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Transcript

Oxford Storytelling Festival · Mooney's Mythic Podcast

0:01
SPEAKER_00: Hello, welcome to Moony's Mythic Podcast.
0:05
SPEAKER_00: This is the late night edition.
0:09
SPEAKER_00: It's not that late but it's dark and I'm sitting by my hearth,
0:14
SPEAKER_00: by my fire and I am recording this pod for you in the most gentle and tender way.
0:25
SPEAKER_00: I'm sitting here with my fire and I am sewing and I'll tell you a little bit as we
0:31
SPEAKER_00: go along about what I'm sewing.
0:34
SPEAKER_00: But first of all I'll just tell you about the thread.
0:36
SPEAKER_00: I've had this thread for a long time.
0:38
SPEAKER_00: It was woven, it was sheared and it was carded and it was spun by my friend.
0:48
SPEAKER_00: And I dyed it at Pencoit, which is where I'm doing the storytelling retreat on the 27th of September.
0:59
SPEAKER_00: Sometimes I gather there with some gorgeous women that I've known for a really long time.
1:04
SPEAKER_00: And we just decide what it is that we want to do, how we want to spend our time.
1:10
SPEAKER_00: And one year, I think it was me that suggested it.
1:14
SPEAKER_00: I said I wanted to dye some wool with natural dyes.
1:17
SPEAKER_00: So that's what we did.
1:19
SPEAKER_00: A gorgeous woman called Jane Redpath showed us how to do it.
1:24
SPEAKER_00: And this particular one.
1:27
SPEAKER_00: I'm holding in my hand is dyed with madder but I've also got some that's been dyed
1:33
SPEAKER_00: with metal and this one's been dyed with another root I can't remember what it is
1:39
SPEAKER_00: but I've got a few here but I've got this nice kind of peachy one and I'm just
1:46
SPEAKER_00: gonna thread my needle with it now and I'm just in a really soft
1:53
SPEAKER_00: quiet shanty space so i hope you can join me here in this in this space which is
2:02
SPEAKER_00: kind of the the twilight of the summer you know we've got it all at the moment
2:09
SPEAKER_00: we've got these bursts of great and glorious sunshine and we've got this wind
2:15
SPEAKER_00: coming in and we've got flowers blooming and we've got
2:21
SPEAKER_00: brown leaves and green leaves and berries.
2:25
SPEAKER_00: I'm really happy that we've got it all.
2:27
SPEAKER_00: It just feels like very, very, very rich and very full.
2:32
SPEAKER_00: I've got vegetables in my garden that are growing.
2:35
SPEAKER_00: I mean, yeah, you know, mostly courgettes, but I'm loving the courgettes.
2:40
SPEAKER_00: Let's just call them marrows, shall we?
2:42
SPEAKER_00: Because they're way,
2:44
SPEAKER_00: like myself,
2:45
SPEAKER_00: I have got past the courgette stage long ago and I am a ripe and juicy marrow.
2:54
SPEAKER_00: And I'm just recording this pod because I'm back from the Oxfordshire Storytelling Festival.
3:01
SPEAKER_00: And I didn't intend to record it tonight,
3:02
SPEAKER_00: but I just suddenly had this feeling that I wouldn't give you a kind of authentic
3:08
SPEAKER_00: transmission if I didn't come and deliver it straight away.
3:13
SPEAKER_00: So here we are back from the Oxford Storytelling Festival.
3:17
SPEAKER_00: And I wasn't telling stories, so it's not a story that I'm going to share with you.
3:21
SPEAKER_00: It's my whole experience of being there.
3:25
SPEAKER_00: And it's been a long time since I've been to a storytelling festival because I went
3:30
SPEAKER_00: to one probably 20 years ago and I was very,
3:35
SPEAKER_00: very excited and I wanted to get my money's worth because I'm a cockney.
3:40
SPEAKER_00: So I went to see like three storytelling sessions in a row and just had enough after that.
