There is a venerable history to the walking mediation. It is a favourite of the Zen Buddhist tradition, Taoist traditions in Tai Chi, for example, as well as, I believe, for Christian orders of Monks. Being at times somewhat Monkish, perhaps due to past life influences, I have an attraction to the walking meditation. On these beautiful summer mornings, it almost seems a shame to sit inside to do one’s morning practice. I have felt in my heart a longing to be outside, in the fresh air.

So here is my walking meditation, pagan style. Optional accessories are a staff and robe, but these are not absolutely necessary. The idea is to walk in a sunwise circle around some convenient outdoor space. It is best done in bare feet.

Begin, in the Air Quarter, and begin walking slowly and deliberately. Breathe deeply and steadily into the pit of the stomach, and exhale slowly and deliberately. Inhale for the space of three steps, two if your not well practiced at deep breathing, and exhale for the space of three steps, or two if not practiced at deep breathing.

Each step should be slow, deliberate and carefully placed, with awareness of every aspect of the movement. Place the ball of the right foot down on the ground, transfer weight to the foot, and then lower the heel onto the ground. Continue to transfer your weight onto the foot, while lifting the heel of the left foot, and taking all the weight from it. When weight is entirely on the right foot, lift the left foot, and slowly and deliberately position it in the place where you wish to place it. Drop the ball of the left foot down, and begin placing weight into the foot, as the heel goes down onto the ground, and carry on, step by deliberate step. The energy to aim for is the intensity and concentration of stalking a wild animal.

After one or more rounds of stalking, add the next element, which is to bring in the energy of the spiritual sun. See overhead the bright intense light of a white orb, sending down a searing white ray from directly overhead to strike your crown chakra at the top of the head, and to blaze down the centre of your body to the pit of your stomach, from which centre it radiates out filling your aura with white light. With each step. Leave a footprint of light, which begins to form a circle as additional rounds are made. The breathing and deliberate and careful movements should carry on as before.

After one or more rounds, the visualising changes to bring in the energy of the Earth. See deep within the ground a glowing dark red sphere of energy. It sends up a ray of red light which splits into three, striking you on the ball of each foot, and also at the root chakra between the anus and base of penis or vagina. This middle ray carries on inside the body to strike the centre at the pit of the stomach, and from there diffuses throughout the aura, filing it with a dark red earth energy glow. As with the white light, see each foot-print marked out with the glow of earth energy, adding to the intensity of the circle of light that is being created. The earth circle will be just inside the Sun circle, so that you are gradually spiralling inwards.

After several rounds, stop at the Air quarter, and turning sun wise to face the Air quarter, greet or call the element of Air. Walk one or more rounds with the elemental energy of Air. Repeat with Fire, Water, and Earth, visualising appropriate colours and attributes for each. You have now created a sacred space, and may use it as you see fit. I carry on to greet my Deities, walking one or more rounds with each, seeking their advice or comment, or just their presence and company. I may then symbolically perform the sacred marriage, to bring about balance and renewal in myself, and around me on all planes and dimensions.

The walking meditation is completed by continuing to spiral into the centre of the space. I then thank my Deities for their presence and company, and, facing the four quarters in turn, thank the four elements. With giving thanks, I intentionally draw back into myself what has been projected, empowered and energised by its contact with the elemental energies and the spirit of my Deities. I then walk three rounds to spiral outwards from the centre of the circle, and into my day.

Well that is my framework for a pagan style walking mediation. It has plenty of scope for being adapted to the needs and capacities of just about anyone! May the blessing of the Ancient Ones touch every part of your life.

Blessed Be

Rob

When I became interested in the old ways, as many people do, I became interested in the healing and magical powers of herbs. I keep a well stocked herb cupboard, and have been making my own herbal tinctures for a number of years. The principle of the tincture is to dissolve the active ingredient of the herb in a mixture of alcohol and water. The alcohol dissolves many constituents that do not dissolve so well in water, and likewise, the water dissolves constituents which are not so soluble in alcohol. The alcohol acts as a preservative, and creates an environment where bacteria and spoilage organisms can’t survive. So tinctures, once made, and stored in an air-tight brown glass bottle (to reduce exposure to light), can last for many years without any loss of activity. Dried herbs, in contrast, begin to lose their potency after a year or so, and should be replaced.

