To see clearly, to know what the goal is and how to get there, this is only some of what vision means to me.  Vision can be a part of a religious experience, through trance work and meditation, and much of society often describes the various religions of the world as “world views.”  It is said that prophets have strange visions, which to me would seem to be much more comprehensible versions of REM-style dreams. Our visual perception allows us to make sense of and interpret the information coming into our brain.  We can accurately judge how far away an object is, as well as what it is.  

Vision is an important element for any group to have, and many organizations will have what is called a, “Vision Statement.” Vision, in all its various forms, even if those forms that are only taken as metaphor, seems to point toward an idea of true understanding and the ability to reach out toward a goal.  We often talk about “seeing” issues in a moral light, and by this we seem to equate vision with knowledge and truth; just we talk about someone not seeing the truth of circumstances as being blind.  We often talk about moral change as coming from “seeing an issue in a different light.” Vision allows us to walk a path in truth and integrity.  Vision is the glue that holds all the virtues together.

Despite what society at large seems to think of the word, despite the thesaurus having fearlessness as a synonym for it, courage is not a complete absence of fear.  A complete absence of fear in the face of danger is either stupidity or ignorance.  This is the type of disposition that will soon led to deadness.  Courage is the ability to take stock of the risks, the dangers, and the pain required to accomplish the goal; to completely understand what is at stake, and then to continue despite the fear involved. A person can have physical courage, the ability to face a challenge despite the pain and possible death that may occur. A person might have moral courage, the ability to do what is right in word and in action, despite the pressure by society to do otherwise. A person could also have social courage, such as having the courage to stand up and give a speech to a crowded room. One could have intellectual courage by facing perviously held thought patterns and judging if they are indeed correct, to ask those pesky hard questions of ourselves and of others.

"Courage is what it takes to stand up and speak; courage is also what it takes to sit down and listen," Winston Churchill. 

The culture I grew up in defined meditation strictly in the Zen style, meaning the emptying of all action and thought, till one is just sitting in the moment.  This might be why I never realized that the long walks I used to take as a teenager, those walks where I would move into an inner world and pay little attention to the outer, were in fact a type of meditation.  It wasn’t until years later that I learned this is what is called, aptly enough, a walking meditation.  

The neighborhood I grew up in was extremely safe and so this form of meditation was easy and powerful.  I found myself living full lives within that inner world, and I really do think that my imagination grew by leaps and bounds because of this practice as a teen. I was able to keep this practice up for just a year into college before I realized how unsafe the area where my university was located really was.  The practice of walking meditation went by the wayside, and I must say I have missed it since. 

When I started working on the meditation section of the DP, I had already been working on the Zen form of meditation for some time.  I wanted to try and stretch into new forms of meditation during this time, so strived to try a different forms of mediation work.  My first thought was to go back to that walking meditation of my youth.  I arranged for hubby to keep the wee ones so that I might go walking.  This was a huge disaster!  The whole time I was so concerned about the kids, and feeling such guilt for leaving my family behind, that I couldn’t get into that inner world at all.  

Okay, fine, I’ll take the kids walking with me.  Yeah, it was a nice thought, but it turns out that having one or the other child not wanting to walk, and complaining the whole time, is a bit of an insurmountable wall.  I have a treadmill in our basement, surely walking on that would help.  The kids could sit upstairs, and I could walk and meditate without the guilt or complaining.  Two problems quickly presented themselves.  First, the moment I leave the kids alone for a few minutes, the bickering, fighting, and calls for Mom to intervene begin without fail.  Second, I just found the mess of the basement (which is also the kid’s playroom) too distracting, and so I was unable to get anywhere close to a meditative state. 

