Contemplative Inquiry

January 10, 2013

NOTE AND SONG

I have continued to experiment with the forms of contemplative prayer and mantra work I use in connection to my Ceile De paidirean. Having worked some time now with the heart prayer, I have started to engage with other expressions of this tradition. These are drawn from the wider range of Ceile De fuinn (chants).

My overall morning practice is customarily held within a circle cast in “the Sacred Grove of Sophia, the luminous spirit of wisdom”. I have found a fonn (chant) for my walking meditation that links back, for me, to her. The words are:

Gun tigeadh solas nan solas air mo chridhe; gun tigeadh ais an spiorad air mo chridhe

Goon tee-guch solus nan solus air mo chree; goon tee-guch aysh an speer-utch air mo chridhe

Come light of lights to my heart; come wisdom of spirit to my heart

When I use this fonn (chant) in walking meditation, I use Sireadh Thall (Sheer-ich Hall) as a mantra, for periods of time, when sitting. It means “seek beyond” and according to the Ceile De, Sireadh Thall is “one of the many poetic names for the Great Goddess of the Gael, Brighide or Bridget”. She has sometimes been called the northern Sophia (as in Caitlin Matthews’ book, ‘Sophia’). Sireadh Thall, as a divine name, gives me a sense of the Goddess pointing beyond herself to a place where names, forms and images of the divine dissolve.

Gun tigeadh solas nan solas air mo chridhe; gun tigeadh ais an spiorad air mo chridhe is the fifth fonn on the first Ceile De fonn CD. Sireadh Thall is the tenth. I find this latter especially moving. For me it is presented here in a perfect weaving of voices. There is no soloist, yet the loss of any one voice – each with its unique integrity – would diminish the piece. So collectively this fonn gives voice to the Oran Mor, the great song of what is.

In working with different fuinn in this way, I can listen in to them, feel them, taste them – their resonance, their energy, and their inspiration. I get closer to finding my note within that song.

(Sireadh Thall can be accessed and downloaded on http://www.ceilede.co.uk/company/the-fonn.)

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January 4, 2013

PAIDIREAN (PAHJ-URINN) II

I started wearing my Paidirean – the Ceile De prayer beads – for my morning practice on 19 December. In the Ceile De Order they are used in conjunction with what in this tradition is called the Heart Prayer:

A Thighearna … Solus an domhain … Chriost mo chridhe … dean trocair oirnn

Ah hee-earn-ah … Solus on dowain … Chree-ost mo chree … Jaun trok-ir orn

O Lord … Light of the world … Christ my heart … show mercy/compassion/grace

I don’t follow the practice as prescribed, but I notice that I soon started saying this prayer aloud (having listened carefully to the Ceile De CD) when doing walking meditation – initially drawn in by the sound of the old language. In walking meditation I am mindful to each footfall and so in working the Heart Prayer I have become mindful to each footfall and a syllable of the Heart Prayer as well (except of course when I am not). As time has gone on I have increased the use of the prayer, sometimes said aloud, sometimes not. I intersperse this with times of complete silence within as well as without to make the practice more spacious. Likewise in sitting meditation, essentially a plain breath meditation, I have introduced the key phrase “Chriost mo chridhe”, as an intermittent mantra within the practice. These words in particular anchor in my sense that ‘Christ’ stands for an interior awakening rather than an external or historical being.

Why has this prayer become resonant to me? I am reminded again of the summer of 2007. At midsummer I went to Melrose and had the experiences I described in my previous blog post. On a weekend late in July I was scheduled to go to a conference with my partner Elaine. The plan involved getting from Bristol, where I lived, to Stroud, where she lived. But we were cut off from each other by floods: roads closed, railway in chaos. So we both stayed put. I was following the OBOD Ovate course at the time and decided to have a day of ritual derived from the course followed by a day of reflection and recovery. The main result of all this, the one image that fully imprinted itself and which I took away, was that of a dove feather falling gently down beside me It felt initiatic and it gave me my felt sense of connection with Sophia the Holy Wisdom. It changed the course of my work. My centre of gravity had shifted and I realised that I had quite a bit of work to do to make this breakthrough good. How was I going to use the altered state of the ritual experience to create a more lasting change? Although not fully recognized at the time, this was the beginning of my ‘contemplative’ turn.

