The Prophets Tour

Part one of my report on the tour of ancient sites in southwest England. In which I learn how the visitor's participation animates the power of the sites in their role as temples.

Stonehenge

Of all the iconic landmarks that could represent England, I was most attached to Stonehenge. Its mystery kept alive something that history hadn't managed to categorize and box up. It dominated the landscape, despite being bound on two sides by noisy highways. To the average visitor it was cordoned off and had to be viewed from a distance, but Freddy Silva, our tour leader, had promised that we would have complete access to the stones. And though there were so many of us that we had to enter in two groups of 26, we would all have an hour at sunset to absorb the mystery held within the circle of stones.

Catherine and I were in the second group. We stood on the path feeling the stones from afar. And we could feel it too. I hadn't known to do this on previous visits, but having practiced feeling for energy forces emanating from individuals in my Shamanic healing workshop, I was enthralled that this sensation was so defined against my palms, like a wall of buoyant energy. I was too hard of hearing to hear the high pitch sound given off by the stones, but Catherine could hear it. Both of these phenomena Freddy had mentioned we might sense.

Since this tour was a part of my Shamanic exploration, I came prepared to dance my spirit animals at the site. I had my iPod with me and began to do a jig of sorts, much to the amusement of Catherine who was taking video pictures of me (and listening to her own iPod—to a Buddhist dharma talk). Then we hung out on the grass, on this clear evening, watching the first group mingle about among the stones. After a while, I lay on the ground to attempt a shamanic journey, but I couldn't do it; the site appeared to be protected underground by a rigid replica of the stones and I was unable to proceed. Just at that moment Catherine was telling me to get up. It was time to go in.

As we entered through the gateway stones, Freddy told us to hold an intention for something we wanted to ask the stones. Ask the stones! I was surprised by this New Age speak for I had joined the tour because of his knowledge of geomancy. At the same time his charming manner told us not to hold him accountable for any of this woo woo stuff. (I often used such charm myself just to see how far people would humor me. To charm was, after all, a casting of a spell to remove you from ordinary reality.)

And so he told us the story he espoused, about how Stonehenge came to be built by a race of Egyptian builders—giants who were some twelve feet tall—who came to Britain circa 8,000 B.C. as part of a temple building boom after a global flood. Said builders had levitated the stones into place. In England this levitation story is popularly attributed to Merlin. I was familiar with discussions of levitation from other New Age literature, but giants—not so much—apart from Jack and the Beanstalk and Haggard in Harry Potter.

These builders were "dedicated to the preservation and transmission to the future, of a body of spiritual knowledge from the remote past," Freddy says in his book Common Wealth. They wanted to "maintain an unbroken chain of self-help centers in the face of potential chaos…because temples are living organisms that amplify human potential". It was the part about amplifying human potential that had excited me enough to make this journey across ocean and continent to see for myself.

Curiously, once inside the circle, I could no longer feel the electromagnetic force. The stones seemed quiet and protective. Later I would learn that the site was designed in such a way that an electromagnetic field was created around the perimeter to protect it and to alert those who knew how to use such sites. Perhaps that was why I couldn't journey outside of the site. And why I was seeing a picture of it all locked up. Duh.

Stonehenge was originally intended to be a lunar calendar, Freddy told us, which was why the blue stones used to be outside the circle of larger stones, but when the climate changed, the ancients moved the stones inside to adapt to the new solar oriented climate. Thus mankind went from a feminine culture (governed by the moon) to a masculine culture (governed by the sun). That's for sure, I thought, but I'd not heard it attributed to a change in climate.

Even more interesting was the healing properties that Freddy mentioned was associated with the stones through sound. Sound was a method healers used to put the human body back into alignment. This coincided with recent information I had learned about the use of sound to open the chakras for healing. 

Sound was a tool we would use to raise the level of energy within the site; this would make it easier for us to access what the site had to offer, Freddy told us. He then instructed us to find a note that we felt emanated from the stones and sing it. This was called toning. I'm not much of a singer, but I did indeed feel that the note I picked was true to the stones; it was also in harmony with the rest of the group. 

He then suggested we look around and find the stone that was calling to us, go to it and see what it had to offer. He encouraged us to "go with the faeries" as we did this. In his own way, he was speaking in shamanic terms.

The best way I knew to access knowledge from an "inanimate" object was to use a fluid mind—enter the dreamscape with my spirit animals. Standing before a large stone on the perimeter, I meshed with Mongoose, climbed up to the top and asked for a vision of the future. I saw a man in a horse drawn cart coming down a dirt road. He looked like Igor from the movie Young Frankenstein.

