Humuh Monastery
(Apr 2003)

The front cover is of yet another retreat centre and I have a few more yet to feature as time moves along. BC seems to be a growing oasis for people seeking knowledge and reflective time. The Hümüh Monastery in Westbridge, is where Gerry from the Juicy Carrot is moving to. He has been feeling the call for quite some time and now that the building has been sold, it is time to move on. The Juicy Carrot and the Rainbow Connection Book/Gift Store and Yoga Studio will no longer be in existence as of May 15, 2003. The lady who bought the building is going to transform it into a Health Spa. It is a perfect location, and this old building will love the face-lift. Issues Magazine will continue to rent its portion until Oct. 1.

I invite all my friends, shoppers and well-wishers to drop by and check out the sale of used books and unique gifts from April 10 to May 10. I will be spending the summer teaching and hosting workshops at the Retreat Center at Johnson’s Landing. I will be back and forth to help with printing the August edition, and getting ready for the Wise Woman Weekend in September. When the Oct/Nov. edition is complete, I will pack up the office and move it to the Kootenays. I would like to invite our readers to visit our sanctuary and feel for yourself the serenity of the mountains and the magic of the land.

My intention in moving to the Retreat Center is to create a community of people who wish to work cooperatively on the land, creating a living for ourselves and sharing organic vegetarian meals. As well, I will get some experience running a retreat center as I continue to publish Issues Magazine. I have lots of ideas and I will soon find out if Richard and I can attract some creative people who would like to join us on the journey. I am not sure what the journey will look like, but I am a trusting soul, and assume the universe has a plan. It took only a week for the buyer to be manifested once I had decided to let go and move on. She said she was looking at land in another part of the city when a thought came through quite clear that she was to check out my place.

I am encouraged by the fact that Findhorn in Scotland is celebrating its fortieth year of being an intentional community, and I love the depth of content their programs offer. They teach stewardship in the true sense, that looking after the Earth will help us to look after ourselves. It all started when God spoke to Eileen Caddy and the nature spirits spoke to Dorothy Maclean. They were given clear instructions on the day-to-day planning, without a vision of how big it would become. When I spoke to Dorothy last summer at the Retreat Center, she said that if they had known the bigger picture, it might not have turned out as well. She is glad to live in the moment and now travels around the world teaching people how to communicate with the devas. With time they were joined by David Spangler, an American. David’s three year stay expanded and clarified the vision of Findhorn and the responsibilities of cooperation.

In one of Findhorn’s books, published in 1975 and entitled The Findhorn Garden–Pioneering A New Vision of Man and Nature in Cooperation, this opening quote appealed to me. “Our radiant energy pervades and gives rise to all life. While it may speak to us through plants, nature spirits or the human beings with whom we share life on this planet, all are reflections of the deeper reality behind and within them. Myth has become reality in the Findhorn Garden, not to present us with a new form of spiritualism, but to offer us a new vision of life, a vision of unity. Essentially, the devas and nature spirits are aspects of our own selves, guiding us toward our true identity, the divine reality within. The story of the garden is a celebration of this divine life in its myriad forms. May the joy we experience in participating in this celebration deepen our commitment to revealing the total beauty of ourselves and all life around us.”

The lessons learned from the growing of plants were applied to the growing number of people joining the organization. Then Roc joined, an English researcher into the elemental kingdoms, who had heard about the forty-pound cabbages and other plants growing in the sand and wind in Northern Scotland. The energy drew him like a magnet. As a child, he passionately believed in fairies and loved both the Greek myths and their Norse equivalents, whose Gods were very real to him. He had already met the God Pan, through the ethers, and their long conversations about the nature of man as described in the book, intrigued me.

This Greek mythological creature came alive to Roc and spoke of his love for man but said that his destructive ways were affecting the devas. They too had a choice and many no longer wanted to help humankind. They don’t understand why we are clear-cutting the forests or spraying toxic chemicals on the fields that the elemental beings inhabit. Overall, the book does a great job of explaining the etheric energy and archetypal patterns of plants and even describes how quarrelling affects their vibration.

Modern man has forgotten how to listen to wind and water, flower and tree, angel and elf. The consciousness of the archaic cultures, Tibetan, Hopi, Sufi and Celtic are making a comeback because they contain the wisdom we need for the survival of our species. Our ecological footprint has become too large. We must change or the changes will be made for us. I for one know it is
time to start a new phase of my life, and look forward to the possibilites of growth for my soul.