So, with this failure in mind I bought a book that helped me come to the next style of meditation I was going to try. “The Druidry Handbook: Spiritual Practice Rooted in the Living Earth,” by John Michael Greer, describes what he calls an active meditation.  Once again, I had found a familiar practice from my past, with a new name.  When I was a Christian, I practiced what is called Lectio Divina.  This was a process by which I would read a passage of scripture through once.  This would allow me to have a brief overview of what the scripture was dealing with. After a brief pause, I would return to read the passage again to see what images or words caught my attention.  I would then take each word or image in turn, and unpack what it meant or how it affected me.  I would then proceed to read the passage a third time with these new insights in mind to see how the passage had changed, and what would now stand out.  I could easily read a single passage a dozen times and still be finding new thoughts and images. This allowed me a way to interact with the text in a very dynamic fashion.  Greer’s book suggested doing this practice with myths and stories from the past.  I decided to do this with a story from the “Mabinogi”.  The story I choose was one where Pwyll, Prince of Dyfed meets Arawn, Lord of the Other World, while out hunting. The first image that struck me was how Prince Pwyll, who is a very considerate and kind man, chases Arawn’s hounds off a downed stag and allows his own hounds to finish the stag.  This image struck me as extremely odd, especially when considering that Pwyll’s reaction is one of embarrassment and he apologizes profusely when Arawn accuses him of being very insulting by this action.  This myth illustrates how the other world overlaps and is part of our world even when not seen, and I began to follow that thought as applied to the hounds of Arawn.  Did Pwyll see the hounds but misinterpreted them as wild dogs?  Since they were part of the otherworld that was not within his ability to see at all times, perhaps his eyes were not able to understand what he was seeing during that hunt.  This thought then led to me to wonder when I find myself reacting to situations in life; that maybe I too am not seeing all that is at play. This was just the beginning of what the story began to open up to me.  I still turn back to this myth in my meditations when I find myself in situations I am sure I don’t completely understand.

I also decided to try and deepen my trance work. I had been using techniques that I learned in Caitlin Matthew's book, “Singing the Soul Home.”  I decided to buy Diane Paxson’s “Trance-portation.”  I found many of the practices helpful, but not as powerful as Matthew’s “Two Trees,” meditation.  It was through the Two Trees that I met Cerridwyn, who in turn gave me my true name.  This name has been a source of grounding for me, because it so perfectly describes the sum total of who I really am.  No, I will not share it, for it is far too personal.  I will keep that one between me and the Kindreds.  This is the part where I will admit to rather horrible trance hygiene.  One thing I learned from my attempts at walking meditation was that the only time and place where I can truly be alone is in my bed just before sleep.  I lie prone in bed, and allow myself to work on trance journeys.  I will admit that I have tried and sometimes failed to create a clear ending before falling asleep.

I think for me, the active, Lectio Divina, style of meditation has been the most successful durning this period of mental training.  I am hoping to get back to walking meditation at some point in my life, maybe when the kids are older and in less need of Mommy’s help and supervision.

The days are getting darker earlier, and the first of the cold weather is officially here.  All the trees are going to sleep and shedding their dead leaves all over the ground; is it any wonder that our minds turn to death?  Many years ago, before the modern grocery store, this was the time of year when food was the most plentiful.  The store houses were full and it was time to celebrate the good fortune of having enough to eat, because very soon that may not be the case.  Winter would bring the storage pantry more air, as people would use what was needed.This was also the time of year in which to decided which animals to slaughter for the coming cold and lean months.  Animals required food, and in the winter, food would not be near as available.  The slaughtered animal meat would also provide yet more food for the humans during a time when hunting may not provide as much food.
      
     It is said that magic is strongest in the between moments.  This is why the spell in fairytales away is cast or broken at the stroke of midnight; that time between one day to the next.  Samhain is the space between this world and the world of the dead. The veil between worlds is considered to be so thin that spirits could pass freely from one world to the next, and as the days grow colder perhaps it would be easier for the living to cross over as well.  Winter, before central heating and those wonderful grocery stores, was a time when the weakest ones could indeed die more easily.  We are standing on the cusp of a time of plenty, and a time of scarcity.  This is a time when the light is, without a doubt, loosing ground; the dark is taking over in force.  Death stands all around and is in balance with life.
    
    I will take time this week to stand in this balance, or at least to try and find the balance in my life.  I will allow myself to feel the profound sorrow and joy of abundance and loss. What will you do?

