Month: June 2021
Intuition and dreams
There is this psychic space within us that we can discover via paying attention, feeling and fully experiencing our dreams or having life itself show us the alignment of within and without. It is a space where there is absolutely no doubt, a space that carries all the answers and knows all the ways that you, as an individual, operate. It is unique to you in one sense, but it is also universal, as we all have this space within us. It can bring incredibly strong affirmations to us through various ways that the feeling of it is so right it can not be questioned. Notice I say feeling – that is one most important and undoubtedly correct navigation system, as I like to say, you can not unfeel what you feel or pretend you are not feeling something. To know what I mean just try not to feel something when you are feeling something. It is there and its message, history, manifestation is valid because it simply is, the way it is in the moment, in your consciousness, born out of the collection of thoughts, behaviours, histories and beliefs from your psyche. It is born out of you, the feeling that is an affirmation of something intuitive within you that comes through in various ways.
One way to receive answers and affirmations from your intuition is via dreams and again, the way to know is via how you feel on waking from your sleep. If you don’t interpret anything else, e.g. symbols, archetypes, colours in your dreams, interpret your feeling. It will be there always as something for you to know. I think many would relate to having a particular feeling after a specific dream. Some are stronger than others, some scary others uplifting – all valid, all are messengers.
I have had several of these dreams lately where there was a question of some kind that had been flowing around for some time, things I wasn’t entirely sure about and was exploring, but also was leaning towards a particular resolution. A dream would come, and affirm the answer I have been seeking, or rather knew already and the feeling on waking would be so right I would have no doubt left. The question would then clear out of my psyche and on to the next thing. I noticed this pattern of processing psychic material via intuitive knowing that manifests in dreams often for me aligned with seasons and summer, June, in particular, is one such time when dreams become an active part of my intuitive manifestations and affirming answers for myself.
Intuitive ways can be weaved into your magic/spiritual practice and in your life in general in so many ways. It is a wonderfully enriching and enlightening journey and something that, once it becomes second nature, is like nothing else in a way of feeling content, fulfilled and free. It empores and inspires one to live in a way that has always been right for you. Application and manifestation of intuitive knowing is wide. It amazes me still every day just how much can be known and achieved when working from inside out.
Check out my latest book on Intuitive Practice, which covers working with nature; spell crafting; intuitive in general; dreams and intuition, etc. Have a look via the link of what is included in the Contents.
Pagan Portals Intuitive Magic Practice review
Pagan Portals Intuitive Magic Practice available in paperback and ebook https://www.johnhuntpublishing.com/moon-books/our-books/pagan-portals-intuitive-magical-practice
Intuitive Magic Practice, part of the Pagan Portals series, by Natalia Clarke makes me want to breathe a long, deep sigh of relief. Things have been a bit hectic in my world recently, and I’ve felt the disconnection that stems from being out of touch with my inner voice. Reading this book has shifted me back into my more natural, receptive state of being in the most delightful way.
Clarke has combined her experience as a transpersonal psychotherapist with wisdom as a spiritual guide to offer readers insight on how to create anintuitivemagic practice. Throughout the book, her gentle, calming tone invites a sense of fluidity, harmony, and personal energetic resonance to emerge.
In no way is this book one in which the author holds the knowledge, prompting a hierarchy between author and reader. Rather, Clarke develops a relationship with the reader that’s guided by feelings of…
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What nature does
It keeps me in balance in the body, mind and spirit. When seasons are aligned externally I am aligned internally. When it is off, I am off. It is a point of reference for me physically, mentally, emotionally and spiritually. It is a way of knowing myself as part of a bigger picture. The way it makes us feel insignificant is beneficial for us to bring us back into a place of humble being. Landscapes surrounding us and there are multiple landscapes, each of which, can offer a perspective. I like to think in terms of the four elements. Water, earth, fire and air. Each landscape has all of it entwined with one or more dominating, just like us, humans do and through immersion into the elements we get to restore back into balance.
Nature is an incredible life-partner, one I can not live without, as without it there will not be me. The deep knowing of it being within and without brings a profound sense of ‘this is it’. It comforts and reassures like nothing else.
It helps my mind be simply a function in aid to all my other functions, no more and no less. There’s always just enough thinking and clear enough to begin and end where it should. There’s no ruminating, overthinking and becoming overwhelmed by my thoughts to a point everything else shuts down. For me this is specifically related to hiking in nature landscapes, physically moving through places of natural environments and again there is a place for each desired effect I might be seeking.
Nature is a source of inspiration, awe, enchantment and wonder and it is the greatest feeder of my soul. Spirit is in the land and it is felt no matter where I am. It speaks a language that is so specific to nuances of the heart that it can take your breath away and it often does. One might say an understanding can be had from nature towards us. It has no judgement or punishment or even interest in particular in us. It just is and that is perfection, something for us takes a life-time to comprehend, if at all.
