FAIRY MAGIC FOR BELTANE

Hi all!  I will be back at the Triple Goddess tomorrow to demonstrate some uses for fairy cards, in honor of the great fairy festival of Beltane.  In the meantime, I’ve been thinking about ways that we can enjoy a good relationship with the fairy folk.

When we look at the role the fairies play in so many different cultural traditions, we see that the fairies’ activities raise the vital energy that enlivens the universe.  Or maybe I should say, “multiverse.”  Actually, I like the Buddhist convention of talking in terms of “the ten thousand world systems.”  When viewed from that perspective, there can also be many different types of fairy realms, and other realms that can feel the influence of fairy magic.

 

So, if so much of fairy magic is spreading well being, what can we do to generate some good energy to keep the fairies going?  Well, traditionally, some of the most basic things are 1) acknowledging the fairies and their good work through greetings and ritual, 2) setting out suitable offerings, 3) creating beauty--as beautiful words, gestures, things, and places give fairies delight, and 4) engaging in celebrational activities, because festive energies revitalize fairy life.  Of course, in planning your celebrations, be sure to acknowledge the fairies by inviting their participation, set out foodstuffs such as miniature sweets or pour libations in their honor, and be creative about ways to bring beauty and grace into the festivities.

Of course, working with the different fairy decks is another way of acknowledging fairies.  So, now I have something personal to relate.  After drafting the above three paragraphs, I got up to read some fairy cards for myself, as I am about to go out on a walk, and wanted something to muse over, as well as some fairy companions to accompany me.  Well, seconds after pulling cards from assorted decks—and I’m talking seconds, because I don’t think even a minute had passed—I found my little gold mano cornuta necklace & pendant, which I have been looking for for two weeks, and had given up for lost, figuring it had fallen off during one of my walks.  I think the little folk are trying to tell me something, in affirming their existence.  Incidentally, some of the cards I drew were the Brownie from the Mason-Franklin “Fairy Ring” deck, and “Gawtcha,” a fairy type that catches you unawares, from the Froud “Faeries Oracle.”   So, one of my errands today will be to buy a fancy cupcake to set out as an offering, since fairy magic should always be acknowledged with gratitude.

Upcoming themes: Faery World and the Magic of Flowering

Looking forward to my next workshop: because the month of May opens with Beltane, which is an important festival in fairy lore, I turn my thoughts to special things we can do with fairy-themed tarot decks and oracle cards.  My magical chat session for May will be on the 6^th, (the first Sunday in May), at the Triple Goddess, from 1pm to 3pm.

I particularly like to work with Brian Froud’s “Faeries' Oracle” cards, because the faery personalities portrayed more directly engage the viewer.  (Some of the Froud faeries are from traditional lore, while others are “revealed” faeries.)  I also use the “Fairy Ring” oracle by Paul Mason and Anna Franklin, which portrays fairy types from the British Isles.  Along with these, we might bring in some tarot decks that work fairies into tarot illustrations.

Another theme for May is “the magic of flowering,” because this is when so many wild flowers as well as other flowers are in bloom.  (This follows the “magic of opening,” which we discussed in relation to the beginning of April.)  Faeries are concerned with flowering because traditionally, the good energies raised by their dances, revels, and processions enhance Nature’s fertility.  Because fairies appreciate beauty, laughter, and celebration, anything you do to generate these qualities energizes the fairies, which in turn sends more good energy to the green-sphere and to what my friend Fred Adams called “the Imagination of the Earth,” Gaia Chthon.  There are all kinds of theories about who or what fairies are, but I believe a number of fairy encounters are contacts between human minds and various intelligences in Nature, including the Imagination of the Earth.

So, among other things, I’m planning the usual exercises for May, which include giving out “Faery Friends” (Froud cards) as talismans to keep, pairing the Faery Friends with Doreen Virtue “Fairy Messages” cards to give the faeries a voice, and inserting the faery cards into regular tarot decks and other decks, to see how Faery World energies might open/blossom out into other areas of our lives.  Even if you’ve seen these techniques demonstrated before, there is always something new to learn about cultivating relationship with Faerie.

When the Fairies get into your Tarot Deck

OK, looking at ways the Heart of Faerie cards can interact with tarot cards, for clues as to the unique ways that fairy energies can manifest in life.