Sophia brings a gnostic understanding to Christ consciousness, awakening the practitioner to a non-dual awareness where knower, known and knowledge, lover, love and beloved, are one. Except that this last sentence is also a formula of sorts and formulas – even if authentic messages from those who have gone before us – are necessarily suspect. This, at least, is what I take away from the gnostic Gospel of Thomas:

“Jesus said to his followers, ‘compare me to something and tell me what I am like. Simon Peter said to him, ‘you are like a just messenger’. Matthew said to him, ‘you are like a wise philosopher’. Thomas said to him, ‘Teacher my mouth is utterly unable to say what you are like’. Jesus said, ‘I am not your Teacher. Because you have drunk, you have been intoxicated from the bubbling spring that I have measured out.’ Two followers have personal and cultural presuppositions so strong that their availability for direct experience is compromised. Only one is sufficiently open and unknowing to make the connection and the shift that goes with it.

Thich Nhat Hanh puts it another way. “In Buddhist circles, we are careful to avoid getting stuck in concepts, even concepts like ‘Buddhism’ and ‘Buddha’. If you think of the Buddha as someone separate from the rest of the world, you will never recognize a Buddha even if you see him on the street. That is why one Zen Master said to his student, ‘When you meet the Buddha, kill him’. He meant that the student should kill the Buddha-concept in order for him to experience the real Buddha directly.” (From Living Buddha, Living Christ.)

Following my experience in late July 2007, I wrote a blackberry Lughnasadh verse for my wheel of the year tree poem.

I am Blackberry

The bramble and the fruit and the wine

And the spirit.

Intoxication as from a bubbling spring,

Freely measured out.

It alluded to the words in St. Thomas and reflected my realization, such as it was. It was not particularly mature or fully integrated, but it did push me into seeking and developing a more rigorous and systematic personal practice. My hope is that the new shift inspired by the paidirean will deepen and extend it.

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December 30, 2012

PAIDIREAN (PAHJ-URINN)

The Paidirean are the prayer beads of the Ceile De. Some believe that they have a Druid origin. They have always been part of the Ceile De tradition are known to have been used in the days of Columcille (St. Columba).

I got mine from the Ceile De shop a little before Christmas. There are 150 beads, each about 5 mm wide. They are made of unstained rosewood and were left immersed in rose damask oil for a month. As well as scenting the beads, the oil gives the beads a pinkish colour. An equal armed and circled silver cross hangs from the beads – at heart level when worn as a necklace. This form of cross – Celtic, Gnostic and universal – is an ancient symbol, found in pre-Christian and Christian carvings, and sacred to many people from many cultures.

Each Paidirean is ceremonially strung in Scotland by a Ceile De Order member. The process takes two hours and involves prayer, meditation and continuous chanting during the stringing. Then a blessing is spoken over the completed Paidirean which is anointed with water and with oil from a local holy well, used for at least 1500 years. Sister Fionn strung my Paidirean. Many blessings to you, Sister Fionn, at the turning of the year.

The Paidirean is an object of power as well as beauty. I wear it as a necklace when practicing, as well as an OBOD Awen necklace which ends just below the throat. Wearing the two feels like a kind of completion, and I am reminded of a visit I made to Scotland at Midsummer 2007. I was in Melrose in the Scottish border region, an area with strong family connections. And I seemed to be in business with three locations. One was the semi-ruined Abbey, and in particular its orchard and garden. One was the Eildon Hills, looming up into low clouds. One was a path by the River Tweed.

I was wondering where I felt most spiritually attuned and where I wanted to spend most of my time. In its gardens the Abbey felt like a place of peace and tradition, though clearly also compromised by conflicts between nations and orthodoxies. The hollow hills of Thomas the Rhymer fame held challenge, glamour – the heroic spirituality of the vision quest in its local form. But I turned to the river, and had a small epiphany whilst contemplating a wild rose on the riverbanks. And I later wrote this verse, which became part of a longer poem.

I am Rose. I am wild Rose.

I am Rose at Midsummer.

The river flows by me.

Fragile, I shiver in the wind.

And I am the heart’s core, mover of mountains.

In a sense, that experience, and the verse that recorded it, established the direction for my subsequent spiritual life and practice. The Paidirean sets the seal on it.

