Magic School: Chakras, Mindfulness and Essential Oils

City Lit, in Central London, always seems to be running some wonderful courses. I've already blogged about its five-week summer evening class courses Magic, Witchcraft and Religion and Anthropology of the Paranormal, both of which start in July and you can still sign up for. Here are brief details of three more summer school classes that might interest pagans:

Balance your Chakras to Balance your Life
Balancing your mind, body and spirit creates a deeper sense of well-being in life. Learn simple techniques to balance your own energy centres for a more integrated, healthy and enjoyable lifestyle.
Dates: 25/07/15 - 26/07/15
Time: 10.15am to 5.15pm
Full fee: £141
Course code: FSB33

Mindfulness and Essential Oils for Mental Well-being
Explore the simple yet powerful benefits of mindfulness meditation. Grow your awareness of being in the present and enhance your sense of well being, combined with the practical use of essential oils to enhance focus, relaxation and clarity.
Date: 18/07/15
Time: 10am to 5.30pm
Full fee: £73
Course code: FSB09

Blend your own Fragrance with Essential Oils
Enjoy blending different essential oils to make a personal fragrance and learn a little about how essential oils can work for you and how you can blend oils for different purposes.
Dates: 10/08/15
Time: 6pm - 9.30pm
Full fee: £37
Course code: FSB15

The classes all take place at City Lit, Keeley Street, Covent Garden, Camden, London WC2B 4BA. For more details, visit: http://www.citylit.ac.uk/ or call 020 7831 7831 to enrol.

Previous related posts:
http://www.badwitch.co.uk/2015/04/magic-school-magic-witchcraft-religion.html
http://www.badwitch.co.uk/2015/04/magic-school-anthropology-of-paranormal.html
http://www.badwitch.co.uk/2014/07/craft-learning-to-use-aromatheraphy-oils.html
http://www.badwitch.co.uk/2014/06/review-chakra-wisdom-oracle-cards.html
http://www.badwitch.co.uk/2009/08/constipation-and-chakra-clearing.html

Review: Chakra Wisdom Oracle Cards

I do like to take a divination set away with me when I go on holiday. My copy of the new Chakra Wisdom Oracle Cardsarrived in the post just as I was about to set off for Scotland so I popped the boxed set in my luggage.

It turned out to be quite a good test of durability for the box, because my luggage was just a squashy bag that got crammed into the back of the car with several other people's bags on top. At the other end of the journey it looked as pristine as when I started. I'm now back home again and it survived the return trip just as well.

Of course, one doesn't buy a divination set just because it comes in nice packaging. So on to the cards themselves.

The subtitle for the oracle cards is The Complete Spiritual Toolkit for Transforming Your Life.I'm normally skeptical about anything that offers spiritual transformation in a box, but having used these cards for a couple of weeks I can see how the Chakra Wisdom cards could be a very useful tool for personal development.

What I particularly like about the Chakra Wisdom Oracle Cards is that they tackle difficult issues in a way that is gentle, yet to the point. They do this by using fables, which are teaching stories in the form of fairytale-like allegories.

The deck's creator, Tori Hartman, says that she got inspiration for these new fables while she was ill in hospital. She felt an insistence to write the fables down, but only much later found an artist who could paint the illustrations.

The chakra theme comes from the way the cards are divided into seven coloured suits based on what chakras are often associated with. These are basic drives, emotions, thoughts, the heart, communication, the senses and spirit.

You can use the cards just by drawing one or two and using your own intuition to read them, or you can look them up in the book. That gives the fable for the image as well as an inspirational phrase, things to think about and a meditation to do. There are suggested layouts for specific things such as love, money, career and to help remove blocks.

Watkins Publishing, which produces the set, offers this description on its website: "Set your intentions, break through blockages and learn ways to manifest your dreams using the 49 cards and guidebook of this extraordinary divination system! Each original card connects with a major chakra and represents one of the mystical fables revealed by angels to psychic Tori Hartman over 25 years ago following a near-death experience."

The RRP for the boxed set is only £14.99, which means it is highly affordable as well as unusual and useful.

Links
Chakra Wisdom Oracle Cards: The Complete Spiritual Toolkit for Transforming Your Life
http://www.watkinspublishing.co.uk/

Workshop: The Oracular Womb of London and Delphi

A weekend workshop this June offers you the chance to deepen your connection to the sacred landscape of London and learn more about the oracular tradition of Delphi.

The event is called Returning to the Oracular Womb - A Weekend Intensive on London and Delphi, and it is taking place on Saturday, June 15 and Sunday, June 16 at Conway Hall, in London.

The description of the event says:

'The city of London, known for its history and diverse culture, has an ancient past in which the Divine Feminine played an important part of daily life. Temples dotted the sacred landscape that is London, the womb chakra of the UK. In Delphi, the priestesses of the temple were oracles, speaking the wisdom directly accessed from the Divine. 

'Join Priestesses of the Goddess, Dr. Marguerite Rigoglioso, Ph.D and; Elle Hull on a deep exploration of the Goddess energies of London and the return of the oracular priestess tradition once found in Delphi; fusing the ancient and with the modern by reclaiming the ancient oracle priestess traditions for our world today.'

The weekend course offers to teach you to access your own oracular ability, connect with the Goddess energy of the Earth through the sacred landscape of London. Running the workshop are Dr Marguerite Rigoglioso, Ph.D and Elle Hull with guest presenter Tressy Driver.

The cost for the event is £150 with all materials included in the price. Venue: Conway Hall, 25 Red Lion Square, London. Time: 10am to 5pm each day. For more information and to book online, visit http://oracularwomb.blogspot.co.uk/.

