Tag Archives: celebration

You can only be there to be transformed.

On leaving Brighton last June, I was full of bravado. Determined for a new chapter and challenge. Calling out to London and the next rung of academia, I was determined that this city in all its sprawl and corners; its chaos, capital and overwhelm, would teach me a lesson. Help me smash the plant pot that had become Brighton for the previous decade and revitalise me somehow – let me grow.

 

Probably naively – wide open and fatigued from the summer downloads of Folleterre and heartbreak of Berlin – I rocked up to meet her in my typical state of unpreparedness. All tentacles, no core. 

 

In retrospect, owing everything to the wild resilience of other residents, who gave me shade in all manner of ways and allowed me to probe and curl new roots around the curves and cracks of this relentless, steaming slab. 

 

I hit winter hard. Watched another illusion of encounter and connection whither. And set into a space nearly and then finally my own. Alone in the east, smoking and drinking too much and posturing in unhealthy ways around too much Netflix and procrastination, I burned out. Sank into chronic pain and scared myself of how unwell I can become. Popped up every now and again to talk to people about gut health – mesmerising them with northern articulation, anecdote and stand up. The download that leaves me depleted. Then went back to it. The lack of embodiment obvious;  ashamed to talk about healing in such a state of dis-ease. 

 

Up until early spring, I was up for calling it a day. I think the thought of anyone close to me having to navigate the chaos of my material legacy after the fact was the only pacifier. The sun was a rescue at first if only in animation. Found myself wondering cruising grounds too early until I met myself. And that’s kind of where London took me – really deep into the pain that I think Brighton bandaged. Scared me hard enough that I had to look again at my shit. To look again at why for so many years I kept cycling through peak experiences to crash upon my arse lost and alone. This time, she gave me a place where I would be alone and then let me really sink into it. 

 

After years of meeting my makers in folds of geometry; holding, receiving and pouring into heart circle, singing with frogs and puking into buckets; sweating in lodges, vibrating around fires and sucking cock in ritual – it was clear that yeah, I still had some work to do. 

 

Part of that began at Unston Grange at the beginning of spring. Where after a long and deliberate hiatus from the Albion circle, I tentatively reconnected with the community. Momentarily bringing a bit of that shadow into the light of a relatively new format for domestic community. Away from the corridors of the castle and some of the trickier relating I find there, and perhaps a bit of the unprocessed shame and history of Avalon – here, there was a rhythm of community that spoke of home again. In both the silence and the stars, I felt held. And I went back to my lair in London in a kind of renewal. 

 

In Spring I found myself co-facilitating a gathering in Portugal. Finally in that place of stone and lavender which had been such an online effort in shadow to help co-create. And I felt fully home again on-continent, in community and surprised myself at how boundless, connected, in love and strong I could feel. How accepted and accepting I could be. 

 

At this gathering I brought the shadow dance – product of years of fantasising about this form of ritual – and watched through my mask, in awe; charged and connected in a way I’ve only known with the plants – as the community, initially apprehensive, responded. Lurching and moaning in shapes around the fire in honour of one of our most taboo, tricksterish, yet essential teachers. And then walking back into sanctuary revealed somehow. Honest. Open. Seen. 

 

After having the opportunity to deepen my connection with a faerie at ADF, already known but not known, they said their goodbyes and gratitudes to me in the bathroom whilst I hid behind my toothbrush. But I heard what they said and it re-inspired me to the kind of heart I’m capable of. Later as I sat bare arsed on a chocolate and banana cake in no-talent, windmills gushing to my left on the hill – I felt the reminder of inner rest flow through me like I hadn’t in a long time. I’d come home. 

 

Beltane was the ignition for self-love, clarity, assessments and therapy. And for the first time in my process I got some answers around why my experience in the world had been pitched the way it had been for so long. I saw very clearly who I could be and wanted to be in the laboratory of community and the work I’d need to do to brave that heart in the rest of the world. 

 

Probing and manifesting those depths is never seamless though – and on leading upto some of the biggest medicine of the year, Pan Gathering – I wobbled. Felt the pressures of navigating the system in the city materially and reluctant to shift my focus to where it counts. But I went and arrived in the heart of a process where wild, free and naked in the woods I fully embodied the truth of my names in a circle of Pan revellers both old and new. Let my heart fully connect and worship another unconditionally. Fully knew my Libra in Venus. Re-calibrated on what I need in terms of romance and feeling in the collective. Renegotiated my polyamory – maybe even abandoned an aspect of my polyamory. Got a taste of where to go when I am cut adrift. Held space graciously despite my ram. Felt my power. Reconnected wholly with my spirituality through drum and rattle. Believed again. Heard the horse on the hill whinny at my private ritual at the ancestors tree – just like the first time, years ago. Felt totally the wisdom of my sisters and what they mean to me when I reach out and allow. 

 

In that gathering I heard such profound poetry and meaning and fully understood the experiential nature of our culture – our profoundly oral tradition. Breathing in medicine for the heart in whispers and eyes, like silk parcels through the letterbox of my soul. You can’t write these exchanges to their full potency. You can only be there to be transformed. 

 

Despite a few closing thanks – this is where my piece initially ended. I hesitated at posting at first because of the more raw truth in the struggle. But also, a technical issue with the website came up and I couldn’t get in to post. So I kind of sat on it. Almost forgot. And then Queer Spirit Festival happened and in retrospect, I couldn’t have really said what I wanted to say without it. 

 

Any of the community close to me know that I’ve had some political misgivings about the impact of the festival on faerie culture. The groundswell of new energy and the challenge it brings for the sensitive transmission of our cultures and ways – and for those negotiating and finding their space in our folds with their own histories, experiences and boundaries. The energy it takes to grow, rather than tend. But more personally, community is a delicate web for me where I feel trust through being properly seen and understood. And despite the excesses of Fish Wife, Octopus is a creature of solitude or at least, of a tight nest. 

 

But in the spirit of the medicine this year, I showed up. And I was moved. 

