by Jane Ellen Combelic
Over the last ten years at Findhorn, I have occasionally studied Incarnational Spirituality with Freya Secrest, Mary Inglis, Judy McAllister and others, including David Spangler via video link. Every year when Freya came from the States I signed up for her workshops. Last year, in September, the workshop was called “Holding Wholeness” and for the first time her husband Jeremy Berg was one of the teachers.
It was on the third day, when Jeremy did his part, that I first encountered the Sidhe. One day that changed everything.
We were sitting, about thirty of us, in a circle in the Upper Community Centre. The moment I saw the oversized Sidhe cards Jeremy was setting out around the central candle, something stirred deep in my soul. As I caught a glimpse of images of stones, I felt a shivering in my heart, the same thrill I feel in a medieval church or an ancient shrine—an expansion into the mind of God.
Jeremy laid out the Stone Circle of the Sidhe and guided us in a series of visualizations. When I closed my eyes, I saw distinct images and heard messages totally relevant to my own journey. I know that I have a vivid imagination, but this was of a different order.
The first image that came to me, as Jeremy guided us to the Howe or central altar, was a small round female figure, perhaps an elder, who emanated serenity and warmth. At the Gateway to the Earth I saw an immense horse. I put my hand on its pale flank and felt its physical strength coursing through me. At the Gateway to the Dawn, feeling some fear about the horse and vowing not to be afraid, I heard the gift that is mine to give is the gift of non-fear. I didn’t want to leave the Gateway of Stars, where I knew that I would use my voice to share my vision and speak truth to power.
I felt accompanied, protected, affirmed. In the last visualization, the Gateway of Twilight, I saw myself walking along a stream with a Sidhe at either hand, all three of us dancing and laughing. I was totally there.
How can I describe the joy, the sense of partnership, the feeling of completion? For the first time in my life I felt whole, as if long-missing parts of me had been restored.
Filled with excitement I shared my story with the group; to my delight they lit up as I spoke, receiving and reflecting my joy and inspiration. My whole body vibrated with power, my skin tingled.
I knew viscerally that I had crossed some kind of threshold.
It wasn’t easy, though, to integrate such a deep transformation. Over the following weeks and months I had trouble finding the ground under my feet. Everything had shifted. How did this amazing experience fit in with my ordinary life?
Everything had shifted, yet nothing had changed. In many ways I doubted my own experience. It had felt real, and yet it wasn’t real in our consensual reality. I approached several elders for guidance, and some of them helped me understand and accept this new reality. Still, I didn’t know what to do with it. The best advice I got, from friend and colleague Adele Napier, was to put one foot in front of the other. Not think about it too much, just allow it to unfold. But no one could walk this path for me.
Meanwhile, the Sidhe continue to visit me when I seek them in my imagination. I don’t see anything; it is more a felt sense of presence, a beautiful knowingness, a joy in being alive. My sensory perceptions are heightened and everything shimmers with luminosity, every blade of grass glimmers and glows. When I invite them into my body, I feel a tingling in every cell, an intensity of sensation that’s just delicious.
First, however, I need to be fully present in my body. This, for me, is sometimes accompanied by grief, the sorrow of everything that is lost, in my personal history and for us as a species. It is my own and it is the existential loneliness of being human. When I really feel the grief, I drop through it into love. My heart is broken open. It is from that soft and sovereign space that I can connect with the Sidhe.
Sometimes my mind throws up doubts. Yet affirmation comes in many forms. Just today, for instance, as I was writing those words, I came across this message in an email from Michael Lipson, a student of both David Spangler and Rudolf Steiner, and a wonderful teacher in his own right:
"We invoke these energies [of pain and misery], because they help us bring our tender human presence to the table, and with it our ability to notice and be changed by the unexpected. We want our hearts to be unguarded, open, vulnerable.... This radical availability lets us meet and endure the presence of beings and energies from unseen parts of the world."
The solutions to all of humanity’s problems, especially the climate crisis, will come to us from another dimension, from Gaia herself, in ways we cannot fathom with our intellectual thinking. That is another insight that came to me during Jeremy’s guided meditation.
The Sidhe, our long-lost cousins, want to help us, if we will only learn to listen.
When I listen now, what I often here is something like this: “Be still. Slow down. Feel what you feel. Be on the earth.” The coronavirus, though it has brought much suffering and chaos, also brought the gift of last spring’s Great Pause. Who could have imagined commerce shutting down, airplanes grounded, city centers empty, roads nearly free of vehicles? People stayed home, sang from their windows, spent a precious hour every day out in nature. The skies cleared, we could breathe fresh air and hear the glorious singing of the birds.
With the added presence of the Sidhe, my life took on a radiance I had never known. I often walked in Roseisle Forest and onto the beach of the Moray Firth. Every leaf, every fern, every pine tree shimmered with inner light. Surrounded by magic, I felt a deep peace. When I encountered someone, I smiled, knowing that we were all facing the same predicament. I relished that sense of oneness, that stillness and slowness.
Once life started going back to “normal,” it was harder for me to tap into that. Now I find myself getting busier, attending all kinds of wonderful events on Zoom, meeting friends when I can. Life has speeded up again. Sadly, my connection with the Sidhe has dimmed over time. Yet when I enjoy the beauty of nature, or fall into grief and despair at the unraveling of our world, and really feel it, love opens up. My heart softens, my mind slows, my body grows still. When I call on them, the Sidhe are always there. They bring guidance, comfort, joy and hope. And more than anything, companionship.
I am not alone. We are not alone. And everything we need is right here.