"You've been reading too many peak oil books", I said to Mongoose, and climbed down again.

At the next stone I meshed with Bear, climbed up to the top, looked at the sky and saw a space ship by twilight. Well now, this was more fun. I stayed there waiting and a hatch opened. A humanoid alien walked down the gang plank, put out a finger and touched me then returned to his ship and took off.
Having got the obvious visions out of the way, my mind was emptier of expectation. I approached a small stone about waist high. I had Mongoose touch it. (We were not allowed to touch the stones; it made the guards anxious.) The pint size stone started to dance and reminded me of Silly Putty, a favorite toy I made my parents buy me when I was ten. What had entranced me about Silly Putty was that you could press it onto a newspaper and take from it an imprint. The stone was telling me it was a publishing stone. Good enough; I had friends telling me to publish and now a stone too. 

Behind it was a taller stone with a tiny hole where an eye might be. It told me it was a reporter stone and received massive amounts of information through his one eye. This visual amused me so intensely, I was satisfied that I had found the right message. I sat back and watched a crow fly to the top of the lichen encrusted stones. He caught a wasp buzzing about there and ate it. 

The sun was setting. It was time to go. As we left the site, a woman in our group came up to me.

"I love your energy", she said. This is New Age speak for I think you're hot—on a cosmic level. 

"Are you Native American?" she asked me. Ah, she was fooled by the feather in my hat. I told her my background and asked her where she was from. 

"Jerusalem," she said. 

The Hat, The Shirt, The Feather

My outfit for Stonehenge was purposefully flamboyant. For the trip, I had sewn a shirt from fabric so full of colors it looked like a Rousseau jungle. The shirt had a floppy collar and wide medieval sleeves ending in elastic clown ruffles at the wrist. (Very useful for pushing up the elbow when the day turns warm.) To the open V neck collar, I could add my white aviator scarf when the nights got chilly. I wore the shirt like a tunic with my black belt with the sun ray brass buckle (made by a craftsman in San Gimignano from our visit to Italy). Worn with black pants, it was, all in all, a swashbuckling effect. When you can't blend in, you might as well stand out. It makes people consider twice before pigeonholing you. 

To complete the outfit I had to have a hat. If I was not to be English (for I knew the English did not hear my accent as English), then I might as well be American. This called for a baseball cap or a cowboy hat. The closest I had to a cowboy hat was my leather Australian Bahmah (also perfect for rainstorms).

My mother noticed the feather poked into the hatband when she came to take us to the airport. She commented on it being shaman like. Indeed, it was the final shamanic touch. It was a turkey feather, often used by Native Americans in their ritual ornamentation. I found the big, brown and white striped feather on a recent camping trip to Henry W. Coe State Park. There you can hear the wild turkeys gobble as you wake up. They left me the feather on the trail near the campsite.

 "It's all about the hat," I told my mother as I put it on my head for the ride to the airport.

The Prophets

In the next few days I would get to know the tour members. Many were professional intuitive counselors, astrologers, channelers, healers, Reike practitioners, massage therapists plus an accountant. The tour leaders referred to us as prophets after the name of their conference. It was not altogether a misnomer. I had been "prophesying" doom for some years now.

At Avebury we gathered at the very long procession of what was originally 600 stones standing in two lines about 20 feet apart. The pairs of rocks were designed to wake up the entering initiate as electromagnetic energy bounced between them. 

The site was on two ley lines known as the Michael and Mary line (or in pre-Christian times as the Apollo and Athena line). The stones on the left guarded the female line and the ones on the right, the male line. Several of the prophets said they could feel the pulsing between the pairs of stones. I couldn't feel it, but I was used to being the dumb one in the group.

To show us where these energy fields began and ended Freddy asked for a pair of dowsers and sure enough one of the prophets produced a pair. As he walked across the field in front of the stones, with the L shaped metal rods in his fists, the dowsers turned just as he reached the edge of the stone and turned again when he reached the other edge. I was dumbstruck. Now I was going to have to learn about dowsing. (It is not unlike the pendulum with which I already have a familiarity.)

For his next demonstration Freddy called for a volunteer. We had, by then, entered the main field where the stone circle lay. We were at a very large female rock at the entrance of the circle. It had a seat in it where the volunteer would sit. Once she did so, Freddy scanned her with his hand to discover the site of the ailment (as I had learned in my extraction healing workshop). He held his hand there and toned the appropriate note into the rock face. At the top of the "sound" chamber the rock jutted out capturing the sound and sending it back down to the patient.