 

The faerie encampment was such a profound healing experience of a circle within a circle – from where I could stretch out, dance, laugh, feel, touch, taste, fondle and fuck with this enormous and beautiful sodden love nest of queer hearted beings. I was honoured to serve the high priestess GayLove in assisting in the sacred sexuality temple; where I saw the most radical visions of queer utopia in action. The full spectrum of gender embodied in the play-fighting, foreskin stretching, cunt sharing, pain meditating, queer orgying ecstacy; which spoke to me of a true and honest scope of our boundaries and readiness for evolution in the co-creation of fundamentally queer places of spirit, play and worship. Both sober and messy, I found and felt profound love in that place. It dawned on me after all of these years in community, what I don’t see or hide from. That we are fucking family. And it was deep – no prose needed. But also, that exponential broadening, deepening, spreading and sharing of our spaces is the work. And that I am part of it. Gratitude and graces, Octopus may have been a bit late to the party. 

 

I am now in Berlin. Still riding the waves of QS and entering Virgo season feeling a bit like I’m being blown apart and filed into a different path. It’s bringing more truth, more clarity and a search for the future of me; of the love and the spaces I want to be part of and to create. It’s not that this isn’t without its bumps, retraction, re-entrenchment, old-patterning and a bit of mania-dusting – but it is what it is and overall, it’s promising. 

 

And in that sense, dear faeries – this is a thankyou. Thankyou for saving my life time and time again. Thankyou for loving me. Thankyou for showing me a life that I am so blessed to live with you. Every year I am changed through you. 

 

And while yes, I can curl up all tendril in my time away – not sure where my point of reconnection is, whether I can relate, or how to start over – I know that you’re waiting for me to begin the walk again. And that each time of holding your hands up and through it, I come back to myself more whole. More potent. More wise. That this dance never ends and that I still feel you in my hair, when I walk the other paths alone. 

 

Changes are afoot. 

 

Octopus & Fish Wife X 

 

Special thanks to True Paradox, Ofra, Eyal, Ananda, GayLove, Sprouty Merlot, Blue Star, My Little Pony, Bliss, Shokti Lovestar, Faunalicious, Foxie Plethora Deux Mille, Hazel, Printemps, Wood Pigeon, Andy B, Mushroom, Kingfisher, Thunder, Princess, Iris, Bholenath, Nigel and Ed.

Other stuff by Octopus:

Breakups | A Call to Sisterhood. 

Our Glorious Bodies. 

Shokti’s Radical Faerie Fundamentals

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Radical Faerie is a term adopted by some humans (often but by no means exclusively gay men) as a label to indicate we view ourselves as free and sacred beings of nature, seeking to live from the heart in tune with the natural forces, and that like nature is constantly exploring and growing, is both male and female, elemental and divine. Each Faerie will have their own unique definition of the term, no faerie seeks to speak for another, this offering is Shokti’s take on some fundamental faerie fae-osophy. I believe Faerie space offers sanctuary to those of us who wish to explore who and what we are from the root up, a sanctuary where the self-limiting, hierarchical and patriarchal concepts of materialist science and certain dictatorial religions do not reign. Instead Magic is on the throne, and Her reign gives us Freedom to be Who We Are.

Tucson 1979

The faerie fundamentals as seen by SHOKTI: Each human soul is a unique mixture of the primal energies of Creation. A soul has self-awareness, a quality which mystics of all faiths have declared is the essential nature of the Creator Consciousness – like the Source itself, we have self-knowledge, and the ability to create our own destiny. An interplay of pure consciousness (Shiva) and pure energy (Shakti), often depicted as an ecstatic, sexual union, brings the worlds into being. Souls combine the Shiva and Shakti nature of the Divine Creator Source within themselves, the fundamental truth is that at soul level we all both male and female energies, they flow together to create our being, while our personalities are also shaped by the interplay of the four elemental forces that are the building blocks of life.

Humans are the meeting point of nature and spirit. To live a healthy, balanced life we need to be well connected to both – modern life is crippled by disease and disaster because most people are connected to neither.

And yet healing and wholeness are our birthright as divine beings at home in the universe, and with some adjustments to our attitudes and outlooks can be ours. At any point we can choose to re-boot our lives and bring ourselves into harmony with the natural flow of the universe. We have to remember that we are not separate from nature or spirit, in fact we are constantly under the influence of energy flows which our ancient ancestors understood much better than we do today.

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Four simple steps to healing:

Attuning to Nature

Opening to Spirit

Healing the Heart

Reprogramming the Mind

The route to all this is through the Body.

If we seek wholeness, peace and wisdom in our lives, we have to take the responsibility for our healing out of the hands of doctors and into our own bodies. It will help if we believe that it is possible to come into harmonic flow with life. We have probably been encouraged to believe in a random, purposeless existence for most of our lives. We will need to be prepared to learn some new things, which are in fact old things, the things our souls already know, but which we forgot.

Inside each of us exists a soul that has deep roots in the indigenous tribes of this planet, in rites and ceremonies that connect us deeply to the Earth, the Air, the Fire and Water…. Plus to the Spirit, the multidimensional consciousness that we are forever part of. Through our own intuition we can bring ourselves into alignment – but these energies are extremely powerful, and can unbalance us as well as help us. Therefore it is valuable to share our journey into healing with others who can support and reflect back to us what is going on.

Most of us have taken psychedelics, or worked with medicine plant helpers, to expand our awareness in some way. Drug use is so popular because humans love to experience the potential limitlessness and ecstatic feelings in their soul – though in a materialist, scientific era, soul is a word we rarely use. If we accept the reality of the soul, a question that then comes up of course is do we also have to accept the religious rules and concepts we were indoctrinated with as children?

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Only one way to find out – ask the soul. Step One. Go out in Nature. Attuning to Nature also involves taking notice of moon cycles, seasonal changes and astrological influences. Step Two. We can raise our vibrational frequency to talk to the Spirit. There are infinite ways to alter our vibrations. Eventually drugs become irrelevant – they can be useful to open up energy channels in us which we can then access through other means, eg dance, drumming, chanting, yoga, breathing techniques, sexual energy. Those channels exist in us, it’s just the modern world convinced most of us to tune them out.

