*
I dream of light-flowers erupting from hilltops and wake up feeling refreshed and looking forward to our planned trip to the Uffington hill carving and Wayland’s Smithy despite the gloomy weather.
I cannot really blame Wen for this one because it was my idea but even that was strange… its passage from idea to manifestation took place like the growth of some improbable multi- faceted Chrysanthemum…
First there was Lee telling me about his trip to the famous long barrow and me waiting and waiting and expecting at any time some inkling as to the naming of the place.
I had previously disclosed to him the Raven-Stone hidden at Hordron‘s… and had felt sure that he would be on the lookout for something similar but if he had been then he obviously did not find it.
Then again Lee did not really appreciate the ramifications of the Raven-Stone.
Who would?
I am not sure I do, completely.
It is difficult to grasp that the way the ancients saw the same things we see was so radically different… I had been slightly envious of Lee getting to Wayland’s before me but that envy was assuaged somewhat by his apparent lack of discernment and the small… still… voice… telling me that it was not yet time and that the timing of these things was almost as important if not more important than any kind of discernment.
And then the Wayland’s image kept turning up when it did not really fit… I had been experimenting with images and quotations and linking them through meditation.
It appeared that while words appeal primarily to the intellect, images are intrinsically more emotionally charged but repeated use of the two in conjunction can afford an approach to the fusion of these two normally separate centres.
The images were predominantly culled from works of art with the exception of the Wayland image which was simply a photograph… of place!
It was incongruous but insistent…
‘…What do you really want from the use of this image?’
‘I want people to visit the site as a prelude
to embarking upon their new spiritual journey.’
*
*****
THE INITIATE
Book One of the Triad of Albion
Stuart France & Sue Vincent
The Initiate is the story of a journey beyond the realms of our accustomed normality.
It is a true story told in a fictional manner. In just such a way did the Bards of old hide in the legends and deeds of folk heroes, those deeper truths for those ‘with eyes to see and ears to hear’.
Don and Wen, two founding members of a new Esoteric School, meet to explore an ancient sacred site, as a prelude to the School’s opening event. The new School is to be based upon a nine-fold system and operate under the aegis of the Horus Hawk.
The trip does not unfold as planned.
Instead, Don and Wen, guided by the birds, find themselves embarking upon a journey that will lead them through a maze of spiritual symbolism, to magical mysteries and the shadowy figure of the Ninth Knight.
As the veils thin and waver, time shifts and the present is peopled with shadowy figures of the past, weaving their tales through a quest for understanding and opening wide the doors of perception…
Now available via Amazon worldwide.
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France & Vincent 
I think I too am an initiate to this, my second year of study, and transcending into a higher level of life. I enlarged the picture, and when I see all these beautiful photos, I so want to be part of it all.
A part of me is having to die so that I can emerge in a new state. I can no longer be a victim of life, nor can life be victimized by me. Something is emerging, and it is like the birthing time. Parts of it are painful, not only for the mother, but for the baby who is emerging too. Being an initiate has to involve a certain amount of pain. I was thinking of those caterpillars who will shortly become Monarch butterflies. They ate all the leaves of the milkweed bush so that they can become cocoons and change into butterflies. Can you even imagine what it must be like to eat milkweed bush? I would have to be nearly dead in order to force myself to eat it, and then I am sure I would have to wash it down with tons of water, which still would not take away the taste.
So perhaps the life of an initiate will involve a sort of dying, but I am sure it will bring about something beautiful – something that can soar high above those things of the everyday world in spirit and brings a sort of strength that can’t be easily described. I don’t think anyone could ever envision them as victims, even if evolution and the environment speaks differently. Their lives may be short, but every moment is lived fully, and they truly deserve the title of Monarchs.
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