Lake Isle - A Poem

The Lake Isle of Innisfree by William Butler Yeats

I am sharing poems that I remember from my childhood...

I will arise and go now, and go to Innisfree,

And a small cabin build there, of clay and wattles made;

Nine bean-rows will I have there, a hive for the honey-bee,

And live alone in the bee-loud glade.

And I shall have some peace there, for peace comes dropping slow,

Dropping from the veils of the morning to where the cricket sings;

There midnight’s all a glimmer, and noon a purple glow,

And evening full of the linnet’s wings.

I will arise and go now, for always night and day

I hear lake water lapping with low sounds by the shore;

While I stand on the roadway, or on the pavements grey,

I hear it in the deep heart’s core.

Healing & wellbeing with Tarot

Since the dawn of recorded history, healing has been considered a magical art. Healing was a secret  known by shamans, medicine women and men, priestesses and priests, and the wise people whose knowledge was handed down the generations. Many people went on pilgrimages and learnt about the plants that grew by the wayside, how to cure a fever, attend to cuts, blisters, etc., and how to care for the animals that accompanied them on their journey. We know from ancient texts that the Egyptians knew many remedies for illnesses. Originally Egypt was called the Land of Khem, because they knew how to create and use chemicals. To gain more knowledge about their use, the alchemists of the Middle Ages were prepared to risk their own lives. 

Today, we know a great deal about health care; we are told daily to cut salt, sugar and fat from our diet, take exercise, avoid over indulgence in alcohol, and long term stresses. Regular daily mindfulness and meditation are shown to provide increased concentration and greater relaxation. They can also help to deal with the difficulties that present themselves to us through bereavement, disappointments, poor health and relationship breakdowns. 

Origin of divination cards

The origin of playing cards goes back more than a thousand years to ancient China. They were carried by traders and travellers, soldiers and pilgrims through Mongolia to the Middle East and then into Europe. Cards provided games of chance, skill and entertainment and they developed as they passed from one hand to another. The casting of lots with sticks, bones and dice was common throughout many cultures and cards became yet another way to give advice.

Playing cards with 4 suits and including court cards in each suit with the 10 pip cards, created a card deck of 52 cards. Some believe that the cards were used to represent the weeks of the year and the four weeks of the month or perhaps the seasons, so cards may have been an educational value. Playing cards came to Europe in late 1300s and by 1440 there is a letter from the Duke of Milan requesting several decks of playing cards for a game known as ‘triumph’ which was similar to bridge and included the playing card deck and 22 extra picture cards. Around 1530, in Italy, these cards were called ‘Tarocchi’ and in France ‘Tarot’. By 1781, they were used in England for divination. During the Victorian era in England, there was a revival of alternative spirituality and occult pastimes became popular. From that time to the present day, Tarot cards have been increasing in popularity; the market has grown and developed with new ideas and understanding for using the cards in sophisticated ways for fortune telling, personal development and meditation, and are now made in their thousands with creative focus far beyond the original images, such as animals, angels and fairies.

Kipper Cards

Kipper Cards were first seen in Munich around 1900 and named after their creator, Frau Susanne Kipper. However, some say that there is a river in Germany called the Wipper and that the people from this area invented the deck and some say the word comes from a type of tipping scales used for the devaluing of coinage! There are 36 cards with straightforward meanings, all read upright. Unlike Lenormand, they have no playing card images, just a number, title and image. Kipper also has main male and main female cards to represent the Querent and there are several images of people alongside titles, such as success in love, a gift, house, court, work, etc. Some Readers like to combine the Petit Lenormand of 36 cards with the 36 cards of the Kipper for a fuller deck of 72 cards.  

Isis Hymn - Dolores Ashcroft-Nowicki

Free Healing youtube video

Isis was the most powerful Goddess of Ancient Egypt. She was the Goddess of healing, compassion and equality. For thousands of years, she was known throughout Egypt and her fame spread to Greece, Rome and to Britain.

HYMN TO ISIS: Silver-footed One, come to me with quiet steps - in the temple of my heart, lift up Thy voice, and call my name that I may know Thee and rejoice in Thy presence. In my sadness, comfort me, in my happiness, share with me. At my birth, Thou wast there, at my death, wait for me. Most glorious of woman, most tender of mothers, I am Thy Handmaiden, bless me. Dolores Ashcroft-Nowicki

Holy Grail Part Three

A chivalric exponent wrote 3 books about the Chivilric code in the hope of reviving French knighthood. In the ‘Book of Chivilry’, keeping peace was paramount, and it says any knight who failed in his duties “deserves to have his teeth pulled out one by one”! 