3:49
SPEAKER_00: I really had.
3:49
SPEAKER_00: I felt really full up.
3:50
SPEAKER_00: I felt really sad that...
3:54
SPEAKER_00: These stories,
3:54
SPEAKER_00: they were sexist and they were quite dated,
3:59
SPEAKER_00: I thought,
3:59
SPEAKER_00: you know,
4:00
SPEAKER_00: and I know some stories are ancient,
4:01
SPEAKER_00: but I think it's really our job to,
4:05
SPEAKER_00: I want something that sings through my whole body.
4:08
SPEAKER_00: You know, we can tell stories really purely and they do that, whatever the content.
4:14
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I was kind of full up and disappointed.
4:17
SPEAKER_00: And so I think I paid 150 quid for the ticket.
4:20
SPEAKER_00: I'd seen three storytelling sessions.
4:22
SPEAKER_00: That was 50 quid a session.
4:24
SPEAKER_00: Probably expensive.
4:26
SPEAKER_00: So I have not been back.
4:28
SPEAKER_00: Not until my very good friend, and not only my very good friend, but her daughter is my goddaughter.
4:36
SPEAKER_00: My very good friend,
4:37
SPEAKER_00: Charlotte Mabon,
4:39
SPEAKER_00: was booked to the Oxford Storytelling Festival to sing medicine songs.
4:45
SPEAKER_00: And our medicine songs are kind of magical songs, incantations.
4:52
SPEAKER_00: Songs where you can really feel your own soul.
4:55
SPEAKER_00: They can be sometimes quite slow.
4:58
SPEAKER_00: They can be repetitive.
5:00
SPEAKER_00: But they're sacred and they're very moving.
5:04
SPEAKER_00: And Charlotte really brought that through at this festival.
5:09
SPEAKER_00: So I was dead excited.
5:11
SPEAKER_00: And my goddaughter and her sister were going.
5:13
SPEAKER_00: So we were going to spend some time together.
5:16
SPEAKER_00: And I thought, okay, well, I'll just go and I'll follow them.
5:19
SPEAKER_00: I'll do whatever they want to do.
5:22
SPEAKER_00: I'll have a lovely time.
5:23
SPEAKER_00: I've not spent such a long time with them, I think, ever before.
5:25
SPEAKER_00: So I was really looking forward to that.
5:29
SPEAKER_00: And I arrived and the place was absolutely beautiful.
5:32
SPEAKER_00: It's in this place called Waterbury Gardens.
5:35
SPEAKER_00: And the gardens, they're so thoughtfully created for really one who wants to wander and dream.
5:41
SPEAKER_00: They are an absolute blessing.
5:44
SPEAKER_00: And it had this jaw-dropping amphitheatre.
5:47
SPEAKER_00: I mean, wow.
5:49
SPEAKER_00: I would love to tell a story in an amphitheatre.
5:52
SPEAKER_00: I've never told a story in an amphitheatre.
5:55
SPEAKER_00: And I put in mind of Rowena Cade, who built the Minak in Cornwall.
6:02
SPEAKER_00: She built it brick by brick.
6:03
SPEAKER_00: There's a great picture of her sitting in an upturned wheelbarrow.
6:07
SPEAKER_00: And that made me think about all the women who have built things with their hands.
6:14
SPEAKER_00: And I'm not so great at really doing things
6:19
SPEAKER_00: with my hands.
6:20
SPEAKER_00: I think that's why I get drawn to the story of the Handless Maiden over and over again,
6:24
SPEAKER_00: kind of as a way to recover and reclaim these arts and crafts with our hands.
6:33
SPEAKER_00: And it's great to be talking about this as I'm sitting here with you now, making this pouch.
6:38
SPEAKER_00: So what was the first thing I saw?
6:43
SPEAKER_00: I can't remember.
6:45
SPEAKER_00: Oh, yeah.
6:47
SPEAKER_00: Oh, the first storyteller I saw was a woman called Jenix.
