This morning I shall let others tell the tale of the weekend. The first post comes from my co-director, Steve:

A Kiss from the Sun

It was Sue who started it. As is her way, she, innocently (!) mentioned a few weeks ago that, try as I might, my years of working closely with Dolores Ashcroft-Nowicki, the Director of Studies of SOL, had made me into an effective and hard-core Magician. No matter what my protestations, Sue said, about the fact that there needed to be new ways and new Paths to embrace both science and the growing body of knowledge from Depth Psychology, I was and always would be a Magician.

Hmmm.

On Saturday night, in the heart of the Derbyshire Hills, surrounded by 22 tired but enthusiastic folk playing their hearts out in the third ritual drama of the day to achieve the potency in the room that the words on the page promised, I gave in to that sentiment, and decided that, for all my stubbornness, I would finally surrender to that notion and ensure that the Silent Eye combined the best of both those worlds.

Over the seven years that we worked together, there were many beautiful gifts from Dolores; but the greatest thing she taught me was not to be afraid of innovation, particularly when it came to Ritual Drama (for two Geminis with Scorpio rising you may not be surprised).

Far more that my Rosicrucian mentors before her, she showed, by example, what you can do with ritual in a relatively small space when the participants come together with a loving and integrity-filled purpose, to make true Magic, which is simply the raising of Consciousness; and the sheer force (read not-simply) of personal transformation that it brings. I think I probably graduated from her tutoring during the first of the preceding Alchemy workshops, also held at the Nightingale Centre, but this weekend we entered a new space, with a new agenda under the solar wings of the Silent Eye School.

In that now-hallowed memory in time and place, we manifested a real a group of pilgrims lost in the mountains in a ferocious storm, and rescued by the presence of a mystic monastery where the Keepers wove a magical journey of psychological discovery from the raw material of nine strong characters and the catalyst of two troubadours plus young man whose negative Ego had never developed, leaving him free to see the world and its distorted inhabitants for what they are . . . and could be.

As a teacher of such things, I cannot think of a more effective way to contribute to the minds and hearts of those who will enter our new School, or the the traditions from which I journeyed.

And after this wonderful weekend, I wouldn’t want to.

So bring on the sweet-smelling new Earth, the singing Lamb dancing by the stream along the way, the beautiful Sunrise in a soft blue sky and above all, the company of wonderful and sincere Souls who put their inner development high in importance in their lives.

A Kiss from the Sun, indeed.

Steve Tanham
Director
The Silent Eye School of Consciousness
(photo by Matt Baldwin-Ives, consummate pro and friend of the School)