The Pines of Fleming Park.

May 29, 2025May 16, 2025 / Ann Murphy / 6 Comments

Fleming park is in Eastleigh, in Hampshire. It was originally owned by the Flemings, and its parkland was designed by Lancelot Capability Brown. The estate covered much of this part of Eastleigh, and was once called North Stoneham estate. Although much of the original estate has been built on, of course, some parts remain. A portion of the estate became a golf course and this protected the landscaped park from development. The same cannot be said for many other parts of this beautiful landscape, however. But at least parts of it are still accessible.

We first ventured into Fleming park when we had to visit the Honda dealer and had time to spare. On that first visit, we found a group of pines who spoke, with collective fondness, for the ‘tree-man’. We later discovered that the park had been landscaped by Lancelot Capability Brown and he loved trees. Really loved trees. The trees themselves spoke of him as though he were a human-tree.

On that occasion, one large pine tree gifted us a tree attunement, so we could help people connect to trees in a tree-way.

On this occasion, in May 25, we were called back to the trees. Early one morning, we drove down and walked over the bridge that spanned Monk’s Brook and headed up the incline towards them. Once we had crossed that bridge, the energy was palpable. The tree’s energy reaches out to you as you approach them, once you have already made their acquaintance. You can feel the pull in your body, as though your aura is being draw towards them.

At the top of the incline, we found the tree that gave us the attunement last time, and we made our way through the brambles to get to it. It was a tall, stately pine tree and its energy was palpable. Chris was picking up that this tree was the Arthur tree, the king tree who holds the other trees. Like the mother trees act as mothers to other, younger trees – including us humans as we learn to be trees too – it also acts as guardian of the area so it is aware of all the other trees.

We walked around the tree anticlockwise, three times in total, each time going deeper into its consciousness, then we both stood with our backs to the trunk and activated the heartwood symbol. Because we had gone deeply into the elemental realm we were now connected to the Elven realm. Once we had activated this symbol in our own heart centres, this then connected us to the heartwood of the tree, but this time there was the gold line of the tree we were connecting to. The gold line came from beneath the tree, ran up through the centre of the trunk and out through the branches. This was an energy we could tap into, so we were not simply connecting the heartwood but to the purpose of its tree-ness. Its intention for being alive.

The heartwood symbol was like a key, opening up to the vitality of the tree. It pulls this vitality from the sun and the earth. After a few minutes of this, I was instructed to change position and stand facing the tree with our palms on the trunk. Now, the heartwood key emerged out the back our heart centres. This was new! It shows that the symbol remains in place and as we change bodily direction, the key comes out the front of the chest, or the back, at the heart level.

Just as in the beautiful beech tree in Winchester Cathedral grounds, Chris was picking up a different level of elemental consciousness than I was. He saw the gnome energy-beings running through tunnels below the tree, working with the roots of plants and helping the energy to flow. I had worked with a similar energy on Stockbridge Down years ago when we had to ‘drop down’ into the earth and reconfigure the energy lines that ran below the ancient burial mounds there. Then too, I saw them as a gnome-type entity, looking somewhat like the dwarves from Snow White. My memory-banks chose this image to help me understand the nature of the beings who do this below-ground work with the land.

On this day, Chris was picking up one level of energy and I was picking up another. The tree then began to speak of the crown, and I could see a gold crown in its branches. The king Tree. Facing the tree, with our palms on the truck, there was a red cord running up through it, just as we had laid in Flowerdown. At the burial mound, we had walked the gold cord in one direction and on the way back walked the red cord. Now, facing the tree we were connecting a red line, whereas when we had our backs to the tree, we were working with the gold cord. The red cord only went through the trunk, however, whereas the gold line went all the way to the branches.