6:52
SPEAKER_00: I'd met her at breakfast and my goddaughters weren't there yet.
6:55
SPEAKER_00: So I felt like, oh, I can do whatever I want.
6:57
SPEAKER_00: And I thought I'd go and see this woman called Jenix because it didn't look like I
7:02
SPEAKER_00: think it's at age 14 plus or something on her next story.
7:05
SPEAKER_00: So the kids would be able to come.
7:08
SPEAKER_00: So I didn't really know what to expect.
7:10
SPEAKER_00: But I had sat with her at breakfast and she was a really fascinating woman.
7:16
SPEAKER_00: And we go into the room and there is an altar created in the centre and there's a
7:22
SPEAKER_00: big bundle in the centre that she told us was her pipe.
7:27
SPEAKER_00: And there were two pipes either side.
7:30
SPEAKER_00: One of the pipe bowls, the chanupa they're called.
7:34
SPEAKER_00: in Native American and she did have a Native American teacher so she talked a lot about that.
7:40
SPEAKER_00: One of the chenupas was carved in the form of a jaguar and one of the chenupas was
7:45
SPEAKER_00: carved in the form of an eagle's head and she gave us the jaguar chenupa to hold
7:52
SPEAKER_00: and to introduce ourselves.
7:57
SPEAKER_00: So let's just hold our hands like a bowl
8:01
SPEAKER_00: and just feel the heavy head of the Jaguar resting,
8:07
SPEAKER_00: resting down in us,
8:12
SPEAKER_00: seeing if we can evoke what message the Jaguar might have to impart to us.
8:23
SPEAKER_00: What holding the head of a Jaguar made out of a black stone
8:29
SPEAKER_00: could be filled with a sacred herb and smoked and prayed over i wonder what that
8:38
SPEAKER_00: evokes for you i'd love to tell you what it evoked for me but i can't remember so
8:45
SPEAKER_00: uh trusting whatever you got in that moment was enough
8:52
SPEAKER_00: So she did that for us and the workshop was gorgeous and I'm going to end with an
8:57
SPEAKER_00: inspiration that I had from Jenix's workshop and she's coming to Glastonbury in a
9:02
SPEAKER_00: few weeks time so hopefully she'll come and tell us more about what she does and
9:08
SPEAKER_00: how she does things.
9:11
SPEAKER_00: So I finished that workshop and then my goddaughters were there, brilliant.
9:15
SPEAKER_00: We went to the room and we hung out for a bit and we caught up and they told me
9:20
SPEAKER_00: that I should really watch The Derry Girls because I would love it and I have been
9:24
SPEAKER_00: watching it and it's very funny.
9:26
SPEAKER_00: Thank you, you two, for that.
9:28
SPEAKER_00: And then we went to see a storyteller called Sonia Sophia and she was telling Welsh tales.
9:34
SPEAKER_00: She was telling the story of Ceridwyn and Taliesin
9:39
SPEAKER_00: and Gerardwyn was a great witch and I'm going to open this story I'm going to tell
9:44
SPEAKER_00: this story when I do my season of the witch stories which is going to be at the
9:49
SPEAKER_00: beginning of October so you've got to wait a couple of weeks before you hear this
9:53
SPEAKER_00: story but Sonia's so fierce she had this meditative way of telling a story which
10:00
SPEAKER_00: made me feel like I was walking the Welsh landscape with her
10:05
SPEAKER_00: And it made me want to go out and walk and tell and tell and walk stories.
10:10
SPEAKER_00: It made me want to really know when I'm walking the landscape of a story,
10:15
SPEAKER_00: really know what hill and what dell,
10:19
SPEAKER_00: what forest,
10:20
SPEAKER_00: what exact tree I'm talking about.
10:29
SPEAKER_00: And during the story,
10:31
SPEAKER_00: she told us that Keridwyn,
10:34
SPEAKER_00: in order to create something of a transformative pouch for the boy that she wanted to,
10:46
SPEAKER_00: that she was initiating,
10:48
SPEAKER_00: she put him in a pouch of seal skin.
