 When we demand too much certainty in life, and ask for too many guarantees, we only frustrate ourselves and waste an immense amount of our energy.
When, however, we are able to live without certainty, comfortable with the paradoxes of life, answers have a way of arriving in their own time.
In order to be at ease with the rhythms of existence, we need a sense of curiosity and wonder. We need to be able to face the insecurities of life with an eternal question in our heart, rather than a constant demand for concrete answers.
Being comfortable with not knowing is as necessary to learning process as an empty mouth is to feeding.
(In Search of Balance John Robbins & Ann Mortifee H J Kramer Inc. pg.44)
Psychic Phenomena -- manifestation of the existence of spirits, ghost or anything which is extraordinary to the physical world. WHITE WOMEN: (see Fairy)Witte wieven literally means white women today, but "wise women" in dialects of the Low Saxon language of the Netherlands. The word witte in Dutch means white. Wit or witte meant "witty" or "wise", from the root word "weten" which means "to know." The word for wisdom was wijsheid. Witte wieven is often translated to be "white woman" (sources differ) as the words come from the same roots. The association of wise women with the color white was either an accidental translation error, or a symbolic color association for wisdom (sources differ). Historically, the witte wieven are thought to be wise women, herbalists and medicine healers who took care of people's physical and mental ailments ( wala in OHG). It was said they had the talent for prophecy and looking into the future. They had a high status in the communities, and so when they died ceremonies were held at their grave sites to honour them. According to mythology, their spirits remained on earth, and they became living spirits (or elven beings) that either helped or hindered people who encountered them. They tended to reside in the burial sites or other sacred places. It was thought that mist on a gravehill was the spirit of the wise woman appearing, and people would bring them offerings and ask for help. While many scholars believe Witte Wieven originated as above from honoring graves of wise women, others think the mythology of witte wieven come from part of the Germanic belief in disen, land wights, and/or alven (Old Dutch for "elf") for several reasons: The practice of bringing offerings and asking for help from their graves is very similar to honoring disen, land wights and alfen in Germanic paganism. In addition, in some localities the mythological witte wieven were described directly as "Alfen" or "Alven". Jacob Grimm mentioned them in the Deutsche Mythologie (1835) as the Dutch variant of the Germanic weisse frauen: "The people of Friesland, Drenthe and the Netherlands have just as much to tell of their written wijven or juffers in hills and caverns ... though here they get mixed up with elvish personages." [1] ********************************************************************* Fairies a host of supernatural beings and spirits who occupy a limbo between earth and heaven. Both good and evil, fairies have a various times in history, been blended and confused with witches. Belief in fairies is universal and ancient, dating back to pagan deities. Fairies come in all shapes and sizes and are known by scores of names, among them brownie, elf, dwarf, troll, gnome, pooka, kobold, leprechaun and banshee. They exist in virtually all cultures but are most common in Europe and the British Isle. Divination -- When there is no communication you don't know how much you've lost.
Fairy -- whether the form was of a pixies, gnomes, or just plain garden-variety fairies, these charming creatures, promise the materialization of your dearest wish when you least expect it. Elf -- help from an unexpected, or even unknown, sources will be yours if you dreamed/or seen of these mystical, magical characters. Face -- if smiling, it signifies pleasant new friends, experiences, and/or financial gains. Woman -- it usually means that you will be fortunate in your love affairs.
 4. Another person is a mystery, a calling of me outside myself. He or she is a mystery not only because he or she bears within him the mystery of life and the mystery of death and the mystery of nature that he has made over (or that, better, has made him over) within his conscious and unconscious personality, but because to be a person (from the Greek word for mask) is to be a mystery properly speaking.
This is why when we meet a person for the first time we do not ask straight off and directly: "Show me your mystery" (which we mean himself or herself); we work up to the mysteries in this person's life and the mystery of this person by circumlocutionary probings. Questions of place ("Where are you from?" "Where do you live?"), time "(Is this person my age and generation, or from what world does he come?"), work ("What do you do?"), and interest ("Are you a sports fan?") gradually soften up the process of meeting another.