The gold line was the solar line, but the red was the vitality of the earth. There was also a faint blue line, which represents water. But it was not very visible. I became aware of a violet energy surrounding the area, a soft amethyst, so the tree was connecting to the amethyst layer of the crystalline field of the earth, just like the tree at crab wood. We anchored the amethyst sphere around the tree, just as we had at Crab Wood, and within the sphere a violet flame. The wind rose then in a beautiful way and it felt very druidy. The flame shines out like a beacon, cleansing the area. In the branches, a golden egg appeared. This collects the sunlight and sends new golden energy down through the branches to feed the tree, which then feeds us, energetically.

When we had finished, we noticed seams of gold sap, some of it crystallised, in the creases of the bark. So we took some home to make an incense mix. Sap from a tree you’ve worked on emits an energetic aroma as well as its gorgeous fragrance, filling your space with the energy of the tree. We will collect more on our next visit. Apparently, you can also make tea with the sap, so I will be trying that!

Flowerdown Barrow

September 21, 2023September 8, 2023 / Ann Murphy / Leave a comment

A few weeks ago, I had a sudden impulse to take a different route to my father’s house, (every time I write My Father’s house, I think ironically of the biblical heaven, which it clearly isn’t) and went through Littleton, in Hampshire, passing Flowerdown Barrow as I did. Passing the site, I felt a connection to the barrow, which then anchored itself in my lower hara centre, behind my navel. This is my energetic connection to Mother Earth the human energy field. The connection looks, to my inner sight, like a gold cord, vibrant and alive.

I wondered what I was supposed to do with it. Two weeks later…

5th September.

This morning was one of those mornings when I had no desire to do anything. Usually, my mornings are filled with a routine: reading for an hour, somatic exercises, then breakfast, followed by a shower, and then writing for a bit, or getting some shopping for Dad. On mornings when my time feels empty of purpose, I have learned that that is when I need to go out and walk – there is energy-work to do – somewhere.

I drove in the direction of Barton Stacey, still unsure of my destination, until the idea to visit Flowerdown popped loudly into my head! I had wanted to visit the stone beside the barrow there since I had a dream about menhirs a month ago. The dream showed how outlying menhirs were anchors of fertility, like electricity pylons, creating an anchor for the energies of the larger sites that control fertility, such as stone circles and disc barrows. They are erected on a line of energy from the main site and then that energy is transmitted into the surrounding landscape, adding energy to the land.

This is very much the same as having acupuncture to keep your body’s meridians flowing. The energy flows, unhindered, through your chakras. These chakras, or ‘wheels’, distribute the energy throughout your body, filling it with vitality. When the tissues are infused with higher vibrational energy, the body is healthy and can do what it was designed to do.

Stone circles ‘contain’ the energy of the land, which is brought into it from the solar energies at specific times of the year. It is channelled into the energy point below it, or into underground waterways, which then feeds the surrounding countryside, like a chakra point. But a circle only has a certain radius. The way to get around this is to place outliers, menhirs, which can hold an energy line from the circle and radiate it into its locality. One circle, either stone or henge, can have many outliers at a certain distance from it, and I imagine, the tall individual standing stones would have stood within a certain area and also be used as territorial marker stones, or signposts. They might have had multiple uses, but their primary purpose would have been as an energy transmitter.

Thinking about that, it makes me wonder if the menhirs also signposted the proximity of a sacred site? The people back then would have known and understood the function of the Menhirs, and would have also known how to use them to find their way to sites or settlements.

The stones, stone circles, and barrows do the same for the landscape as acupuncture needles do for the body. If the energy is flowing well, the fertility of the soil means better crops and healthier livestock. The sarsen in Littleton, which had been found in 1906 in Dean Down Drove, would have been connected to the Flowerdown Barrow, the largest barrow in Hampshire and, according to ‘Upstairs’, one of the most important sacred sites in the prehistoric area of modern-day Hampshire.

