I really ought to give some form of recognition to Saint Beuno. Whenever we encounter this saint’s sacred places on our journeys around the northern wildernesses of Wales we always end up learning something of interest. On this occasion Kal and I stopped off in the small village of Gwyddelwern – not a village noted for anything much except the fenced off remnants of a well that couldn’t find. That wasn’t such a disappointment given that we would then go on to drive to St Sara’s Well, and Kal has already posted that experience.
St.Beuno’s church in Gwyddelwern is tucked away behind a now empty inn of some outstanding beauty that stands in the centre of the village along the main road. We walked into the churchyard without a script or agenda for what we would be doing here. We had already visited several sites that day and there were more to come, but this was an off-the-cuff excursion and sometimes they turn out to be some of the most interesting. For me, this would turn out to be the case.
Go Gently Into That Dark Night
One of the first features of St.Beuno’s church in Gwyddelwern is the beautiful elevated yew tree that sits close to the entrance to the churchyard. It is one of the first things one notices on approach. Of course, it was the first thing I made a bee-line for, noticing it, admiring it, and making my presence known to it by introducing myself. As I didn’t feel I had any work to do that involved it, I passed it by, but Kal stopped to do some dowsing around it.
If you have read any of the many posts we wrote last year when I was going through the Yew Stage of Druidic learning then you will know that the yew tree has symbolic significance for this path – it is the symbol of life, death, re-birth and transformation. As such it is a powerful force and ally in such work, but I was not here for those properties today. There is another aspect to the yew tree that is very much overlooked and little understood these days – its ability to pacify and ground the energies of the wandering shade.
What this means in practise is that churchyards that have yew trees (and the greater the number or the older and bigger the tree then the stronger the effect) will have largely peaceful spaces – there will be very few energetic remnants of human beings left to wander the grounds, potentially attaching themselves to living humans of doing whatever it is that amuses them to do with us! There will usually be one or two shades, but rarely will there be lots of them. Maybe there is some form of energetic exchange going on between the yew tree and the energies surrounding graves, I don’t actually know. What I know is that we rarely find much shade activity when yew trees are present, and that if you dowse for the connection between a yew tree and anything else in the area you will usually be taken to each and every grave site on the plot. They have a relationship, and the relationship is based upon some form of pacifying quality that the yew tree offers. The same is true of Gwyddelwern churchyard too.
“Celebrations of the Winter Solstice focus strongly on the yew as it is supposed to be closely linked to the deities of death and rebirth. This mystical link means that it was used (collections of the bark at least) during funerals or laid on top of graves as a reminder of death merely being another part of the human journey to what happens after life.” (source: ParanormalHaze.com)
“As a reminder...”, they say. Well, maybe that is how the knowledge has been interpreted in recent times, but I think it has a more practical purpose – the energies of the yew tree can ground human death energies.
This is where our research differs from other information you may find on the Internet. Kal and I are working with these trees to uncover their secrets, discover their properties, and understand what they can do. This is practical druidry – not a theoretical regurgitation of some information passed down through a hundred creative re-tellings. This is direct first-hand experience. In that sense, we know our information is more useful to us than reading about the properties of a tree and then going to enact someone else’s rituals beneath it in the hope that such magic will work. Our form of Natural Magick is based upon direct experience with these entities, and visionary and intuited knowledge in the presence of these great teachers – the trees themselves. The forces of Nature themselves craft the rituals we perform.
Vampire Shades
There was at last one shade that managed to escape the attentions of the grounding energies of the yew tree. How it was able to do that, I don’t know, but we have come across this at other churchyards too. As Kal was checking the properties of the yew tree, I was searching around for any remaining shades. I found one – a lady who had been interred in 1872, but whose shade – her remnant energy body – was still present in the churchyard. Who knows what level of intelligence remains in these energy bodies? The accounts of psychics and other sensitives tell us that they are largely automatic – existing in a world outside of an awareness of time, re-living the strong emotions that perpetuate their energy forms, and drawing upon available energy resources such as passing humans whenever they can.
This is not an area that I spend much time researching. I have read several books on hauntings, poltergeists, ghosts and the books of mediums, but it is not an area that I feel particularly drawn to study. Druid courses often included elements of “getting in touch with the ancestors”, and whilst I think this is an interesting form of divination or access to knowledge beyond our normal sense, I personally believe it is a world that I do not have much ability to comprehend, so I tend to stay away from it. However, saying that, I do not shy away from the necessary skills that I must achieve if I am to progress, and I recognise that druidry entails some aspects of working with death energies. With that in mind I investigated this interesting shade that had managed so remains here for over 100 years – just how had she done that? The answer was a little startling!
As we have mentioned many times before, asking “How” or “Why” questions to dowsing rods is like asking a baby to solve a Times Crossword – cryptic questions lead to unsolvable puzzles. Instead I used Kal’s patented method of asking to be taken to a place that would give me a clue as to how this shade was managing to stay active. The rods swung away from where I was, by the side of this lady’s grave, and moved me towards the newer patch of burial sites until the rods crossed atop a grave that was only a few years old – possibly the newest grave in the churchyard. The markings on the grave indicated that the person had died relatively young – in their forties. So, here was the clue – a potentially vibrant human energy had been interred and the shade had seemingly drained or leeched that energy from this person’s body. As I began to dowse more to check this feeling all the answers seemed to confirm this – the remnant shade drew energy from each new corpse that was laid in the church, if the circumstances were suitable.
I know what you’re asking – what are the circumstances? I don’t know. There are many questions raised by this finding, and few answers. In my experience a person who seems in some way aware of death and can make preparations has more opportunity to ground themselves by neutralising their energy – balancing it out – righting wrongs, settling debts, that kind of thing – they are the ones who will neutralise their energy body and free their spirits to return to the source. The dying person’s objective is to ground their energy as they approach death. If the death is sudden or unexpected then this release process may not happen and the shade may get stuck outside of the planes of existence that it is intended to travel to. This is one idea – there are many theories but only death itself will confirm or deny them for us. Do report back when you go, won’t you? I have so many questions!
One more detail that I did manage to elicit from the rods was that death energy that isn’t grounded is liable to become fodder for vampiric shades who can leech the energy. The shades are able to sustain their lifespan in this way for about 8-12 years per draining. Why some become shades I don’t know. One theory is that it is to do with an attachment to life, or to some person on earth that the shade simply cannot bring themselves to leave. I’m not sure that the answer is so simple, because the shade seems unable to be with the person that they may have been so attached to, so why bother sticking around? Another of many mysteries about death energies and their forms. Perhaps time will straighten this out a little?
Gwas.
