Presence and Druidry
What does it mean to be present in the moment as a Druid? For me, it has come to mean being in an active state of relationship and engagement with whatever is around me. That doesn’t have to mean being silent – although silence is fine. It doesn’t require me to be ‘alone’, although being the only human is workable, and some humans demand all that active engagement and make it trickier to engage with the non-human. It certainly doesn’t call for bodily stillness, inner stillness or inner silence.
I measure my presence and connection by my ability to notice and respond to other presences. This may mean noticing details of light and the shape of the land. It may mean seeing birds, wild animals, noticing unusual flowers or seeing how the season is progressing. The more open I am to the wild world around me, the more of it I see. I can hold that openness when reading a book, looking up somehow, magically, as the buzzard spirals above me. I can sit at my computer and be open enough to look up when the nuthatches, woodpeckers and other small birds are active in the tree opposite. I’ve raised my head from work to see a heron fly right past my window. I can have conversations with humans while walking and still notice the deer, and stop for them.
I don’t have to greet the world with an empty head. There can be ideas bubbling away. I may have a song as an inner soundtrack, I may be just letting random thoughts collide, but I certainly don’t need inner silence to notice the dragonflies or to spot a tiger moth. I don’t see the flow of inspiration as any kind of distraction from spiritual work – why would I? Awen is sacred. Experiencing inspiration as thought, energy and emotion is part of what it means to me to be in a state of presence and connection. I am not wholly separate from the rest of the world. My thoughts and feelings are part of my process of experiencing and participating in existence.
Quality may be an important issue. The quality of a conversation, or of silence can vary considerably. The quality of the thoughts in my head. Is my inner soundtrack a beautiful and much loved piece of music or an awkward jangle of half remembered commercial pop? What is the quality of attention I am paying to my surroundings? Do I care about what I’m doing? Care creates depth, richness, and opens the way to a better quality of experience. A person can stare hard at the world and still see nothing, can be silent and still not really hear what’s around them, can see and hear, and still not be moved.
And what is Druidry if not a thinking and feeling participation in existence?