The stone itself is beautiful. It is a golden sandy colour and might have stood at least a meter higher if the top had not been broken off. I also found some interesting markings on it which maybe someone can explain to me. There are many scratches on one surface, which makes me think they could have happened during the move to Chilcomb Museum. But there is a definite lozenge carved into the surface. Again, it could be accidental, but equally, it might have been intentional. You can see these lines in one of the photos below. The lozenge seems to be part of a bigger pattern but the stone is quite damaged here too.

The stone is obviously not in its original position, it was moved originally from Dean Down Drove, which leads off from the barrrows, but I can find no evidence of the stone on old OS maps so it might have been buried under years of mud and vegetation. But there is also a hole which has been bored low down on one side, which I initially thought was a core sampling hole, however, it is too shallow and too wide. Could it have been used as a gate post, perhaps at some more recent date? That is what it reminded me of, yet there is no record of a stone anywhere near either of the Dean farms, where, I imagine, the drove-way lead to – or from… The hole might also have been caused by rain but I would have thought there would have been more, in that case…

On this particular visit, my job was to connect the stone to the disc barrow, as I imagined it was originally connected before it was moved or had fallen over. But first, I had to walk anti-clockwise around the first barrow, something I had not done on all my previous visits. Halfway around the barrow, I became aware of a woman in handwoven, woollen clothes standing on top of it. She watched me, as I went around, and I got the impression that she was waiting to see if I knew what I was doing. She continued to watch, while I finished the round.

I was then told to create a lemniscate, the infinity symbol, by walking anti-clockwise around the disc barrow, joining the two barrows. I’m always curious why things happen at certain times. I have been coming to this barrow site for nearly twenty years and only now are these two barrows being connected. As I came close, to where I started walking around the larger barrow, I felt energy rising which to me feels like excited anticipation. Sometimes it makes me want to exhale forcibly, but not this time. I have to say, feeling energy that way is one of the things that makes this work so enjoyable. It is as though I am doing what I am supposed to do, working with the landscape the way our ancestors did. In that moment of rising energy, I am the ancestors.

As I completed the round of the disc barrow, I stopped to take some photos and then heard ‘Complete the circuit’. I realised that I had not gone back to the beginning. There was still about two meters to go. I completed the circuit, as instructed, then walked into the centre of the barrow. I was immediately aware of the emerald energy but it was coming in with a blue ray, like sapphire. I have worked with Sapphire before but I’m still not sure where it fits. I asked what this ray was and was shown a blue dragon descending through it. Aha! The blue dragon is water, rain. My immediate thought was, ‘Haven’t we had enough of that?!’ (As it turned out, the land in parts of Littleton floods when the winter bourne rises).

The emerald energy above the sapphite tube represents the energy of vegetation so in that context, it made sense that the blue dragon would descend down a column of sapphire. You can’t have vegatation without water.

Once this energy had been fully anchored, I moved off the barrow. As I approached the other, smaller burial mound, I heard: ‘A message for you.’ The woman in her reddish-brown, shin-length dress was there again. She wore a blueish tartan-like top, all handwoven, and was old, her hair yellow-white. She would have been fair-haired when she was younger.

As she looked down at me from the top of the mound, she held out a package wrapped in soft brown leather, tied with a leather thong. ‘Take this,’ she said, ‘And guard it well.’ She placed a yellow flower on top of the package, which looked like a dandelion, or cat’s ear, then added, ‘For the chosen one.’ I took the package, knowing I had to pass it on to someone else. Then she said, ‘For you.’ And she gave me a bottle, the lower rounded half wrapped in a leather casing, like a bottle of sweet wine, or Sherry, from Spain.