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December 22, 2012

THE TURNING OF THE YEAR

I’ve experienced the turning of the year through small yet telling events. Yesterday I got up very early, by ‘mistake’. Awake, hearing traffic, misreading a number on a digital watch, I thought it was 5 a.m. when it was actually 3. I decided to get up any way and do my practice.

What was on offer, when I got to the lights out and sitting part of the work, was an especially strong felt sense of being born in the dark, of an ever-waking-now experience held by the nurture of the night. And my switching on of a lamp, when coming out of this experience, seemed like a natural next step. I could look at the world around me with fresh eyes, with energized attention, with a sense of a blessed awareness.

Later in the day I stood at the Severn Estuary. I experienced the wider world as latency rather than stasis. I was in a watery place at a watery time. There were currents flowing in both directions. The sky above was cloudy and grey, yet looking back to the ridge that I’d come from, I could see clear blue. There weren’t many people around. The energy of the environment seemed to have elements of stillness, of waiting and of gathering. For the first time in this season, I began to feel an onward pull, away from the still point of the turn, and on to what might be emerging.

In the evening I drew a DruidCraft Tarot card – a single card, to reflect the moment. I got the 3 of Wands. A young man looks to the horizon and a possible journey (or a possible visit). He seems at ease and is companionably holding a tree. His three wands have been planted nearby and are beginning to blossom. The path to (or from) an unseen destination (or point of departure) is clearly laid out as far as can be seen. He clearly has a certain confidence, and something to work with. And I thought: “OK”.

Finally, I remembered a poem by William Anderson in his ‘Green Man – the Archetype of our Oneness of the Earth’, a book from the beginning of the 90’s. The poem has 13 verses, each covering a four week period, each connected with an Ogam tree, and I’ve always run the first verse from 22 December to 18 January. By the time I went to bed yesterday I felt ready for that verse. So during this new period I’ll be conscious of:

“Like antlers, like veins of the brain the birches

Mark patterns of mind on the red winter sky:

‘I am thought of all plants,’ says the Green Man,

‘I am thought of all plants,’ says he.”

I wonder what these lines may inspire over the next few weeks. And for now – Season’s Greetings to everyone and warmest wishes for the coming year.

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December 11, 2012

DARKNESS

In her recent book ‘The Wakeful World: Animism, mind and the Self in Nature’, Emma Restall Orr writes:

“At its most fundamental, nature is darkness. Nature’s primary state is darkness. In stillness, formless, in the darkness, nature is whole. Yet, nature is minded: it exists within a wakefulness of its own being. Aware of itself, nature turns within itself in reflection. The essential movement of nature is the breath of existence, the sacred wind of being.

“… Each moment of interaction within the darkness of nature creates a pattern, a spirit fleetingly finding form, flashing momentarily into being before dissolving back into the whole – except where interactions repeat, allowing a pattern to persist, the spirit lingering in its ethereal form.”

The writing is part of a complex revisioning of animism as a possible philosophical basis for a modern life practice – spiritual, cultural, ethical, political, personal. As such it seems to me to be an important original contribution to Druidic thought as it moves and develops through time.

What specifically touches me as a meditator is a recognition of how my experience, when practicing, seems to resonate with the above passages. I tend now to sit in complete darkness with eyes open, and this sitting usually happens somewhere between 5.30 and 6.30 a.m. At this time of year, it’s mostly pretty dark. I generally experience myself as sitting within darkness as a nurturing potential. Sometimes I am alert and mindful, sometimes not. And I come back to this darkness.

At one level this can be an in-the-moment, ‘power of now’ kind of experience. But the feeling-tone of the experience is influenced by the repetition of the practice over time, by the liturgy that structures it, and the darkness that surrounds and contains it. They help to create a pattern of contemplative experiencing, shaping an extended field of awareness. They support ‘me’ in awakening to/in the world and relationship(s) with/within it. Meditation can seem solitary and in a way it is. Yet for me it brings relationship (the kind that the Vietnamese Buddhist teacher Thich Nhat Hanh calls ‘interbeing’) into fuller life.

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December 11, 2012

ANOTHER POEM

Here is another take on the divine child theme – this time by Nuinn (Ross Nichols), who led OBOD in its 1964-75 manifestation. Ross’ poem is called ‘The Coming Child’.

We have created a web of flesh and blood

A fish in our river, a frog in our shallows;

And he shall be a beast of promise and a springing grain.

