HallowQuest - Lesson 4 - The Flowering of Logres

[PathWalker]

With very many thanks to Aerin from Aeclectic, who originally typed all this out years ago!

 

 

The Land of Logres Speaks: "I am the promise of the land that will be restored. Behold! the waters run once more, each bough is in bud or blosson, the sacred grain is ripening. You who dance out the seedtime of your soul's journey under my broad meadows, I bid you find the rainbow's end and your true treasury."

 

Every age has to solve the problem of evil, find people who will go on quest in service of the Grail. The Grail is an ongoing cycle. To help see the current pattern of events, look at the Grail's manifestation:

 

1. The Dolorous blow (D.B.) afflicts the land. Usually by a publically responsible person acting in a privately personal/ selfish way. Or when a Hallow is misused e.g. Balin striking Pelles with the Spear in self defence. The analogue of this blow is when Gwenhwyfar has a cup of wine thrown in her lap, an insult to the representative of Sovreignty.

 

2. The D.B. afflicts King and Land with infertility and wasting. The land is overun by foes who waste resources and terrrorize the weak. The kingdom becomes anarchistic, society breaks down.

 

3. The Grail appears symbolically or actually to those who have dedicated themselves to resoring Sovereign and Wasteland to rights.

 

4. The Grail's healing is sought by a quest, a journey of personal danger, prayer, seership, by the formation of a dedicated followers of seekers. (The Grail Family)

 

5. One seeker has greater affinity with the Grail, often less well educated/ weaker/ less able/ 'foolish'. The foolishness is the result of the non-duality of innocent perception, it is the youngest who can perceive and attain the Grail.

 

6. The Grail winner heals Land and King by being open to the Grail's grace. Land becomes fertile, old king dies or retires, Grail-Winner and companions become the new Guardians of the Grail which is no longer symbolic but manifest everywhere.

 

This template can be used at all times and all cultures. It is endlessly repeated in history of your land and age. It is an act of seership to recognise the patterns and protagonists of the Grail in your time and place. This is true alchemy, where the Great Work is the perfecting of the times.

 

 

Restoring the Likeness: The card represents restoration to essential perfection, you may suspect 'things fall apart, the centre cannot hold' and you are right. We may achieve our quest for a little space only, the Grail-vision erased from our hearts. What does this mean and what can we do?

Loss of realisations and empowerments is a regular feature of life e.g. when we change our inner myth, when seasonal esoteric tides change. This is normal and natural, remember our emptiness will be filled again in a while.

Most spiritual training upholds a wholistic raison d'etre, we live in a dualistic world right/ wrong good/ bad etc. The Piscean perspective aims at a final perfected end in our spiritual lives, the Aquarian that we discover our spiritual trajectory by encountering the challenges and rewards of life sharing the fruits of our experience with all beings.

In the ancient world the initiate was no longer subject to the cyclability and mutability of life: most of us do not attain this except in brief flashes of comprehension when we look to the heart of things and know ourselves part of them. Most of us alternate carefree abandon or anxious suspicion: this card bids us find more balance. Looking on life as a spiral may help us, the wheel of the year spins and we are different people at the end of it. Other experiences are available in successive cycles. Keeping a journal is good, we can look back and realise what we have forgotten.

The perfection in this card is restoration of holy likeness, rediscovery of intrinsic sacred quality of creation. Taking the rainbow path in perfect love and trust means the grace of Divine Spirit (however you call it) leads us to the centre of our quest. The experience of the Restoration of the Hallows cannot be taken from us, whatever happens.

The quest in not for the faint hearted, also those who set out with selfish intentions do not get far. The Seeker is impelled by the Grail Vision to restore what is lost, in every generation there are those who follow the path. You satnd at the beginning of your quest, to achieve the Flowering of Logres - restoration of wholeness of self, the land, the earth.

 

Tasks:

 

1. Make a list of what you would like to chieve: tomorrow, next week, month, year, 2-3 yrs

 

2. Look at long cherished ideals and hopes. Are you still resolved to fulfil them? Have ideals become stale, without motion? If still cherished, how will you fulfil them? Out loud, rescind old unwanted ideals that may be clogging your pathway, also speak your present ideals and wishes.

3. Do a Mabon's Gateway spread for a cherished project not coming to fruition. Record it and findings in your diary.

 

Questions:

1. How does the Wasteland manifest in your personal life and surroundings? What are you doing/ can be done about it?

2. What is your secret dream?

 

Meditation:

1. Set the FoL before you, study it. Without looking at meaning, what impression do you receive?

2. Enter the scene as an observer - what is it like to be in this landscape? Describe what you see, hear, smell, feel.

3. Enter the card and stand as one of the children or as the Seeker. What made the Wasteland flower? What legacy of wisdom would you leave to the children? What do the bee and butterfly say? What are the uses of the Hallows?

 

Visualisation: Intended to give you a sense of over-view of the quest for the Hallows.

 

~ The visualisation is three whole pages long, and even the wonderful Aerin didn't type it all out! But it is an important step in your journey.

[PathWalker]

Although I did this part of the course some years ago, it might still be helpful to someone to see the kind of things that I aimed for at that time.

 

This was written in my notebook some time ago, but circumstances swept me away rather. Now I am working on this again, so filling in the previous stuff 

 

What I would like to achieve:

TOMORROW - Good impression and good performance at work. Looking after the birds really well. Enjoy the beauty of the season. Make my loved ones smile.

NEXT WEEK - Next part of Hallowquest journey achieved. Internet commitments fulfilled. Help daughter prepare for university. Help husband keep going in the search for work. Contact some friends. Enjoy the training day at work - keep up my performance there. Get my timetable plans up and running. Get the birds more prepared for the next season.