Step Three. Healing the Heart involves sharing our stories, being heard without judgement in the warm embrace of fellow souls. Heart Circle is the most powerful heart healing tool I have ever come across. We can only do so much emotional healing alone, we can do so much with a special lover – but to fully heal our hearts we have to accept that humans are social creatures, we belong in community. Our hearts thrive when they are connected to many other hearts in openness, trust and joy. If we restrict our love to romantic illusions of partnership over all else, we will suffer. If we are held in the bosom of a loving community of friends we will survive all life throws at us, and grow through our challenges.

Step Four. The Mind has to give up. It doesn’t run the show. It isn’t designed to know everything – it is designed to ask questions, to analyse and consider. We keep our minds so full, and over stimulated in modern life – meditation helps us to calm the mind, enter into a passive mode within it, where we can, through stillness or trance, get access to its deeper levels, to the places shared with others in the collective consciousness. Through these levels we can even talk to plants, animals and spirit beings.

For this to be possible the mind has to be able to become clear and open, like a cloudless sky, and for that to happen we will need to reprogramme all beliefs and thought patterns that keep the dark clouds in our lives.

Coming to Healing involves coming home to the Body. Taking the body into nature – moving, stretching and opening the body to let in spirit – bringing the body into close physical contact with others (healing touch is part of healing the heart) – and even the reprogramming of the mind, the release of old beliefs and the affirmation of new, happens most effectively when the body is engaged too. Our bodies are temples of our spirit, containing a powerhouse of spiritual energy accessible through our sexuality. Sex is the fastest way to enlightenment, it has been said – if it is approached with awareness, love and surrender.

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The Earth’s journey round the Sun provides us with eight seasonal festival points when it becomes possible for us to leap onto the Path of Healing and Awakening. Spring Equinox is just round the corner as I write this – as Nature reawakens after the cold, inward Winter months, so can we. As we dedicate ourselves to our own healing – as we discover our own ability to heal – the energies of Nature and Spirit rush to assist us.

The elements offer us a way to know and explore who and what we really are. Other metaphysical systems, such as the chakras, the kabbalistic tree of life, the planet’s astrological maps are also very helfpul tools for us to deepen self-knowledge and come into harmony with life. These maps are around to help us maximise the experience the soul is having while on planet Earth.   But the greatest teacher of all is LOVE, and on that point probably every faerie will agree – love opens the gates to the soul, to subject-SUBJECT consciousness (the term invented by Rad Fae Grandfather Harry Hay). Faeries gather in tribal groupings because the LOVE draws us in, transforms and heals us, opens the way to fuller manifestation of the light and joy in our souls. We were born this way, born to awaken, born to seek deeper and higher than most folk, born to be planetary healers. The time is really NOW. We are birthing the Age of Aquarius.

IF YOU FEEL THE CALL, FIND US

Fuck Shame by Wood Pigeon.

I will not be shamed

I will not be ashamed

Shame has no refuge in my soul

No dark corner to harbor

To embed and unravel into my beautiful life.

 

I am animal

I am spirit

I am queer

I am gay

I fuck men

I fancy twinks

I love rimming

Cuddle me

Hold me

I am not ashamed.

 

Stick your homophobia in a primark bag

Re-cycle it

Re-use it

Lose it

I don’t give a shit

It’s your shame. You carry it home.

 

My sex mirrors you, triggers you, brings fear up in you

Follow my lead

Ditch your shame too.

 

Come take your freedom back

Birth it

Love it

Let it ooze all juicy and sap rising

Full of surprising

Spontaneous, liberating, fuck you all

It’s my one shot on earth and let your shame ridden hatred fall

Fall

Fall.

 

Breathe.

 

 

Blessings on your heart walk,

Woodie Wood Pigeon X


Walking the Labyrinth by Cunty.

I see the path I am on, the behaviour I exhibit, the words I offer and receive. I feel the rush of elation with one step, the heavy burden of shame with the next.

This is achingly familiar, from the instinct to pull away to the vulnerability of being open-hearted and loving. The twists and turns of emotions at a Faerie gathering are dizzying and mercurial. I stumble on, trusting that the path will lead me to the centre as much as I trust in the process of the heart circle.

It feels as if I’m passing back a way I’ve already come and yet it is different, leading deeper into the Mystery. In between the stumbling I also feel myself about to leap in flight. It is exhausting and exhilarating in equal measure.

I have offered my id as a sacrifice to Dionysus/Aphrodite and I am Maenad, a raving one, destroying all in my path, invulnerable and prophesying as my bleeding soles take one more step, just one more, always one more. Every touch, kiss, embrace fuels me still, pushing me further on, although I have long forgotten the question I held as I began the journey.

This bone-shearing, raucous, playful, chaotic, whimsical pilgrimage of queerness, connection, vulnerability and resilience is all I can remember, all I can taste, and all I want or need.

The gnarled dance of one who doesn’t dance, equal parts Salome, Kate Bush and Baba Yaga, cannot stop of be undone. It is the search for sustenance like the root of a tree, a tendril burrowing deeper and further down into the earth, reaching out, reaching down, and reaching inward.

Were I to see from above, if I remembered such a place, I would see the shape of the labyrinth, leading me home to myself. With such perspective I might find comfort in correspondences;

Seven coils, laid out around the centre

Seven paths, inward and outward

Seven days, seven nights of the gathering

Seven chakras, from root to crown

Seven planetary bodies, seen with the human eye

Seven gates, as Inanna passed through to the Underworld

Seven seasons, as Buffy lived (and died twice) through

But thought and reason elude me, for I am lost in the movement, ever onwards, to the centre. One path to tread, unicursally leading me to the point where there is an ending of sorts. Almost as soon as the awareness of an ending creeps in, I find myself there. I stand in the heart of the labyrinth.

The diary that I have kept for this gathering is a mirror standing tall, implacable in its cold reflection. As my breathing stills and thought once again permeates my emotional being, I am presented with the manifestation of myself, my selves, my other.

