2018 Mount Haemus Award Article – Channeling the Awen Within: An Exploration of Learning the Bardic Arts in the Modern Druid Tradition

By The Druid’s Garden

Dana's avatarThe Druid's Garden

I am excited to annouce that my 2018 Mount Haemus Award article, titled “Channeling the Awen Within: An Exploration of Learning the Bardic Arts in the Druid Tradition” has been released on OBOD’s website (a better formatted PDF is at the bottom of the page; I suggest downloading and reading that). In 2020, I will travel to the UK to deliver a talk tied to the paper itself, as every four years, OBOD offers a Mount Haemus lecture for the four most recent scholars. Every eight years, OBOD publishes a volume, and the next volume will also include this paper. Given this incredible honor–and the fact that the project is now finally finished (whew!)–I wanted to take a bit of time today to talk about the project, what I learned, and how I hope it can help others.

What I Learned

Regeneration, card 79 from the 3rd edition of the Tarot of Trees Regeneration, card 79 from the 3rd edition of…

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Healing Ancestral Trauma with Plant Medicine

In these days of DNA tests one gets through websites to trace your family tree … Is it truly appropriation of traditions or culture if the DNA of your ancestors come from Nigeria, Romans that conquered Germany, Britons, Eastern Europe, North Africa, etc. Skin color maybe white, but the ancestors that traveled to colder climates were not. Those ancestors often provide guidance to practice their indigenous traditions. Through many of the traditions of my ancestors, I have learned to revere and elevate ancestors that had been ignored for generations. As anthropological research and DNA tests trace our origins back to the area of ancient Egypt … As ancestor reverence once again comes to the forefront and people learn to listen to the messages from their ancestors, it is my hope that terms such as cultural appropriation become obsolete because it’s not appropriation, but a rediscovery of our ancestral roots.

Ancestral Arts's avatarAncestral Apothecary

By third year Cecemmana student, Kara Wood.

Several years ago I had a lightning bolt message from my ancestors that I needed to live my truth and combine all the things that I care about (plants, ancestors, genetics, herbal medicine) and really live who I am. That is when I found Ancestral Apothecary School and the Cecemmana program.   I am in the third year and what I have learned and experienced surpassed any possible expectations. So much of what I had always been doing, that I didn’t yet recognize, was preparing me for this.

In this life do any of us really escape trauma? It can affect us at any time in our lives from in utero on.  We also experience ancestral trauma, sometimes referred to as transgenerational trauma. This trauma is the one that inhabits each of us in some way.  Each generation before us imprinted information and trauma…

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AstrorisaMoon Loft: Getting Ready for May 29th Full Moon Time

IN THE LOFT 
Greetings!
Hello my people! We’re hanging out in the loft, getting ready for the upcoming full moon in Sagittarius May 29th.
Conference Call: May 27, 2018 at 9:00 PM EDT
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If you’d like to participate please send your request to my email: astrorisa@gmail.com by May 26th, I’ll send a group invite on the 27th in the AM.  Please subscribe to receive your moon forecast if you haven’t already received it.

Ancestral Reading ~ Astrorisa Moon Forecaster

EGUNGUN MONTH
Weekly Ancestral Reading
5/22/2018
Astrorisa Moon Forecaster / Moon Talk
May is Egungun Month
An ancestral reading for our collective consciousness
each week for the month of May.

Birth Place Elements On Your Altar

by Slavic Witch

Walking the Path of the Ovate: Building Localized Ecological Knowledge

by The Druid’s Garden

Dana's avatarThe Druid's Garden

Rocky Maine Shore at Sunrise Rocky Maine Shore at Sunrise

Everything changes in this wild place. The ebb and flow of the tides drives the ecology on this rocky shore. The landscape abruptly changes its appearance based on proximity to the sea and elevation. Firs and spruces dominate along with a groundcover of laurel and blueberry. Even old friends, like birch, maple, and beech, take on new skin. The mountain peaks offer a desert-like climate where air and fire dominate. I am in this wild place, letting it seep into my bones, into my breath, into my spirit. Desipte the books on ecology I’ve purchased, I really have no idea what I’m seeing, no real knowledge of the deeper mystery of this land and shore. Books cannot teach that kind of wisdom, only time and experience can. My eyes physically see, but I am seeing without any real understanding of what it is that is…

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An American Ley Line Network: A Ritual of Creation

by The Druid’s Garden

Dana's avatarThe Druid's Garden

This past weekend, we had a delightful time at the 2nd OBOD Mid Atlantic Gathering of US(or MAGUS). It was a wonderful weekend full of positive energy, community, and celebration of the land. I was involved heavily in the ritual planning and work this year and was the gathering’s keynote speaker, and we once again did a Galdr ritual (a chanting ritual) using Ogham (sacred trees). This year’s theme was “Sacred Time, Sacred Space” and as part of this work, we decided to re-enchant the land by establishing a new ley line network. We are co-creating a new ley line network across the land.

Motherstone at Four Quarters Interfaith Sanctuary Motherstone at Four Quarters Interfaith Sanctuary

The overall goal of this ritual was to re-enchanting our landscape, connecting sacred spaces and creating sacred spaces across the landscape, and connecting our broader druid community. The work involves empowering, connecting, and eventually, dispersing a set of stones…

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Ancestral Reading For The Week of May 1st ~ 7th

EGUNGUN MONTH
Weekly Ancestral Reading 5/1/18
Astrorisa Moon Forecaster / Moon Talk
May is Egungun Month
An ancestral reading for our collective consciousness each week for the month of May.

Authenticity, Ancestors and the Druid Revival Tradition: Reclaiming our Ancestors and Living Druidry Today

by The Druid’s Garden

Dana's avatarThe Druid's Garden

A mobile army of metaphors, metonyms, anthropomorphisms, in short, a sum of human relations which were poetically and rhetorically heightened, transferred, and adorned, and after long use seem solid, canonical, and binding to a nation. Truths….are coins which have lost their image and now can be used only as metal, and no longer coins.”

“On Truth and Lying in a Moral Sense” Nietzsche, P. 250

Standing stones in Bangor, PA (recently set) Standing stones in Bangor, PA (recently set)

There seems to be a preoccupation with “authenticity” and “truth” within the druid community (and outside of it). Time and time again, people have asked me a lot about the history of the tradition, the “truth” of the druid revival material, the lack of knowledge about the Ancient druids, and how we can be a “legitimate” religious or spiritual tradition. This has come not only from the outside, but also from members of the two druid orders to which I…

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Sacred Landscapes, Part IV: Sacred Time, Sacred Space

by The Druid’s Garden

Dana's avatarThe Druid's Garden

A woodburned sign bidding druids to enter a sacred space A woodburned sign bidding druids to enter a sacred space

“This is sacred time, this is sacred space.” At the end of the opening of every OBOD ritual, this powerful statement is made.  But what does “sacred time, sacred space” really mean? What is “the sacred” and how do we know it?  What is sacred in the context of American Druidry, where we do not have an abundance of ancient stone circles or accessible sacred sites? In this post, I want to spend some time today thinking about the ways we might enact the sacred in our own lives and lands as part of building sacred landscapes and re-enchanting our land.

In my first post in this series, I talked about the “disenchantment” of the world through industrialization and the rise of a religious tradition that did not acknowledge the land as sacred. And truly, a disenchanted worldview–where…

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