The history of medicine, and particularly herbal medicine, is interwoven with the alchemical tradition. Indeed, one of the pioneers of modern medicine and a champion of herbal medicine, was Paracelsus, a practicing alchemist. It was Paracelsus, as I understand it, who brought the making of tinctures into prominence. The alchemical idea is to dissolve the essence or spirit of the herb in alcohol. Alcohol, in fact, is called spirits to this day, which recollects the alchemists’ belief that the distillation process, which produced alcohol from wine or fermented grain, separated the spirit, or essence, from the gross matter that remained.

Thus tinctures arose out of a desire to collect the essence of the herb and its energetic spirit, in the belief that this was responsible for the healing qualities. This philosophical orientation has remained with us today throughout scientific medicine, which seems to believe as an article of faith that a purified single substance is the optimum for effecting a cure in any illness.

Later alchemists however realised that health is based on the harmony and balance of body, mind and spirit. Based on the metaphor of the sacred marriage, the gross remains (physical plane) are re-united with the spirituous essence (spiritual plane), to form an alchemical tincture. Practically, one makes a tincture, and instead of discarding the exhausted herbal plant matter, as is usually done, it is instead heated to drive off any moisture, charred, and pounded in a mortar and pestle to a fine powder. This fine powder is added to the tincture, accompanied by suitable incantations celebrating the sacred marriage and the restoration of health and balance for all who drink of it.

Actually, this is my simple version of the process, which anyone can do in a normal kitchen, with normal pots and pans. If you want the full alchemical version, then I refer you to “Herbs in Magic and Alchemy”, by C.L. Zalewski (Prism, Dorset,  and Unity, Woolhara, 1990), which gives the full rundown involving retorts, calcination, Salt, Sulphur and Mercury, and potentiation through repeated distillation.

So here is my recipe for a simple alchemical tincture.

(1) Place dried herb in a glass jar. Use a jar sized so that it is three quarters or more full.

(2) Cover the herbal matter with brandy. (Vodka can also be used, but brandy is traditional, and confers the anti-inflammatory benefits of the wine bio-flavanoids)

(3) Stand in a cool dark place for at least three weeks. I generally wait a cycle of the moon. Check after a day, and top up with brandy if the herbal matter has swelled and is consequently out of the solution.

(4) Filter the solution to remove all the herbal matter. I use some coffee filter papers for this. Stand them in a cup, or a kitchen funnel. After most of the liquid has gone through, squeeze out the remaining herbal matter to get as much of the liquid as possible. This is a standard herbal tincture.

(5) Heat a flat stainless steel frypan over a low heat. Take the exhausted herbal matter, and place it in the pan, and stir constantly with a wooden spoon until all the vapour is driven off.

(6) Continue to stir over the low heat until the matter begins to lightly char and smoke. Adjust the heat by removing the pan if the smoke starts to become too heavy. The idea is to drive off the first smoke. Use your intuition to know when the first smoke has been driven off.

(7) Place the dried and slightly charred herbal material in a large mortar, and pound with a pestle until it is reduced to a fine powder, the finer the better. When I used this method for Vervain and Meadowsweet tinctures, grinding the herbal remains caused a gunpowder like odour to form.

(8) Place the ground herbal matter with the tincture extract in a brown glass bottle with a tight fitting lid.

(9) Of course the whole process is a magical exercise, and should be conducted as such, with attention paid to the state of mind at every step, and keeping the purity of healing and rebalancing intention always at the forefront of the mind.

(10) Shake well, and allow the tincture to cure for two or three days, before decanting into dropper bottles, shake well. Also shake well before each dose.

The dose for an alchemical tincture is a matter of personal experimentation. I have found that 20 drops is sufficient for an adult for the two examples I have made, but this could vary.