NEXT MONTH - Celebrate the sabbat and full moon. See daughter doing fine at uni and start helping her with accounts. Continue with Hallowquest. Solitary walks/arboretum trips. Really make good work impressions. Do some more textile/artwork stuff.

NEXT YEAR - Greater structure and prosperity in our home life. Greater connection with OH. New relationship with student daughter. Spiritual journey. Textile projects. More confidence and opportunity in tarot reading. A holiday. Strong friendships. Better health.

TWO YEARS - Give up work if I chose, because no longer necessary. Go on a mushroom identification walk. Do more gardening, herb drying and incense making. Be in a position to take an art based degree(?) or tarot art, or something similar that I would really enjoy. To be outside more.

 

Cherished Ideals. This is a difficult area to consider because my most cherished hopes involve a financial situation which is, realistically, beyond my control. I'd like the time to be able to study for several years, like a degree-type course. And I'd like to have a cottage/retreat in the woods where I would be undisturbed [i'm truly a hermit-type of person].

Both of these things require a level of financial support that I'm unlikely to have.

 

 

Pathwalker - Mabon's Gate Spread

________________________________________

 

(again, this was done some time ago, and I see different things in the reading now, but this is how I first saw it)

 

On the subject of further education/study for me:

 

1 Guinevere

2 Hermit

3 Stone Hallow

4 Seeker

5 Sword King

6 Stone Three

7 Sovereignty

8 Sword Knight

9 Stone Seven

10 Cauldron

11 Sword Two

 

[Wow, all majors, Swords and Stones!]

 

1. What would I like to achieve? III Guinevere

Well, I guess that does pretty much sum me up! (ETA no studying here then, no timetables imposed) She is the honoured queen of the fertile summer land, and is pursuing a textile craft outdoors, with flowers in her long hair, and wearing a wonderful long [impractical] gown 

 

2. What is blocking me from achieving it? XI Grail Hermit

Now, that card here does surprise me! I love the solitary, studious Grail Hermit, with his cottage in the wood, and his books. How does this block me? One of the reversed meanings is "procrastination". Am I wasting time waiting for the perfect situations to come into being? )ETA of course, the hermit isn't just sitting here to please himself, he has a task. perhaps I don't know the task, or suit the task I've set in some way?)

 

3. How I unconsciously block myself. Stone Hallow

Again, a hard to see card. Reversed it says "Learning the hard way. Prosperity brings responsibility". So I stop myself.

(ETA I don't think I understood that at all at the time. My thoughts were always about the finance of a situation; I hope I may be beginning to see beyond that now.)

 

4. What have I already achieved? O The Seeker

I have started on the road, seen the possibilities, I am still looking into the distance.

 

5. What helps me achieve it? Sword King

My own mental abilities, and the support given to me by the personification of the Sword King in my real life.

(ETA yes, I needed to experience and reason, before understanding)

 

6. How have I helped myself? Stone Three

By being committed and organised, skilful and creative! That's nice.

 

7. The way my idea is seen by others. XI Sovereignty

So, I could do it if I wanted? I am the Queen of my domain? It's something I could grasp if I felt I wanted it?

 

8. Who will benefit from my idea? Sword Knight

Well if Lancelot is OH, how does he benefit? (ETA Both of us benefit from a new way of daily living, even if his burden is now different to mine)

 

9. How can I revisualise my idea? Stone Three

I drew this card once, in conjunction with the Grail Maiden. After studying them both I wondered if the Maiden was waiting for me, with the Grail, in the distant trees on this card. If I could get past the damaged section of the wall, or bestir myself to repair it and move on, I could travel to the distant grove, and there find my spiritualy inspiring place.

 

10. The next step. XIV Cauldron

I'm thinking that this has two aspects.

1) is about continuing on a spiritual path, but

2) is about allowing things to go into the pot, to be changed and reconstituted. This is a vessel to be sought, but it also changes. It has the energy/power to allow me to move into a new state of mind or place.

 

11. The key which will unlock the door to the next achievement. Sword Two

My old friend the 2 of Swords (and the Adder again). I need to find time to consider seriously - to make a good compromise work - not all one thing or the other.

(ETA, now I see this as having to choose, not trying to live in a compromise situation).

 

Pathwalker - questions and meditation

________________________________________

 

How does the Wasteland manifest in your personal life and surroundings?

"Most of my time is spent in places which have no active 'love' principle. At work, shopping, even on the internet, I may be stepping on poisoned ground - rushing around but not building.

 

What are you doing/can be done about it?

"Ah, I could spread love with each step I took, be the active principle which I feel is missing, spread healing, even to the ground itself, to negate the effects of the poison."

 

What is your secret dream?

"To be empowered to do this, to ask for and receive the spiritual gifts which I can then use to heal, to be the solution to the problem I see. To have the financial security to make my dreams a reality, a lottery win or something amazing like that."

 

 

 

The Flowering of Logres.

Here I get the impression that times are mellow and rich. Everywhere is green, even the slpoes of the hills, and there is ripe grain. Butterfly and Bee say to me "flowers, fruit, honey." (ETA - each in it's right time)

Each of the Hallows is here, adults dance with children, there is joy, knowledge of good, completion.

The landscape is good, wholesome, fresh. It is not broken, polluted, ravaged for more than we need. The land is love, and has love. There is peace. There is enough.

There are the sounds of nature, and growth, not the sounds of anger and destruction. There is work to do - but neither the land or the people are desolate or broken.

 

 

The long visualisation is private, but it becomes clear to me that it's not about me, it's about helping uncover the inspiring light for my times.