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The Moola Mantra and Me

4/4/2014

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Some of you will have noticed little signals in my writing - small but frequent mentions that I am not entirely happy where I am geographically. I'm homesick for Scotland in a number of different ways, and struggling to love the environment I'm living in. One of the things I have trouble with is car journeys, especially if I'm a passenger, because then I really have time on my hands to look around me and see all the things I don't like. A dry, rather colourless and windblown landscape which has suffered terrible environmental degradation, littered with the careless leavings of unsustainable and failing agricultural processes, with signs of poverty and hopeless ignorance everywhere. (Yeah, I fitted a lot of negativity into that last sentence, didn't I?) That's how I see it on a bad day, and it is one kind of truth.
The thing is, though, that since I live a long way from any amenities, I have to go places by car quite a bit, and I often find it quite distressing. Not fun. So much not fun, that I have probably been avoiding it more than I realise. However, I seem to have stumbled upon a really good remedy!
About a year ago, I signed up for a 21 day meditation challenge with Deva Premal and Mitten. Each day featured a mantra, one of which was the Moola Mantra. The words of that mantra are:
Om
Sat Chit Ananda
Parabrahma
Purushothama
Paramatma
Sri Bhagavathi
Sametha
Sri Bhagavathe
Namaha
Deva explains their meaning this way:
Sat - truth, Chit-  consciousness, Ananda -  bliss  (this is also a mantra in its own right)

Parabramha - the unmanifest divine, the divine that is all around us, the air we breathe, the space that's all around us permeating everything.

Purushothama - the divine that is manifest in human beings, as our spiritual teachers, gurus, avatars, enlightened masters.

Paramatma - the soul that's within every living thing, the divine essence that's within every living thing.

Sri Bhagavathi Sametha Sri Bhagavathe - the feminine principle together with the masculine principle.

Namaha - I offer salutations (to all of the above). So to the divine in its unmanifest form, then channelled into our teachers and gurus, then coming to the universal understanding of everything being divine, of everything being a reflection of the divine perfection  and then the dance of the feminine and the masculine energy like a yin and yang at the end of the mantra.

It's so easy to acknowledge the divine in things we like, or people we like. In pretty things. Less easy to do so in the things we find ugly, in people or actions we find ill-intentioned. It's easy to forget that the unmanifest divine somehow permeates all. It's easy for me to feel that if I don't fight the things I don't like, then somehow they win and I have given up. But I think that just creates blocked energy rather than the flowing energy with which I am able to create and to manifest useful change. But back to the Moola Mantra...
I loved this mantra so much the way Deva explained it. To look around me, and remember that the divine is in everything is very good for me. I also loved her musical interpretation of this, and found out that there is an entire fifty minute version. I bought a copy. It seemed like good driving music, so I put it in my car. Well, maybe you can see where this is going ...
It has helped immensely. Whether that's because, as some believe, the Sanskrit words of mantras have some extra mystical power, or because I have connected with their meaning at a conscious level, or just something in the music - I feel better connected to the landscape, more lovingly connected, and much calmer. And I think that this effect has filtered out a bit into the rest of my time, as well.

If you enjoyed this post, you might also like Thoughts on Guided Meditation

If you would like to read a more detailed explanation of the Moola Mantra I like
this one (scroll down to the "Full Meaning").

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Dancing on Bridges

14/8/2013

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"My mother comes from a place called Masshill [County Sligo, Ireland] in the Ox Mountains, but, unfortunately, her immediate family had all moved away, mostly to England, by the time I was about three or four years old. However, I do remember several of the stories of the house dances that used to be held there and also of the summer's evening dances on the flat bridge over the Black River, just below the house. In later years I got to know some of the musicians who would have been playing at those dances... "
        - Kevin Burke, November 2000

It was this chance description, in a booklet which accompanies his CD Sweeney's Dream, which originally informed my thinking about the Bridge card in my oracle deck. Not so long ago, bridges were popular meeting places, particularly on summer evenings - for trysts, for games, and because they were usually nice and flat, for dancing. It's easy to take bridges for granted, but they are important landmarks, making life much easier and linking communities.

