Céad Míle Fáilte: First Imagine ©
by Tira Brandon-Evans

"There is no use trying, said Alice; one can't believe impossible things."
"I dare say you haven't had much practice, said the Queen. When I was your age, I always did it for half an hour a day. Why, sometimes I've believed as many as six impossible things before breakfast."

(Lewis Carroll, Through the Looking Glass)

Many new students, and friends, just beginning their shamanic pathwork tell me their journeys are lacking in reality. They cannot ‘see’ themselves in the Otherworld or they cannot ‘see’ the Otherworld at all. They ‘sort of feel’ things in journeys but they don’t seem real. It is often reported that during journeys there are flashes of momentary ‘reality’ where things are clear but this is soon lost and the mists return.

This is perfectly normal and we even have precedence within our lives for what is happening here. When a baby is in the womb her senses are not as developed as they will be after birth. Our sense of touch is the first to develop. At around ten weeks, certain areas of his body become sensitive to touch. At fifteen weeks, she can both taste and smell. He hears and reacts to sounds at sixteen weeks. Around twenty-six weeks she begins to react to light, even though her eyelids are closed. Sight, as we see, is the last of our senses to develop before birth.

When you first emerged from your mother’s womb, all your senses were suddenly assaulted by confusing stimuli at once. Bright lights, loud noises, direct touches, sharp smells, the first taste of air at the sharp intake of breath when the medico slapped your bottom. You were suddenly in a completely different world then the one you had known for so long. You could not make any sense of this new environment at all.

Gradually, over time, this new world did begin to make sense. When you were fed feelings of gratification replaced hunger. When you became very uncomfortable, wet and smelly someone would change your diaper and you felt comfortable and dry. When you were cold, someone wrapped you in a warm blanket. Everything was done for you and as time went on you learned you could ‘will’ certain things to happen. You could cry when you were hungry, cold, or wet and this would directly affect your well being. Eventually, you began to make purposeful movements, to direct your body towards a particular goal. Rolling over, creeping, crawling, and finally walking were all tremendous achievements, and all these were accomplished by your own will.

Once we have moved beyond infancy none of us expect all our needs to be met automatically. We know if we spend our days and nights reclined on a couch, we will most probably not fare well for many hours. We understand we have to make decisions. We must will to do. Once I realize I am hungry, I must rise from the couch and go to the kitchen to prepare food. I do not expect the food to magically appear on the coffee table before me. As soon as I realize I am hungry, I begin to imagine what sort of lunch I will have.

How well my imagination and reality coincide will depend on what food is available. If I imagine I want lobster thermidor and all I have is some bread and tin of tuna, my imagination will not coincide with reality. But if I imagine I want a tuna sandwich reality and imagination will coincide perfectly.

Almost all of our lives are based on the ways in which our wills and imaginations coincide with reality. Of course, some things are beyond our control. We can never be 100% certain upon rising whether today will be our last on this earth or the ‘first day of the rest of our lives’. We may set out to work expecting to arrive at a certain time but be delayed by traffic, or arrive early because there were hardly any other vehicles on the road. Reality does exist outside of the individual will and imagination. But every one of us affects her own reality through her will imagination.

Shamans new to pathwork who find journeying difficult need to turn on their imaginations. But, if I only imagine it doesn’t that mean my journey is not real?

WE FIRST IMAGINE, THEN WE WILL

Even to so much as prepare a tuna sandwich we begin with imagination. We imagine it first. Then we will to do it. Many will say, “Oh, I have NO imagination AT ALL.” In fact, they do. Practically everything we do in a day begins with imagination. The alarm goes off and we wake up. We may hit the kill switch on the annoying alarm by instinct, but then we begin to imagine our day. Some of what we do is automatic, but most follows after we first imagine doing it. If you pay attention to how your thought processes work you will soon see how much you depend on your imagination every day.

The imagination is the organ through which the conscious mind communicates with the will. It is also the organ through which we communicate with those who dwell in the Otherworlds. The only instrument that they have for entering into communication with you is your own imagination. The faculty of your mind, which is called 'imagination', is the interface between your mind and the minds of faerys, ancestors, totem animals, elementals, deities and all dwellers in Otherworlds.

Your imagination is the organ through which the Fae communicate with you. If you refuse to allow your imagination to operate you will not be able to do anything at all.

Think of it this way, let us say you know 'Lord of the Rings' is on television and you want to see it but you refuse to turn on your television because that would make watching the movie less real. You can see how pointless this attitude is.

You have to allow your imagination to work. Don't worry about whether or not things are 'real'. Requiring the Fair Folk to do things your way is not going to work for them anymore than insisting on watching LOTR but refusing to turn on the television is going to work.


Many have found one technique I recommend very effective. This involves entering the Shining Country, encountering an ancestor and animal guide, going into a 'safe house' and ‘falling asleep’ there under the watchful eye of a special guardian. In your ‘sleep’, you 'dream' your journey.

You do not actually fall asleep in the material world but rather imagine you are falling asleep in the Otherworld. Your dream in the Otherworld will quite often be very clear. This way of doing things seems to cast down the barriers between your conscious mind and your inner sight.

Imagine entering the Otherworld through a door in a garden wall, or by passing between two trees growing close together. Picture this as an act of will in the same way you picture a scene from a favourite movie. It takes wilful act of imagination to do this. As the journey progresses continue the active imagining of the incidents -- create the image in your mind of the ancestor and animal guides, the hut, and the girl guardian. Do not wait for the image to form itself. You create it. Then imagine you are dreaming. This will bring everything in to focus.

