It is not very often that I get to work with the ancestors, and even less so that I work with other people. On this occasions I got to do both, and the results surprised me. I was at Conscious Camp, and there was a ceremony hosted by the delightful “Rainbow” (by name and nature). It involved the whole camp being invited ceremonially into the big tent and then began a long evocation of and dedication to the Earth Mother. During the ceremony we were asked to contact our ancestors, whoever we believed them to be. I didn’t have to think about that too much having already contacted them…. (wibbly wobbly dream time screen….)
I settled into a meditation – not easy when you’re packed into a tent with a hundred other people. You could hear a pin drop, though, and soon I was drifting backward in time in search of my ancestral connection. As I spun backwards I came to rest withing The Feasting Hall – a space out of time at The Hill of Tara in Ireland. In this space I met Aengus Roe and Swinney – my past and future Seeker selves.
What is this “feasting hall outside of time”? In my original encounter at Tara I had gone through a series of preparatory steps to get prepared to step outside of time – in a zone where time did not exist. It was both a physical place (a section of the Tara complex) but also, in my mind, I was transported into a hall where a feast was taking place, lit by torches, and with many other “seekers” feasting and enjoying themselves in their respective clans or tribes.
By “seeker” I mean that I felt these were people like myself who were questing, working energetically to discover their origins, recover knowledge, work in a shamanic tradition. and to push themselves to discover new knowledge – ways of bringing the old teachings back to life in the modern world. They were doing this by meeting their previous incarnation who had done the same, and also their future incarnation who would yet do the same work.
Back in the tent at Conscious Camp, while others were following the ritual, I was able to work with the parts of the ritual in my own way. When the four elements, plants and animals were invoked, I used these ancestral connections to spread the energy that was being generated and to send it farther out into the world in my own time. This was a powerful experience. I was not only working in my own time and space, but I was pulling through the combined knowledge and power of my past seeker self and my future one too! I was working as a triad, uniting the Seeker Selves in the present momentarily.
It was an experience that I haven’t fully explored yet. It took me a little by surprise, ad I was not expecting to be able to do this, or rather, to be allowed for this to happen. Let’s see whether it is ever repeated and for what purpose such a technique is used next time.