Recently I was away camping with my family, and we forgot to bring my daughter’s asthma puffer with us. Actually, she has been doing so well with being careful to alkalinize the diet and a herbal tonic that the puffer hadn’t been needed for months. Anyway, there we were in the middle of the bush, when she got bitten by a jumper ant. A few hours later, she started to get an asthma attack, and the coughing was getting worse and worse. It looked like we might need a trip into

To give you some idea of the potency of the tincture, the recommended adult dosage is 1 to 4 grams of the dried herb. The tincture is generally at about a concentration of 5mls per gram. So the recommended dose for a child of five, is ¼ of the adult dose, or ¼ to 1 gram, or 1.25 to 5 mls of tincture. Ten drops is no more than half a ml, less than half the recommended minimum dose, yet it did the job very well.

Of course I don’t recommend anyone should diagnose and attempt the cure of their own medical conditions with alchemical tinctures. Please get professional advice about any health matters. However my experience, such as it is, and without any professional pretensions, is placed here for the benefit of all who may be interested. Make use of it at your own discretion – and make sure you adequately research any herbs you decide to work with, to understand their effects and dosages, and any possible toxicity.. Stay away from herbs that are toxic, and stick to herbs that are commonly used for herbal teas, and chances are you won’t end up poisoning yourself!

Someone asked me the other day about Silky Oaks, and then for the next few days I was noticing Silky Oaks every where! These are pretty common in Brisbane and the surrounding regions, with people often planting them in gardens and parks. They have a magnificent display of yellow-orange flowers in Spring. This year they are coming in to flower as I write, at the end of September. Around Brisbane they seem to prefer scrubby areas along creeks. If one ventures out west a little way, in the Laidley and Gatton areas, for example, I have seen them as one of the dominant species along creeks. The road from Gatton via Ma Ma Creek and Hirstglen to the New England Highway near Allora, winds along the Ma Ma Creek Valley and you’ll spot many magnificent specimens.

Last weekend, I was up in Toowoomba for the Festival of Flowers, and noticed many magnificent Silky Oaks growing in Queens Park. So I thought I would take a few pictures, so that if you don’t already know the Silky Oak, you can learn to spot them. It is a very distinctive tree, and really can’t be mistaken!

So take a look at my Silky Oak page, and happy tree spotting!

Blessed Be,

Rob

Having just got back from a weekend camping at Goomburra,  just over Cunningham’s Gap from Brisbane, I have been struck with the beauty and quiet presence of the beautiful Sydney Blue Gums. This is a tree I am very fond of which also grows in the Brisbane area in the wet rainforests and rainforest margins of the surrounding ranges. I love its smooth bark, which seems so calming and reassuring to me. I always feel refreshed and cleansed after a walk amongst the Sydney Blue Gums.  So if you would also like to take a walk amongst the Blue Gums, take a look at my Sydney Blue Gum page.

Blessed Be

Robyn Wood

Something I believe quite passionately is that pagans in Australia would be well served to explore the awesomely beautiful and powerful native trees of this unique continent. Our trees are every bit as magical and energetically significant as the usual list of sacred trees from the northern hemisphere. Not that I have anything against the beautiful and magnificent Oaks, Ashes, Birches and so on – I love them too, and have spent many a happy hour beneath their boughs on some visits to the northern hemisphere. However here in Australia, I work with our own native trees. They are plugged into the collective energy of place that exists here, in a way that transplanted northern hemisphere trees, in general, are not. 

So to help you get started with your love affair with Australian Trees, I have put together this virtual tree-walk. It is particularly meant for people in Brisbane. Trees in Australia vary from region to region, so chances are you won’t find all of these exact trees in your locality  is outside the Greater Brisbane area, though you might find some of them, and you may find very similar trees, but which may well be a different species.

