Joanna van der Hoeven - 8 July

About the Author

Joanna van der Hoeven is a Druid, Witch, author, and teacher. She has written several books on Druidry including the best-selling introductory book The Awen Alone: Walking the Path of the Solitary Druid . She has also written countless articles for Pagan magazines and websites and spoken at conferences, fairs, festivals, and more. Joanna is the co-founder of Druid College UK, which offers a three-year training programme, and she is also the director of her own dance company.

Joanna was born in Quebec, Canada. She moved to the UK in 1998, where she now lives with her husband in a small village near the coast of the North Sea. She has a BA (Hons) English Language and Literature degree. In her spare time, Joanna enjoys reading, walking and singing back to the land.

Copyright Information

The Book of Hedge Druidry: A Complete Guide for the Solitary Seeker 2019 by Joanna van der Hoeven.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any matter whatsoever, including Internet usage, without written permission from Llewellyn Publications, except in the form of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

As the purchaser of this e-book, you are granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on screen. The text may not be otherwise reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, or recorded on any other storage device in any form or by any means.

Any unauthorized usage of the text without express written permission of the publisher is a violation of the authors copyright and is illegal and punishable by law.

First e-book edition 2019

E-book ISBN: 9780738758312

Cover design by Shira Atakpu

Editing by Brian R. Erdrich

Llewellyn Publications is an imprint of Llewellyn Worldwide Ltd.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data (Pending)

ISBN: 978-0-7387-5825-1

Llewellyn Publications does not participate in, endorse, or have any authority or responsibility concerning private business arrangements between our authors and the public.

Any Internet references contained in this work are current at publication time, but the publisher cannot guarantee that a specific reference will continue or be maintained. Please refer to the publishers website for links to current author websites.

Llewellyn Publications

Llewellyn Worldwide Ltd.

2143 Wooddale Drive

Woodbury, MN 55125

www.Llewellyn.com

Manufactured in the United States of America

Dedication

To my mother, father, sister, brother, and extended familyyou all mean so much to me.

To my readers for being with me on this journey and supporting my work. My deepest regards and thanks.

Disclaimer

The publisher and the author assume no liability for any injuries caused to the reader that may result from the readers use of content contained in this publication and recommend common sense when contemplating the practices described in the work. Please consult a standard reference source or an expert herbalist to learn more about the possible effects of certain herbs.

Contents

PART ONE: THEORY

Chapter 1:

Chapter 2:

Chapter 3:

Chapter 4:

Chapter 5:

Chapter 6:

Chapter 7:

Chapter 8:

Chapter 9:

Chapter 10:

Chapter 11:

Chapter 12:

Chapter 13:

PART TWO: PRACTICE

Chapter 14:

Chapter 15:

Chapter 16:

Chapter 17:

Chapter 18:

Chapter 19:

Chapter 20:

PART THREE: STUDY

Chapter 21:

Chapter 22:

Chapter 23:

PART FOUR: SKILLS AND TECHNIQUE

Chapter 24:

Chapter 25:

Chapter 26:

Chapter 27:

Introduction

S he walks toward the hedge, the boundary that separates the farmers field from the village, a line that runs down to a wooded area and the heathland beyond. When she reaches the hedge of hawthorn, blackthorn, and dog rose, a triad of wild and native plants that hold ancient and special meaning, she smiles and reaches out to stroke a rose hip. The cool autumn breeze plays in her hair, whipping it around her face as the sun spills its light in waves across the landscape, the sky dotted with huge fluffy clouds. It is harvest time, when natures abundance is at its peak. She feels the strength of the ancestors flowing through her blood and bones and hears their song in the wind. She says a quick prayer to the ancestors and blesses the land and the ongoing harvest, even as the sound of heavy farm machinery floats upon the breeze.

She turns and follows the hedgerow down to the little woodland, a special place that bursts with bluebells in the spring. In this place she stands for a moment, utterly still, listening to the sounds of the spirits of place: the robins and blackbirds, a pheasant squawking, a hawk crying high overhead, riding the thermals. This is the edgewhere the hedge meets the wild, where the known meets the unknown; the civilised comes up against the wild. Here, at the edge, is the special place, the in-between place. This is where she belongs.

Inviting the power of the ancestors to flow through her, inviting the gods and goddesses that she loves, inviting the spirits of place to join with her intention, she turns three times anticlockwise and sings. Once she has stopped, she knows that she walks between the worlds, that the Otherworld is all around her and she can seek its wisdom and guidance, while testing her courage and her wits. Here she will find the answer to help her in her quest. Here she will find the inspiration, known to the Druids as awen. Here is where the magic happens. Here she walks as a Hedge Druid.

Druidry is a deeply fulfilling earth-based spirituality. Western spiritual traditions often differ from, say, Eastern traditions in that they can be a more solo affair. Our mythology is filled with tales of a hero or heroine on a quest, and it is that quest which seems to be a recurring theme. There are challenges and people to help along the way, but on the whole the quest must be fulfilled by the seeker and the seeker alone. With Buddhism, one often has a community, a sangha, a teacher to go to, monasteries and abbeys, and more. Western Paganism is a bit different, but fast growing with events, organisations, festivals, schools, colleges, and more. Perhaps in our lifetime we will see the equivalent of Pagan monasteries and abbeys, where the priesthood or those wishing to live a life entirely dedicated to their Pagan religion is sanctioned, widely accepted, and has community financial support. However, the point remains that the solo quest has been and most likely will always be central to Western Paganism.

This quest can be seen in many different ways. It could be a quest to find the true nature of the self. It could be a quest on behalf of another person, or a spiritual quest to find communion and integrate with the gods, a form of mysticism if you will. Often we are seeking to bring disparate parts of our own soul back together, to find the whole once again, to bring a holistic view into our ever-increasing disparate and isolationist society. When we find the whole within our own self, we find the whole within the community and the world.

Druidry is no exception. Druidry is the quest to find our place in the world and to work in the world in balance and harmony. It is being a part of a functioning ecosystem, to learn its ways and find how we too can be a contributing member. We might be seeking the divine in order to build that bridge that allows us to understand how to find our place in the world, or we might be trying to connect with our ancestors and their knowledge of the world. We might look to the spirits of place or to the Fair Folk for guidance and inspiration on how to walk in this world and the Otherworld, in balance and for the benefit of all. For the Otherworld is also a part of this world, overlaying it and offering a different perspective on the nature of things. We need this different perspective in order to step outside of our narrow human-centric perspective, to enable us to see the bigger picture. And so we might quest to the Otherworld as well, to gain this broader viewpoint, finding guides and companions that can provide knowledge and insight for us to take back into this world.