"I can see her chakra expanding," said one of the prophets with a North American accent.

"Ah good so it's working," Freddy said.

Later I spoke to the woman who could see chakras and asked if she was an intuitive. She said she had been able to see auras since quite young and was giving classes when she was thirteen, but there was not much money in intuitive work so now she was a coach. Hmm, yes, join the club.

On the third day, of the tour, we followed just the Mary line for we were devoting the day to getting a feel for the feminine energy. And what a lovely day it was for taking in the sites. First a fertility site where the Cerne Giant with his impressive phallus was etched in the hillside with lines of white chalk. Then a visit to the Cerne Well in a quiet walled garden behind a church. 

As we sat in the dappled light under the trees, Freddy encouraged us to enjoy the contemplative environment and to drink from the stone basin in the ground at our feet. The water was full of iron and was good for us, he said. We would also be drinking the memories of all those who came before us which would connect us to the past and future. The water was cool and thick. It had been a long time since I could drink water directly from nature.

This, I thought, was the perfect place for a shamanic journey and just as I picked my intention for the journey (to help me further bond with my two power animals), a German woman, not from our group, spoke up and announced that she was going to lead a shamanic journey and anyone who wanted to could join her. I looked up to see a large, bespectacled woman in a poncho and a hat much like mine. In her hand she held a handmade skin drum.


How serendipitous was that? I put my face in my hat to block the light and she began to drum exactly the beat that I was accustomed to.

And so we three spirit friends, Bear, Mongoose and I set off on a fast ride in a dinghy up the Cerne spring. We were enjoying the open countryside when the spring led us into an underground tunnel behind the Cerne Giant. We then came to a large wooden door. The drum bid us enter and we walked into a sun filled village peopled with celebrants. Following the path we came to a rock face from which water poured forth. A pretty woman in period dress and flowers in her hair stood beside it. She handed us each a crystal goblet and bid us drink. This we did and were thus refreshed and bonded in this ceremonial pilgrimage to the wellhead. Just then the drum sounded the beat of return and we hurried back the way we came, boat and all. It was such an invigorating journey it filled me with magic. Afterwards I got up and introduced myself to the German shaman, exchanging a few words about our shamanic traditions.

A Prophets Advice

For lunch there were two pubs to pick from, The Royal Oak and The Giant Inn. Naturally I picked the Giant. Soon other prophets joined me, ones I recognized for their high level of intuitive skills. When they asked what I did for a living they were fascinated that I went into people's home to do actual clutter clearing. How funny, I thought, for their work was equally exotic to me.

Another prophet, an Englishwoman, sat down next to me and bid me tell her about the feather in my hat, asking if it was an eagle feather. She also wanted to know what was up with the red rock lobsters on my bright yellow shirt. I explained about the turkey feather and told her how I had made the shirt from a vintage Hawaiian sarong (in the same style as the Rousseau jungle shirt). This seemed to past muster and she proceeded to speak to me as a peer. 

She was a channeler, she said, as if describing an ordinary job. (I love that down-to-earth quality of the New Age Brits.) I asked her how that was different from a medium. She said mediums just work with dead people. She used to do that, but dead people weren't any wiser for being on the Other Side and she was tired of them leaving footprints on her psyche. Channelers, she told me, work with the energy of the earth, Gaia for instance, to ask her to be gentle with her back cracking which we experienced as earthquakes.

She asked how San Francisco had managed to avoid having an earthquake, because from where she stood, one was due, what with all the earthquakes happening in Japan and all.

"I don't know", I said, "all of us who live there are nuts." For living in earthquake country, I was thinking.

"It probably feels good living there", she said, "because of all the negative ions coming out of the cracks in the earth". I hadn't thought of that.

"We'll you must be doing something right," she concluded. Yes, according to Gaia relationship theory, we must be in her good graces. I liked to think so with all the weekend events I went to to improve things with the planet.

She told me about brokering deals with unfriendly spirits that harmed the environment. It sounded so much like what I'd been reading about possession by unwanted entities, I told her about my hoarding clients. She said I should do space clearing after I decluttered my clients' homes. 

"I'm not really trained in space clearing", I told her. "It's more the department of my Feng Shui colleagues." 

"I'm giving you a hint," she said adamantly, not put off by a lack of credentials. "And you should change your name to Ananda," she added. This was a Sanskrit name also used in Thailand. Perhaps she had changed her name too, I wondered later. She had a Celtic one with a handful of vowels. I heard it as Elfa.