But the authentic meeting takes place in insight: perhaps a look into the eyes may be enough for the revelation of the person. We say revelation, for this is the way one approaches a mystery: mystery is not arrived at (though it may be prepared for) by our pressured activity. It is revealed, unveiled, opened up for us as a rose in its time and under the proper atmospheric conditions becomes open for beholder to see. A human person is such a mystery capable of revelation of self when the time and the company are correct. This revelation is enough to stop one short, to change one who beholds the other.
It goes without saying that those who see others as problems, as body counts, as rungs on one's own private ladder to the heights, or as votes for one's own "policies" (always carefully manipulated to kowtow to rather than to attract), or as consumers to be counted and seduced-in short, as usable and useful in themselves-shut out mysteries these people run the ultimate risk of reducing their own existence (no less than that of those they manipulate) to a problematic one. Once again the consequence of such an option would be lifelessness or tedium with nonmysterious existence. It is to close oneself forever to the possibility-however distant it may sometimes appear to be from our touch-of intimacy, the sharing of the mysteries of life.
Picture taken by Angie Skelhorn on May 17, 2011 Full Moon - Faery Moon On Becoming A Musical Mystical Bear by Matthew Fox Paulist press/Deus Book pges 38-39
 Each month there is a spirit that goes forth and walks by night; There spirits that walk by night must be appeased; For the external influences act on man, in accordance with the stars. Kawang-Tchu, Treatise on Wandering Influences
May 9 - First day of Lemuria, a Roman festival of the dead; this festival was probably borrowed from the Etruscans and is one possible ancestor of our modren Halloween. (Etruscan civilization - highest civilization in Italy before the rise of Rome)
Souls of the Dead who sometimes returned to the world to reunite themselves with their bodies. Plato spoke of them in Paedra. The Etruscans and the Romans thought that lemurs attached themselves to the living in order to torment them. Less frightening than the larvae (lemures) but less honorable than the manes.
*Larvae (1) The Romans believed them to be the ghosts of criminals or men who had died tragically. They had the appearance of horrible specters or skeletons.
(2) In the Middle Ages the Larvae became the terrifying spirits who brought great sadness and epileptic diseases to man.
(3) The Larvae were really elemental spirits used by black magicians to obsess their enemies. For Paracelsus and some Cabalists, the Larvae were the children of Adam's solitude, born in filth and squalor during the night. They entered men's blood or into some living tissue. They could be extracted by using a sharp instrument and by fumigation with perfumes with a base of henbane, mandragora and poppy.
* Manes (Shades) to the Romans, they were the deified souls of their ancestors, or di manes. In the month of February holidays were celebrated in their honor (the Parentalis and the Fetlia). They were offered sacrifices to appease them.
(2) In the wide sense, the world sometimes designates the gods of the Underworld (chthonian gods) as opposed to the gods of the Sky (uranian gods) called the de superi.
The Etruscans and Romans tried to appease them by conducting strange ceremonies known as the Lemuria, held every May. The father of the family would offer black beans to the demons. Because they appeared in the form of specters or animals, some occultists compared them, incorrectly, to vampires.
May 9, 2011 is a sacred date. This day will correspond to the day when the visible and material world is in harmony with the spiritual world. This will be the night when the spirits of Nature come into contact with those with a pure heart and who have prepared for their arrival. During this spiritual contact, spirits will flood the lives of these people with "magical" energy, thus enabling luck and good fortune if the people’s conduct is unselfishly motivated.
In the ancient tradition which dates from the dawn of time, the magical night is an exceptional night. It is a cosmic night when the visible and material world is in harmony with the spiritual world. In other words, an ideal night for communicating with the spiritual forces which surround us. These supernatural forces are able to help people who request them to. This ancient practice-several thousand years old-symbolises the confidence and wisdom of that our ancestors had in the supernatural and cosmic forces bringing happiness on earth. Of course, for the spiritual forces to be able to work, the person requesting their help needs to be doing so only for good.
On that night, you will be able to approach the night’s invisible and beneficial forces and request their help. It has been so for millennia, and still today, the beneficial forces can help you.