Shedding the child is an act of plenty

The womb full-eared, the excess of the year

And its coming again.

He came in a tent, he

Paddled in a boat, he

Went to the weir.

Who is he that came in a tent

And was known in the waters of the firmament?

Even he, the web of blood and flesh,

The small thing nestled in red,

Floating in the water of motherhead

In a bag of skin.

The beast shall leap aloud and shout

From rock to rock;

And this new grain shall be in ear

Before twelve year.

What is the sign that this shall be?

For life and death fall fatally.

The waters of the weir are dammed

But the falls flow on;

The sun dies and is eaten of Set

But there is a new sun.

The river cannot stop nor for long be stayed,

And its mighty fall

Is the descending of the milk of life,

Birth and succour of all.

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December 5, 2012

HE WILL COME LIKE LAST LEAF’S FALL

Karen Webb posted this in ‘Contemplative Druidry’. It seemed like a natural contribution for passing on.

“This poem moved me to tears. We rarely speak of the Midwinter Born Child, though he or she appears in so many myths. Christianity is but one of those storylines. This is from Rowan Williams, a true Bard if ever I met one. And something to contemplate…

“He will come like last leaf’s fall.
One night when the November wind
has flayed the trees to bone, and earth

“wakes choking on the mould,
the soft shroud’s folding.

“He will come like the frost.
One morning when the shrinking earth
opens on mist, to find itself
arrested in the net
of alien, sword-set beauty.

“He will come like dark.
One evening when the bursting red
December sun draws up the sheet
and penny-masks its eye to yield
the star-snowed fields of sky.

“He will come, will come,
will come like crying in the night,
like blood, like breaking,
as the earth writhes to toss him free.
He will come like child.”

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December 1, 2012

DIVINE REMEMBERING

I was moved yesterday by a post made by Rosamonde Ikshvaku Miller to her Gnostic Sanctuary group.

“God manifesting in any type of flesh suffers from amnesia, but only God can remember God. The human mind only deals with symbols and those may lead to remembrance. We think it is us, but it is the awakened God spark in us that may awaken and “remember” through an act of anamnesis (although somewhat different from Plato’s definition of the word). That spark doesn’t care what names we give that knowledge (gnosis) and what hair-splitting distinctions we use. There is chaos and confusion outside and stillness and clarity in the central aperture of the “eye.” What are we listening to? The outer, with its words and erudition may give us tools of communication with which we may illustrate what we try to convey or distract us, so we forget and continue going in circles chasing our tails.”

In a way this reads rather dryly, and I even had to check Wikipedia for the different meanings of anamnesis*. Yet I was affected almost to the point of overwhelm, before moving into a calmer period with an undertow of ecstasy. The triggers were the words about forgetting, remembering and the awakened spark (in me). I was beyond belief and skepticism alike. Just very at home. And I sat with it, this morning, in the nurturing dark. And I seemed to experience a new centre of gravity, in my sitting. Words are tricky, as the piece above makes clear. Yet, for me, they can and do matter – when they truly evoke something that is ready to be called.

*Plato says that in the shock of birth, the soul forgets its previous incarnations and everything it has learned. Anamnesis is the recovery of knowledge. In Christian traditions, including Gnostic ones, anamnesis is the memorial aspect of the Eucharist, and of the passion, resurrection and ascension of Christ.

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November 7, 2012

DEVOTIONAL PRACTICE

I’ve never really thought of my spiritual practice as devotional. Most devotional practice concerns relationship with deity or deities who are perceived – or at least talked about – in terms of self-conscious, independent being. The most widely used practice is petitionary prayer. I have never sat easily with this, though I know it works for many other practitioners. One of the earliest self-directing steps I took in my OBOD path, 19 years ago, was to change the beginning of the Druid prayer when using it by myself. Instead of ‘Grant O Go/dess thy protection’, I said ‘I seek, within Spirit, protection’.

Although ‘my’ (?) spirituality – even in its most withdrawn and solitary moments – is in many ways all about I-Thou relationship of various kinds, relationship with separated deity/deities has not been my way of expressing it. I do have a relationship with the Holy Wisdom, who is more and greater than I am, but I do not experience ‘her’ as separate. That’s complicated, and I can’t say what’s “really” going on there (to the extent that “really” might be a useful word).