When I told Catherine, that evening about Elfa's suggestion, she reminded me that Ananda was also the companion to the Buddha. Yes, I remembered. He was the dumb one who didn't get what the Buddha was going on about, asked a lot of questions and wrote everything down.

"Well, that sounds about right," I said.

Eyes of a Shaman

A report of my experiences with a local weekend workshop in basic core shamanism. "Core" refers to universal or common principles derived from traditional practices as researched by Michael Harner, author of "The Way of the Shaman" (first published in 1979) and founder of The Foundation for Shamanic Studies.

Monday after my beginning workshop in core shamanism, the world was freshly washed after a storm. A blue sky set off the many cumulus clouds. And I wanted to sit and watch them. I'm not normally given to a desire to commune with nature, nor was this impulse an awakened interest in natural beauty. It was more that I had learned a new language and everything now looked like it had something riveting to say. Not in that trippy way of having spent the day on LSD with your synapses jammed open with a pry bar providing the effect of everything seeming to breath, calling out for attention. This was a more subtle knowing, a realization that I could pay attention to the physical world and have it tell me things. Nothing dramatic, just a lively conversation with unique friends interested in what was on my mind.

Object Divination

In order to put us in such a metaphorical frame of reference Lesson One, at our small workshop of 11 people, was Object Divination. Here we were to use a rock for the purpose of mapping out an answer to a question. Not a yes or no question, but a who, what, why or how question. A partner would record our session.

"How can I improve my ability as a professional organizer with my clients?" I asked.

We were then told to look at the rock and point to four different things we saw. I immediately saw a face taking up a large part of the rock. To the right an arrow pointing upward in a zig zag. Across the face a path of stepping stones. In the distance and visible from the path was a distinct star.

We were then to interpret what each of these things was telling us in answer to our query. The face was obviously a forlorn client as full of suffering as the painting of the Scream by Munch. What the face was trying to tell me was how much this emotional and existential suffering was also about a need for meaning in the context of the clients cluttered life. The arrow showed that progress with the client would be uplifting, but not in a linear fashion. The first two stepping stones were very visible thus the first steps of our work would be obvious, then the path seemed to take two paths, both would work, but one would seem to me to be the better path because it was better positioned to see the distant star representing a focal point for our work. The star was telling me that the goal was as yet unobtainable, but was a powerful motivator.

We were then to flip the rock either towards us or away from us and repeat the process.

I immediately saw a smaller, but happier face with a deep hole next to it where an ear might be, marked by a triangle. On the other side of the face I saw another, larger, cat-like face. Down low and to the side, a set of three indentations.

Obviously the client was happier plus she had companionship either from an animal, a supportive family member or some kind of relationship involving other people. The hole was for me to speak into and suggest ideas for further progress. The 3 indentations were a set of portals integrated into the client's life for the removal of items not useful to their life. (Organizers often think in threes when dividing up items for removal.)

This was a pretty accurate narrative of the work that I do with clients, but because of the format, I was pushed to see just a little bit more about the work and introduce some elements that are not usually part of my repertoire. It was in effect, a map, but because it was a map I had made myself in a relationship with a natural object it had an added dimension that made it stick in my mind in a meaningful way. It also reminded me which part of the process I needed to work on.

I had essentially been coached by a rock and with better results. If I got nothing else out of the workshop the rock had already won me over.

Port of Entry

Having learned to see messages in nature, we wasted no time getting to the meat of Shamanistic technique—visions. I knew that no drugs were used, in this school, for the conjuring of visions, so was intrigued to learn that drumming prompted a dream state. At 3 to 7 beats per second, the brain would produce theta waves much like those observed during dreaming.

Our teacher, a woman not given to inflections of awe or wonder, taught class as though it were a hands-on technology, much like any computer tech class except that her tools were handmade. A rawhide drum, several rattles and a beater for the drum were laid out on a striped woven blanket at her feet. She wore an unusual pendant around her neck, but was otherwise dressed in ordinary slacks and attractive blouse. I appreciated her no nonsense style. It made the material feel accessible especially when she told us that a box of Tic Tacs would do fine as a rattle.

She gave a brief introduction to shamanism as a system of knowledge found all over the world—humankind's oldest spiritual practice. The Foundation's purpose in teaching shamanism was to bring back spiritual democracy so everyone could personally access the sacred. Thus we were not borrowing another culture's religion, but bringing back our birthright through our own practice.

