SEEING FAIRIES
Tradition says that the best time to see fairies is at summer or winter solstice, or spring or autum equinox, at noon or midnight, dawn or dusk, and it helps if it is hot and you are a little sleepy and feeling a little spooky (fairyish or eerie), watching unblinking, and when the crickets are not singing the fairies away, and you are sitting quietly or dancing on a barrow or in a vale, at a spring or on a tor, in a woods or on a mor. Also, one can see fairies readily by looking through a stone with a natural hole in it, or through a pure crystal. However, stone peeking has been around for many centuries and has a rather bad name.
Personally, I have never used it. Fairy seeing involves a shamanic technique called "LOOKING BACKWARD FROM THE FUTURE". Nevertheless, tradition tells us that some people cannot see fairies.
1. It helps to have a fairy seer show the uninitiated a real fairy. About 90% of all people can sense the fairy presence. A few will say they had sensed it before but did not know what it was. It will take time for someone to find a fairy for the first time. For best luck, begin in beautiful gardens that have stones and waters in a natural setting where bugs and birds are common. It helps to have some graves nearby, a stream, a lake, or a cave. However, fairies can be found in houses and other artificial settings once you know what you are looking for. Sacred locations usually have many faeriekind.
2. Approach the area with an open heart and an open spirit. My teacher said, "LISTEN" I told him I could hear the village indians preparing for the ceremony. He said, "YOU ARE NOT LISTENING!" I listened harder and could hear the birds in the trees and the whoosh of the breezes in the tall pines. He said to "LISTEN." And then I relaxed into listening and realized i was fighting myself. I let go of the struggle and just quietly listened. I heard the cicada singing and the brook gurgling and our own breaths, and I could tell that there was more that I could not readily identify. He said, "YOU ARE BEGINING TO LISTEN." This relaxed sensing is a sort of meditation. It is not easy to let go of your own internal struggles.
3. Approach all faeriekind with gentleness and love and respect. Enter the area having announced what you are doing and asking for their cooperation. You should do this out loud at first because mortals have very confused thoughts. Then walk through the area sensing everywhere with your hands, moving slow and gently. What you are sensing for will feel like a flutter of butterfly wings, a breath of air where no air moved, an electrostatic charge where no metal is near by. It is a gentle rippling of fairy auras, sometimes it is their wings which we feel most readily. Fairy wings seem to be extensions of their aura from the back and shoulder area. Fairy hair is also noticeable and feels just like being brushed by fine hair. When you feel this something, which is there, but does not match any physical thing, then stop. You have located a fairy or a spirit.
4. To talk to the fairy, think back to the emotional content of what you first sensed. This is "LOOKING BACKWARD FROM THE FUTURE". The sense of what you felt will usually be a fairy greeting: "I love you", "hello", or sometimes something slightly mischevious. You can tell a ghost from a fairy because the ghost will be thinking about its life or about rational things. Fairies think about mysterious things and think it is funny that you do not understand fairy things. They are great teases and love to do things that make them laugh. They talk exceedingly fast and think like lightning. Do not expect a normal conversation. Looking back at a moments touch will reveal a whole complex thought as though they spoke paragraphs in every instant. They are delightful conversationalists and love it when you understand one of their jokes.
A word of warning, there are bad spirits, usually called demons, which are sometimes found. If the contact does not feel loving, it is not a fairy. Drop the contact and leave the area immediately.
ENTERING FAIRY LAND
The Celtic tradition says that one can open a door into a fairy hill by walking around it three times counterclockwise.
You can cross into the Mists during certain meditations and out-of-body experiences. You can enter the realm of spirits in near-death-experiences. See the instructions for these techniques elsewhere. Most of the techniques have undergone rigorous scientific study and the most effective techniques have been identified.
Every time I write how to physically enter Fairy land the computer crashes so I will not say more, except to note that the books about the teachings of the Yaki Indian Don Juan in the books of Carlos Castenada reveal some of the structure of the Mists and the realm beyond as well as the technique for finding a doorway and entering it.
