Stacey L.L. Couch's Blog, page 16
July 25, 2014
SageWoman Magazine Review of Gracious Wild
Gracious Wild Book Review by Paola Suarez in SageWoman Magazine Issue #86: Renewal & Rebirth
We are blessed to have red-tailed hawks nest in our local park. They share the rawness of nature when you see the remains of pigeons they have eaten or watch them swoop down to capture a squirrel. As I admire their beauty and strength, I also hold my six-pound dog close to me and shiver. Our red-tailed hawks are unapologetic about their roles as death bringers, as predators.
Death is a central theme to...
July 21, 2014
The Shamanic Journey & Hero’s Journey (Part I)
Delving deep for the last few months into Joseph Campbell’s “The Hero with a Thousand Faces”, I am astounded by the overwhelming wealth of information Mr. Campbell amassed in his studies. He did this all before the age of the internet when access to every bit of information we want comes instantly no matter where we are. I picture him pouring over ancient texts, seeking myths across continents, sifting through shelves of books, and placing more than one inter-library loan. How he accessed the...
June 24, 2014
Sacred Action
The power of action is an amazing thing, but weoften see action solelyas a consequence of our decisions. As beings birthed of the Age of Reason, we emphasize the decision and how we come to it, separating it from the action that follows. We set a course and then ride it out. We tip the first domino and wait for the rest of the line to fall.
I am coming to understand that in this mindsetwe lose so much. We zero in on how to get in touch with our intuition so we can choose the “right” answer tha...
June 23, 2014
Power Animals: DELICATELY DEER
She nibbles grass by gathering at a few blades at a time with her gentle lips and clipping the greens into her immaculate, petite mouth. Nearby, another of her kind, a male with velvet dripping off his headful of antlers tenderly plucks leaves from a service berry bush. She senses her others also around quietly browsing, but the brush and their tawny coats obscures them from view. Everything appears halcyon, at peace, but this belies the sparkling tension in the air. With an unexpected crack...
June 9, 2014
“A Barn Owl’s Help” from Gracious Wild
In this section of Gracious Wild: A Shamanic Journey with Hawks, I share the story of meeting and caring for a potential candidate for the raptor education program I was volunteering in. The program took in and rehabilitated injured raptors. If the birds were handicapped for life, and we had space available, we trainedthem to work with humans so they could be “ambassador birds” that traveled to schools and clubs to raise awareness about the value of these incredible birds of prey. This is the...
May 28, 2014
VIDEO: Inner Reflections in Ecology
In this lecture and book signing at Maria’s Bookshop in Durango, Colorado, I tell the story of how ecological tragedy can inform our own inner process and help guide us to a healthier way of being in the world from the outside in. My book, Gracious Wild: A Shamanic Journey with Hawks, delves deep into the plight of wildlife who suffer at the hands of civilization and embraces the incredible gifts the wild ones have to share with us. Looking through a mystical lens, wild animals become divine...
Spirit Birding: Introduction
The 10th Annual Ute Mountain/Mesa Verde Birding Festival was nice enough to take a chance on me this year by hosting my lecture on “Spirit Birding”. They admitted that it was an out of the ordinary topic for them, so I was delighted to have a nice crowd assemble to put their knowledge of bird identification to a greater purpose. This video of my entire talk is an introduction to a body of work I have been assembling for years. This work not only includes decoding the messages of birds, but al...
April 14, 2014
VIDEO: Stacey Couch at Boulder Book Store
This presentation at the Boulder Book Store in Boulder, CO was filmed on April 10th, 2014. In the first clip, I share a bit about the writing and publishing process and share my training as a writer.
In this second clip, I read an excerpt of the book that is a perfect example of why I decided to write the book Gracious Wild: A Shamanic Journey with Hawks. The excerpt is from the chapter “The Mouthpiece”.
The post VIDEO: Stacey Couch at Boulder Book Store appeared first on Wild Gratitude.
How to: Prayers for the Directions
In an earlier post on “Calling the Directions & The Medicine Wheel” I shared a definition of medicine wheels, how to move about the wheel, and possible associations with the directions on the wheel. In this post, I share with you methods for composing a prayer to call in the directions.
Prayers are peculiar things that can take on any nature. Just because we call something a “prayer” does not make it sacred. The ego can compose selfish, greedy, unconscious pleas to God. Many people choose not...
April 8, 2014
Journey / Dream Interpretation Guides
When working to unwind the mysteries of the mystical world, we must seek guidance in many places. Reference books are a treasure trove of assistance and I can’t express how important they are in interpreting dream and journey symbols. Websites and mobile apps are quickly racing up to parallel the power in books as far as the depth and breadth of information available. The thing is that the internet makes it possible for anyone to post their rendering of what a symbol might mean, and just beca...