Two of the fairy friends that were drawn at Sunday’s session were #29, The Green Man, and #56, The Challenge. Graphically, there are some similarities, because the former features a being with a leafy, mask-like face, and the latter a character with a leafy mask; both gaze directly outward. Both images also use the mystique of the mask as an interface with Nature, and I believe someone in our group mentioned something to the effect that the mask provides a transitional space for us to look outward through the eyes of Spirit. Do I recall this correctly? Does anyone remember more specifically what was said? The Frouds actually use the mask as a motif repeated throughout The Heart of Faerie.

The person who got The Green Man as her fairy friend was using “The Whimsical Tarot” by Mary Hanson-Roberts and Dorothy Morrison, which uses images from fairy tales and nursery rhymes. Here, The Green Man was flanked by the Page of Rods, (depicted, simply, as a horn or trumpet), and the Eight of Swords, (which in this deck is illustrated with a sleeping Rip Van Winkle.) Now the Page of Rods can represent communication, (though the trumpet in this illustration also suggests something of a wake-up call), and the Green Man suggests an Intelligence within Nature that is willing to communicate. Although Rip Van Winkle is portrayed sleeping, his sleep is almost something of a communion with Nature--at least as it is shown in this illustration. (I think the Eight of Swords’ meanings, in this context, denote more of a holding pattern.) So, what I’m getting here is a kind of paradoxical message: wake up to the voice of Nature by relaxing into Nature. (The term “relaxing into Nature,” is, I believe, used by Tom Brown, the Pine Barrens tracker, to convey the idea of being totally at home in Nature.) The person who drew this card already considers herself a nature person, so perhaps this reading just offers suggestions for greater attunement. If this person has a garden, she might want to put out some sort of a Green Man image, just as a means of returning the greeting.

The person who drew “The Challenge” card combined it with the Shadowscapes Tarot, (the new deck by Stephanie Pui-Mun Law), getting the Nine of Wands to the left and the Hermit to the right. This person views the Nine as representing challenges she has previously met, and the Hermit as keeping one’s own counsel. One way that the mask as an emblem of the fairy folk might apply to this card combination is that folklorically, in their interface with humans, the Fae may try to appear as human, but can’t totally disguise themselves. For example, mermaids always have wet skirts, or the Huldre folk and others may appear hollow behind. We also see this in Ben Okri’s novel, “The Famished Road,” where the forest spirits manifest as human, but there’s always something “off” about them—they can’t quite get it down. The person who drew the Challenge is a Pisces, and I think that a lot of Pisces folk are almost like mermaids or other beings who exist only partly in the human world. To meet the challenges of “the real world,” Pisces (or any number of others, including spiritually oriented persons, or persons who are neurologically different) have to invest a lot of energy in “passing for normal.” In this case, the prior Nine of Wands challenges may have involved assuming different personas, (as Wands can get into identity issues, and a persona is also a mask), in order to take on the challenges, yet still be able to preserve her Hermit’s need to have some personal space. This person also got a [Doreen Virtue] fairy message card exhorting her to “be yourself.” This isn’t necessarily a contradiction, because we have many quite authentic sub-selves, and these are what we can draw on when we assume different personas for different situations.

This reminds me of another aspect of Faerie, that is, it seems that all different cultures recognize different types of fairy beings who have some similarities across cultures, but also culture-specific differences, because fairies try to communicate and interact with us in ways that we can understand, and that make sense in our cultural context. With this in mind, assuming a persona isn’t being phony—it’s facilitating communication.

This also suggests a little ritual that a person could do with The Challenge card—or indeed, with any number of other fairy or tarot cards--when trying to assume a persona or get psyched up for a specific role or event. A lot of actors have little rituals to help them get into character, or just to help them transition into a different mode. So, Jack Lemmon would use the phrase, “It’s Magic Time!” when he was ready to get started, and if you’ve seen the movie, “All that Jazz,” Roy Scheider (playing the Bob Fosse character) would stand in front of the mirror, and with a certain flourish, announce, “It’s show time, folks!” Similarly, you could stand in front of the mirror, flourish your fairy or tarot card, and say something appropriate to what you’re trying to achieve, related to the symbolism of the card. In this way, you are also engaging the shape-shifting qualities of fairy magic.

To be continued …

A Tarot Rite for Sharing Blessings with Spirit

Sunday afternoon, we concluded our chat session with a little ritual that was new, so I thought I’d write it up for those who weren’t able to be with us. As I often say, these get-togethers are a chance to bring our spirit mentors along with us, to a place where the better sort of spirits converge, so they can share information by hobnobbing with each other, and we can benefit from their collective wisdom and advice. So, as we had a nice little circle arrangement, we used tarot cards as a way of circulating blessing energy for ourselves as well as our friends in Spirit.