Thinkst thou, oh man! to attain power to gratify thy lusts, to enrich thy coffers, to build houses, to raise thyself to the pinnacle of human admiration: If these are the hopes and desires, thou has reason to lament thy being born: all such desires are immediately from the Devil. (Francis Barret, The Magus, London, 1801)
The knowledge of black magic is an old as the knowledge of good and evil; and as long as magic has been self-consciously practiced, distinction has been made between the black and white varieties. At first the distinction was simple: white magic was either religious magic, performed with the sanction of the gods, or it was magic that did not hurt anyone else. It included such practices as magic healing, divination, use of love charms and potions, and casting spells for finding buried treasure. Black magic was that which injured another, and was usually illegal, the punishment varying with the degree of harm intended. In ancient times, the white magician, who might be a priest practicing on one side, was generally respected and admired. Later however, the practitioners of white magic exclusively were often considered witches or black magicians. During the period of the witch trails, the most benevolent wise woman or herbalist might be accused of witchcraft by customers for whom her magic cures did not work. Under Christianity, black magic came to be defined in terms of association with the Devil rather than the degree of evil in the magic acts themselves. With the increasing credulity of the Church toward the possibility of successfully working black magic, punishment became more and more savage. During the witch trails, the accused were treated as servants of the Devil, who must be prevented from having any chance to use their powers. Magicians were considered somewhat less dangerous, since the witch-hunters believed that the effectiveness of magic came from making a pact with the Devil, not from merely working spells. However, it was thought unlikely that one who attained magic powers had got them from any but Satanic sources and could use them for good. It is easy to believe in black magic as the witch-hunters dd, but often quite difficult to believe in the possibility of white magic. Magic can be white only to the degree that a human being can be good, and examples of pure white magic are therefore hard to find. Many magical practices that traditionally have been considered good, such as finding of buried treasure and the use of love charms, are of mixed value. One must consider not only whether the spell actively injures another but also what effect it has on the magician's character. Will obtaining the treasure make him wiser or stronger? Might the woman he desires to win by magic be happier with someone else? Although the categories of black and white no longer seem especially useful for describing the practice of magic, the would-be magician should be consider carefully the nature of the forces he/she is evoking, and what effect they will have upon him/her. Dion Fortune's description of black and white magic might be helpful: "White Magic seeks to reach backwards into an outgrown phase of evolution and release forces which have long since been equilibriated into a static force...In Black Occultism a breaking down of organized form into lower types of force takes place. ( Dion Fortune, The Training amd Work of an Initlate, London, 1955) Information taken from The Complete Book of Magic & Witchcraft revised edition Kathryn Paulsen
 The three fox sisters, Kate in the middle, Margaret on the right, and Leah on the left.
The Fox sisters, Margaret the middle daughter. Her sister Kate the youngest and Leah, considerably older made "contact" with the spirit world on March 31 1848 sparking the spiritualist movement.
In 1955 a shrine was erected at the rear of the replica cottage; the original burned down and an exact replica was built by John Drummond. A memorial stone that reads, The Birthplace of Modern Spiritualism now marks the location of the Fox sister's cottage in Hydesville, Newark N.Y..
THERE IS NO DEATH - THERE IS NO DEAD
The three sisters interest and belief in rapping's that could be heard in the cottage led to the establishment of Spiritualism. Even before the Foxes moved into the cottage had a reputation of mysterious noises beside rapping. Gurgling sounds from the throat, a death struggle, heavy dragging of a body across the room have all been reported by prior tenants.
Kate, Margaret, and Leah, made history by being the first to establish a dialogue with the dead after disturbing series of raps and noises in their cottage. Margaret was an innocent ten year old when the first strange rapping's were heard. John Fox, her father inspected their home for a reasonable explanation. Kate at the tender age of seven proved to her father Spirit was real. "Do as I do," said Kate as she clapped her hands. The same number of raps was heard made by invisible hands. "No, do just as I do. Count one, two, three, four," Margaret interrupted. Exactly four raps were heard. Margaret became to afraid to continue the game they started.
The three sisters devised a system where they would ask a question to the unseen entity that could be answered one rap- yes, or two raps-no.