It is the Minotaur, the bull-headed beast of raging need and mistrust. The creature imprisoned, fed on the sacrifice of youths’ bodies. Asterion, the shamed one. It takes everything I have to hold still, to look him in the eye, to not back down, to not turn and run.

With each word I read from my journal I note another detail of the monster. How he is “too intense” (how many times I have been told that!). How clumsy and unseemly he is. How territorial he has become, even in his solitude and how his insatiable desire and longing are too much for any mortal being to gaze upon.

Every confession of vulnerability I have recorded is another strike of Theseus’ cock-like club, each declaration of connection and love another stab of his phallic sword until the beast lies fallen. Broken and bleeding, sides heaving and sweat slicking his hair, his breathing ragged. How can I not love him now, as I love broken things or broken people I can heal and thus prove my worth to? I pull him to me and lament all the hurt, the misunderstanding, the senseless anger, the years lost now.

When this passes, as all things do, I look around and register the change in light, the transience of time and also the acceptance of what has been. The crumpled body has evaporated like a heavy dream, though streaks of blood and filth remain.

As I return to my other life, the life between gatherings, I find myself back in the coils of the labyrinth, this time moving outwards. I apply reason and consideration to the experiences I have undergone, to the changes that are wrought in me.

As my feet retread the pathway back out, I assimilate the loves and lessons into myself, into my rational and irrational mind. I make a point of being kind with myself, of allowing myself the chance to do a little better every time I make this journey. I return with messages to and from myself, from Spirit and from the Gods.

I wrap concepts into words, the way I would package fragile ornaments for a move. Placing each one with care where I can retrieve it later and still find it whole. I recall and honour those whom I shared the journey with, shared moments with and shared a bed with.

Soon enough I find myself stepping out from the labyrinth, back again into the other-realm. I do not look back over my shoulder. I honour the path, the coils, the centre and the lessons learned as I take a breath and take another step.

 

A LONG overdue realisation – The story of Wolf and his first Albion gathering.

So it’s been just over a week since I heaved my rucksack onto my back, kissed/hugged some new found friends goodbye and tearily made my way back to civilisation. After what was one of the most cathartic and honest experiences of my life.

Due to prior commitments, the last seven days have been wildly different to the previously wonderful 4.5 days spent on that great farm in Glastonbury.    The very next day I was surrounded by about 300 other gays at a pool-party for Sitges Pride.  For the first time in my life I’m actually enjoying the spectacle of it all and not feeling body shamed or self-conscious.  Followed the next day by a BBQ with a bunch of old friends who’ve recently come back into my life, and I realised I have very much missed.   Then I easyjetted it over to the beautiful city of Rome – for a week’s crash course on people and crisis management.  Strange but true.

It is in that great Italian city, where I am now, in a cute little Air bnb flat, just off the beautiful Plaza Cavour – where about an hour ago, I felt compelled to commit some thoughts to paper.   Due to the cancellation of one of my friends’ flights I have found myself alone in Rome this weekend, with only my wits to keep me company.   Not such a wise thing sometimes.

Today having spent the afternoon walking around the stunning city, whilst marvelling at the remnants of 3000 years of human endeavour, something fundamental happened for me.  Something within me shifted and like the parting of the curtain within the emerald city, I suddenly could see the truth of the old man behind the illusion of the Wizard.    Stick with me friends of Dorothy, you will see what I mean.

Since my departure from the land of the Faeries I have been getting these sweet little after-shocks of emotional realization, that can and have hit me out of the blue.   One such aftershock hit me today, and it nearly knocked my off my feet.  For the truth of it was so strong and clear that I had to steady myself.   It was something I have known for many years, but have never, ever been able to give it voice or shape before.

I hate myself or rather, I am racked with self-loathing. It is like a cloak of shadow that I have wound so tightly around my soul that it is always with me. It consumes me.  It shapes how I see, feel and perceive the world around me. It provides me with vitriol that I use against myself and against all those whom I can target – in a bid to make my shadow-self feel better.

I am only just realising this, only today have I seen this truth for what it is.  There is a part of me that hates myself so much, it would actually happily see me destroyed.   This revelation was so strong that I almost had an out-of-body experience.   I felt, for a while, as though I was outside myself, looking at a strange being inhabiting my own body, someone/something that I didn’t recognise or like. Or to put it another way, I felt how I imagine the perpetually handsome Dorian Gray would have felt each and every time he lifted the cover from the painting, to see how truly ugly it had become.  Somehow separate and distinct from the ugliness – yet still one and the same with it.

Then a second thought hit me.

Why have hated I myself and for how long?  Why did this start?  Then a third.

When did this start?  When did I first look in the mirror and only see my faults?  The answer is that I don’t know and I never want to know. A very, very LONG time.  Almost for as long as I can remember.

Then I thought about how these thoughts manifested.  What I had heard the voice in my head say to me, over and over again:

My eyes are too deeply set!  My brow too Neanderthal!  My stomach is too big!  My nose too wide!  My legs too thin!  My hairline too low…On and on I went, listing the ways the negative voice could always find fault, when all others saw something completely different.

All were very real thoughts I have entertained, things I have said to myself repeatedly, building up a mental image of myself as some sort of missing link in the chain of human evolution.  Somewhere between Neanderthal and homo-sapien, but even less attractive.

And then all at once, a new realisation hit.   All of this was total and utter BOLLOCKS. These were untruths, negative opinions of myself.  With no basis in reality and no evidence for their existence. Bullshit and rubbish I have been carrying around with me for far too long.

The negative thoughts/voices – whatever you want to call them, have been so loud, for so long that they have shaped me.  NO that word isn’t strong enough.   RESTRAINED me.   Forced me into contorted, twisted shapes that were uncomfortable and unnatural to me.

I stoop, because I feel I am too tall.   And thus I now have rounded shoulders and a painful lower back.  I breath in because my stomach sticks out – which it would do if I stoop.   On and on these thoughts have taken physical and emotional manifestations that have become so overpowering that I nearly lost all sense of self in the vortex of negativity.