10:52
SPEAKER_00: And that reminded me that I had some seal skin, that I've got some seal skin, because
11:00
SPEAKER_00: Once I got a phone call from a vegan friend and she was clearing out her mum's
11:07
SPEAKER_00: house and she said Sarah there's some fur here can you just come and deal with it
11:11
SPEAKER_00: for me she didn't want to touch it she didn't want to be involved in it and so
11:17
SPEAKER_00: there were two jackets and I took one home and I didn't know what fur they were for
11:21
SPEAKER_00: a long time but I was just cutting the lining out of one of them and it said 100%
11:27
SPEAKER_00: genuine seal fur inside and I've been wondering about how to honour this seal fur
11:37
SPEAKER_00: And I have it as a blanket and I dream often with it on top of me when I want to dream about stories.
11:45
SPEAKER_00: I put it on top of me and sometimes I lend it to other women,
11:48
SPEAKER_00: other sisters,
11:50
SPEAKER_00: so that they can dream with it too.
11:53
SPEAKER_00: It feels like a really precious thing and it feels like something to be shared.
11:57
SPEAKER_00: She told me when Sonia Sophia was talking about Keridwyn putting...
12:05
SPEAKER_00: the baby that she had birthed inside a seal skin pouch.
12:10
SPEAKER_00: I just had this inspiration that I was going to make a seal skin pouch and that it
12:15
SPEAKER_00: would be something that the people that come to the retreat in Wales at the end of
12:21
SPEAKER_00: September would be able to use if there was something they wanted to transform.
12:26
SPEAKER_00: that they could put it inside,
12:29
SPEAKER_00: either a token or some words or something,
12:33
SPEAKER_00: that they could put it inside for the weekend.
12:36
SPEAKER_00: And I thought I would make it by my fire whilst I was talking to you guys,
12:42
SPEAKER_00: so that it had all of that magic and intention in it,
12:46
SPEAKER_00: so that's what I'm doing.
12:51
SPEAKER_00: And whilst I'm making this sealskin pouch and I'm thinking about Sonia Sophia's story,
12:57
SPEAKER_00: such a meditation,
12:59
SPEAKER_00: such a welcoming to the land,
13:07
SPEAKER_00: it reminded me that Rachel May,
13:09
SPEAKER_00: who set up the storytelling festival that I'd read an interview with her,
13:14
SPEAKER_00: and she said...
13:15
SPEAKER_00: that the first time she saw a story,
13:18
SPEAKER_00: she went to a storytelling event,
13:21
SPEAKER_00: she felt as though she'd been storied.
13:24
SPEAKER_00: And that is how I felt this weekend.
13:26
SPEAKER_00: I felt like I'd been storied.
13:28
SPEAKER_00: In fact,
13:29
SPEAKER_00: after I'd listened to a few different people's storytelling and then we went to bed
13:33
SPEAKER_00: that night and we were all sleeping in the same room,
13:36
SPEAKER_00: I didn't sleep a wink.
13:37
SPEAKER_00: I was just having dreams and imaginings and ideas and recapitulations and I was
13:43
SPEAKER_00: really thinking,
13:43
SPEAKER_00: yeah,
13:44
SPEAKER_00: this is what...
13:45
SPEAKER_00: Storytelling is all about the way that it just gets inside you and deepens inside you.
13:51
SPEAKER_00: It's so fantastic.
13:53
SPEAKER_00: And in the morning, I confessed to my goddaughter that I hadn't slept a wink.
13:57
SPEAKER_00: And she said to me,
13:59
SPEAKER_00: she said,
14:00
SPEAKER_00: I wondered,
14:01
SPEAKER_00: she said,
14:01
SPEAKER_00: because you were quiet all night and I'd heard that you snored like a groundhog.