Tournaments carried the oriflamme banner, the royal standard at the Battle of Poitiers where Geoffrey de Charny (1300-1356) died. 

What was dubbing? It was an accolade of knighthood. It involved giving a blow with the hand or a strike with the flat of the sword in church. The knight would confess his sins to the priest, take a bath and spent the night in vigil. 

Creating Your Oracle Deck

A proposal to a publisher needs to include what qualifies you to write the deck (your journey), and why you have chosen your illustrator and what media the illustrator works in. What is a typical purchaser or seeker for this deck. Describe them! Why did you chose the theme? In what way will the cards help with life’s problems, what type of guidance is described, what type of  direction or life path? Any omissions or gaps in the overall theme package or have you worked with it sufficiently to know it covers sufficiently the theme?. Upright only or upright and reversed meaning given. Backs of cards, mirror images on backs or not? How many images have been produced and how far along you are with writing the book. How many images still to produce? Most important in your proposal, is how you intend to promote the deck when published, eg., use it yourself for client readings, have a website, promote it on your YouTube channel, promote it on your blog, etc. For beginner or experienced reader? For self or others? Any other similar deck on the market? What is your USP? Do you have suggestion for packaging, such as a mat or bag? 

Cards: image, title, subtitle, white border? Astrology, Kabbalah, symbolism, metaphor, elements, numerology, etc.

The guidebook should include:

The importance of the theme and the benefits. How to use the cards? Blessed? Prepared? How stored? How shuffled? How laid out? Titles for Spreads. Sample reading for one or two spreads. Upright meanings only or reversed also? Alphabetical order? Title, subtitle, keywords, affirmation, symbolism meaning, divinatory guidance, channelled message. Additions could be ritual, exercise, creative activity. 

November

In the old Celtic calendar, November is the beginning of the New Year, the time of new beginnings, as the day began at nightfall, and the seed begins life in the dark soil. The moon lends itself to this, dark and then a crescent emerging in the early days and becoming full on 15th. This month honours the ancestors, those brave and resourceful people who have gone on the Great Journey before us, each living until adulthood and bearing children of whom we are one. These are the Hallows and Saints of the early days of the month. In ancient times, this was the 9th month, the time of greatest spirituality of the year. Animals were killed and salted and stored for winter; it was a time of preparation and many chose to renew commitments and make new plans at this time. 

The autumn season is one of rich colour and beauty, as we say goodbye to the warmth of summer and embrace lengthening nights of the colder months. We welcome the Angel I have chosen to accompany us through this month, Adnachiel, the Truth Seeker, whose ability of perception sees through the veils of our world into the clarity and honesty that is our spiritual birthright. 

Jack

According to Andrew Collins an AK was a similar to the Lord of Missrule, his name had become rendered as Jack in such a mischievous mythical sprites as Jack Frost, Jack-in-the-Box, and Springhill Jack. He may have been in the equivalent of the Nordic guard Loki Loki was the trickster of the guards and an energy of him was born each year at the start of winter to stay off his unruly influence during the cold days ahead.

In ancient times, a fool or jester was burnt on a bonfire at the beginning of November in many parts of Britain. In 1605 after Guy Fawkes was arrested at attempting to blow up the houses parliament, the same tradition of lighting a fire at the autumnal time of year lived on. If AK could be similar to Loki, a wise fool that was believed to be beyond the influence of cause and effect.

A pilgrim on the road to Santiago de Compostela was called a ‘jack’. 

The name Jack features in folk tales and children’s stories as ‘everyman’, an ordinary man, perhaps an uneducated and perhaps unskilled man, we might immrdiately think of Jack Spratt, and Jack the Ripper. In days gone by, anyone with the name of John was likely to be nicknamed Jack. It was a name for a country bumpkin, as the Coventry, and the Townley Mystery Plays describe just an ordinary boy and girl, as Jack and Jill. Jack is sometimes a fool, such as the comedic character who goes up a hill to fetch water rather than down to the river. In fairy stories, he is sometimes a crafty, or aggressive opportunist, who, by guile and trickery, gets rich rewards without ethics. He can wed the King’s daughter by making her laugh with a stick that beats people upon a command, a bed with a lovely singing voice, and a fiddle that plays by itself. In Jack and the Beanstalk, he is sent by his widowed mother to sell a cow, and he returns with magic beans that grow so tall he can climb up to a giant house in the sky where rich ogres live. 

The Great Bell Chant

For peace, truth, justice, kindness, compassion, and all spiritual values