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Post by dreamguardian on Jan 13, 2011 15:06:35 GMT -1
I wasted a lot of f**king hard earned money on the 'all new improved' material. IMHO. it sucks!
There are many obodies that disagree, which I respect.
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Post by crowman on Jan 13, 2011 16:28:43 GMT -1
But i bet there are just as many that would agree
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Post by crowman on Jan 13, 2011 16:32:56 GMT -1
Just had a quick look at the website and i made a mistake... just to clarify, i chose the text only version which is £195 or £35 with 12 monthly payments of £13.50 - if you choose text and audio then expect to fork out £320!!!!!
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Post by Deleted on Jan 13, 2011 19:50:33 GMT -1
I think I have to put in a word or two for OBOD here! I joined in '92 - I'd been doing some Native American work but felt it was wrong culturally for me - the language, the flora and fauna. I wanted something more British and found OBOD. I very much enjoyed my bardic year and had a wonderful initiation into the ovate grade with Philip and Steph et al at summercamp in a wood with a young yew at the centre - it was a powerful and memorable experience. I was just reviewing the vows I made the other day... The course is meant to be a tool for personal development as well as instruction into 'druidry'. I liked that because I believe that to engage with a magical path it's important to work on yourself on the emotional/psychological level as well. The course costs to produce and send out and you have a tutor who gives his/her time freely... I don't think it's a rip-off-though it might not be right for everyone. I found it was a stepping-stone on my journey and I'm grateful to it for that. I went from the course and the writings of the Matthews and Philip to more scholarly material as I wanted to get closer to the sources and make up my own mind about things. I liked the emphasis on poetry and creativity I suppose... and that little reminder "if it feels right to you" do this or that gave me the leeway to take from it the bits I did feel were right and abandon the rest. I expect that's why it's such a 'broad church' and has such a following - it's not dogmatic. In a way I feel you get out what you put in plus some. It gives you signposts and you have the freedom to go deeper - into UPG and research or whatever. I left around '97/8 for a mix of reasons, some personal. I did find it rather anglo-centric and the attitude to and ignorance of Wales and the Welsh were alienating sometimes. I'd come across the CR lists and they offered something I wanted and I spent more time on those and moved into something else. I thought OBOD might have changed later as I heard that some Welsh speakers had joined. There is the issue of cultural misrepresentation - which is murky (and I wonder about my own role in that). I did buy the audio ovate course last year at a knock-down price and thought I might work pick it up where I left off - as a way of sparking the inner work. Though I haven't looked at it - the need for something like that passed I think, but I don't rule it out. Of course - I am an old hippy I gather it's rather a derogatory term now... but a lot of good things came out of it.
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Post by dreamguardian on Jan 14, 2011 7:12:25 GMT -1
I think I have to put in a word or two for OBOD here! ... I don't think it's a rip-off-though it might not be right for everyone. As I said, I knew not everyone would agree with me ;D Not sure I would agree there GF. It is dogmatic & Heirarchical. They might just as well call themselves aztecs. Afterall, they are not trying to connect or replicate the culture and spiritual faith of the aztec past. But "if it feels right to you" then it's ok to do an expensive corporate self improvement course & call yourself an aztec. It's fine too, to believe any old twoddle in the name of an aztec-ry so long as you keep buying the 3 courses, as well as the ones not mentioned to allow you to pass to the next course ... so long as you keep buying into the pyramid sales... keep buying the workshops and keep buying the books and keep buying ... and keep buying .... and keep buying ... Moan over .... I promise
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Post by megli on Jan 14, 2011 13:48:11 GMT -1
The question's always seemed to me to be: would an ancient Gaulish druid of 100BC recognise Tiny Shrimp or Branwen NicLlyr or Nightshade Shadowmancer as being recognisably akin to himself, in some sense in the same line of work? To which the obvious answer is: of course not.
Pretending to be a druid is like getting some ghee from the local shop, lighting a barbecue and some nag champa in the back garden, then making yourself a dhoti out of a pillowcase and pouring the ghee onto the fire while chanting a bit from Wendy Doniger's English translation of the Rig Veda---and saying you are thereby a Vedic sage, participating in a timeless and immemorial tradition of exquisite sanctity. Actually no: it would merely be cheap, a little bit unhinged, and a narcissistic appropriation.
Of course some of us see the dead, like *all the time*, and so can have our egos stroked by wise old druid spirit-guides with invisible ram-headed staffs and cod-Gaelic names, or are visited by deceased priestesses of Brigit who dispense sage advice. (So THAT's alright then...)
If ever I were to set up a Pagan organisation (and I've burned my boats there) the very first rule would be: 'Saying things repeatedly *does not make them true.*'
There's nothing wrong with being thoughtful, or setting about psychological work/inner growth. There's nothing wrong with loving the natural world passionately or liking Celtic myth, the Lord of the Rings, Loreena McKennitt, candlelight, playing the harp, writing poems, being vegan, or growing herbs. Some of that seems to me to be perfectly admirable, nay wonderful and wholly positive. But I dislike the way that kind of well-meaning constellation of (quintessentially modern) feelings and preferences can be packaged and sold to people as mystical wisdom rooted in the ancient tradition of a caste of North-Western European magico-religious specialists who disappeared a minimum of1300 years ago, and about whom we know next to nothing for certain. I always imagine OBODites must have that queasy feeling that lifelong LibDems currently do...
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Post by dreamguardian on Jan 14, 2011 14:19:02 GMT -1
Nellie, as one who underwent 'training' in OBOD in the time of Ross Nichols ... it wasn't then required that an individual followed quite such a specific programme as now, which, I think, is more to to with constructing a 'course' that can be offered than it is any sort of conviction as to what is essential. In those days guided meditation and study of the Kaballah were more to the fore; these things change and are to some extent an arbitrary extension of the 'teacher'. As someone who knew Ross Nichols very well, heron. What do you think he would make of obod today?
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Post by Heron on Jan 14, 2011 15:09:45 GMT -1
Nellie, as one who underwent 'training' in OBOD in the time of Ross Nichols ... it wasn't then required that an individual followed quite such a specific programme as now, which, I think, is more to to with constructing a 'course' that can be offered than it is any sort of conviction as to what is essential. In those days guided meditation and study of the Kaballah were more to the fore; these things change and are to some extent an arbitrary extension of the 'teacher'. As someone who knew Ross Nichols very well, heron. What do you think he would make of obod today? He ran his own small tutoring college preparing mainly overseas students for A Levels etc, so he wouldn't necessarily have been averse to the entrepreneurial side of offering a course, but he came out of a different tradition from the current emphasis and, in the nature of things then, what was offered was face to face study groups, meditation sessions and, of course the public rituals. I took part in ceremonies on Glastonbury Tor and such places (though never Stonehenge which was less accessible then and, I think, claimed by the Druid Order) but these were more often on Parliament Hill in London where I remember spending all of Midsummer Night in the running track area before using the changing rooms to robe up and process to the top of the hill at dawn. But these public events were very much seen as 'outer' activities with the significant stuff being the inner more private sessions of a much smaller group at his tutorial premises and, even more 'inner' still, for a select group at his house. That is, there was still very much the aura of initiates and non-iniiates that was so much a feature of Wicca at the time (after all he had known Gerald Gardner). Maybe the current OBOD hierarchy has an inner group of this sort they don't talk about? Don't know as I've had nothing to do with the revived order.
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