Jesus H Christ!   This has even destroyed my love life and my relationships.   I am too scared to talk to people I am attracted to for fear they will see an ugly wretch, barely worthy of their contempt – when this frankly isn’t true.   Then, even with those whom I am not entirely attracted to but want to try to connect with, I become so self-conscious – that they can only see someone who is nervous, agitated and clearly not happy in themselves, so they run for the trees.

Well, enough is enough.  This is bullshit and I can now see it for what it is.   It genuinely does feel as though the exploitative old man, whispering negative thoughts from behind the curtain has been exposed, and now I know he is there I have vowed to destroy him.   No longer will I listen to such crap about myself.

I know I am fairly good-looking.   I know this as I have been told it many, many a time, and have always shrugged it off.   Well from now on, I shall accept that compliment in the manner that it was intended and not recoil from it, as though someone had poked me in the eye with a hot branding iron.   So when I look in the mirror I will see what is there.   I may not be perfect, but I am happy and that suits me just fine!

I know I am respected in my job and career.  I actually have the awards / accolades and experience to prove that.   So old man, nothing you can say can / will take that away from me.

I also know I am strong, for over my 39 years, I have survived many different trials.  Not only those that are caused by the chaos that is external life.  But battles that have raged within, those created by the thoughts / feelings of self-loathing.  For here I stand, at 39 years of age discovering myself, liking myself, and growing into a much stronger, happier me.

Last week I found a new me.  A confident me.  A me that I can see myself truly becoming.   So I am owning that new me. Today I am WOLF.   WOLF is a work in progress.  But WOLF is happy and there is no self-loathing here.

WOLF is Giles.  Giles is WOLF.   The two will always be one.  But WOLF is the good, positive, strong Giles.  The real Giles, not the shadow self – the shadow self is dead!

Thanks Faeries.  You don’t know the gift you have given me.  The gift of freedom, it was only 4 days, but such an important four days.

I love you all.

WOLF

Our Glorious Bodies: Strategies for resisting mainstream prescriptions of allure and beauty.

This year, as part of the Albion Faeries summer solstice celebrations, a circle of courageous faeries came together to share our experiences of embodiment: to talk about how our body issues; anxieties, fears, comparisons, resentments and projections shape our experience of the world, our intimacies and relationships.

Our circle was well attended by a diversity of bodies vis a vis size, shape and age: slim and skinny, big and wholesome, young and old. Our collective was mostly white, mostly male and cisgender – but also genderqueer.

We recognised the lack of representation by our female, trans, black and brown brothers and sisters and honoured their unique experiences. We hope our thoughts and process help initiate further circles where all bodies; their histories, narratives and futures can be held and welcomed, seen and heard, loved and supported.

We set out our space with love and intention and our facilitator encouraged discussion around a number of talking points. As an introduction, participants were invited to reflect on why they had come to the workshop:

  • Why are we here? What moved you individually about the workshop title? What particular feelings and / or grievances do you have about you body that you want to share and / or understand?

Each individual was given space for five minutes to talk around this opening point. A variety of experiences / trauma / conflicts and reflections were offered. Some of us had experienced serious accidents and had been left with the pain and insecurities of scars and surgeries. Some of us, perceived as ‘not having body issues’, felt silenced, unheard and isolated in our pain; not ‘taken seriously’ by others about our anxieties and fears. Some of us were confused by our bodies and by others bodies too – feeling like the body and the symbolism around the ‘preferred’ and ‘body beautiful’ were barriers to finding connection and relationships. Most of us felt dismayed at the pervasiveness of such notions, feeling that even ‘spiritual’ and ‘queer’ communities were just as afflicted and affected by such exclusion and reductivism.

Some of us disliked particular areas of our bodies: our bellies, our faces, our stretch marks, acne, teeth, gums, varicose veins, grey hair and general appearance. Some of us felt a little resentful that just as we were embarking on newly discovered queer-trajectories and callings, our bodies betrayed us by ageing and becoming less appealing to those seeking out the youthful body, the adonis or its non-binary equivalent.

  • How does it feel to inhabit a body that doesn’t conform to mainstream prescriptions of beauty and allure? How does it feel to be disenchanted / depressed or resentful of your own body when it or parts of it feel ‘ugly’ or are sick and weak? How does this affect our lives and relationships?

This section was timed at around 10-15mins and was an open session with people volunteering reflections and insights. Here we uncovered a great sense of awareness and mourning around the painful experience of being in the world with a body that doesn’t ‘match up’ or that ‘plays up’. Some of us spoke of entertaining a love / hate duality with our bodies; recognising and appreciating its potency, capability and inherent beauty but feeling resentful of its ‘shortfalls’ and ‘weaknesses’. Some of us described the act of recoiling from others touch or interest – literally flinching at the approach of another body or intimate encounter. And also of second guessing and being suspicious of the others intentions: the internal narrative of ‘they’re not really interested’, or ‘I’m not enough’.

Courtesy of Luke Beachey
Courtesy of Luke Beachey

The common experience here was on of inadequacy, which was referenced continuously. Some of us spoke of an energetic experience of ‘closing inwards’ or ‘closing down’, a ‘shrinking feeling’ and a ‘peeling back’ from the world; a clammy fear of being seen and avoiding the gaze of others.

In times of complete disillusionment with our bodies, some of us spoke of adopting an asexual energy and position as a defensive strategy: ‘no one wants it anyway honey, so put it away’. Our natural impulses toward sexuality and intimacy were denied through fear of rejection or having to expose a body that we felt interminably shameful about. Some of us spoke about wanting to just disappear, to be invisible – in humour (but also, in deadly seriousness), some of us spoke of the magic trick of invisibility accompanying a visit to a gay bar, when the affected gaze of the audience to only detect certain bodies, denied the existence of our own.

We all blamed our bodies at some point for all kinds of events and misfortunes: ‘if only my body would do or be such and such, then such and such would be easier’. As a result, at times when our bodies needed the most compassion, in times of ill health or disease, we confessed to subjecting them to all manner of insults and scolding for their ‘lack of perfection’.

Ultimately, all of these experiences converged to instil in us an unbearable low self-esteem. Some of us were so distraught by our embodiment, that we actively retreated into disembodiment, or of taking notions of the energetic body to extremes by inhabiting them as a defensive alternative to being our bodies as material.