The logo  is Cosmic Heart by Giovanni Rubaltelli of http://exper.3drecursions.com/

Constipation and Chakra Clearing

After an evening of rich food and cocktails, I woke up the following morning in some discomfort. Yes, I was constipated.

Anticipating having to sit on the toilet for a while, I grabbed some reading matter to help me pass the time - if nothing else - off the top of my pile of unread books. It was Chakra Clearing: Awakening Your Spiritual Power to Know and Heal by Doreen Virtue.

This wasn't anything I had bought myself – it was one of those books that got given to someone as a present and then handed around from person to person. I didn't need to be psychic to work that out - the fact that it had “Happy Birthday” written on the flysheet and was dog-eared was enough material evidence.

I'd never read anything by Doreen Virtue before. Her stuff had always seemed a bit overly fluffy with titles about angels and dolphins, which I know are popular subjects but aren't really my thing. Nevertheless, I was quite happy to give this one on chakras a read, particularly as it hadn't cost me anything. And after reading a few pages while sitting on the loo something certainly cleared, though I'm not sure it was my chakras.

I was right in thinking the book was a bit on the sweetness and light side: “You are a being composed of light, love and intelligence” the book began. Sitting on the loo with gut ache, I was pretty certain I was composed of other things too. But, when you are feeling a bit s**t, sometimes a gentle feel-good book is just what you need to cheer you up.

I was pleasantly surprised to find that Chakra Clearing has a lot of good stuff among the fluffy bits. It is essentially a book of meditations on the theme of chakras – which, it says, are energy centres in your body that relate to various thinking habits as follows:

Root chakra at the base of the spine, relating to basic material needs
Sacral chakra a few inches higher, relating to physical desires
Solar plexus chakra in the stomach area, relating to power and control
Heart chakra in the chest, relating to love and clairsentience
Throat chakra at the Adam's apple, relating to communication
Ear chakras above the ears, relating to clairaudience
Third eye chakra between the eyes relating to clairvoyance
Crown chakra inside the top of the head, relating to claircognisance and divine guidance

The book says that clearing and balancing these chakras will help you overcome any issues you might have in the associated areas as well as make you feel better generally.

Two of the meditations come on a CD enclosed with the book, so you can just sit back and listen to them. Some of the others are apparently available on CDs that you can buy separately – although you could just sit, read and visualise them.

I've done quite a few chakra opening exercises over the years – first at yoga classes. The exercises in this book are a little different to that, I found. Exercises and meditations I've done in the past usually involved drawing energy up from the ground to the base chakra and then through the body, passing out of the top of the head at the crown chakra and then flowing back down to the ground like a fountain.

In the meditations in Chakra Clearing the source of the energy is seen as divine light. I suspect this is because the book has an emphasis that feels more inspired by Christianity, or at least the concept of there being a single source of divine energy, rather than coming from pantheistic, pagan or nature-based traditions.

Once I was off the loo, I put the CD on and tried out the first of the meditations. I was suitably impressed. Fluffy and light it may be, but it was effective and certainly left me feeling much better than I was when I got up in the morning.

The book also recommends giving up booze and chocolate – apparently they are very bad for your chakras – but I'm not sure I'm ready to go quite that far...

Chakra Clearing: Awakening Your Spiritual Power to Know and Heal: Book + CD (Book & CD) is available through Amazon

Links
Chakra Clearing: Awakening Your Spiritual Power to Know and Heal: Book + CD (Book & CD)
http://www.badwitch.co.uk/2009/03/review-crystal-chakra-heaing.html

Review: Crystal Chakra Healing

I've never met anyone who didn't find crystals beautiful and fascinating. They sparkle with light and colour, their shapes are intriguing and they seem to be able to make people feel happier just by looking at them.

Humans have worn crystals as jewellery since jewellery was first invented - and they have also been used for healing since ancient times in places such as China, India and Greece.

Philip Permutt's latest book The Complete Guide to Crystal Chakra Healing: Energy Medicine for Mind, Body and Spirit, explains how crystals can be used for healing today, using the body's seven chakra, or energy, points.

With lovely colour photographs of crystals and minerals, the book explains clearly and simply the properties and benefits of each one. It also explains how to use them with the body's chakra points to rebalance energy and help promote healing.

Descriptions are given of the main methods of crystal healing, such as laying the stones on the body, placing them around the room, holding them, making crystal elixirs and dowsing for the appropriate crystals and placements. Care for crystals is also covered, as is using them for divination and to boost psychic abilities.

Simple practical exercises take you through the process of learning to feel energy, sensing the body's aura, selecting crystals, recognising if a chakra is blocked, diagnosing problems, activating crystals, finding out where to place them, combing and sealing the aura after a healing session, and grounding before leaving the healing room.

If you want to use crystals yourself or to heal others, The Complete Guide to Crystal Chakra Healing, is ideal as an easy-to-read guide for the complete novice or as a reference book for those with more experience.

The Complete Guide to Crystal Chakra Healing: Energy Medicine for Mind, Body and Spirit, by Philip Permutt is published by Cico Books. It costs £14.99 and is available through Amazon, and other bookshops. For further information about the book, visit http://www.cicobooks.co.uk/ or email sonia.pugh@virgin.net.

Philip Permutt is also running a practical evening workshop introducing the concepts behind The Complete Guide to Crystal Chakra Healing: Energy Medicine for Mind, Body and Spirit on Monday, March 16, at iSiS, 1 Market Place, St Albans, Hertfordshire AL3 5DR. It runs from 8pm to 10pm. Tickets are £7.50. Advance booking is necessary, call iSiS on 01727 866720 or visit http://www.thecrystalhealer.co.uk/.