent 
All sorcerers [Seiðmennir] from Black Head”
-Maria Kvilhaug, Hyndluljóð, st. Poetic Edda 

There was an interesting development this week: an idea was floated on Facebook (by two of my  students: Katharine Lucy Haworth and Lyn Hill) that rather than only teaching my more innovative and exciting courses at Pendle Hill Quaker Retreat Centre just outside Philadelphia in the US - perhaps I need to made a pilgrimage to "the real Pendle Hill" (we will read this as "the original Pendle Hill" to avoid upset on the other side of the pond!)  in Yorkshire UK and teach a course there that honours the memories of the witches of the area (executed during the witch trials).

(UK) Pendle Hill is notorious for being a place where twelve accused witches lived in the 17th century. These twelve witches were accused of murdering ten people. They figured prominently in what is known as The Lancashire Witch Trials. One of the twelve accused Lancashire witches died during the trials. Ten were found guilty and executed by hanging and only one was found not guilty. The history of the witch trials has given the place an eerie atmosphere. A Bronze Age burial site has been discovered at the hill’s summit. 

JULY 2018 NEWSLETTER

 Moving Around The Wheel, May 2018

Extract: Once upon a time there was no division between astronomy and astrology, between chemistry and alchemy, between mathematics and numerology or sacred geometry. That division was imposed much later on in the history of western culture. I have sometimes wondered how it could be that an astrology chart is such an unique "cosmogram" - just thinking of how many people are born literally every moment, globally speaking. The issue is that only one person can be born at one specific place (point) on earth at one time. Even twins arrive with a time interval dividing them - meaning a slightly different chart. When a caesarian section is performed, they are lifted out one at a time - again with a small time lapse dividing them - meaning differences in their charts.

Guest article by astrologer Susan Rossi:

...I have described a few of the key movements you can see present in your chart, even if you know NOTHING about astrology!  There are, of course, many other movements and elements present that add clarity and depth.  However, even with no training, you can look at your map and sense what it shows you about the movement and focus present in the cosmic energies when you entered the world.  Your chart is a map, but how you travel it is the creation story of your life...

MAY 2018 NEWSLETTER


 The Holy Grail, April 2018

Are you willing to be a crucible for change and transmutation in our world?!

Extract: Over the centuries many scholars and mystics have arrived at different definitions of what the Holy Grail is or was. For me personally the crucial question is: What is the Holy Grail to you?!

For me, first and last, the Grail is a CRUCIBLE –  a sacred container for transformation and transmutation – the big question is: are we willing to make ourselves a crucible (sacred chalice or Holy Grail)?!

For much of 2016 and 2017 I was working intensely with a mysterious figure who called herself The Poison Mother.  She came to me in Sweden and became one of my key allies over time. Click on the picture to the left to see the art video!

APRIL 2018 NEWSLETTER

 True North, March 2018

Extract: One issue that came up in our "Soul" group was the question of black magic and all things dark. Some people translate the word "seidr" as "sorcery". I do not agree with that translation as I feel the original meaning relates to both the old customs (sed in contemporary Swedish)  and spinning the lines of Destiny (here think of the figure of the V?lva or Völva and the Norns).

I look around me today and it is very clear to me that for all of us to truly and effectively counter the shadows being enacted on the world stage - we can no longer study spiritual material without studying its darker applications and manifestations. Not to practice it, NO!! - But to understand its workings and deepest recesses -  in order top formulate an adequate response to it.

If we do not personally and collectively embrace the need to do this much-needed shadow work, it seems possible that our shadow taking physical manifestations (in corrupt politicians or even terrorists and so forth) will decide the future of The Human Family on Earth. That cannot be right -  let's wake up, step into our power and dream (co-create) a different outcome together!! 

MARCH 2018 NEWSLETTER

 

 The Super Blue Blood Moon, January 2018

When I was asked to be a presenter on Year of Ceremony with Sounds True I had no idea that their team would assign me a very special moon indeed:  the Full Moon of January 2018 is the Super Blue Blood Moon and there is also a total lunar eclipse!
 
The name Blue Moon refers to the second full moon in a calendar month. That happens every two and a half years, hence the saying "once in a blue moon". February 2018 will  be a calendar month without a full moon!  With Earth in between the Sun and the Moon, sunlight has to pass through the Earth's atmosphere, which scatters the green to violet light more than it scatters the red light. So the Moon appears red - a blood moon. NASA came up with the name The Super Blue Blood Moon!

Things get even better: these two celestial events, the blue moon and the super moon, will also coincide with a total lunar eclipse!  The last time all three events lined up this perfectly was more than 150 years ago. According to the Canon of Lunar Eclipses, the last time humans saw a total eclipse of a blue moon was 31 March 1866"...

JANUARY 2018 NEWSLETTER


 

Extract: For me personally most things start and end with dreams. I had a powerful dream in Sweden about a Swan Maiden and her infant son which I could not immediately place. Some research took me to nearby Denmark:

In 1975 a Mesolithic era cemetery was discovered in the town of Vedbaek in Denmark, just north of Copenhagen. The body of a young woman (aged about 18) was found with the body of a premature baby boy. It is presumed that she and her son died in childbirth. The baby was cradled in a whooper swan wing and he had a flint knife by his side. His mother had grave goods with her, such as ornaments made from shells and the teeth of animals such as bear, deer, elk and boar. Both bodies had been sprinkled with red ochre. It is believed that the swan’s wing indicates an ancient belief in swans as soul conductors or psychopomps, accompanying people on their transition to the Otherworld.

Archaeoastronomy studies how people in the past have interpreted phenomena they observed in the night sky. It is of interest to mention here that there is a related field called ethnoastronomy and this studies the astronomy of indigenous or tribal peoples. (and how their perception relates to their cosmology and mythology)  For me these two fields have become a passion in recent years

The Winter Street (Vintergatan in Swedish) or Milky Way was sometimes called Vroneldestraet (the street or highway of Frau Holle) in Middle Dutch because there are so many powerful myths connected to this celestial road or river. In earlier pagan times in Europe  it was believed that this time of year (days darkening and Winter approaching) the souls of the unquiet dead roamed our world and that a  great goddess or god (depending on location and tribe) roamed both land and sky with a troupe of otherworldly followers. For the Germanic tribes this was Frau Holle, for the Scandinavian peoples it was Odin and the Celtic peoples worked with  the Morrighan, Lugh, the Bone Mother and the Tuatha dé Danann 

In July 2016 I wrote that I was a woman on a mission. This has not changed! Exactly one year later I remain dedicated to the vision of young people voices and visions being heard in discussions and decisions about global resources and the future of our planet!

The Shift Network has invited me  to appear on this year's Shamanism Global Summit again