Grimoire for the Apprentice Wizard

Course Seven: Lore

Class I: The Other Worlds

Modern humans go about their business in the mundane sphere as if the world were

as it appears at first glance, having been assured that the notion of a realm beyond is

merely a primitive, superstitious leftover from the foolish childhood of our race. Yet

lurking beyond the façade of conventional reality, Faerie is still there, connected to all things,

uncontrollable, and pervasive. What modern civilization has discarded like a forgotten child’s

toy is a mighty secret, a power that will blow the lid off the narrow “rational” worldview.

—Ian Lurking Bear (“Gateways to Faerie”)

Oz, Never-Never-Land, and Middle-Earth. As you learn

to explore and become familiar with the landscape of

The Dreaming, you will gain access to these other

realms as well. Sometimes a portal to another realm is

as simple as passing between two ancient trees.

Every species of sentient creatures on Earth and

throughout the Universe dreams, and thus each

species also has a Dreaming of their own. As we are

cells in the great body of Gaea (Mother Earth), and

planets are but cells in the greater body of the Galaxy,

and so on—so are our dreams part of The Dreaming,

and The Dreaming is part of the Dream of Gaea—and

so on it goes, in ever-wider concentric realms.

Lesson 3. Faerie

Beyond conventional space and time, glowing

through the physical world like a Chinese lantern,

the raw, fundamental power of consciousness and

desire in the universe pulses and dances, feral and

exhilarating. To touch this power is to touch the

secret truth of who we really are, of the nature of

our being, outside life and death, beyond ego and

attachment. —Ian Lurking Bear

Faerie is the closest realm to ours, bordering on

both The Dreaming and the mundane world. Faerie is

also close to the realm of the dead, to the voices of the

ancestors, and it is connected to the divine aspect of

ourselves. Through Faerie we may contact sacred

power more directly. We enter into a realm where gods

and goddesses are quite real and may speak to us.

Gateways to Faerie are found not only in The

Dreaming, but also in enchanted glens and forest

clearings, mushroom rings, ancient stone circles,

hollow mounds, raths, barrows, and overgrown ruins.

In such places, all you need do to pass through is enter

a trance or fall asleep—especially on Beltaine Eve or

Samhain, when “the veil between the worlds” is

particularly thin and the misty gates are open. Any time

you are caught in a thick fog, you may find yourself in

Faerie when it clears. Faerie is “as close as a prayer, as

1. Introduction: Other Worlds

E LIVE IN A MULTIVERSE OF INFINITE

worlds and possibilities. In

addition to the Mundane world

we inhabit with our physical

bodies and share with each other,

there are non-physical or astral

realms of Dream, Myth,

Imagination, and Story. Some of

these are also shared with others, and some we may

have all to ourselves. Nonetheless, these worlds are

as real to us as we believe them to be. For when it

comes right down to it, we each really live alone in a

tiny room, and everything we see, hear, know, and

experience of what’s outside that room has to be piped

in to us. What we “see” is what we get.

In this Class, I would like to introduce you to

some of the non-physical worlds that are shared by

many people. They each have their denizens and rules,

and some of them have even been mapped. The world

of Tolkein’s Middle Earth is an example of such a realm,

created by one man, but now shared by millions. I’ll

bet you can close your eyes and see the Shire or

Rivendell as clearly as any other place you have lived

or visited—I know I can!

Lesson 2. The Dreaming

The greatest astral country we can access directly is

called The Dreaming because we enter it through our

dreams. Australian Aborigines (“natives”) call it the

Alcheringa, or “The Dreamtime,” and psychologists

call it “The Collective Unconscious.” We share this

psychic realm with all other dreamers throughout the

world, and it has a certain well-established geography

shaped over the ages by the morphogenic fields—like

well-worn pathways—of all who ever have visited there.

Within the Dreaming are gateways to the countries

of Faerie, the Afterworlds of all faiths, the realms of

gods, spirits, and ancestors, and all the fantasy-worlds

of myth and story—such as Phantasia, Wonderland,

Corrected pages 3rd printing.2.p65 51 6/10/2004, 4:03 PM