Nature is the greatest gift to humanity yet we abuse it daily. That’s what humans do through ignorance and arrogance. It does continue and regenerate though, it carries on regardless and if only we had reverence for that kind of resilience and beingness the world would be a different place. Think heaven on earth, well it is all there, in nature, in the land itself. It’s always been heavenly and always will be. Why we don’t want to be part of that I will never know…
Nature is sacred. There is mystery, magic, truth and life all locked within it. That is all there is to it. It is the most important creation on earth and always will be long after we are all gone. Ending up without our nature landscapes would erase all meaning for me. I can not comprehend existing without it and every day looking out of the window to a birch tree outside I feel blessed to have witnessed nature for real, in my life time. I fear it won’t be here forever…
Lessons from the mountain
In May this year I went on a solo road trip leaving home and all that anchors me into the responsibility side of life behind. I decided to experiment, as I had been feeling cooped up and stuck for some time, like so many during the last year.
I find after a time of still-standing not only I need to move physically, I also need to explore and rediscover myself psychologically and spiritually, otherwise I begin to feel weighed down by life. I need a change and a challenge.
The trip turned out to be very insightful, for which I am very grateful, as it fulfilled my desire for diving deeper into understanding some of the things I had been going through internally for many yearly cycles now. It was important for me to see if this time I could attempt to break those cycles again and unleash myself from being stuck in a place that became emptied of a sense of personal freedom and joy.
One of the main things I found out was that I liked being ‘by myself’, but not ‘with myself’. Two different things. It exposed a side to self-exploration that sometimes can become toxic and overbearing. I suspected this might have been the case for many years and consciously moved away from inner work during certain points and when it started to impact on everything negatively. Yes, that can happen. Too much of one thing at the wrong time can have the opposite effect to what one might be wanting to do. It got me thinking in terms of long-term healing and short-term solution/action-based types of personal therapy, as my point of reference. Is a long-term exploration good for us, or is it better undertaken in manageable/digestible chunks? I suspect the later is true, for me anyway.
So, I wanted to define for myself the difference between being ‘by yourself’ and being ‘with yourself’? Those two differ, and here is my definition and understanding of each.
Being ‘by yourself’ means being solitary, in solitude. It is not being lonely, isolated, or abandoned. I really enjoy being by myself; being quiet and alone in a way that nothing and no one can interfere or interrupt my chosen flow and I am in control of what happens in each moment. It is being removed from burdens and responsibilities of day-to-day life. This type of solitude is intentional and conscious. To me it is something I can not be without. It is the ultimate manifestation of my personal freedom, which I value above all.
Being ‘with yourself’ means being aware of your internal processes and for me that is not necessarily good all the time especially when I choose to be by myself. One can be deeply unconscious and one is chosen. When that happens a conflict can arise. Being ‘with yourself’ can involve thoughts going round and round and you are able to hear them, engage with, act upon, or become overwhelmed. It can be feeling more, as there is no external noise or distractions that require your attention. Overall, it means you are more present with yourself and everything that you carry within you. This is something that I find difficult, as my mind becomes very loud and my thoughts can take me places I do not want to go especially when I am being consciously and wanting to be ‘by myself’. My purpose of choosing to be by myself is, in fact, the opposite. I do it to quieten everything to a soft pace or at the very least gain clarity. Having said that this only relates to my ‘head’, my thinking. I would never aim to quieten my feelings and instincts. Those, to me, are the essence of being and mechanisms that keep me in touch with myself in a positive, useful way, not disruptive and overwhelming. Those ‘feeling’ functions of myself are my creativity, my soothing tools and something that makes me flourish be it bringing ideas into being or directing me towards where I need to go. I tell you intuition in the mountains, I called it ‘follow your nose and gut’, is a very useful tool. Something I experimented with, as I use intuition in all areas of my life.
What I realised again is that the way for me not to be with myself in a negative way I need to do something. There is a time and a place for ‘being with myself’, I found, and it really does depend on what I do with my time ‘being by myself’ whether ‘being with myself’ would impact me negatively.
In this case my trip was planned and intentional and hiking is an activity that always works for the benefit of my mind. For that to work I do need a plan, a route, in this case, a goal, a destination, some focus that benefits my physical, mental, and spiritual selves. It has to be something physical, something that will use your body. When I walk, I am aware of just walking, taking in the scenery and being aware of my feet making progress reflected in the distance I have done around me and on the map route. There is something reassuring about putting one foot in front of the other and the metaphor for getting through something really comes alive in this activity. If thoughts come in on a hike, they are easier to discern, i.e. not getting tangled up, they are less threatening or deep somehow. I find they clarify and disperse quicker and answers come more naturally.
I thought many might relate to this hiking/thinking pattern scenario and seeking relief in nature, as well as, looking at healing from your own perspective and what works for you as an individual. These days I am into analysing less and being more. One of the way to bring that into being is for me to write blogs again rather than processing things using my journal, which has become one of those suffocating tools that can really take me places I never intended to go. Something to do with concise nature and being in the present/external rather than internal, which links back again to a long-term/short-term way of healing.
I hope you found this interesting and might relate to some of the things I discuss.
My book Intuitive Magic Practice discusses the subject of intuition in life in general and in a spiritual practice, if you wish to delve further into it.
Raw Nature Spirit 
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