This technique takes some practice. Do not expect to have a perfectly clear journey the first time. In fact, let go of all your expectations. Allow yourself to guide the journey and don't require the journey to convince you of its reality. At this stage, it does not matter if it is 'real' or not. Pretend it is now and one day very soon you will be past that 'reality' barrier and able to journey very well and see all you wish to see.

BUT IF I IMAGINE IT, IT CAN’T BE REAL

Your imagination is the interface between this and Otherworlds. Imagination is the 'machine' that allows you to communicate with the citizens of the Shining Realms. We all understand this when we are kids. I have never seen a little girl or boy speaking or playing with their 'imaginary' friends who seems to worried they are 'doing it wrong or that their experience is not ‘real’.

They communicate naturally with the Shining Ones because they allow their imaginations to work properly. At some point some adult or older child tells the little child there is no such thing as faerys, it is all in their imagination. This naturally discourages the little child. Not wishing to appear foolish, the little child begins to ignore the fae and over time shuts down their imagination.

Once the imagination is turned off, it is very hard for the Shining Ones to contact us. They do keep trying to turn our imagination back on but until we are willing to throw that switch ourselves, they cannot keep the line open.

Think of it this way. You are reading this page on some sort of electronic device. It was digitally delivered to that device over a phone line, a cable or through the air -- depending on your Internet service. Because we both have electronic devices, we are also able to send and receive messages. We can communicate by e-mail. But you can clearly see that if I turn my computer off and do not turn it back on I will not be able to receive your messages at all, or send any to you or anyone else. You may send me twenty messages a day but I will not get them unless I turn my computer on and open my email program.

My computer is the interface between me and wide world of the Internet. I cannot get my mail, browse the web, or google except through my computer. Just so is my imagination. It is the interface between this and Otherworlds. I cannot enter those worlds or receive communications from the citizens of those worlds unless I 'turn on' my imagination.

Don't worry about whether or not things are 'real'.

NO EXPECTATIONS

You must leave all expectations to one side as you develop your gifts.

Expecting your journeys are going to be exactly the way they are related in a book—or a Faery Shamans' Apprenticeship Program—or they are going to be like mine, or anyone's other than your own, is setting yourself up for disappointment.

Don't wonder or worry too much about what things mean. Much will be shown to you in due course. But you will never have all the answers.

I cannot stress this often enough—when you are feeling blocked—like you have come to a dead end or a stone wall and you just can't get around it—pretend.

Your imagination is the organ through which the Fae communicate with you. If you refuse to allow your imagination to operate you will not be able to do anything at all.

Don't be sober and serious about all this. Relax and have some fun. This is play. One of the reasons children are so in touch with the Otherworlds is because they are not serious about it.

When you get blocked pretend. This will work and you will find—well, I am not going to create any expectation.

Allow all.

BUT IF I DO IT ‘WRONG’ WON’T BAD THINGS HAPPEN TO ME?

If your imagination is full of fearful images and ideas, such as demons, devils, vampires, monsters and aliens, those are the images you will perceive when you are contacted by the faerys. If, on the other hand, your imagination is full of light and love, of trust and courage, you will be able to experience true, clear perceptions in this and in Otherworlds.

I am talking here about the dreadful things we imagine, not the dreadful things that we may actually see in this world. An operating room nurse or a policeman will see things that many others would considered terrible, but these are things that do exist in this world. Pain, suffering, hunger, injustice, all these we do need to see, understand, and heal.

What we do not need to do is dwell on darkness. Going out of our way to entertain ourselves with horror films and books about exorcisms, demons, alien abductions, and so on is not healthy for anyone. It is especially harmful for a shaman or anyone who is seeking to learn the way of the shaman.

I am especially concerned with those who enjoy seeing darkness all around them. Those who actively seek out unhealthy occult experiences by attending séances, playing with ouija boards, coercing contact with spirits of the dead, engaging in group or solitary exorcisms, vampiric rituals, and other pass times of this sort are absolutely not suited to this path. If you are engaged in such practices, you need to stop them at once. If you feel you cannot give up these morbid activities, you need to contact me at once.

Finally, know that nothing that originates in Otherworlds can harm you unless you make that possible through your own fear. The only power any citizen of the Otherworlds has over you is the power you give them through your own fear.

NOTHING IN THE OTHERWORLDS CAN HARM YOU UNLESS, THROUGH YOUR OWN FEAR, YOU ALLOW IT TO.

NOTHING IN THE OTHERWORLDS CAN HARM YOU UNLESS, THROUGH YOUR OWN FEAR, YOU ALLOW IT TO.

NOTHING IN THE OTHERWORLDS CAN HARM YOU UNLESS, THROUGH YOUR OWN FEAR, YOU ALLOW IT TO.

Not everything we imagine may be healthy or wise. You direct your own imagination and do not allow the media or the fears of others to influence you. Be well, be strong, be free.

Allow.




Tira Brandon-Evans is the Founder and Moderator of the Society of Celtic Shamans, editor of Earthsongs: Journal of the Society of Celtic Shamans, and is, herself, a Faery Shaman. Her books, The Green and Burning Tree: A Faery Shaman's Handbook, Portals of the Seasons: A Celtic Wheel of the Year, Through the Unremembered Gate: Journeys of Initiation, The Labyrinthine Way: Walking Ancient Paths in a Modern World, and Healing Waters, are all published by Elder Grove Press. She is presently writing a book about the Ogham. You may contact Tira by email at info@faeryshaman.org.



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Earthsongs: International Journal of the Society of Celtic Shamans copyright © 2008 by Elder Grove Press and content providers. All rights reserved. International copyright laws prohibit reproduction of or distribution of this page by any means whatsoever, electronic or otherwise, without first obtaining the written permissions of the copyright holders. We retain legal counsel to protect our copyrights.