Some of us reflected on how all kinds of sexual practices and fetishes were explored as a way of coping with having a different body: how swim wear, leather and sports gear (not exhaustive) allow us to engage sexually and provocatively but to also hide our skins (well, at least partially). The significance of the dark-room in gay sex spaces was not lost on us.

Finally, we closed our section in realising how, whilst being so neurotic in our fear of rejection from others, we spend most of our waking day rejecting our embodied selves.

  • Where do our body anxieties stem from? Whose idealistic and normative prescriptions of the body are we trying to live up to? And where do they come from?

This section ran for another 10-15mins and was another open session. The intention here was to grasp some of the social factors that inform and influence the context for our bodies and our experience of them.

Courtesy of Luke Beachey
Courtesy of Luke Beachey

An interesting insight was into our similar experience as queers as growing up in a straight (white) man’s world: and how, our bodies would ‘betray’ us from an early age, appearing too effeminate or not masculine enough. This would provide the early context for a deep distrust of our bodies and sow the seeds for our delight or retreat into disembodiment. Or perhaps our love of costume and drag – to hide our skins of shame. Our ‘bodies as betrayal’ extends to the bodies expression of natural sexual interest and expression too – how we psychically punish our bodies as youngsters for exhibiting arousal for our same-sex attractors. Shame was recognised as a common emotion and experience for us all and a primary factor in distorting our own body-image.

Some of us commented on the unrealistic portrayals of the body in the media and in fashion especially. Some of us had worked specifically in this industry and reassured everyone of how much of a hot mess models look before being pampered, preened and photoshopped. All of us recognised the damaging effects of this propaganda. All of us felt beleaguered by the trend of a new style for assessing the validity and worth of bodies on ‘the scene’ by ‘rating them’. How our magnificence and complexity had now been reduced to two, three or four stars if-you-should-be-so-lucky.

Many of us felt this phenomena to be fascinating and relevant in the context of our capitalist and consumer culture: how our bodies have been reduced to commodities and forced to operate by the instrumental and transactional logic of capitalism. Dating apps like Grindr have only confounded this problem: we now ‘shop for cock’ and scroll menus of flesh completely disembodied from their human and spiritual realities. Grindr is commodity-fetishism at its zenith.

Further, categorisations and labeling of our bodies (most predominately on that gay scene) excluded those that aren’t deemed to fit and further inflamed the commodification frenzy of them. Not to mention, the fact that the idea of the solid, smooth, athletic body of prowess that is the now everywhere standard, especially within our LGBTQI communities, leaves no room for the visibility and compassion for bodies affected and depleted by a whole spectrum of social issues that affect us disproportionately (chronic and mental health conditions, drug abuse, domestic violence, homelessness and poverty etc).

Some of us commented on how the lack of representation of bodies that are different from the mainstream accepted and celebrated types only bolsters our collective desensitization to bodies deemed ‘other’ or ‘out of control’. In particular, categorisations and labeling of our bodies (most predominately on the gay scene) excluded those that aren’t deemed fit and / or desirable and further inflame the commodification frenzy of them.

It was agreed that the situation has reached fever pitch: an ever narrowing self-perpetuating cycle of exclusion and shame accompanies the media-orgy and fetishisation of the body beautiful. We all acknowledged that non of us belonged to any such ‘boys club’ – and yet recognized that whilst those bodies weren’t represented amongst us, how their particular body issues were unique, significant and valid in their own right.

  • Yet, even in a state of some prescribed ‘non-perfection’, sickness or ill-health – what do our bodies allow? What are our bodies really, beyond biased and corrupt notions of beauty, capability and worth?

Another ten minute open session. Here we discussed ideas of what the body signified or represented ‘authentically’ (to us as disruptive, open-minded and spiritual queers). Here we enjoyed the notion that our bodies were vessels / vehicles / platforms from which to enjoy and celebrate the world and each other. Beyond the above reductivism, we smiled at our bodies as conferring gifts and abilities, such as our innate drive for creativity: our small circle for example, boasted dancers, gardeners, writers, artists, healers, actors, singers and songwriters, musicians and poets.

Courtesy of Luke Beachey
Courtesy of Luke Beachey

We agreed that our bodies, ultimately, are vehicles for connection, for love and intimacy and for building community – the notion that disability, disease or a failure to achieve or possess a certain body type should disqualify us from such bounty, are abstract and destructive concepts born of an abstract and destructive culture.

Some of us enjoyed the idea, inspired by our own journeying with medicine plants and otherwise, that our bodies are but magnificent containers for our consciousness. That what we perceive as individuality is a confusion and a distraction – that this is a momentary, transient and permeable experience: consciousness is eternal and our embodied lives are an experience. We rested together in the miracle and awesomeness of our bodies, the mystery and mystical nature of them. We found solace in reconnecting with their fundamental interdependence with and interconnection with the world around us – how our lives are a perfect symbiosis from the microbial and beyond.

We encouraged together a sense of gratefulness for this realisation and reflected at how easily these understandings were forgotten in the nexus of bodily-symbolic violence and commodification. We connected with the promise of our bodies for our personal development – our facing of fears, our learning and our embracing of the strange, unknown and of each other. We took refuge in the ability of our bodies to transform and for us to act upon our bodies in the pursuit of our personal transformations. A touching story came to the circle, when in her parting moments, one of our Mother’s declared: ‘I am not my body’. Closing, we all nodded in recognition of this familiar experience and knowledge of similar realisations.

  • Moving forward, what are our strategies for resisting commodification of our bodies? For celebrating the glory of our bodies and resisting mainstream prescriptions for allure and beauty?

A twenty minute session by accident. We first dealt with some conflict around what these strategies were and should be. We agreed that what they are not is yet more prescriptions for ‘what we should do’ to our bodies, or how we should be in them. We agreed that the cycle of violence must stop by learning to accept and love our bodies how they are in the moment, without change or regime on the route to some notion of perfection.