14:07
SPEAKER_00: Which I thought was interesting.
14:11
SPEAKER_00: So I didn't snore at all that night because I didn't sleep because I was dreaming so much about stories.
14:21
SPEAKER_00: And I was thinking about stories,
14:22
SPEAKER_00: they're everywhere,
14:23
SPEAKER_00: you know,
14:24
SPEAKER_00: they're films,
14:25
SPEAKER_00: they're the way that people used,
14:27
SPEAKER_00: you know,
14:27
SPEAKER_00: there's lots of marketing and sales things about stories.
14:32
SPEAKER_00: We're all involved in stories all the time.
14:36
SPEAKER_00: And the more ancient the stories we tell,
14:40
SPEAKER_00: I think the more connected to our ancestors we can be,
14:44
SPEAKER_00: the more we can call upon the wisdom and the magic of the past.
14:53
SPEAKER_00: So then we went to see Amanda Cortey's story and she was doing something called
14:58
SPEAKER_00: Three Days of Listening to the Land.
15:02
SPEAKER_00: three days of listening to the land.
15:05
SPEAKER_00: So she was asking the land, what story do you wish me to tell?
15:09
SPEAKER_00: I just love that notion.
15:12
SPEAKER_00: I just love that notion.
15:15
SPEAKER_00: What story does the land want us to tell?
15:18
SPEAKER_00: I want to ask.
15:23
SPEAKER_00: I want to know.
15:23
SPEAKER_00: And Amanda must have listened so well and so gorgeously because her storytelling was mighty.
15:31
SPEAKER_00: It was like
15:33
SPEAKER_00: She included everything.
15:34
SPEAKER_00: The children felt more included than in some of the other adult storytelling.
15:40
SPEAKER_00: She included everything,
15:41
SPEAKER_00: and I felt in the way that she included everything,
15:44
SPEAKER_00: and then the story could just get bigger and bigger and bigger because of all that
15:49
SPEAKER_00: she included.
15:51
SPEAKER_00: And we were outside for some of the time and we were inside for some of the time
15:56
SPEAKER_00: and the weather kind of came with us and the weather then became part of the story.
16:00
SPEAKER_00: It truly was a great experience.
16:03
SPEAKER_00: I really appreciated that.
16:09
SPEAKER_00: Sorry,
16:10
SPEAKER_00: my needle's just really finding it hard to get into this little last bit of
16:14
SPEAKER_00: sheepskin pouch,
16:16
SPEAKER_00: seal skin pouch.
16:17
SPEAKER_00: So I am just pulling it through with all my might before I continue.
16:22
SPEAKER_00: There we go.
16:26
SPEAKER_00: And in the amphitheatre on Saturday night, we saw Joe Blake crying.
16:33
SPEAKER_00: telling a story with this great male dancer.
16:37
SPEAKER_00: We saw her telling the story of Mary Magdalene.
16:41
SPEAKER_00: And this was just real.
16:43
SPEAKER_00: It was brilliant.
16:44
SPEAKER_00: It was so great.
16:45
SPEAKER_00: It was so great that like two thirds of the way through, I heard Dolly Parton.
16:50
SPEAKER_00: I remember Dolly Parton saying once to someone, we're going to get a standing O for this.
16:57
SPEAKER_00: And she knew that the audience, you could just tell that
17:01
SPEAKER_00: what they had delivered was worthy of a standing ovation and I really felt that
17:04
SPEAKER_00: with Joe Blake and I was just like really ready to like jump to my feet at the end
17:09
SPEAKER_00: because I was so moved by what I'd experienced.
17:13
SPEAKER_00: And the moment that moved me so much was when Jesus and Mary Magdalene first met.
17:22
SPEAKER_00: He'd been talking and she could see his throat was dry and she brought him a glass of water
17:34
SPEAKER_00: And then this guy and this storyteller with this glass of water,
17:42
SPEAKER_00: their hands touch and they circle around each other.
