SteveTanham – writing, mysticism, photography, poetry, friends

Category: landscapes

June 27, 2019 + #Silenti, Ancient Landscapes, Ancient Sacred Sites, Celtic Christianity, Christianity and modern mysticism, Consciousness, esoteric psychology, Highlands of Scotland, landscapes, Magic, Mindfulness, Mystery Schools, Mystical ritual drama, myths and spirituality, Neolithic, Pentagram, Scotland, Silent Eye School, Spirituality

Three Days of the Oyster-Catcher (Part 3) Headland of the Picts

by Steve Tanham

The Moray Firth is vast, wild and beautiful. Examined on a map it resembles a child’s geometry exercise in triangles, with the coast between its ‘origin’ at Inverness and far-away Fraserburgh being a virtually flat west-east baseline. From Fraserburgh the great inlet of the Moray Firth reaches northwards into the North Sea. The final line in the triangle, from Inverness moving north-east, ends at … Read More Three Days of the Oyster-Catcher (Part 3) Headland of the Picts

June 25, 2019 + #Silenti, Ancient Landscapes, Ancient Sacred Sites, Celtic Christianity, Christianity and modern mysticism, Consciousness, esoteric psychology, Highlands of Scotland, landscapes, Magic, Mindfulness, Mystery Schools, Mystical ritual drama, myths and spirituality, Neolithic, Pentagram, Scotland, Silent Eye School, Spirituality

Three Days of the Oyster-Catcher (2) Coast and Castle

by Steve Tanham

There has to be a dawn… I’m not being flippant. Our Silent Eye ‘spirituality in the landscape’ weekends always have at least one early morning event during which we gather somewhere beautiful and greet the dawn. It’s a joy and also a discipline: something that tells our inner self that ‘we mean it’. Sometimes we might read poetry or even enact something from esoteric … Read More Three Days of the Oyster-Catcher (2) Coast and Castle

June 19, 2019 + #Silenti, Ancient Landscapes, Ancient Sacred Sites, Celtic Christianity, Christianity and modern mysticism, Consciousness, esoteric psychology, Highlands of Scotland, landscapes, Magic, Mindfulness, Mystery Schools, Mystical ritual drama, myths and spirituality, Neolithic, Pentagram, Scotland, Silent Eye School, Spirituality

Three Days of the Oyster-Catcher (1)

by Steve Tanham

We were standing close to the River Spey in the grounds of Strathallan church a few miles from the centre of Grantown-on-Spey: one of the gems of the north-eastern highlands of Scotland. The previous hour had seen us all meet at a tea room in the centre of the town. We discussed the plans for the weekend, drank tea and had cake… Strathallan church … Read More Three Days of the Oyster-Catcher (1)

May 30, 2019 + #Silenti, Ancient Landscapes, Ancient Sacred Sites, Astrology, Belief and Faith, Biology and mysticism, Castles, Child of Light, Consciousness, Egregore, Esoteric Meaning of Myth, esoteric psychology, Higher Mind, Highlands of Scotland, Initiation, landscapes, Magic, Mindfulness, Mystery Schools, Mystical ritual drama, myths and spirituality, Scotland, Silent Eye School, spiritual turning around, Spirituality, Travel and Photography, Understanding Fear

Five Faces of the Macbeth Human

by Steve Tanham

Exploring the faces of the ‘human condition’ should be consuming our world at the moment. We might reasonably conclude that understanding the heights and depths of our shared experience, as we drain the planet of its living life, would be of interest to us. But we don’t… Instead, if we ask any questions at all, we spend months looking at things from a political … Read More Five Faces of the Macbeth Human

April 23, 2019 + Consciousness, Dementia, Lake District, landscapes, Mindfulness, Silent Eye School