Picture
Bridge - Merrymaking, flirtation and easy-going connections between individuals or communities.
This song from by Jack Dodd, from Newfoundland, describes similar memories.
On the Big River bridge on an evening in June
To enjoy the village dancing by the light of the moon
For the happy sound of laughter and the old time quadrille
Sure is among my happy memories of old Flatrock Hills

Now time it will change but the old bridge will stand
It's the same as when we stood there hand in hand
It's old stone foundation supporting itself
And the river still flows o'er the old Flatrock Hills

In a reading, this card might be there to remind us of the importance of connections, and not only for the more practical uses of commerce or travel, but also for the fun of coming together. Individuals easily become sour and stale without a bit of socialising, and communities falter without the influx of new blood from their neighbours.


One of my favourite examples of communities using a bridge is the annual meeting  on the Wye bridge, which links Chepstow, in Wales, with the communities of Tutshill and Sedbury, in England around New Year. Wassailers from the English side and a Mari Lwyd party from the Welsh side meet mid-bridge for an exchange of cultural celebrations and partying. This link will take you to a video of the event. I've set it to begin at the meeting on the bridge, but the whole video is enjoyable, if you have time.
Picture
Wassail and Mari Lwyd on the Wye Bridge, Chepstow.

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Of Oracles, Wonder and Inspiration

24/7/2013

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With Lughnasadh nearly here, I thought I would share this piece which I originally published on facebook in March 2012.

Some thoughts on the coming of Lugh.

I've just been reading a wonderful retelling of the Irish story "The Coming of Lugh" by Ella Young. Myths often contain a passage of "wonder" which particularly moves me. This story has such a passage, but first, let me set the scene.

The Irish sea god Manannán mac Lir, whom you may remember from my post on The Voyage of Bran, takes the young god Lugh to Tir na nOg (The Land of Youth) for his upbringing. Here  -

He raced the waves along the strand; he gathered apples sweeter than honey from trees with crimson blossoms: and wonderful birds came to play with him. Mananaun's daughter, Niav, took him, through woods where there were milk-white deer with horns of gold, and blackmaned lions and spotted panthers, and unicorns that shone like silver, and strange beasts that no one ever heard of; and all the animals were glad to see him, and he played with them and called them by their names.
Meanwhile, back in Ireland, the people of the land, the Tuatha De Danaan, were having a hard time of it. They were subjugated to the not-so-nice Fomorians, and Nuada, the king of the De Danaan, was unable to defeat the Fomorians in any decisive way. Things dragged on, with Ireland constantly at war. Manannán knew this because he'd been putting on his cloak of invisibility and checking up on things at night.

When Lugh came of age, Manannán gave him a magical sword, and Lugh decided to head back to Ireland and see what he could do to straighten things out. Of course, when he got there, nobody knew who he was, so he had a little trouble getting into Nuada's castle. Through a dialogue of boasts and challenges, he was finally admitted, and proceeded to best Nuada at chess and other games.

Seeing Lugh's many talents, Nuada then asked him to play the harp -

"I see a kingly harp within reach of your hand," said Lugh.

"That is the harp of the Dagda. No one can bring music from that harp but himself. When he plays on it, the four Seasons--Spring, Summer, Autumn, and Winter- pass over the earth."

"I will play on it," said Lugh.

The harp was given to him.

Lugh played the music of joy, and outside the dun the birds began to sing as though it were morning and wonderful crimson flowers sprang through the grass--flowers that trembled with delight and swayed and touched each other with a delicate faery ringing as of silver bells. Inside the dun a subtle sweetness of laughter filled the hearts of every one: it seemed to them that they had never known gladness till that night.