17:47
SPEAKER_00: And they say something, first of all her and then in unison, nothing changed.
17:52
SPEAKER_00: I think they said together and everything changed.
18:00
SPEAKER_00: And it was profound for me because it was a beautiful moment of storytelling.
18:05
SPEAKER_00: But also because I just feel like we don't see enough modelled in anything we see
18:12
SPEAKER_00: people giving each other glasses of water.
18:15
SPEAKER_00: And I don't think I've ever offered anyone a glass of water.
18:17
SPEAKER_00: People have asked for it at my house.
18:19
SPEAKER_00: But I want to just normalise more glasses of water because it's like it's the elixir of life.
18:28
SPEAKER_00: it is life it is flow it's such magic I remember seeing this film with Ryan
18:36
SPEAKER_00: Reynolds and someone offers him a glass of water and it moved me because it's
18:42
SPEAKER_00: usually a product you know it's usually a moment where one of those companies has
18:48
SPEAKER_00: bought that sponsorship so everyone is drinking that and it's rife everywhere you
18:53
SPEAKER_00: know drinks companies
18:57
SPEAKER_00: sponsoring sporting events sponsoring films sponsoring things so that we don't
19:02
SPEAKER_00: think to go for a glass of water we think to go for their product and it makes
19:08
SPEAKER_00: money for them and they get our money and we don't get this pure flow through us we
19:18
SPEAKER_00: don't get this gift from from nature
19:26
SPEAKER_00: Should that really move me?
19:27
SPEAKER_00: So if you want to stop, pause this, go and get yourself a glass of water.
19:33
SPEAKER_00: I'd feel like that was my job done.
19:36
SPEAKER_00: And yeah, if I could press pause on my thing, I would.
19:41
SPEAKER_00: But I promise you when I get up from this, I'm going to get myself a glass of water.
19:47
SPEAKER_00: And now I'm pausing just to lick my wool because it's come out of my needle I need to reach.
19:54
SPEAKER_00: re uh thread it yeah so i'm leaning towards the fire now to thread it whilst i
20:05
SPEAKER_00: think about what else i wanted to share with you yeah stories they go so deep in
20:15
SPEAKER_00: and that's what i've been thinking about for the winter you know what stories are
20:18
SPEAKER_00: deep in us that um
20:21
SPEAKER_00: that are working us in a way that we don't want them to, you know.
20:26
SPEAKER_00: Hans Christian Andersen, his stories are all about, you know, behaving well.
20:32
SPEAKER_00: If you behave well,
20:33
SPEAKER_00: if you're a good girl,
20:34
SPEAKER_00: if you're a maiden,
20:34
SPEAKER_00: if you're this,
20:35
SPEAKER_00: if you're that,
20:35
SPEAKER_00: if you're this,
20:36
SPEAKER_00: if you're that.
20:38
SPEAKER_00: And I want us to reclaim those stories, those stories that are kind of already kind of
20:44
SPEAKER_00: they're poison really, you know, they're poison inside us.
20:48
SPEAKER_00: I want to retell those stories and reclaim those parts of us.
20:52
SPEAKER_00: I started doing it a little bit with Snow White and the Seven Dwarves if you have
20:56
SPEAKER_00: listened to my couple of earlier pods.
20:58
SPEAKER_00: I think I'm going to do an online group over the winter where we take those stories,
21:04
SPEAKER_00: we'll kind of gather the group and then see what their childhood stories they
21:10
SPEAKER_00: remember are and then we'll go through
21:12
SPEAKER_00: And we'll activate the medicine of those stories rather than going into the stories
21:19
SPEAKER_00: and reactivating the kind of negative stuff that has been poured and poked into us
21:30
SPEAKER_00: through these stories.
21:31
SPEAKER_00: It's time.
21:32
SPEAKER_00: It's time.
21:32
SPEAKER_00: It's time.
21:33
SPEAKER_00: This is the time of our lives.