To do this, each person pulls “The Star” and “The Ace of Cups” cards from his/her personal deck. The Star represents spiritual sources, and the Ace of Cups chalice can serve as a symbolic libation cup. Among ancient peoples, offering libations was one of the most common ways of showing respect to Spirit. (If you’ve read the Iliad, you may recall how the principal characters—even the gods--always had their libation cups at the ready.)

Now, with your left hand, raise The Star card, and say something like, “We honor our friends in Spirit, whose blessings and wisdom flow through us!” The left hand is the receiving hand, which draws from the Unconscious, so visualize energy being drawn from the realm of Spirit, and channeled through your being. Then, with your right hand, which directs energy outward, hold the Ace of Cups before you, pointing toward the center of the circle, and say something like, “We offer gratitude to all our friends in Spirit!” The energy thus directed to the center is both concentrated and amplified for all in Spirit to enjoy. Then, each person touches his or her Ace of Cups chalice card to the next person’s Star card as a way of creating a circuit of energy that flows through the circle, and say something like, “May all beings be refreshed by the free flow of spirit!” (This, of course, includes the Fae folk as well as other friendly spirits.) The circulating energy refreshes humans and spirits alike. Then, as part of a coordinated motion, have everybody bring their hands and cards flat to the table and say something like, “So be it!” to bring things to a close.

Also: I took a few notes on some of the readings we did, where first we selected Fairy Friends (from the Heart of Faerie deck), and then inserted them into tarot decks or others, in order to see how those fairies’ energies can operate in different areas of our lives. Among other things, we also paired our fairy friends with Doreen Virtue’s “Magical Messages from the Fairies” oracle cards, to give them a chance to speak. Although we had a lively discussion on the implications of the different cards, I shall take another look at my notes, to see if I can offer further insights into how the faeries might express themselves through the tarot in upcoming posts.

Faerie World Adventures

This Sunday I will be demonstrating techniques with the Faerie Oracle and the Heart of Faerie Oracle cards, among other oracle and tarot decks. As we work with these cards, a question to consider is, how can these fairies help us to enhance our relationship with a Universe that is intensely alive and in constant communication with us? (See my March 30th post on communications from the Living Universe.)

Wendy Froud, who has done the write-up for the Heart of Faerie cards, describes the cards as revealing, “how the wisdom of Faerie transforms life & relationships.” Transforming life and relationships suggests possibilities for shamanic engagement, because it recalls Serge Kahili King’s definition of the shaman as, “a healer of relationships: between mind and body, between people, between people and circumstances, between humans and Nature, and between matter and spirit” [“Urban Shaman” 14].

Pursuing an interest in shamanic healing, I have been re-reading Margie McArthur’s book, “Faery Healing.” (She also maintains a site at www.faeryhealing.com). Margie defines Faery Healing as “the practice of reestablishing communication and working relationship with our kin of the subtle realms of the Earth, the Elementals, the Earth Beings, the Faeries, and ‘the small clans of the Earth’s delight,’ to use Fiona Macleod’s charming phrase” [183]. Margie’s assertion that, “To do Faery Healing we must be prepared to go into the Heart of the World, that innerworld place where the Flame of Being burns brightly and connects us all by virtue of the Fire of Life which sparks and blazes within all life,” is echoed by Brian Froud’s desire to “experience the love and wisdom that comes from the hearts of the faeries and from the heart of Faerie itself.” The second part of “Faery Healing,” provides different healing techniques, starting out with suggestions for the art of “being hollow,” “body sensing,” how to clear intention and attention—note that the Frouds also emphasize paying attention as part of your bargain for the faeries’ insight and wisdom—different levels of grounding techniques, working with the elements and quarters, shapeshifting, finding faery healing allies, and so on. Something that I hope to learn more about as we explore these things together is how the different types of fairy cards might be used to help with grounding, (for example, cards portraying beings with their roots in the Earth), issues around being in touch with your body and with Nature, (the cards have a lot of images of bodies in harmony with Nature, even aspects of nature that some might consider icky), achieving that “hollowness,” paying attention, shape-shifting, and so on.

By the way, in the March 30 post, I was wondering if others had encountered decks that give a sense of a highly animated universe, and Javier responded with a number of suggestions with links, so you might want to refer back and take a peek at some of those. I do think that there is a lot more that could be done here, by aspiring tarot artists, in conveying ways that the Universe can communicate to us through the cards.