Singing Deer Healing

I’ve never done SoulCollage before, but upon reading about the process at True North Arts, my imagination caught fire. For some time now I’d thought it would be cool to design a wisdom deck of cards that were basically images and situations that manifested in dreams. Reading about SoulCollage, I realized that in a sense that’s exactly what these cards were — manifestations of dreams, images, and archetypal wisdom mined from the depths of the psyche.

I created three cards for the SoulCollage Blog Party.  Enter the adventure here!

~~~~~~~

Welcome, Travelers, to this small journey!.

I have infused the art and this post (and the entire website for that matter!) with Reiki healing energy and my good wishes and blessings to you.  May you receive just what you need as you encounter these mysterious but kindly beings as you journey through the cosmos of your inner nature, your soul terrain ….

I am the one who restores you to Jeweled Time.

I slash at the notions
holding you back about not enough, and reveal the simple
beauty of eternity contained in the rose of the moment.

My gift to you
is the Jewel that is here before you — the essence contained in this
moment of time that is your soul in joyful, fierce, reverberant
expression, your Queen of Hearts nature.

What Jewel is before you, right here — right now?

~

I am the one who rides the wind and speaks its language.

I reside over
the highest mountains, and shelter the flower that is the Sun of your
soul. You can find the Cloud City and discover its treasures–the
exquisite expression of You– when you converse with my dragon-spirit,
when you dare to climb onto my back and fly.

Here is the secret of the
Cloud City: it is your domain, your birthright, your place to command.
It holds infinite knowledge, and precious gifts and powerful magic all
perfectly tuned and attuned to awaken to the dragon being that you are.

When you arrive at the Cloud City and assume your sovereignty you assume
your dragon-nature.  Your very being and essence transforms the City and
then the World.

Tell me: Do you see me, hear me, feel me right now?

I am poised to carry you immediately and directly to your Cloud City.  I await only a whispered word from you, the courage and clarity of your command.

~

I am the one who tends the Winter Garden.
Your world may be barren, may be cold,
but look around you.  Rest on the bench in the snow-shrouded forest,
and I will bring you just what you need.

Flowers or treasures, or

my older-than-the-snows presence and

my listening ear

The candle stays lit in the Winter Garden, illuminating hope for you when all is lost.

Tell me, young one:

What hope have you abandoned?  Rest here a spell, and together we will shine promise upon it.  What warms within you as a result?  What soil of soul quickens within you?

~~~~~~~

Rest for a time, dear One, and receive blessing here!

_______

What is your story?  How do these images speak to you?  I invite you to share your impressions, tales, and insights in the box below!

Thank you for wandering to my corner of imagination and healing!

~ In Grace,

Jane

Rooting The Uniqueness Of You

Below is an article I wrote awhile back. Though it is written to “artists in the trade” (harpers, storytellers, bards) it may serve as an introduction to some concepts about the use of story as a medicine for ourselves, others, and for our culture that I will discuss in forthcoming posts. Whether you work consciously with story or just love story, I invite you to meditate in particular on the quotes below. What felt sense arises in you when you read the quotes? Do any of the words spark something true in you or is the feeling more: that isn’t for me!

How might a deepened relationship with the magic of the natural world and with the poetry of the soul as expressed in myth, dream, and the yearnings of your own heart speak to you of something of your own nature that the world most desperately needs you to root into our place and times?

Bardic Harp & Healing
by Jane Valencia

The 21st century bard is an important voice for our emerging culture– a culture that is rooted in the natural world, sustainable, just, spiritually-connected, considerate of future generations, honoring of the past, and above all, hopeful. In my opinion the bard of our times would do well to consciously craft performances and his or her artistry to inspire us to connect more deeply with ourselves, our nature, our heritage, our future.

As a 21st century bard, I feel that my art form is woven of the following:

* song and harp artistry
* folklore, poetry, and other aspects of heritage, art, and the “immense inner language of the soul”
* a quest to weave stories to nourish a positive future right now
* a call to live our deep-rooted, unique magical nature
* personal journeying into our indigenous nature as humans in relationship to one’s ecology and as humble members of the more-than-human earth community.

As a bardic healing artist I apply this bardic perspective of belief in the possible, the weaving of sacred space (encircling and providing sanctuary for my client), the gentle exploration of story–why is the client here, now? What is does this moment and situation reveal of the larger story woven into my client’s life and heart?–and a celebration of him or her. This is all mingled with the sound and energy healing to rebalance, restore, and nourish the body, mind, heart, and spirit of the person before me.

Here are some quotes to inspire you on your path as a 21st Century Bard or Bardic Healing Artist — or both (these days artistry is by nature a healing or a “reminder-of-our-wholeness” art, I believe).

“There is no shortage of mysteries. What would happen if you were to understand one of them?”
- Rumi

“The true university is the forest. …. We need simply to open ourselves to the life around us.”
- Brooke Medicine Eagle, forward to Sacred Plant Medicine by Stephen Harrod Buhner

“We are mythic by nature. We find the subtle symbolic ground hidden in ourselves. Myth is the second nature of the world. Nature with its rhythm, cyclical activity … is the first.”
- Michael Meade, Entering Mythic Territory

“The bards of old inhabited a magic reality of their own making, and they made of their lives a fairy tale. They could not be caged by possibilities, nor could they be bought. Poetic insight is more important in our lives than ever in this computerized, industrialized age. We desperately need people who are passionately alive in an enchanted reality, cohabited by the spirits, the ancestors, and the gods.”
- Robin Williamson, forward to The Bardic Sourcebook, ed. John Matthews.

Feel free to share your thoughts here!

Here is an improvisation in Lydian mode (a kind of scale) that skips briefly into Mixolydian mode, then slides back again. My younger daughter and I are reading lots of books about fairies these days, thus I envision Lydian Mode Fairy skipping along in the starlight, briefly taking hands with Mixolydian Fairy before dancing away to breathe in the cool night air, the flowers (petals now closed), and listen to the sweet music of the heavens …. is that overly fanciful? . Anyway, I invite you to enjoy the music!