Talking Sticks

Above is one of my favourite Talking Sticks, which is more than that of course, isn’t everything?

This stick took me on a journey,  they do that you know.

Since 2010 I have been making Talking Sticks. It began after a significant illness and stay in hospital. Even while in my hospital bed visions and dreams were coming thick and fast. Once home drawing and painting was not enough it seemed. I told my husband, I want to make a Talking Stick.

To his credit he just nodded and very soon there was a box of various sticks, deadfall, in the kitchen. It turns out he had a lot of kindling that he had collected the year before and it had been seasoning in the garage all that time.

Well there it was, all this wood from different trees but all collected from around the area where we had been married.

It all just seemed to fit.

The very first stick was the one I learned with. I learned that the stick itself has a story it wants to be portrayed and sometimes that can be quite a journey.

Back to the first stick. It sat there on my work table and we regarded each other for a while.

I would pick it up and just hold it for a time. I suppose I was getting a feel for the energy it was giving out.  Then the colours came. I painted it gold. I couldn’t for the life of me imagine why I would do so. Thought was not really there, it was just feeling.  Satisfied with that to a point I let it dry, but there had to be something else.

There was, so much more to it and this was just the beginning.

From the gold base, a pattern of leaves came through and then at the one end of the stick I saw a beak and it was bright orange and so I painted that.

What came after that was something that was really unexpected – at the other end – a Seal, a baby Seal.

This stick taught me so much about connecting and trusting the wood to show the story that was held within.

With that lesson learned I went on to make more and the one in the video was one of the most inspiring that I have had the pleasure to work on.

I have been asked many times about a course to make Talking Sticks which are also Power Animal or Spirit sticks as they all have their own Spirit energy.

So now there is a course, soon to be released. Look out for more news soon.

Enjoy, we’ll be bringing out more courses soon. So look out for them here and on the Facebook pages

Be Well, Be Blessed, Be Loved

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