She then went on to tell me that she was a Mother in the local community, which now lies beneath Littleton … somewhere. As I was walking away, she stood and waved, but now she had her granddaughter with her, reminding me that her daughter was a spiritual leader within the community and that she herself was teaching her granddaughter, just as the Neolithic ancestors had done. It also made me wonder if both hers, and her granddaughter’s, ashes were in the smaller barrow. It also made me think there was a subtle message there too about teaching my own granddaughters…

Later, I wondered if the single yellow flower represented the energy of this ancient Down (a Hampshire word meaning a chalkland hill) which had been called Flower Down. It has been called Flower Down for centuries, possibly because of the profusion of wildflowers that grow on chalkland, and it has been called that since before 1750. It was originally used as common land to graze animals, and therefore never ploughed. This is why the barrows were left alone and undamaged. It must have been beautiful if they called it after the flowers that grew there, the land fertilised by all the animals. After the Enclosures Act, a patch of land, with the barrows on it, was allowed for the villagers; the rest was owned by a landowner. Thankfully, he left them that part, or we might not still have them and all that information would be lost!

Continueing my journey to Dad’s, I passed hte Running Horse Inn and had the thought that I should have breakfast there one day, that therre was something beneath it that needing accessing. So, next Sunday, we are going to check it out. I’ll let you know what happens.

If you are ever in Winchester, pay Flowerdown Disc Barrow a visit, and tune in. It is a wonderful place, as many Wintonians can vouch for. I know some of you already know this stone, and these barrows, very well indeed.

https://www.cityofwinchester.co.uk/history/html/sarsens.html

The Enclosure Acts

https://www.alresfordhistandlit.co.uk/72%20An%20Introduction%20to%20Hampshire%20Drove%20Roads.pdf

Click to access Flowerdown-Sir-John-Moore-Barracks-A-Planning-Overview.pdf

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Arthur’s Gate and the Mother Tree.

May 15, 2023September 10, 2023 / Ann Murphy / 4 Comments

I recently had a spontaneous initiation on the grounds of Lainston House, near Winchester, in Hampshire. Many years ago, in 1999, I made a connection with an old Yew tree which grows close to the road that bisects the old Lainston House avenue. This tree is one I have visited many times and every time I visited, she gave me many gifts, such as energy, a cloak of bark and tree wisdom. I had only arrived in the UK in 1991 and within a couple of years had begun training in mediumship, counselling and Reiki. I didn’t know then that I would be working with earth energies. That wouldn’t happen for another ten years. Or that I was beginning a spiritual training that would result in the Gaia Method Earthways. I wouldn’t have believed anyone even if they had told me. I remember my first experience of spiritual communication. It was in the Winchester Spiritualist church, back in 1994. I had been training as a tarot reader with the wonderful Rosemary Prince, which lead to her running a development circle. I went to the church a few times and one night the medium gave me messages, telling me I was a healer. I remember thinking she must be mistaking me for the woman who was sitting next to me as I was certainly no healer. Now, of course, I know she was right, but back then I felt too damaged to be anything, let alone a healer.

My first experience with this beautiful old Yew tree was when I discovered it, having gone for a walk through the woods, close to where I lived. She was such a huge presence there and I immediately felt drawn to go and stand with my back against her. This proved to be an electrifying experience and I felt the energies of every tree in the locality sending information to her through the ground, which she transmitted into the surrounding countryside. (This was before they discovered how trees communicate with each other through mycelium). She was like a mother tree to all the other trees, which she saw as her children, even though they were not of the same tree-species. She had such immense power which spread out for quite a distance across the land. I didn’t realise it at the time, but I was becoming one of her children too.

In that first estatic and powerful experience with her, she opened me up to a world of nature-energies and elementals. Each time I visited her, she gave me something, shared knowledge with me or asked me to share my energy with her. I absolutely loved this tree and visited her when I felt the impulse. And that was another thing, she never needed my constant attention. But when something of importance needed to be shared, I felt the urge to visit her and each time I went, something significant happened.

Lately, I’d passed her every day on my way to my father’s house, projecting ‘Hello’ to her as I went by. But one day, I felt the impulse to stop and visit. I had time to spare, so I parked up, and as I walked down the path towards her the words ‘Arthur’s Gate’ came into my head. My first experience of Arthur’s Gate was in Tintagel. I knew it was an initiation but thought the Gateway initiation was only at Tintagel; that it was a place rather than an event. I didn’t realise it was something that could happen anywhere.