To start the journey we needed a portal into the lower world. A place we had actually visited, a tree stump, the bottom of a lake or a burrow in the ground. We were given only a minute to come up with such a portal so I went with the first one that came to mind, a ring of tall Redwoods where I had once thought to build a tree house.

Whatever we chose it should provide a barrier between this world and the imaginary world of the journey. For it was the imagination, she told us, that provided the visions. She left it to us to believe (or not) that there actually was a Spirit World being accessed by the vision journey. She then assured us that the Lower World, to which we would go, was populated with compassionate beings who would do us no harm. Indeed they wanted to help us. The same was true of the Upper World, which we would visit later. It was the Middle World, the reality we lived in, that was tricky to journey into, containing as it did both benign and harmful beings.

The drumming would begin as we descended. Once we reached the lower world we were to look for an animal that would guide us and see what unfolded. After 15 minutes, the drum would stop. That was our signal to come back; the drumming would resume again to guide us home.

Shaman Journeying

The assistant teacher started drumming and off we went. Down into the soil I scrambled, following the twisted roots, watching for a light at the end of the tunnel. When I emerged there were trees overhead and a black furry creature dropped into my arms.

"Oh no", I thought recognizing the animal, "did it have to be a simian?" I was somehow disappointed, but the urgent beat of the drum did not let me remain argumentative. I accepted the gibbon guide (I'd had several gibbons as a child) and he dropped to the ground leading me by the hand, across a meadow to another grove of trees. There a tall indigenous man waved me down the path, the drums seeming to summon us. All around were people in celebration.

Soon we reached an amphitheatre filling up with people. I could see them far up into the stands. A leadership figure, another tall indigenous man in a long tunic came to the center of the stage. For a lesbian, I thought, this vision sure was filled with a lot of handsome men. It was a diverse crowd of many nationalities. I looked for the animal guides and saw them appear, sitting with their people—lions, cheetahs, birds—each surrounded by a glowing light.

The man welcomed us and spoke of what we were to expect during this day how we would be well taken care of. There were things we would be shown. Eager to see what technologies might be on display, I stood up and made my way outside towards a sandy beach where I saw several sailing vessels moored on the water. How perfect for a sustainable lifestyle, I thought. They were catamarans only with more hulls, about five hulls per vessel.

I was invited on board by the men already seated and given a place at a tiller, my gibbon pal tucked inside my jacket. We set off at a brisk pace, my feet braced on the sides. I was energized by the speed we were going and could feel the water spray, the wind and the pull of the boat. Everyone was working in sink together. After some time we landed at an island where I stepped onto the beach, as did the gibbon. We walked into the forest to drink from a stream with our hands and eat fruit from vines overhead.

"What's your name," I asked my gibbon friend.

"Panda," he said into my mind and added "I know you like jokes." Ha, yes, a gibbon named Panda, an animal by another's name. And the name of a college friend with hippie parents.

Climbing up a bluff I asked if there was a Tarzan swing.

And soon one came to hand. I grabbed one as Panda Gibbon grabbed another and we swung across the forest floor.

Then the drum stopped and I was far from my portal of entry, but I knew from reading The Way of the Shaman that I could go back through another one; there was a tree stump not far off that would do. I ran to it and jumped in through the top, climbing up the tree roots to the quickening beat of the drum, exhilarated with all I had experienced especially the sailing.

Talk To The Animals

The next exercise was more daunting. We were now to partner up, return to our animal guides and ask a question on behalf of our partner.

"The Spirits respond to altruistic intentions," our teacher told us. I was liking this world of compassionate beings more and more.

"Form your question," carefully said our teacher, "the question changes the future as it is being asked." She did not offer an explanation of why this was so. It was part of intention making I surmised. These were not lighthearted questions being asked either. Some in the room had cancer diagnosis or relatives who were ill.

Getting my new gibbon friend to give a straight-forward answer or any answer at all was not an easy task. When I asked him my partner's question, he spun around in circles for quite a bit before he would calm down and sit quietly beside me. I asked him again and he started grooming himself. Then I started putting words in his mouth. "Do you mean this?" I would ask. "How about this?" "What else should he do?" He mimed playing cards with me without looking at me. I asked the question again and he formed words into my head. "And how should he do that?" I asked. The gibbon mimed painting a picture. Then he ate some nearby grapes and sat quietly watching the horizon.

Well it would have to do. The drum was calling me back.

The journey having ended I sat up and composed my notes, then faced my partner with my answer. "Stop looking for solutions in a state of turmoil," I said."Find a quiet place in yourself. Nurture yourself away from your parents. Then return to them and listen with your other mind, your objective mind. Do something companionable and non-confrontational with them. When they are ready, tell them what you see is their future and paint a picture for them. Then nurture yourself again and let things unfold."