The presence identified itself as the spirit of a murdered peddler whose body had been buried beneath the Foxes home. Neighbours came to hear the rapping's and volunteered to dig for the murdered peddler. When water was struck, the search was abandoned. A few months later the digging in the cellar resumed. At a depth of 5 feet fragments of hair and bones believed to be part of a human skeleton. Fifty-six years later workmen unearthed an almost complete skeleton. There was a peddler's box near the bones. The discovery led to the theory that murder first buried the body in the cellar, then fearing discovery, dug it up and buried the peddler between two walls. A maid, Lucretia Pulver who lived four years before the Foxes in the cottage confirmed of a peddler's visit to the house and stayed for a night, and her employers sent home to her parents. On return she was told the peddler left.
The Foxes moved from the house to live with other members of their family. unexplained noises and actions followed the sisters. Leah decided to communicate with the invisible entity like she had when she was a child. She would recite the alphabet and raps would respond a certain letter. The first message Leah and her household received was, "Dear Friends, you must proclaim this truth in the world. This is the dawning of a new era; you must not try to conceal it any longer. When you do your duty God will protect you and good spirits will watch over you." Leah took the reins over her sisters. She became the first professional medium. Kate, her younger sister followed Leah's example six months later. Margaret followed suit.
Even though their lives were threatened they toured the U.S. and Europe to, proclaim spirit communication to the world. In 1854, America's first Spiritualist organization, the Society for the Diffusion of Spiritual Knowledge was founded in New York by a wealthy merchant.
Margaret Fox, (1833-1893) in 1888 claimed that the effects were fraudulent. After a fall out with Leah she attempted to turn Spiritualism into a farce. Her published confession said that the raps had been made at first by bumping or dropping a apple on the floor. Margaret confessed she and Kate, perfected control of their muscles that they could snap the joints of their fingers and toes without detection. She demonstrated her technique before an audience at a New York theatre.
Kate and Leah Fox seances were accurate concerning matters of the heart, career or other enterprises, conflicts and struggles as well as practical affairs. They were able to correctly predict destiny and the actions of others that had an important influence. Kate was known to produce spirit forms which proved there was obvious connection. Her communication took place mainly through raps and writing.
Footnote- To learn more about the Fox sisters and Spiritualism, I suggest the book Supernatural - Spirits and Spirit World. Arthur - Roy Stemman. Publisher - The Danbury Press. A Division of Grolier Enterprises Inc.
 Dreams have many functions. They help to process and integrate the day's events. They provide clues, often in the form of symbols and metaphors, that help solve the problems of everyday life - relationships, fears, work, emotions, illness, and much more. They can assist us in achieving our desires and goals if not physically then at least in the form of wish fulfilment.
They aid us in reviewing past events, reminding us of parallels in the resent. They protect sleep by disguising stimuli such as anxieties that would otherwise awaken us. Dreams have a deeper functions as well. They may provide pathways to recovering repressed or forgotten memories, whether from childhood, infancy, into-utro experiences, or even from past life. Past life memory fragments often emerge in the dream state, particularly in those dreams in which the dreamer sees scenes from the years of centuries preceding his or her birth.
Dreams can be psychic or precognitive. Often these particular dreams can predict the future. Accuracy varies because the future appears to be a system of probabilities, and because the ability of people accurately interpret their dreams itself varies tremendously. These psychic or precognitive dreams are experienced by many of all cultures and background. However, many people are shocked when their dreams literally come true.
Another type of psychic dream occurs when communication with a person at a distance is experienced. The person may be alive and geographically distant, or the communication may be with the soul or consciousness of someone who has died, such as a relative or dear friend. Similarly, there may be communication with an angelic spirit, a teacher, or guide. The messages in these dreams are usually genuinely moving and very important.
Travlling dreams also occur. During these dreams, people have experienced of visiting places to which they have never physically been. Details of what they see can later be confirmed. When one actually visits the geographical place, months or years after the dream, a feeling of deja vu or familiarity may occur. Sometimes the dream traveler visits places that do not seem to exist on this planet. These dreams may be far more than nocturnal imaginings. They may be mystical or spiritual experiences, accessed because the usual ego and cognitive barriers are relaxed during sleep dreaming. Knowledge and wisdom acquired during this type of traveling dream can transform lives.
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