Ancestral Medicine
The call of the ancestral work has been ongoing for a few years now, Iāve touched it in gentle ways and ways that have allowed me to sip from the cup of ancestral karma and knowledge, touching the sides of where I have come from and how that has shaped me. Listening and researching the stories of my ancestors through tears and the acute sense of hardships and sufferings. I understand myself better as I pull the threads of different tales and from books of their myths and music from their songs. I Journeyed into their messages through my Druid practices, meeting the storytellers and the archetypes I held in my psyche, meeting the other beings and symbols connected to them. Jung took me deep into the basement of my ancestor's house and allowed their ghosts to be released seen and observed. A space opened for me to wonder what to do with my folk now as they released themselves into my consciousness.
This is where I sought the work of an ancestral Teacher/Guide (Daniel Foor of Ancestral Medicine) to tap into a deeper, spiritual, ritualistic, and ceremonial way my ancient roots were accustomed to. Knowing that ghosts are the undead, the unalive, the ones who suffer keeps them in liminal spaces that are not healing for their souls or ours. I worked through a healing course and resourced myself through the words of his book and an opportunity opened for me through a dear friend of my Druid lineage to retreat for a week in Ireland with his work. Ireland being the home of my Father Father and Fathers Mother line, I knew this was the next step.
Breathing in the Irish air through my lungs and feet, I sensed my people straight away. There was a language in the air that I could hear and feel and the sense that the land was waiting for my return, a return that would support me, a return where I could humbly acknowledge my roots and where my people came from. Folk music, Guinness, sea air, Barry's Tea, and the heavy scent of green earth and salty winds intoxicated me, I didnāt feel the barrenness of the land that had been conveyed to me through the stories of hunger and pain. I felt an aliveness, I heard laughter and music and humor and jokes riding the waves of exhaling breaths around the land. I embraced it all. The fauna and flora, the sacred sites, the people, the unseen beings, the sadness and the happiness, and a deep sense of community filled me up to the top of my being.
The retreat hadnāt even started, but the land had started on me. My dreams are filled with visions of those who passed and new faces that held dark skin and beauty from overseas, I dream of golden scarabs and symbols of Isis, Thoth of the blood of Queens, and the density of feminine power overridden into suppression. I woke in knowing I was working with the Mothers, Mother Line slightly confused and very bewildered, I honored the knowing to work with them on land that wasnāt there and all would reveal itself as the week unfolded. Meeting the ancestral elder of my mother's line, the Egyptian blood that ran through their veins and the symbol of the Golden scarab honoring life and death and a rebirth allowed me to stay open to all that came, all that was revealed. Finding links of the Queen of Scotia the Egyptian Queen who arrived in Scotland and Ireland, settled in my psyche creating an alchemy that within me something new was trying to be born. What did this new information coming through mean for me and what I held?
Women werenāt always seen as the weaker sex, they werenāt always the victim, nor were they always dishonored. There was a time when they held much power, like A LOT of power, that sat in their wombs and hearts, a time when they ruled over the lands, the people, and systems that established society. They held magical power, gifted to them by the Gods and the unseen beings that they knew as well as the seen, and the yielding of such power and magic was a great responsibility. Ancient myth shows us that that all power holds a space where love is devoid, all humans no matter of status and magic are not without shadow and somewhere down the line power and shadow replaced the light of Love. I felt the feminine misuse of power, within my own psyche the domination of the animus that had ruled me most of my life. I ran down the line of my Mothers's Mother feeling the result of this and the repression, the control, and the complete dishonour of the feminine. I shed a lot of tears and grieved deeply for the loss and power struggle between all things. I felt the wars of the clans, the deep tribal instinct to conquer, and the over-power that ran into all people. The grief led me to the present moment, of a world full of conflict, the want of power over another, the human instinct of tribe, the complicatedness of society without love as its foundation, and a world as well as the individual waging war upon itself.