I was not used to giving people advice so boldly which added to the sense that I was delivering a message. My partner nodded in agreement to most of what I said.

"It's pretty much the same as what the rock said," he told me. Whew.

In turn the question I had asked my partner came back with an answer that gave me a new perspective into my question though the actions of her animal guide had much more meaning for her than for me. I was beginning to see how this worked.

"The Spirits arrange things that have some meaning for us," our teacher told us. With practice we would get more adept at communicating with this spirit world and interpreting the answers.

We ended our first day with a dance. We were to dance our animal guides and let them express themselves.

The Healers

The next day we journeyed to the Upper World. We were to ask the first person we met if they were our guide and ask for a healing. If the answer was no we were to go in search of another person.

I entered the Upper World via a tree and found myself in a white room similar to a doctor's office. A woman in white robes came toward me. She had long dark hair covering her face completely. When I searched for a face I saw almond eyes that were closed and a very wrinkled face smiling up at me. She looked not quite human, her skin being the color of paper, but she worked with me nonetheless, passing her hand over my sore hip and shoulder joints. Nothing seemed to work. Healing was not going to be my strong point I could see.

When I came back, on the second journey, with a question on behalf of a partner, the guide beckoned me down the hall to a garden full of patients healing. She spoke words into my mind and showed me things to make her point, a fountain full of coins, water over flowing.

New Animal Friends

By the end of the day I was feeling taxed by both thinking up questions and the retrieving of answers. Thus the final exercise was a welcome replenishing of our spirits.

We were to return to the Lower world on behalf of a partner and call for their power animal. We were not to bring back any insects, menacing reptiles or fish showing teeth. The animal was to show itself four times and then we were to gather it up, feel it in our arms and carry it back. On our return we were to blow the animal into our partners chest with great intention and then into the back of their heads whatever was left. Only then would we tell our partner what the animal was. If it was not the right animal for them it would just evaporate in time.

My partner journeyed first; I lay quietly next to him our knees and ankles touching as instructed. As the minutes went by, I grew eager with anticipation as though awaiting a gift. Then I saw my partner rise, his arms wide. After he blew into my chest and head, he told me there were two animals that wanted to come. While he gathered up one, another had insisted on coming too and had hopped on.

It was fitting. Two was my lot in life, two countries, two languages, two races, two spiritual philosophies east and west.

The first animal was a bear, as big as any you could find. The second a mongoose. I liked them both. I had just been calling for the emergence of my inner bigger self. And the mongoose was indeed a versatile character, Rikki Tikki Tavi having been a favorite childhood story.

A Birthing

In our final journey of the workshop, we met with our power animals to get to know them and ask how they could help us. The Bear was indeed filled with power and the Mongoose very talkative and busy. I asked how I would tell this story, overwhelmed as I was by all the new material and philosophical implications. Bear put his paw on my head, patting so hard that I felt like a basketball being dribbled.

"Hey I thought you weren't supposed to hurt me," I said; (it didn't really hurt) and I got the message that these were very big concepts I was trying to cram into my head. Then he lifted me to face the open landscape. Mongoose came along to interpret.

"Give an overview, then tell your story from the heart," said Mongoose, at which point I turned my head to the Bear's chest and pressed my way into his body, through his heart, descending through the internal cavity and finding myself in a birth canal as Mongoose assisted in my being born. He wiped me off after I emerged and I asked him to dress me. After all, perhaps what I was really in search of was a new wardrobe.

He put a flowing shirt of a swirling, red and ochre pattern over my head, then adorned me with brass pendants. Could this be kosher I wondered, this asking for fashion advice? They seemed okay with it; it was all part of the presentation. Then the drum summoned me to return.

We danced our new power animals; this gave them the joy of being alive, manifested in our body. Then the lights were turned on. Our workshop was done. We lingered, saying our goodbyes, everyone smiling happily.

Integration

In the days ensuing, I was stumped by how I was going to integrate this new experiential information into my daily life. Who would take seriously that I was seeking wisdom from animals? It was so childlike. Buddhism was so much more elegant and dignified.

My first day out I had lunch at an outdoor café with Bart, my editor at the Energy Bulletin. He was eager to hear what I learned at my workshop and I was hesitant to tell him. He was more a man of science than an enthusiast of the occult.

I turned to the sky to take in a pair of large cumulus clouds on that fresh, storm washed morning. One cloud had an in-y and one had an out-y. And as they moved towards each I could see that the out-y was lined up to slide into the cavity of the in-y.