Ironbark Gully is a picnic area in Brisbane Forest Park. Take the Samford Road from Ferny Grove station, pass Camp Mountain turn off on the right. Pass the Lomandra picnic area on left, and Ironbark Gully is about another half a Km on the left. There is a large grassy picnic area to the north of the first car park, which is closest to Ferny Grove. If you park in the main car park, the Crebra circuit walk starts at the ned furthest from the road, and there is a set of stairs down to the grassy picnic area. The trees shown here are all (except for Spotted Gum and Ironbark) growing in the grassy picnic area, so ideal for visiting and doing some tree work. To see the Spotted Gums and Ironbarks, do the Crebra circuit walk. All these trees are very common in the Greater Brisbane Area, and once you are familiar with them, you should be able to spot them at other places as well. Of course there are many other trees as well – but this selection should give you a good start on working with Australian Trees. In the following paragraphs, I have given my assessment of the elemental energetic quality of each tree, with my feeling about its gender, (M) for Male and (F) for female afterwards. The primary elemental quality is the second element, with the refinement given first. For example, Fire of Earth indicates primarily an Earthy quality, but a (relatively) active and passionate manifestation of the primary quality. The photographs for these pages were taken at Ironbark Gully, in Brisbane Forest Park, on September 8^th, 2007.

• Bloodwood
• Brushbox
• Grey Gum
• Tallowwood
• Ironbark
• Spotted Gum 

Blessed Be

Rob

As regular readers will know, I have to be very careful with what I eat. Part of it is to avoid all dairy products. Now, occasionally, being a fair dinkum Australian, I have a yearning for toast with melted butter and vegemite, for which there is no substitute. I indulge, and regretfully suffer the consequences, and become strictly non-dairy again until the discomfort fades with the passing of time, and I am tempted again to non-compliance! Well sour cream is not in the same class as hot buttered toast (with or without vegemite) but still something that can be missed on a non-dairy diet.

Well yesterday, I was doing up some herbal tinctures, and had the coffee filter papers out for straining purposes, when the urge came over me to fill up a glass with soy milk, and add vinegar to it, to see what would happen. I had been reading that soy milk and soy products are very difficult to digest, and I thought I would try adding some vinegar, as vinegar is used traditionally as a means of marinating protein products to make them more digestible. So I did, and it sat on my bench for a couple of hours, and the next time I noticed it, the milk had separated into a clear liquid and some thicker solids. So I popped it into a filter paper, thinking, this is great, I will make some soy cheese. Actually a cheese cloth would have been better, but I am afraid the old cupboard was bare when it came to cheese cloths!

More time passed, during which I made a pot of pumpkin soup. When it came time to eat it, I thought, hey – some sour cream would be really nice with this soup. And then it struck me. I had just made some sour soy cream. So I squeezed out the filter paper, and there it was, nice and sour thanks to the vinegar, and rich and creamy. In fact by this time, quite a thick cream, and almost like a fetta cheese. It was very enjoyable in the pumpkin soup – not exactly like sour cream mind you, but enjoyable on its own terms.

So here is my recipe for sour soy cream, or soy fetta, depending on how thick it ends up being.

1. Fill up a tumbler with soy milk. I suspect that good quality soy milk made from whole soy beans will work better than the cheaper variety made from soy protein isolate.
2. Add a tablespoon of apple cider vinegar. (Less will probably work fine too, and not be so sour)
3. Let sit for an hour or so
4. Strain in a cheese cloth or coffee filter papers.
5. After an hour or so, squeeze the fluid out of the cheese by tightening the cheese cloth or filter papers.
6. Voila. Sour soy cream.

As a side note on the esoteric side of things, this is an example of the moon manifestation cycle. Something emerges out of the depths as an impulse or urge, whose direction is clear, but for which there seems no apparent reason or end point in view. A process unfolds, during which the mind, at various times, conceives of it in various different ways, and at the end of it, one sees with surprise that one has created something quite unanticipated, that perfectly answers a need. Of course this mode of creation is quite foreign to the modern rational mentality, but one with which the Wise are comfortable.

Blessings to Thee dear Mother.

Robyn Wood