So my devotion has to be different. And the difference goes beyond a shift from petitionary prayer to contemplative prayer or other forms of deity yoga that practitioners use to deepen a relationship with the divine, take on the presence and energy of the divine, become possessed by the divine, or enter fully into Godhead. I am deeply moved by the stories (when shared) of people who go down these paths, whilst finding that I am on a different one.

So – at this stage of my journey – I am grateful to Sally Kempton and her Meditation for the love of it: enjoying your own deepest experience. I’ve been in dialogue with this book for well over a year now, because I’ve drawn on its teaching and practice without exactly agreeing with the first of following the second. But she has influenced both. She calls her path a “devotional and contemplative tantra” – a “fusion of knowing and loving” that inspires her to meditate. She says:

The way is tantric through recognizing “the world and ourselves as a tapestry woven of one single intelligent energy”.

It is devotional because “it cultivates a loving attention to ourselves and the world”. It is contemplative because it asks us “to turn into and rest in the interior spaciousness where we know the self as pure transcendent awareness”.

I’m still in dialogue. I’m not sure I’d express myself 100% in the same way. But I find here – as in the case of Taoism understanding and practice – a view from another tradition which is close to that of my ever evolving Druidry. In particular “loving attention to myself and the world” (especially other beings who are close to me) seems like a good way for me to reclaim the word “devotional” and see myself as both devotional and contemplative in my practice.

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September 23, 2012

CORLAN HAFREN: ENCLOSING THE SEVERN

A plan to build an 11-mile long barrage across the Severn estuary has been given a boost after David Cameron asked ministers to look at it. The scheme, according to its champion Peter Hain, would be financed to the tune of £30 billion by ‘sovereign wealth funds’ (state investors largely based in Kuwait and Qatar). It promises to generate 5% of the UK’s electricity and create 10,000 jobs. It would be expected to be operational for more than 120 years. All the UK government has to do is signal its support in principle, provide authorization in the form of a ‘Hybrid’ Parliamentary bill, and stabilize the electricity price for 25-30 years. Possible extra income from a road or rail link across the barrage from Lavernock Point near Cardiff across to Brean Down (fans of Dion Fortune beware) near Weston-super-Mare in Somerset would not be highlighted to investors at this stage. Corlan Hafren (Welsh for Severn Pen or Enclosure), the consortium of engineering and construction companies behind the proposal, wants to sell the plan on the strength of its electricity generating capacity alone.

My personal gut response (without trying to get grown up and political) is grief for the Severn Bore, which would pass into memory with the implementation of this scheme. It is one of Britain’s few truly spectacular phenomena. It’s large surge wave can be seen in the Severn estuary, whose tidal range is the second highest in the world – up to 50 feet (15.4 metres). The shape of the estuary is such that water is funnelled into a narrowing channel as the tide rises, forming the large wave. The river’s course takes it past Avonmouth where it is approximately 5 miles wide, though Lydney and Sharpness where it is approximately 1 mile wide, and eventually to Minsterworth where it is less than a hundred yards across, maintaining this width all the way to Gloucester.

Minsterworth itself is a special place for me, an ideal spot for what I call ‘soft’ contemplation – contemplation as gentle reverie. The churchyard, very close to the river, is the home of a ‘veteran’ yew (500-1200 years old). A church of some kind has been on the site since at least 1030. There are remains of landing stages from a time of commercial fruit growing. It is a peaceful setting, enlivened at both the Spring and Autumn Equinox periods by the appearance of the Bore, now often witnessed by enthusiastic crowds as the wave sweeps past, sometimes bearing surfers and canoeists, temporarily reversing the course of the river. If the Barrier scheme goes through, we will lose the Severn Bore. If it doesn’t go through, we will likely use the yews, the church and the churchyard. Much of the Severn’s intertidal area (the area that is above water at low tide and underwater at high tide and famous for its diverse bird life) will disappear over the coming decades whether it goes through or not.

Whatever happens, the world will not stand still. As we pass beyond the Equinoctial moment into the darker half of the year, I’m feeling uncertainty and disequilibrium. I’m feeling that the ground is disappearing beneath my feet, that the same things will not come reassuringly back year after year. So for me right now, contemplation is about living the point of tension I’m experiencing. And it also raises issues about how best contemplation and action belong together and sustain each other.

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