I continued to the Tree and when I reached her, I touched her rough bark to connect with her. Then I was told to walk once around her anticlockwise, to open the energies between us. When I reached my original position I laid back against her again, and felt a line go from my heart to her heartwood; a sharing of heart energy. Then, I felt the need to walk forward and walked a couple of meters away from her. I experienced this as though I was a child being pushed gently into the world, able to stand on my own two feet. She was communicating to me that it was time I was out on my own, that I didn’t need her anymore.

This was a surprise because I hadn’t realised that she had been my Mother-tree for all these years, teaching me how to become a tree-person. But when I looked back at all I learned, I realise it was true. If it wasn’t for her, and the generosity of her indwelling spirit, the Gaia Method Earthways would never have been developed. She opened a tree-door for me and gave me access to a whole elemental world.

So, feeling a little weird about it, but knowing it was the right thing, I walked away, saying goodbye to her in my head, feeling sad and grateful.

I walked through the woods looking for the Lainston house avenue. This too, I had passed every day, promising myself I would stop and walk it. It was only a short distance away from the tree and in all the times I had been in that little stretch of woods I had never known it was so accessible. I began to walk along the avenue, feeling a little nervous and not sure if I was allowed to be on it at all. Was it private property? My old fear of authority.

I turned to walk down along the avenue and as I did I saw a huge arch of light stretching over the trees. This was the Arthur’s Gate. It was the biggest initiatic gateway I’ve ever had to move through. Gateways can be of any size, and they can appear anywhere. The size corresponds to the importance of the initiation and how much change has to be experienced in order to achieve it. They also take time to actualise, in physical reality. The place, and the emotions experienced while going through them, are also messages giving clues about the nature of the initiation.

I took my time to walk through this huge arch, reflecting on what it meant. It was arched over the longest avenue of Lime trees in England and connected to a house that was built for Charles II so he could live there with his mistress. He had already commissioned a palace in Winchester which was never finished, but which was going to be based on Versailles. It is a house of abundance and history. I have always rejected wealth and stability having grown up with a father who put money first. I decided, early on, that love was more important. Needless to say, poverty isn’t very noble, as I learned when I lived in Luxor, so I have been slowly healing these beliefs around abundance. Now it would seem that it is time to put my new beliefs to the test.

As I walked through the arch, I was also aware of a prayer mat under my feet. This was connected to the initiation and it felt like both Spanish and Egyptian energies. A Moorish/Islamic element. The two countries were connected, energetically.

The Arthurian Gate is an initiation. It is about moving into an area of development which involves connecting to male energies of abundance and power. The ability to accept wealth, fearlessly. It is a particularly masculine gateway energy, so it connects to the layer of Divine masculine energy flow which looks like a river flowing above your head. When I first went through an Arthurian gate, it was in Tintagel looking from the castle out to sea. I was always independent and hated accepting abundance through men. But I was being asked to. I didn’t like the games around money, the way there were so many ‘conditions’ around generosity. So rather than deal with these difficulties, I chose to remain poor. Going through the first gateway changed that and I had to learn how to deal with those issues.

I had expanded into a new level of abundance, and all the lessons and healing, that went with it. Now, those lessons are expanding into something greater – which might also take twenty years to accomplish. I am guessing about the time here because that is how long it has taken me to get to the second Arthur’s Gate!

The place the gateways take place is significant. There are clues everywhere. I wondered if it was significant that I had to leave the nurturing and support of the Mother-tree, which is only meters away from this avenue, to step onto this road of abundance and the things that abundance could help me to establish. It’s like leaving home, and moving into independence with all the learning and tools I need to succeed.

Ultimately, it is now up to me.

Going through ‘gates’ means facing fears, and my initial fear of whether I was breaking some rule by walking along the avenue, was highlighting my fear of ‘needing permission’ to walk the path of empowerment and abundance. Was I allowed to walk this path?