21:35
SPEAKER_00: This is the time for us to have the time of our lives.
21:39
SPEAKER_00: That's what I think.
21:42
SPEAKER_00: So, yeah, this workshop that I went to with Banks was so good, this storytelling workshop.
21:54
SPEAKER_00: And there was lots of animals involved.
21:56
SPEAKER_00: And that was one of the themes was kind of animals of the weekend.
22:01
SPEAKER_00: So when I went, there was a kind of goddess temple there and there was some animal cards.
22:07
SPEAKER_00: So I was like, oh, yeah.
22:09
SPEAKER_00: It's been a real sacred animal weekend.
22:12
SPEAKER_00: And I was kind of feeling a bit sort of fancying myself a little bit at that moment.
22:16
SPEAKER_00: You know, I'd already held a jaguar.
22:18
SPEAKER_00: I'd held an eagle.
22:21
SPEAKER_00: I picked the card of the spider.
22:23
SPEAKER_00: I was feeling really sensual.
22:26
SPEAKER_00: So I picked a card.
22:27
SPEAKER_00: Anyway, it was an orangutan, which I've got to confess I was a little bit disappointed by.
22:32
SPEAKER_00: But then I read the medicine of the orangutan, which was...
22:38
SPEAKER_00: to take my time that the orangutan kind of gets up and eats its breakfast in a
22:50
SPEAKER_00: leisurely pace i mean this is what the card said i've got no idea about the
22:54
SPEAKER_00: breakfasting habits of an orangutan uh look at the way it swings with one arm um on
23:00
SPEAKER_00: a branch and you know just kind of like take it easy and allow things to have their
23:04
SPEAKER_00: own time so that feels like a pretty good way to enter this part of the pod i'm
23:12
SPEAKER_00: just gonna take my time so let's just yeah
23:17
SPEAKER_00: Let's just drop our arms.
23:19
SPEAKER_00: I'm just dropping my arms for a moment like I'm an orangutan,
23:23
SPEAKER_00: you know,
23:24
SPEAKER_00: scraping my knuckles on the ground.
23:26
SPEAKER_00: And as I've dropped my knuckles onto the ground, I'm just letting my shoulders melt.
23:33
SPEAKER_00: Just melt over me.
23:35
SPEAKER_00: Like that, yeah.
23:39
SPEAKER_00: And reaching one hand up like I've got a branch over the top of me and just swinging a little bit.
23:44
SPEAKER_00: Oh, yeah.
23:46
SPEAKER_00: See, that's the beauty of a podcast, not a video.
23:48
SPEAKER_00: I'm actually doing an impression of an orangutan.
23:51
SPEAKER_00: I'm really enjoying it.
23:53
SPEAKER_00: And yeah, you're getting there too, aren't you?
23:55
SPEAKER_00: Like, oh yeah, your shoulders are really feeling it.
23:58
SPEAKER_00: But it's no video.
24:00
SPEAKER_00: So if it was a video, I don't think I could quite get there.
24:03
SPEAKER_00: I don't think I could quite relax as much as I'm doing now.
24:09
SPEAKER_00: the um the the big medicine that i got from um genix's workshop was this great
24:17
SPEAKER_00: meditation she did with us about the spider so she talked about the spider and
24:23
SPEAKER_00: let's now that we've done our kind of orangutan movements let's um i've got to move
24:29
SPEAKER_00: that because i've got a dead leg so
24:31
SPEAKER_00: I'm going to move and imagine I'm just moving my arms out and my legs out like I'm a spider.
24:36
SPEAKER_00: And then just feeling like I've got extra arms and legs.
24:40
SPEAKER_00: There we go.
24:41
SPEAKER_00: So I'm like an actual spider.
24:44
SPEAKER_00: I'm just feeling that.
24:47
SPEAKER_00: Eugenics talked about the web.