Stagshaw Garden

by Steve Tanham

Stagshaw Garden is a sloping woodland garden of approximately eight acres. It is located on a steep slope named Skelghyll Fell on the north-eastern shores of Windermere, England’s largest lake. The area around Windermere is considered the centre of the Lake District. The word ‘Lakeland’ has become a normal way of referring, locally, to the Lake District. Most of the Lake District is protected … Read More Stagshaw Garden

April 4, 2019 + #Silenti, Ancient Landscapes, Ancient Sacred Sites, Consciousness, Dark Humour, Esoteric Meaning of Myth, esoteric psychology, Higher Mind, Journey of the hero, landscapes, Life and Death, Mindfulness, Mystery Play, Mystery Schools, Myth, myths and spirituality, Politics and Power, Spirituality, Truth and Esotericism, Understanding Fear

Dancing with the Ghost in the Machine

by Steve Tanham

If you’ve ever been involved with anything of an ‘amateur dramatic’ nature, you will know that moment: the protagonist, hated until the final few moments (when the greater picture is revealed) shuffles off, in rags, to his doom; and the shared and questioning silence longs for the gentle and poignant soothing that only the right music can bring…. Screech, click, screech, ping, wheeeeeedle…. . … Read More Dancing with the Ghost in the Machine

November 21, 2018 + #Silenti, Australia, Consciousness, landscapes, Stream of Consciousness

The Art of Dark Departure

by Steve Tanham

It could equally well be titled ‘The dark art of departure’, I suppose, but, in this case, it‘s not the act but the leaving which is dark… At the time of writing, we are about to leave Sydney, aboard a cruise ship: the Royal Caribbean ‘Solstice’. We’ve never been on a cruise ship before. It is only happening because two years ago, we booked … Read More The Art of Dark Departure

November 17, 2018 + landscapes, Spirituality

Waving from the Shore

by Steve Tanham

One of the most wonderful moments on our cruise around New Zealand, so far, was when we were leaving the estuary at Dunedin. Bernie and I were sitting on our balcony, watching the soft green hills passing by as the giant ship gained speed towards the open sea. Just ahead of us was a promontory that jutted out in to the waterway. There was … Read More Waving from the Shore

November 13, 2018 + #Silenti, Consciousness, landscapes, Mystical poetry, Silent Eye School, Spirituality

Ungrasped

by Steve Tanham

I take a lot of photographs, and like to share the ones that move me the most. Looking back on these, there is a theme: they are, more often than not, a moment of natural beauty, defined by light on landscape, which could only be captured by camera or poem… so, here, for my less formal ‘Tuesday slot’, is picture and poem. Twin Guardians … Read More Ungrasped

February 1, 2018 + #Silenti, Ancient Sacred Sites, Celtic Christianity, Consciousness, esoteric psychology, Fear, landscapes, Silent Eye School

Castles of the mind

by Steve Tanham

Do we have ‘castles of the mind’? Traditionally, ancient castles were built where there was trouble… Do we have the equivalent in our minds and emotions? Have we, over the course of our lives, built up strong fortifications with which to repel those intrusions which, as children, we considered frightening? The foundations for such things can begin very early, and be formed of some … Read More Castles of the mind

October 10, 2017 + #Silenti, Anglesey, Consciousness, landscapes

A game of three halves… (2)

by Steve Tanham

It is, still, all of it, only one day… Though now the winds that buffeted the bed-and-breakfast farmhouse have abated. I look at my watch. We have two hours to go before we need to leave to drive across Anglesey to meet a young woman named Juliette, who holds the key to this entire story. She will be waiting, at noon, by the red … Read More A game of three halves… (2)

October 5, 2017 + #Silenti, esoteric psychology, landscapes

A game of three halves… (1)

by Steve Tanham

It is, after all, only one day… Have you ever re-assembled a day into a different sequence? Been so involved with its contents that the threads seem to weave themselves, again… and differently. But it is only one day… and at the halfway point she will be waiting; waiting near the red tower where we will meet for the first time. And then the … Read More A game of three halves… (1)