I began to explain, to Bart, the metaphorical techniques, the Rorschach test-like interpretations. It would take me a while to get to the animals.

My pair of clouds were sliding into each other and I sensed that Bart was, after all, quite receptive to this intuitive based seeking. We certainly needed all solution seeking on board. Why not the pre-industrial techniques of medicine men?

I turned to him smiling, daring him, "Don't you think Peak Oil could use a Shaman?"

"Oh yes," he said enthusiastically, and we left it at that.

The Secret Life Of A Content Provider

Near the end of November I was cycling pass the Bay Bridge when I noticed a new sculpture. I was early to my client appointment so I stopped to inspect it and took a few pictures. The sculpture was a giant spider parked out on the sidewalk, big enough to walk under if you stooped. I thought it might be the work of a local artist. I posted my picture to flickr and called it Mutant From The Muck as a reference to the size of the spider and our recent oil spill.

In a day or two one of my flickr contacts left me ten links to other photos of similar spiders in major cities all over Europe and North America. "It seems to be multiplying", he quipped. There it was outside the Tate in London, the Guggenheim in Spain, in a city square in Denmark, Canada and Japan. Clearly this was a must have spider. From the tags on these other photos I learned that the name of the spider was "Maman" and the artist was a French woman from a family of weavers. To be connected to so many points on the globe like this, through an original work of art, was just too cool. I felt worldly and cosmopolitan. This was the appeal of flickr; you never knew what surprising connections might pop up and you had friends to help you find those connections.

When my computer died last month and while I was waiting for another to be delivered, I went from house to house begging for an online connection from any friend I visited. Though I had a back-up computer with which I could do my writing and pick up e-mail with dial-up, it was no longer enough. I felt a huge emotional void where my internet connection had been. I was cut off, isolated as though in a remote village. What had changed?

I couldn't seem to run my life properly. I was in the middle of several auctions on ebay that needed tending. I couldn't cue up the delivery of my next movie from netflix or check my library for a book I'd heard about. I couldn't see if I still had credit on my phone card or if anyone was reading articles on my blog. But what really made me feel intense withdrawal symptoms was that I couldn't post to flickr and leave comments on other people's pictures and blogs. That's when I realized I was a committed content provider, one of the legions posting work freely online for anyone to look at or use, leaving comments that might make someone's day, explain something important to interested parties or best of all, make someone laugh.

This activity had become vital to my own well being. I was at a loss to explain, to those who weren't also conducting these semi-secret relationships, why this was so compelling. Why was it so valuable to have a stranger interested in one's pictures? Someone who cared about what I was doing, but whom I likely would never meet. In fact if I did meet them I feared I would loose interest. The mystery lay in being able to follow an ongoing narrative that I myself could participate in and influence.

My contacts shared common interests with me that weren't covered broadly or at all in mainstream publications—solar ovens, non-electric hand tools, urban cycling, organic gardening, waxed cotton gear, sustainable living. Sometimes I picked a contact who lived somewhere I was interested in keeping tabs on—city life in Bangkok, a suburb in England, urban cycling towns in Europe, a corner of Brazil, New York City, rural south east Asia. These personal photos gave me a window into the world that I could trust to be devoid of hype or agenda other than the one openly promoted by the individual. Most of my contacts were younger than me, most were men. Most had made me their contacts first for reasons of shared interests or just because they thought I was interesting. It was a mutual admiration society.

The Sword In the Mind

On a recent Saturday on the first sunny day after endless rain, I spent five hours inside a padded warehouse learning how to swish a rubber stick around. It was thrilling. Thrilling to learn something new; thrilling to watch movement so familiar it was as if the sword was already in our minds. How was that so? Was it from watching all those kung fu movies or a memory of archetype? Or perhaps it was a hunger to move in physical space in a way that expressed immense purpose and decision within the realm of human scale? I never felt this way about a tennis racket or a golf club, but maybe some do.

I steadied my mind to absorb the choreography of the form. So prone was I to narrate myself right out of the room, traveling far away on a story I was telling myself. To stay focused I narrated myself into the form. Now we bow, now we turn to the rear, step around and swing the sword at our opponent. The newness of each move entered my mind like a gift and kept me riveted to the moment. It occurred to me that this opportunity to absorb something new and complex is a sacred space. Zen Buddhists call it beginner's mind.