24:49
SPEAKER_00: I repeat this or I evoke this in honor of her brilliant holding and and not was a
24:58
SPEAKER_00: way to copy her medicine I would totally encourage you to find her for yourself
25:03
SPEAKER_00: she's grounded like grounded like a planet grounded
25:12
SPEAKER_00: she evoked the web the spider's web and that we all want to imagine that we're all
25:19
SPEAKER_00: spiders and we all have these webs around us and she invited us to draw up
25:30
SPEAKER_00: from the ground from the earth from deep in the earth fire fire fire fire fire and
25:38
SPEAKER_00: from deep up to the stars I know we've done this a few times on this pod up to the
25:44
SPEAKER_00: stars down in this fire and stars fire and stars fire and stars we can activate our
25:51
SPEAKER_00: web with all this fire and stars and we can go along and we can feel
25:56
SPEAKER_00: parts of a web.
25:57
SPEAKER_00: I mean, I'll be honest with you.
25:58
SPEAKER_00: When I first visualized my web, it was like, you know, broken.
26:03
SPEAKER_00: There were bits that were kind of broken everywhere and really dilapidated.
26:08
SPEAKER_00: So that's why I think I was so excited about this exercise because I could go
26:12
SPEAKER_00: through and I could vibrate the web and I could mend with this energy.
26:18
SPEAKER_00: I could mend these places in the web.
26:21
SPEAKER_00: And I think that simple sewing and thinking about mending our web
26:26
SPEAKER_00: web is a really good idea, is another really good winter activity.
26:31
SPEAKER_00: So we were doing that and I loved it and then she took us on this visualisation
26:36
SPEAKER_00: where I imagine these droplets on the web and the droplets,
26:40
SPEAKER_00: we looked into the droplets and we could see ourselves and our whole world
26:44
SPEAKER_00: reflected into the droplet and then reflected back and reflected back and reflected
26:49
SPEAKER_00: back and reflected back and reflected back to infinity.
26:55
SPEAKER_00: And I felt a lot of space when she did that.
26:57
SPEAKER_00: So that was great.
27:00
SPEAKER_00: So I think what I'm saying to you guys is that the Oxford Storytelling Festival was
27:04
SPEAKER_00: really something brilliant and beautiful.
27:07
SPEAKER_00: And I should definitely encourage you to go another time for next year.
27:15
SPEAKER_00: And if you're thinking,
27:16
SPEAKER_00: oh,
27:16
SPEAKER_00: I really want to just gather around and do some storytelling and do some crafting
27:21
SPEAKER_00: and all of that magic,
27:23
SPEAKER_00: then you can still come on my retreat,
27:28
SPEAKER_00: which is on the 27th to the 30th of September.
27:31
SPEAKER_00: in Wales, it really is going to be very precious and rich.
27:36
SPEAKER_00: So get in touch with me if you want to book a place, that would be really great.
27:42
SPEAKER_00: And if you're interested in working online in the winter,
27:46
SPEAKER_00: if you're interested in gathering together with a group of us and spending,
27:51
SPEAKER_00: it's usually Sunday afternoons,
27:52
SPEAKER_00: probably once a month,
27:53
SPEAKER_00: about five of them,
27:54
SPEAKER_00: then let me know because I'd really love to have you on board.
27:58
SPEAKER_00: And yeah, next pod, I'll tell you a story.
28:03
SPEAKER_00: I'm going to end of the road and I'm going to do some psychic storytelling and
28:08
SPEAKER_00: oracle storytelling and rhyming.
28:10
SPEAKER_00: So if you see me there,
28:12
SPEAKER_00: you can choose some of my story cards and tell some stories and some of the stories
28:17
SPEAKER_00: that are evoked in that.
28:21
SPEAKER_00: weekend i will tell next week and i'll just do a pure storytelling session next
28:27
SPEAKER_00: week i just wanted to jump on and give you a little bit of our nighttime fire
28:33
SPEAKER_00: dreaming about the festival before i um jump off to another one tomorrow lots of
28:39
SPEAKER_00: love