All of us pledged to investing in future co-created space where we could safely enjoy our bodies as they are, to be heard and seen in our vulnerability and to see and touch other bodies free from constraining bodily-ideals. We agreed to work to create spaces where we can progress in grappling with and ultimately transcending limiting and damaging ideas of what constitutes an acceptable and/or desirable body: to ‘fuck gender’ and do it anyway. Integral to this is to compliment the intellectual with ‘heart space’ – to bring love into our relationship with our own bodies and to approach other bodies with love too. To ‘be the change’ and to impact on culture by limiting our personal indulgence in reductive and exclusive desires.

Courtesy of Luke Beachey
Courtesy of Luke Beachey

We suggested that restricting our exposure to portrayals of the body beautiful via mainstream media would be nourishing for us: the TV must be sacrificed for our freedom. At the same time to ‘treat our bodies well’ by doing whatever it is to them that brings us nourishment, happiness, contentment or support: to indulge frequently in self-care and to reward ourselves continuously for the courageousness of just ‘being in the body’ and living out our embodied lives.

We promised to smile more, at our bodies and at others too – as a way of signalling our respect, adoration and acceptance of them. But we also recognised the importance of ‘being okay with not being okay’, to give space for sorrow when our bodies are not performing as we would have them, or when looking a certain way – whilst importantly, remembering our discussions and lessons here to guide us again to a place of ease and contentment.

Finally and in recognition that our time together put a limit on the diversity and infinite number of ways we can celebrate our bodies consistently as a way of being, we also set out to challenge ourselves. To step into vulnerability, safely – to celebrate our bodies from within, to allow them to be seen and celebrated more by others.

This process was undertaken on the day of the solstice and I can say that I saw some courageous celebrations of our bodies that evening – and it was beautiful. We were beautiful x

To: Faunalicious, Queever, Big Sister, Brunelle, Brother Sun, Marlena, Stan, Pink Dalek, Hagbard, Badger, Cunty and Swallow.

From my body to yours, Octopus x

Other stuff by Octopus:

Breakups | A Call to Sisterhood. 

You have to be there to be transformed. 

Thankyou Faerie Family by Beverley: stories from Albion, summer solstice 2015.

Feeling Joy at the end of a synchronicity filled week in the magical aura of Avalon,

Love as so many new connections were made and friendships deepened,

Heart blooms peppered the days.

Inspired by the power of community and co-creation, and the great contributions from so many to the collective event,

Feeling humbled and honoured by fae who quietly confided in me their deep secrets,

Fortified by the morning qi gong,

Happy at the greater diversity of the gathering,

Feeling blessed by the many personal learnings scattered across the gathering,

Feeling loved and accepted even when the stress levels spiked and the crown of calm slipped momentarily – then held unconditionally in faerie compassion.

Grateful for the kind thanks and tokens of appreciation & helping to rebuild my broken self worth,

Enriched by the experiences,

Liberated through the workshops,

Thankful for the healing,

Nourished by wonderfully creative vegan food,

Delighted to see those first timers I had encouraged to come find that they did fit in and yes they were part of the faerie family.

Happy to be able to use my cooking skills again and work with a harmonious kitchen team,

Entertained and impressed by the show and the talent, and also those whose living performances that ran non-stop for the week,

Invigorated and recharged by our excursions to the sacred places in Avalon,

Tuned in to spirit and the visions, the telepathy, the synchronicity, the angelic messenger service…

Stronger in my personal capacity to manage life,

Loved again, and loving again, beyond the walls and the wounds,

Unconditionally loved,

Hugged by all the hugs…

Still being hugged now as I type….

Rad Fae Summer Solstice @ Paddington Farm, Glastonbury.

Facebook event here.

Booking form here.

Last year, we were blessed with some awesome weather, as our community descended on Paddington Farm to have one of the most revelatory, nourishing and joyful gatherings seen there – the whispers and energy from which propelled the community into some hungry and ecstatic energy that saw a real spike in community events, happenings and appearances throughout the rest of the year.

We WERQED out our shame and cast it off last summer. We danced naked and painted in the sunshine, in awe of each other and the world. We spoke and we listened, we cooked and we munched, meditated and stretched in the bounty of the Somerset landscape. We played a tribal intensity around the fire throughout the night; beating our drums hot handed and wildly, lost in each other and spirit. We were enchanted.

And now it’s time to gather again, to continue the story and officially break out our tribe into the bosom of summer.

This faerie-qweens, is our summer gathering! Let’s put it all aside for one week to weave some camp-chaos and sissy-serenity in our pop up headquarters, nestled in the ancient hills of Olde-Glasto.

Yes! Let our summer-sport be faerie-loving, and Paddington Farm our pitch. Breathe deep dears and open your hearts: raid your closets, set your intentions and spread the word.

Bring fabulous outfits, smiles, loving-appetites, raw passion, creative inclinations and soulful offerings – let’s co-create and supercharge our radical network the world over, by making this one go off in the brightest, most spectacular and conscious way possible.

It begins with you and ends with us all.

See you there.

If you have any other suggestions around encouraging a more inclusive, safe space that you would like us to consider, or would like to comment on any of these – please, get in touch.

Brotherhood (by Cunty)

Every now and again things align beautifully and disparate patterns coalesce to form a path. For a precious moment things make sense and we find an empowered sense of peace. We find the balance within; we resonate with the magic around us.

It was a cold February evening in Scotland (is there any other kind?) and I was travelling to St Andrews in Fife with one of my dearest friends. A few weeks earlier I’d learned that Panti Bliss, the famous gender discombobulist and gay rights campaigner was to give a talk at the University there and I eagerly booked a couple of tickets.

There’s something else in the town that bears the name of my country’s patron saint: my little brother, who is a student there. We share the same father as a genetic anchor, though we are both emotionally unattached to him. He is half my age, lives with his girlfriend and only learned of my existence a few years ago. I tracked him down last Summer online and we’d chatted online but never met.

So on the day I was off to see Panti I logged into Facebook and discovered it was my brother’s birthday. Since we had been denied the opportunity of knowing each other, I forgive myself for not knowing such details. Shaking, I messaged his girlfriend and asked if she thought he’d be interested in meeting that night. Just before I finished work for the day she replied with the go-ahead.

