Hazel
by Blayze

Sink your awareness down into the earth. Become aware of your breathing. Enter a trance state (using usual breathing techniques…)

You find yourself standing at the foot of a large hill - all around you is darkness pierced only by the brilliant light of the stars… twinkling like jewels embroidered into the velvet cloak of the night sky above you.

By the light of the stars you can see that a path winds in a spiral about the hill. You move to the left and begin to walk along the path - ever twisting and spiralling to the left. You begin to feel the ground slope beneath your feet as you slowly walk the spiral path. Your awareness shifts with each turn as you sink deeper and deeper into trance.

You are aware moonlight growing brighter as you near the summit of the hill and you realise that the moon is rising to hang just above the hill itself. 

Bathed in the moonlight is a tall, ancient stone that stands in the centre of a flat plateau. The spiral path winds ever towards the stone in the centre, one half of which is in shadow, the other illuminated by the silver light of the moon.

Gradually you find yourself walking in a ever tightening spiral as you move closer and closer to the stone… always and ever moving to the left. At last you come face to face to with the towering and ancient weathered rock. By the light of the moon you see that there is an image carved upon its surface… A straight line runs from an inverted V at the base to the top of the stone. Halfway up the line you see four horizontal lines extending to the left. This is the Ogham Coll - the Hazel, carved into the single upthrust spur of living rock.

You feel the power awakening in the stone and sigil as the moon continues to rise. The Ogham stave glows and you run your hand along its length. You feel the energy tingle through you from the tips of your fingers to your feet upon the earth. Suddenly everything shifts and you find that you have passed through the stone into another realm. Mist envelopes you and you experience a moment of disorientation, but you can now feel the stone standing at your back. 

You start to move forward and the mist begins to swirl and shred away. A path is revealed before you. As you walk you come to a low woven fence of hazel hurdles that make the boundary to a field. There is a gap in the hurdles and you enter through this gap into a grove of coppiced Hazel trees. Long straight rods grow from the bases of the trees with small statellite trees and rods radiating out from the parent trees.

This is an old grove, managed with care and love over many generations. Some of the trees have flame coloured bundles of leaf like buds, hiding the nuts that are soon to ripen... ready to be harvested.

You find that you have at your waist a belt that carries a small pouch and a small, sharp knive in a sheath. You begin to walk through the grove and talk to the trees. Look for a sturdy forked branch on one of the trees. When you find  the right one, as the tree if you may cut the branch. When you recieve an answer either cut the branch or move to another tree and repeat the process. At whatever tree you cut, leave an offering that you find within your pouch.

When you have your forked branch, hold it in your hands by the fork and pointing the long end horizontally away from your body, begin to walk to the far side of the grove. You are searching for a body of water. As you get closer to the hidden body of water, the dowsing rod begins to move in your hands. You see up ahead of you another large grove of hazel trees that have not been coppiced. They are old and gnarled with thick branches. They stand around 30 feet high, not so high as some of the trees that you have encountered on your journeys but high enough. On these trees the nuts are ripe.

You approach this new grove and as you get closer, your hazel dowsing rod signals to you that water is very close. As you move through the trees you see that the hazel grove encircles on three sides, a beautiful pool. The far side of the pool is shrouded in mist.

At the water's edge you plant your hazel stick into the soft, wet ground and offer it  thanks for leading you here. The hazel trees tower above and their branches over hang the pool. Great branches with large furry leaves and flame like bundles of nuts.

You bow before the trees and say that you are a seeker of wisdom and by the grace of the hazel and its gift of intuition you have been called here.

A gentle breeze begins to blow amongst the trees getting ever stronger. Suddenly a nut falls at your feet. You crack it open upon the ground and still holding the hust you eat the sweet nut inside.

More nuts begin to fall into the water and as they do you hear the sweetest music as the nuts break the surface of the pool. As you eat the nut you see that the mist on the far side of the pool has now lifted revealing 5 streams of great beauty and mystery.

You make an offering of the hazel husk to the pool.

The music of the falling nuts grows louder and the husks expand to form a coracle resting gently upon the water. A little round water craft of hazel husk instead of leather.

Take off your clothes and belt and lay them under the hazel trees at the bank of the pool.

Carefully step into the coracle and sit down. The wind picks up and small bubbles of inspiration pop on the surface of the pool. Your coracle  is carried to the other side of the pool towards the five streams.

These are the streams of the senses... your coracle will move down one of the streams.

This is your time to explore the streams of one of the sense. Experience the sense but do not get out of the coracle. Try to understand what the sense means in regards to your own knowledge and wisdom. Let it inspire you.

Gradually your coracle drifts down the stream... as you reach the other end of the streams you regain the use of all five senses once more. You come to rest in another smaller pool that feeds the five streams and the pool beyond. This is the source. The well spring of the sixth sense. Feeding this pool is small stone lined spring - a well of inspiration. Growing above the spring and pool is one large Hazel tree... covered in the buds of the promise of knowledge and wisdom yet to come.

Hazel nuts from past seasons have found their resting place in the pool - it is infused with their wisdom. Cup your hands and drink from the well.

You see your surrounds with new eyes. Your  sense of smell is heightened, your skin is more sensitive, your hearing more acute and you can taste each drop of the water.

Forged is the Weapon you wield with Grace
Grace is the tempered Soul

The tempered Soul is nourished by the Well
The Well is a Cauldron of Three

The Cauldron is warmed by the Fires of Art
The Fires are your Inspiration

Inspiration guides your Journey
Your Journey is the Wisdom of the Worlds

The Wisdom is born of the Wave.

Fáilte a Bhríd, do bheannachtaí orainn agus an t-ionad seo
Welcome Brighid! May your blessings be upon us and this place 

You see a figure  begin to take shape behind the spring. It is Brigid - goddess of the well, the hazel and wisdom, poetry and inspiration.

Talk to her of past journeys and ask her aid in gaining wisdom from them and those to come.

Feel your heart fill with poetry and speak to her in words of beauty and inspiration.

She waves her hand over the well and allows you time to scry in her waters... the source.

Your soul rings with poetry. 

Thank Brigid for her gifts... Bid Brigid farewell and hold her words close to you.

She begins to disappear.

Turn around and dive into the pool. You feel your body changing. You can breathe underwater as you become the great salmon... fed on the hazelnuts of wisdom. 

You swim upstream... and find yourself back in the first large pool.

You break the surface and you feel your natural body return to you.

Climb out of the water and collect your clothes.

Move out of the hazel grove and walk through the coppiced grove.

Walk out between the hazel hurdles and walk towards the standing stone along the path.

You arrive back at the Standing Stone. It now bears a spiral marking. Begin to trace the spiral as it twists to the right. You become aware of mist forming around you once more and again a feeling of disorientation. 

As the mist begins to clear you find that you are once again standing upon the hillside under the fading light of the setting moon. By the light of the stars you begin to walk the spiral path out from the centre, ever moving to the right. You begin to feel the path sloping downwards as you tread the spiral path around the hill. As you walk you feel yourself becoming heavier and heavier, you begin to be aware of other sounds…. Slowly you reach the bottom of the hill and sit at its base. You become aware of the feel of your body, the shape of your skin and your breath. You feel the blood flowing through your veins . You become aware of the sounds around you… 

When you are back… open your eyes.