Peace Altar photo by mayah (c)2012
I often pour the wash and rinse water after doing the dishes as an offering at this spot where the roots from four trees converge--3 fichus and one massive ornamental plum tree-- something learned from Dare', because all water is precious. Today, looking at the criss-crossed tree roots, I suddenly thought of a crossroad. Thinking of a crossroad, my mind leapt to the Middle East, crossroad for many civilizations and religions and peoples. I need an altar here, something simple, something with rocks. Add four dove feathers for the four directions and peace. Light a candle and sage. Offer prayers for peace.
Related Blogs:
Dream: Art/Nature/Divinity Powerful dream speaks about art, nature, and the Divine. http://curezone.com/blogs/fm.asp?i=1942949
Spirit of Crow: Taking a walk around my neighborhood, I came across a dead crow. After taking her home and ritually burying her in my backyard, I found out the meaning of Crow as an animal totem. Spirit of Crow then told me a story. http://curezone.com/blogs/fm.asp?i=1945216
PRINCIPLES OF DARÉ
http://www.deenametzger.com/
"Daré needs to be experienced and lived in order to be known. Still, there are certain principles that are fundamental to it.
The strength and essence of Daré is in the circle and its intelligence. Council is its heart. And in Council one always speaks from the heart and allows the spirits and ancestors to speak through one. Wisdom comes from the combined voices and presence of everyone who is participating. The purpose of council is to seek answers from the community that we can’t find ourselves. Asking and addressing a single question coheres the community.
Daré begins by calling in the spirits. Everything depends on this. The invocation allows spirit to inform the participants. It creates a field of knowing and remembering. Daré also centers on telling dreams and receiving dreams as gifts from the ancestors to the circle. Council and dreams are channels between the world of the living and the world of the invisibles.
Music is another essential element. For thousands of years it has been the way that people have called spirit and that spirit has made itself manifest. So, in the Daré in Los Angles as well as in Bulawayo, the voice and the drum as well as other instruments are essential components for invocation as well as healing.
Daré is for the sake of healing, but we don’t presume to say we know what healing is, how it occurs, or even how, always, to recognize it. Sometimes one is the healer and sometimes one is desperate for healing. Sometimes the two activities are one in the moment. Healing is, thus, an interchange, the dynamic of giving and receiving. "