I was walking it, so I guess the answer was YES.So let’s see where the gateway leads.

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Imbolc Celebrations.

February 1, 2021September 10, 2023 / Ann Murphy / Leave a comment

Today is St. Brigit’s day, in the Christian tradition, or Imbolc in the Celtic. She was originally a pre-Celtic goddess, of fire, of healing and of fertility.

As the dark winter days brighten and lengthen, fresh shoots appear. Snowdrops give colour to muddy ground and sparse grass. Bluebell spears emerge from cold soil and energy grows. This is the time when the fertility of the land awakens. The sun’s energy is drawn, deep into the earth, to warm the sleeping seeds and bulbs, to fertilise the land itself with its life-giving rays.

The ancestors celebrated this process. Every few years, in settlements, such as at Danebury, in Hampshire, or Fosbury, in Wiltshire – embodiments of the Mother’s womb – , a priestess would stand on the highest point of the settlement, the belly of the Mother, and bring down, through her body, the solar energy, channelling it into the waiting womb of the earth. The Sheelagh Na Gig, the Crone of Winter, became youthful Virgin once more.

These ‘Mother’ sites were part of a vast network of energies, through which the fertilising light of the sun travelled, even before its physical warmth could be felt. Once the symbolic egg had been made fertile, this energy fed many smaller settlements, some as small as single farmsteads, but all radiating the light into the soil, into the trees, into the hearts and minds of the people.

Giant Sheelagh Na Gig. Danebury Hillfort. Hampshire.

The serpent will come from the hole
On the brown Day of Bríde,
Though there should be three feet of snow
On the flat surface of the ground

One tradition on Brigit’s day was to clean the home, to sweep out the energy of the past and to welcome in the new energy that would bring newness and fertility to its inhabitants. It was all done with intent. The past year was gone, and a new one begins. Clear out old dreams; dream new ones.

This is the time when new pathways are forged and plans for the coming year can be put in motion.

There are many well-known traditions, and all accessible on the internet if you search. The most important aspect, in terms of energywork is the solar fertilising of the earth and the lighting/maintenance of the Flames.

As a planetary healer, part of your work is to maintain these energetic flames. Planting one in your home, if it is connected to this energetic grid, keeps the energy flowing. I have one in my home and have anchored them in the homes of my daughters and friends – other Gaia Method Earthways healers – when I am impulsed to do so. For two weeks before today, the energies rise and the flames are tended. Sometimes, they change colour, sometimes other energies are added. I can see them changing, in colour and number, sometimes becoming three, sometimes reverting to one. Each flame is a frequency of creation, a creative fire that inspires and keeps abundance flowing.

There are ‘Keepers of the Flame’ all over the world, carrying out these ancient tasks, and there have been for millennia. Now we are re-learning their ways so that the earth can be fruitful and abundant. We can change our old ways and learn how to live in communion with the Mother. Learn to channel the light into her pathways once more.

St. Catherine’s Hillfort, here in Winchester — the view from my house — has a flame. This year it has become a white flame, rising from the hilltop into the sky, spreading a disc of silver around the surrounding landscape; the abundance of the Mother. A necessary thing, in these times of fear and confusion. The White feels pure, and light, bringing awareness and a feeling of spiritual power. The power of Light, not might.

The more we work with the ancient energies and ways of life, the better will be both our lives and those of others around us.

In searching for fertility sites, look for the signs, both through intuition and physical evidence. Where the stone-carved Sheelagh na Gig’s are, nearby you will find a site, waiting to be reawakened. Early Christian churches often use them, as they signified a place where the energy of Imbolc was activated, albeit in a different form. There are places all over the British Isles, and Ireland, that hold these energies. All it needs is for you to find them.

“Now is the time to tend the fires. To create anew your dreams for the future. Go into the landscape. Connect to the Mother, Brigit, Goddess of life, and bring fertility and life back into your lives.”