I sat there feeling my internal feminine energy ravaged by internal masculine, I sat amongst the field of nonbinary feeling into a different space that they held in our collective, that I was able to experience and enquire into from a heart space, from a space of internal inquiry. The black and white separates us, the grey allows for the; āI donāt have the answerā, āitās just an opinion/belief my conditioning perhapsā, āI havenāt experienced thatā, āspeak to me of itā, āwhat is that like for youā¦ā ā I disagree but that doesnāt mean to say Iām right, let's talk about itā This is the space we go into inquiry, into openness, into acceptance, it steps us out of what is right and wrong and opens questions that disintegrates our need for power and fear of the other. The grey drops us into an expansive space of love and acceptance and I truly felt it more deeply than I had ever done beforeā¦ I felt within me a pivot, a shift, a turn of the wheel to the west where my Mothers, Motherās line was beginning to heal because I had brought the intention, time, energy, and consciousness to be the conduit of that. I could feel my feminine principle returning, being asked to slow down, take time, be met, and hold expansive space for great change.
In the presence of the others who journey into their ancestry, I was held in a vast container of inquiry, healing, and remembrance. The Irish and Scottish clans in me joined in a symphony of love, a chorus of their lore, and an atonement of their merging. I was held on the āEmerald Isleā in a deep collision of who I am, and where I came from. The Folk songs in the bars and on the retreat reminded me of the old ways that the young ways take into the future in honour and remembrance of those that passed. The stories singing in our bones, offering wisdom and healing. I felt laughter deep in my belly and joy bursting through my heart as I remembered how the community created kinship and cohesion. Watching the young women dance on a hen night while their elders sang songs of marriage and love, forewarning them of the trials to come, imprinted the need for such ways that pass wisdom on in such a way that was gentle, humorous, and entertaining.
The healing happening in my body is tangible, its work on my heart and soul feels like a soft lullaby rocking me gently awake to a new way of being. I want to explore this ancient feminine inside of me, the one whose power is love and who serves a physical community in its celebrations, rituals, and healing. I will uphold the Bandorai ( The Celtic Priestess) within me as a pillar of teachings, rituals, ceremonies, and initiations to others who seek their ancient wisdom. I will continue to honor the land I have the privilege to care take here in France āThe Sacred Grove of Le Temple de la Rose.ā I will cultivate a space to honor the ancestors on our land and for those who come to honor theirs. I will continue to work with my Ancestral Guide who has made herself known before to me in my Druidic practice, but now whose origin I have made conscious and can now honor.
I seek to hold the feminine principle within me more softly so the masculine principle can meet me and meet himself. I honor the meeting of these opposites to explore the emergent third, ( Thank you, Rose who held this principle so beautifully and whose part in the ritual landed this deep piece in me enough, to reflect upon it within myself.)
I will honor the importance of ancestral work, by sharing it with my son, and discussing how my own passing should be honoured so that he can support me in moving through the ancestral realms into deeper healing and assistance on his own journey of life and healing his line.
I sit in a deep space of reflection and expansion, with my drum in hand and the legions of ancestors behind me as they wait for me to apply the same healing to all lines. I thank Daniel Foor for sharing his lifeās work and holding such clean and safe space for us all to work in the realms of the unknown. I offer gratitude to all the people who came together to create a powerful, respectful, and sensitive healing container, where I was able to receive something from each and every one of you ā¦and lastly to my road buddy for the belly laughs, the sacred tears and the friendship based on a healing, spiritual, magical journey.
AWEN
COLLETTE
LINKS FOR FURTHER INTEREST
Queen of Scotia
Scarab symbology
https://www.thecollector.com/egyptian-scarabs/
Thoth Symbology
https://www.mayoclinicproceedings.org/article/S0025-6196(12)62084-9
The Truth behind the Irish Famine
https://www.facebook.com/jerrymul
The Senchai Story Tellers
https://www.irishcentral.com/roots/history/seanchai-storytelling-keepers-irelands-folklore-heritage
Daniel Foor
https://ancestralmedicine.org/bio/
Bandorai (Celtic Priestess) Teachings
https://www.templedelarose.com/bandorai-the-sacred-grove-initiation