Early in my identity as a writer, I read an interview with Kurt Vongegut who said he didn't understand why everyone was so interested in eastern meditation when we had a form of meditation right here in the West. It is what writers do. My most influential writing teacher led me, and a small handful of others, down this path of the writing mind. Through her writing exercises, I learned to recognize natural metaphors arising—those thoughts prompted by what I had been observing or doing, the interweaving of physical action and narrative. She then pointed out that once we were able to access this narrative we could stay in the present in an observant manner by practicing this kind of writing in our heads. It is this ability to be observant as though on the verge of discovery and transformation that makes blogs compelling for me to read.

As a content provider for just this sort of ever evolving narrative, I felt compelled to show up. My narrated life depended on it. Without it I was sitting at my desk alone, staring into the abyss searching for meaning. This is the downside of being self-employed. At a day long retreat of veteran organizers last year, someone asked how many present were on antidepressants. Of the eighteen or so in the room only two did not raise their hands. I was one of the two. On days when I find myself faced with the abyss, I understand why the number is so high. First there is the matter of creating one's own stream of income. If I have clients booked, all is well until I am too busy trying to do too much for too many and am stretched to the limit. When the calendar is empty I am sitting in a room with a limited air supply waiting to slowly asphyxiate. Panic sets in along with mental paralysis. I know I need to get out, network, generate contacts that will bring in work. This is a performance in itself, part faith, part pumped up bravado to show that I am indeed valued on the market when I feel most like a fraud. It is a bipolar sort of existence.

As a content provider I have much more control over my life. I create myself. I have value just being in the world. I post a picture of myself standing in the rain wearing my Australian cowboy hat and waxed cotton raincoat. I comment on the weather and the climate destabilization that has brought us these hurricane force winds. The usual 8 people read my comments. I post a picture of the contents in my bag and add it to the thousands of others on the "what's in my bag “ group. 456 people visit my bag and read the notes about why I carry a letter opener.

A man writing an entry for Wickipedia writes to ask if he can use my pictures of Tassajara in his piece about the Zen monastery. An online guide asks if they can use my picture of the Minnesota library. A flickr contact asks if he can use a picture of a friend's garden for a screensaver. The art director of Yes Magazine writes to ask if she can use my picture of the president of my electric vehicle club who has just written an article for them about plug-in cars. "You have a fun photostream", she comments.

A Content Driven Life

When my internet connection was restored via a new computer, I realized that it is loneliness that has driven me to this online life. (And I am one of the lucky ones who has a partner who shares my passions.) This is a useful insight because now I can understand the emotions that are informing my decision making process. Should I enroll in another class? Or is it that I just want to see the same faces when I walk into a room, working on the same shared topic every week? That is it exactly. As a content provider, I have exhausted that topic. I realize I must leave it now and find a new one.

One of my most popular essays posted to my blog describes my experience building a cob house (from mud and straw) or as I described it to my mother—"It's like the nice white cottage with the thatched roof that Milly Molly Mandy lived in". (Milly Molly Mandy being the heroine of a popular English children's book we both read in our formative years.) Cob building is a traditional building method of pre-industrialized England. Thomas Hardy lived in such a house. The pictures that go with my cob building article have been summoned in multiple searches. So too has the picture of my parents as an interracial couple. The words "mixed race" entered into a search engine is still bringing readers to my blog. Neither of these topics seem to be getting enough coverage.

I'd been thinking of taking a trip back to my childhood home to join a study group scheduled to visit sustainable, eco-driven living solutions including cob buildings, organic farms, a permaculture settlement, a seed saving collective, an intentional community and a fair trade cooperative. I just couldn't bring myself to fling myself across the world to then take an 8 hour bus ride by myself to the hinterlands of rural Thailand. But as a content provider I shrugged off such barriers. I would have purpose. This changed everything. What better than to report on the sustainable efforts of rural farmers in the developing world? Surely this story would be compelling in that a narrator with a personal connection to that part of the world would venture to bring back solutions vital to the healing of the planet. Plus I would get to sleep by the side of a rice field under a mosquito net, take local transportation, shower with a bucket and use composting toilets. This was my idea of travel heaven.

I wrote my family in Thailand. I wrote the leaders of the study trip. I wrote my publisher. I wrote the art director of Yes magazine asking if they'd be interested in articles. I made phone calls. By the end of the week I had registered for the trip and bought my plane ticket. It was exactly a month before I would depart. Suddenly everything was taking shape. I could see into the future. The sword in my mind made decisive moves slicing here cutting there. This is what needs doing now. This is my path. Nothing will stand in my way. All will bow before my sword. It certainly beats staring into the abyss.