Meden Agan (μηδεν ἀγαν), “Nothing in excess.”  These words were written on the temple of Apollo at Delphi along with the better known phrase, Gnothi Seauton (γνῶθι σεαυτόν), “Know thyself.”  These two phrases come directly from the Greek view of “sin.”  Sin was a word that meant, “To miss the mark.”  Sin in the Greek religion had nothing to do with being in rebellion against the Gods, which is how it tends to be viewed in Christianity.  Humans were to know themselves, and their place in society, so that they would know how hard to push and how high to aim their ambitions.  Aim too high, and you could fall into hubris. Aim too low, and you were not living as well as you could.  Moderation, the virtue of allowing yourself not to do anything to excess, was a good way to avoid the Greek version of sin.  Too much of anything can over stimulate and flood the body to the point of poisoning the system (be it physical, mental, or spiritual).  We can see this with food.  Eating in moderation allows the body to not starve as well as not get sick from being overweight.  Our modern society tends to want things in extremes and perhaps this is leading to the general ennui of our generation.  One in ten Americans are currently on antidepressants, and although I do believe that there is more to this statistic then meets the eye, I wonder how much of it comes form the “X-Treme” fascination in our sports, drinks, sex, and whatever else the ads are trying to sell to the public. Epicurus, the founder of the Epicurean school of philosophy, said, “Be moderate in order to taste the joys of life in abundance.”  It is through Moderation that we find balance.

Hypocrisy is one of the quickest ways to turn people off to any sort of social or religious movement.  Hypocrisy shows that the religion one follows is not a path to a life changing experience, or that the professed beliefs of the individual are not all that important to those who say they follow its tenants.  Why would anybody bother with such a creature as that of a religion filled with hypocrisy of those closely associated with it?  This is why integrity is so vital in everything that I do as a druid.  My actions must match the words I speak.  The words I speak must line up with the values and virtues of my religion. Integrity is all about the consistency of actions with values.  This is also why training in what druidry is, is so very important.  ADF’s Dedicant Path allows but the most basic training of what it means to be a druid, but it allows me to live my religion with integrity and clarity.  This is also why we, as a grove, will be choosing a community service project.  We must walk the talk.

Fertility is the natural ability of living organisms to give life and increase diversity in a given population through numbers.  The more life we create, the more diverse that population becomes, the better the chance for a species to survive all stresses that the environment can bring to bear.  Fertility is a virtue because it provides a method for not only survival, but of creating a life worth living.  The creative aspect of fertility allows us produce the capacity for something that is useful and beneficial for the entire species.  As we work to increase the numbers and diversity of our religious members, we bring a greater chance to be useful to our society as a whole.  Furthermore, the process that brings growth in numbers can be fun for all involved.

I pray that what I am offering to the pagan community is of use, that it touches lives, inspires others, and helps the community as a whole, as well as ADF grow.

Piety is one of those words that has been slandered though misuse.  The image of starched collared Sunday church go-ers, leaving church to seep themselves in sin and vice has long been the image I associate with piety. Piety is not synonymous with hypocrisy.  It has taken me many years to realize this. Piety is the strength and fortitude to live out one’s faith in right actions and practice. It takes deep commitment to keep a daily devotional practice.  It takes strength of wisdom, and conscious living to try to apply the nine virtues to daily activity, and it requires a willingness to come before the Kindreds in humility and reverence to learn what actions are required and expected of us. Duty, fealty, obedience, passion, and right religion are the true forms of piety. As I practice piety more with my daily devotions I have come to see the benefit of committed pious actions.  The actions themselves have begun to influence how I look at the world.  By performing simple rituals of a candle lighting with prayer beads, a quick step outside three times a day to feel my feet on the Earth in my back yard, or just the nighttime routine of laying still and allowing my meditation practice to hold up my prone body, I find myself feeling more of a connection to the rhythms of the day and to the life that teems around me; I feel my place in this world come into sharper focus; I feel connected.