Lugh played the music of sorrow. The wind moaned outside, and where the grass and flowers had been there was a dark sea of moving waters. The De Danaans within the dun bowed their heads on their hands and wept, and they had never wept for any grief.

Lugh played the music of peace, and outside there fell silently a strange snow. Flake by flake it settled on the earth and changed to starry dew. Flake by flake the quiet of the Land of the Silver Fleece settled in the hearts and minds of Nuada and his people: they closed their eyes and slept, each in his seat.
snow, pheasants, evening light
Photo by Shelley Newton-Carter

Lugh put the harp from him and stole out of the dun. The snow was still falling outside. It settled on his dark cloak and shone like silver scales; it settled on the thick curls of his hair and shone like jewelled fire; it filled the night about him with white radiance. He went back to his companions.

The sun had risen in the sky when the De Danaans awoke in Nuada's dun. They were light-hearted and joyous and it seemed to them that they had dreamed overnight a strange, beautiful dream.

"The Fomorians have not taken the sun out of the sky," said Nuada. "Let us go to the Hill of Usna and send to our scattered comrades that we may make a stand against our enemies."
aturally, Lugh and Nuada were able to defeat the Fomorians in short order after this. So what changed everything so suddenly? I think it was the inspiration of beauty. The "strange beautiful dream" that Lugh's playing had induced, the inspiration of the beauty of nature hadn't just intoxicated Nuada and his men, it had inspired them. They hadn't so much fallen into a dream as been awakened. Joy, sorrow, and ultimately peace, inspired them. The snow, here a symbol of peace, which physically settles upon Lugh's hair and cloak, that fills the night with radiance. Pure inspiration.

Music, art, symbolism and nature are potent magic. When we are asleep, sometimes it is the dream that truly wakes us. Particularly when the sleep feels like being stuck, as Nuada was. An oracle reading is just one way to dream yourself awake. You might prefer to read a myth, go into nature or experience music or art. All are potent.

At this point in the story, Lugh was Nuada's oracle. Yet he never said "Go, fight the Fomorians, and this time you will win!" Instead he sang of joy, and sorrow and peace. When each man awoke the next day, he knew what to do. And so they all showed up for the battle. The battle they could not win before. Of course, Lugh and the army of Tir na nOg showed up, too. How could they not? They were the embodiment of the inspiration the De Danaan awoke with that morning. For there are three parts to inspiration - there is the dream, then the awakening, and finally the doing. The inspiration of the oracle is in all three.

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A Song, a Story, the Sea

3/7/2013

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Growing up, as I did, in landlocked Colorado, the sea was not so much a mystery to me, as an object of no meaning whatsoever. I never even saw it until I was in my twenties and moved to California. However, when I was about twelve years old a musician called Donovan Leitch came across my radar and his music moved me intensely, and still does so today. In 1968 I bought his double album A Gift From a Flower to a Garden. One LP was acoustic and one electric. The acoustic one spoke deeply to me, and most of the songs on it were about the sea - or more precisely the seaside. Starfish, crabs, gulls and assorted wandering humans inhabited the lyrics in a way that made this environment real and interesting to me for the first time.
Picture
Donovan Leitch

I awoke this morning with a song from that LP in my head. What struck me was how like Manannán, as he appears in his trickster guise, the tinker character is. Manannán who can be recognised by the water sloshing from his shoes as he walks on dry land. I knew he was familiar from somewhere. Maybe I first met him in this song!

You can read about some of Manannán's fun and games in Lady Gregory's "God's and Fighting Men" Part I Book IV: Manannan at Play or listen to an adaptation of it by the folks at The Celtic Myth Podshow in The Raggedy Man

If you enjoyed this post, you might like The Beach

Mythology

A chapbook collection containing the allegorical tale The Story Shawl, a poem about Macha entitled Approaching the House of Cruinniuc, and a long essay called The Beach.


Size 8.5" x 5.5"


14 pages


Please see product page for more information.

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