On stage that night, Panti exceeded all expectations. A heartfelt plea to the young queer kids to explore and celebrate the gifts that come with their otherness was mixed with humour and a story of how she met Madonna at a funeral. The talk itself augmented and fuelled the things I know as a Faerie – that we are a tribe, there’s a purpose to us being here, that we are blessed with the ability to engage in our own forms of transformative magic.

Before catching the train back to Edinburgh, my friend and I went to meet my brother and his girlfriend. After an initial awkwardness and then 40 minutes of my storytelling mode (whilst my friend did her best smile-and-nod-to-reassure-everyone-I’m-not-going-to-pull-a-knife routine) there was much hugging and general loveliness and barriers were broken down.

The train journey home was a deeply reflective 80 minutes. My friend, the most patient person I have ever known, said I could talk the whole way home if I wanted. So I did. I expressed my excitement and joy, my fears about this important step in building a relationship with a sibling, after us both being separated as only children.  I clenched my teeth in anger that our father denied us the option of knowing one another. I delighted in the notion that we had both escaped that solitude imposed upon us, as if we had been prisoners in neighbouring cells, never speaking or seeing each other, yet conspiring through facebook notes to break out of the fortress of his emotional repression we were captive within.

I turned to my uncomplaining companion and told her how blessed I was. How my own otherness had sparked my search for my own vision of spirituality, how being a Faerie gave me the chance to connect with others of my tribe in the most astonishing ways, deeply and honestly. How lucky I was to have the words available to me to express myself and to question familial power structures that are toxic to me. What did my little brother have?

My long-suffering confidant looked at me right in the eye and said “He has you”.

And everything came into alignment. The pattern began to form in my mind.   It was the web of Faeries I know and love. It was the gift they offered freely, without the expectation of conformity that my estranged patriarch demands. Love and connection are the gift and they are what I can pass on, what I can teach my brother and learn from him again in turn. This is part of the Work too, taking the magic of Faeries back into the mundane world, sowing the seeds, waiting for wonder to shoot up between the pavement cracks. For one shining moment it all made sense and I was at peace, having passed through the anger at years wasted.

As the train moved us ever on to home, as I sat with my dear friend who was practically manifesting Kwan-Yin herself at that point, I indulged myself in naming some of those Faeries who have taught me of brotherly love, in between whatever ramblings. Even though the names meant little to her, she smiled at the tears in my eyes as I spoke, and the obvious affection name evoked in me.

Beloved, Gandalf, Wood Pigeon, Royal, Woodchild, Ant of the Earth, Lovehandel, Dogwood, Will, Octopus, Aurora, Buzzy Dandelion, Mushroom, Fanny Boy, Pikachu, Fairy Liquid, Minerva, Zeb, Dido, Future Babes, Hawthorn, Shokti, Brother Sun, Chundra, Tumbleweed, Fellina, Barbarella, Jim from Rural France Not Paris, Ladslove, Mixture, Sunflower, Mata Hari, Whatever You Want, Big Puck, White Rose, Theoklymenos, Qweaver, Joost, Topsoil, Doghood, Fagus, Rabbitstar, Presence, Efthimios, Spirit Force, Coco Pierre, Robder, Pink Sapphire, Lone Wolf. The list is not exhaustive and I apologise for out-of-date names, mis-spellings and omissions.

They helped teach me about speaking from my heart, staying connected, returning from conflict, puppy piles, listening to others’ hearts, being playful, wearing a dress, accepting touch, not being fearful of other men and that a new heart-connection is just as significant and impacting as any other. I hope I honour their gifts as I in turn pass them on to brothers of the heart or of the blood (and heart-sisters and non-binary siblings too). Wherever we go, in or out of Faerie space, or each others’ lives, or to other countries or planes of existence, we are connected in a brotherhood. If not a circle, perhaps a spiral of loving companions, throwing one arm out to the cosmos and the other back to itself and each other.

Sacred-fever, solstice eve by Octopus.

I’ve been waiting. Waiting for that warm glow on the fingertips.

An aural envelope that sings over the skin; a sign for writing.

Scribing the now-myth (legend?) of the paddington farm solstice, the weaving of a new albion potential – is daunting.

 

Should I talk about my tribe of warriors? Facing down a queer burden of shame with exhilarating, fierce-piercing love.

Like hot knives through a butter of bullshit, a searing arc through the rank curse of revolving closets – each witnessed to dissolve like charred flesh in the unwinding of fire.

Taken in by trees that know it no different, and which hold you all the same.

I watched ghosts walk on in bodies that day. I’ll never forget it.

 

Should I talk about my tribe of two-spirits? Walkers on tightropes of imperceptible wavelengths, each wing-tip dipped in the crimson of other-dawns and the fine-centring-focus of the minds that know – and played the solstice in.

How the fire burns and holds – so beautiful you want to fuck it. The surging within, reflected in flame. 

It licks at corners of the unseen unfolding of a boiling-spirit, that animates us each according to our own, but each according to its calling; cackling for its chaos, fucking for ecstasy, embracing in joyful-love – beating drums like a calling, the spirit is home.

 

Should I talk about my tribe of lovers? Fearless in their heart-space, bold in their sharing – an antidote to the plague of “not enough”.

Dancers on the margins, eros on the fringe; eyes like opals in greeting – even in the stillness, at rest, circles twist behind the eyelids and it plays.

Rendering possession meaningless with a fluid love, spontaneous.

A reciprocal gift, untapered, without boundary.

A weaving of tendrils so potent, so unshakeable – we were all touched. And continue to be.

 

Should I talk about the future? About how I saw it – each beat of that drum that I never played, at the intersection of each vibration, its poetic-geometry opening to me, opening like the simple gesture of a flower, opening to the sun.

Each beat, each snarl, each moan – each glide of skin, each pulse of cock; each and every moment in gaze of bewilderment – held in the bowl of its spectacular crown.

We played with it. It played through us. We were perfect. We will be more.