On Being an American Druid

The Druid's Garden

The quintessential image of a druid is a group of people, all in white robes, performing ritual inside an ancient circle of stones.  This image is probably the most known and pervasive of all visuzaliations of druidry, and for many, it shapes the our perceptions of what druidry should be. But taken in a North American context, this image presents two problems.  First, we have no such ancient stone circles and two, another group has already claimed the quitessential white robe, and its not a group with which we want to associate our tradition.  This kind of tension, along with many other unique features of our landscape, make being an American druid inherently different than a druid located somewhere else in the world.  In the case of any spiritual practice, context matters, and context shapes so much of the daily pracice and work.    And so today, I’m going to answer…

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Phobos T3 – Victor Dixen

A Bardic Storytelling Ritual for Empowerment

The Druid's Garden

Everyone has a story to tell, and some stories are worth their weight in gold. How we retell past events, through the bardic art of storytelling, can help shape our present understanding.  Thinking about stories as acts of empowerment in this way is particularly important in an age where so many of us feel disempowered. One of the things I’ve noticed a lot lately is that people, of all ages, are really down, feeling defeated, and feeling burned out. They feel like they don’t have a lot of agency or power. And so, using ritual and spiritual practices to help us find our power, and better understand it, is an extremely useful practice.  Storytelling is a form of magic, in this case, through a bardic storytelling ritual, to help empower us and bring us hope.  So today’s post, in line with my larger series on the bardic arts, will…

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High Speed Snail

Wahou lot of nice pics! and great information 🙂 Hope you go well! 🙂

rambling ratz

It was a cold rain sodden morning (well I am in the UK) and I had to run some errands in my car. Looking out through my side window I discovered that I had a hitchhiker. There was a small snail sliding slowly through the rain drops.

I drove to my next destination very carefully, especially when cornering, wishing I had a sign, « Snail on board » so that other drivers would understand my caution. The mucus was strong in this one, he held on.

Thanks to a very knowledgeable chap on Twitter @BrianE_Cambs I later found out that my stowaway was a girdled snail, Hygromia cinctella. These snails originated in the Mediterranean region and are believed to have been introduced to the UK around 1950. Since the 1970s they have spread rapidly throughout the UK probably in plant pots, on animals and judging by this one by our road…

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Cat Magic Punks

Wahou so cool :p

A Druid’s Anchor Spot

Love it 🙂

The Druid's Garden

Current statistics from the United States EPA suggest that Americans spend almost not amount of time outside: the average American now spends 93% of their total time enclosed (including 87% of their lives indoors and 6% enclosed in automobiles). A UK-based survey indicated that children now spend less than 30 minutes or less outside and 20% of children don’t spend any time outdoors on an average day (which is less time than prisoners spend outside per day). I think that the reason that a lot of people find druidry is because of statistics like these: increasing work and life demands make it harder to get outside, increased urban sprawl makes it harder to find « wild spaces », and our relationship with nature is at a deficit that has implications for our health, happiness, and well being.

If (re)connection with nature is a clear goal for those on the druid path…

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Cat Calendar 2019 by artist Alex Hubbell

Wahouuu amazing :p

Establishing Sacred Land: Shaping A Shared Vision

Wonderful 🙂

The Druid's Garden

In Tending the Wild, a book that has deeply shaped my thinking about humans, nature and relationship, M. Kat Anderson reports in her introduction that the concept of « wilderness » had a very different understanding to the native peoples of California.  To the native peoples, « wilderness » was a negative thing; it was land that was essentially « untended » and left on its own. Native peoples saw tending the land–scattering seeds, selective burning, cultivating various kinds of perennial and annual spaces–as necessary for the health and growth of the land.  And the abundance that is reported by early western visitors to California and all of what is now known as North America certainly supported that fact: the land was incredibly rich, diverse, and abundant.

Of course, today, we see « wilderness » as a good thing. It is something that humans haven’t touched, it remains pristine and unbroken. In the post-industrial western…

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November Colour

Lot of beautiful pics 🙂 always a pleasure to see your articles :p

rambling ratz

After so many storms there doesn’t seem to be many colourful autumnal leaves left on the trees. However, there is still autumn colour to be found. The smoke tree seems to have managed to retain most of its leaves, sheltered by the conifers.

A snapdragon plant that I bought cheaply from a DIY store on account of it being nearly dead has made a remarkable recovery despite my care and has started to flower.

The last of the cyclamens are blooming on the lawn.

The golden rod has gone to seed and is now more of a silvery rod.

Michaelmas daisies are paying no heed to the religious calendar.

There is always herb Robert to be found.

The purple bee lavender is looking glorious, but watch for lurking spiders when you admire it.

Evening primrose is the best substitute for the missing yellow disc in the sky.

Fox and cubs…

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An Ancestor Oracle Deck

Sounds brilliant:)

The Druid's Garden

A part of my completed Ancestor Oracle (currently with 20+ cards)

Samhain is here, and with it comes a time of reflection, casting away, and working with our ancestors. In my post several weeks ago, I discussed in great depth the ways of working with various kinds of ancestors–in this post, we’ll explore a bardic art  project project that you can make to work with your ancestors: an Ancestor Oracle. This was an idea birthed by a friend of mine and I on the drive back from the OBOD East Coast Gathering this year.  We spent hours in the car talking through all kinds of things, and one of the things that came up was a conversation about working with the ancestors–by the end of the conversation, we had both decided to construct an Ancestor Oracle in time for Samhain this year.  I thought others might also like to…

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