The Majickal Garden

This article is dedicated to planning a successful herb garden. If you have planted herb gardens in previous years this will help to revamp and refresh one already have.

Go to your Garden Center and see what herbs are available and suitable for your area. This is important if you are planning an outside herb garden. If you are planning an inside herb garden, since you control the atmosphere, you can choose whatever you like.

My suggestion here would be to select a theme for your herb garden. You can plant them for cooking herbs, cosmetic herbs, medicinal herbs or fragrance herbs use. Be realistic about your plants. Check your whole property to find the right spot. Look for sun or shade, type of soil, and how well the spot drains. These are all very import for picking the best place for your herb garden.

Once you have accomplished the above, pick your sunniest spot because herbs need a lot of sun (a good four top six hours daily). Be sure that the herb garden site is level and sheltered from wind. If your soil is a bit heavy ad lots of compost when preparing your site which will make the soil looser and help with drainage and texture.

Try to keep the herb garden close to the house to facilitate in picking the harvest and checking for troubles. If you can’t find a suitable sunny spot plant them in a garden container that you can move around to follow the sun. (This movement is a bit time consuming but it pay off in the end).

Look at the rest of your gardens. Are they formal or informal? You will want your herb garden to complement your house and garden. Look in books or magazine to get some inspiration. If you are creating a formal herb garden you will need to plant in straight lines and geometric shapes framing them with low hedges and paths. A fountain, bench or topiary shrubs are almost always used as the main focal point. Arrange the layout around a central axis. Then plant one kind of herb in each block, go for bold color and texture. Be warned a formal garden is labor intensive and will be expensive.

In an informal herb garden you can plant more flowing, curved beds and walkways. Add flowers and shrubs for a really exciting look. This type of herb garden requires less initial work and will be easier and cheaper to maintain.

Now it’s time to decide on which herbs to plant. The easy way is to make a list of the ones that follow your theme. Make up your wish list in three columns. Column one is the absolutely must have plants, Column two will be the ones that would be nice to have and Column three is oh well, not necessary. If you’re just starting out do between 5-10 herbs, (depending on your space). This makes the herb gardening more manageable.

Know which herb plants or annual or perennial, and make a note of them so you won’t forget. A small spiral notebook is a good place to make comments on the care of each of your herbs. Situate each plant according to height for maximum enjoyment of your herb garden.

Lastly keep them well fed and give them lots of love and you will a beautiful herb garden that is multi-purpose. You get to plant the herb garden, watch it flourish, and then you get to harvest it for whatever your purpose was: Culinary, Medicinal, Fragrance or Cosmetic.

Happy Planting!

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Through the centuries, various techniques on meditation have been developed by its practitioners. Some of them branch out from original religious meditative rituals, while some adopt new philosophies as taught by their founders. Here are some variations in the techniques that are used by persons who practice meditation.

Descartes Meditation

            This meditation describes the principles and philosophical thoughts by renowned philosopher and scholar Rene Descartes. Descartes lived in 1596 to 1650, and is considered to be the father of western philosophy. His interests also lie in the field of science and mathematics, with a number of notable contributions to knowledge pool of the world.

Descartes meditation was written around 1647 as an outline of the philosophies he taught. There are six parts to this meditation, each analyzing various aspects of the school of thought by Descartes. At present, these meditations are available in books and audio tapes, as well as podcasts.

          In the first part of this technique, Descartes tries to reanalyze everything that he believed in ever since he was a child to establish truth in science. As a youngster, Descartes was already skeptical about the world around him. In the second part, Descartes’ theory with regards to the real nature of the human mind is expounded, and he introduces a theory called representationalism, which, in simple terms basically means “a person’s consciousness verifies his existence.” Descartes explains that the human mind is more easily understood than the body.

The third part of Descartes meditation states that there are three classifications of thoughts, and they are volitions, affections and judgement. In this third meditation, Descartes also stresses that God exists. In the fourth part of Descartes’ meditation, Descartes basically raises the following questions: If God, who is perfect, is the source of everything that is on earth, then why are there wrongdoings in this world? In the fifth part, Descartes says that all his knowledge of the truth and everything else came from God. And the sixth part of this technique concludes that these three things exist: God, self, and other material things.  According to him, these are what reality is comprised of.

Mindfulness Meditation

            Mindfulness meditation is like an anti-self destruct form of meditation, most especially when one is faced to deal with life’s stressful situations. Negative emotions such as anger, disappointment, frustrations and stress are harmful to us and our health, that’s why this meditation helps us in being healthy. Instead of avoiding those stressful situations, mindfulness meditation allows us to face and accept them and solve them by using a sound mind.

          Mindfulness meditation is done without having to concentrate on one certain thought or object. One simply allows his thoughts to parade through his mind, whether they are positive or not. As the thoughts pass through, the meditation practitioner does not allow himself to react, judge, or analyze what the thoughts mean. This practice should not be confused with concentration meditation, which requires the intent focus on a particular point in order to meditate clearly.

As requested. No Music. Raw Footage taken by me with a Flip Video camera.

As I sit in the presence of this sacred space I wonder which of the elders that I have known over the years has indeed manifested what they’ve traveled in body, mind and soul for. How many have learned through trial and error, through doctrines found true and some false, or many without substance of meaning…

As I look through the timelines of what man has accomplished in material wealth or deeds of general progress of science even, I look hard to find an equated source of how spirituality has evolved.

Today there is much of a division of who is right, and what is classified as wrong. You don’t believe me? Look: She or he is Baptist, Buddhist, a Wiccan, A Psychic, a witch, one is Jewish, there goes a Vodun Priestess, it’s about Scientology, come join the Hare Krishna’s, steer away from her hark there goes a Muslim, oh look here comes another Christian, better look out for those Kabalic followers and so on…

If one is to take out all the bull out of religion and stick to the facts, there is little to no room for spirituality. No room for finding the spiritual source of what one needs to find because my dear…it ain’t in neither man nor woman….

I am not suggesting that you hand up your beads, your tarot cards, nor your crosses, but just to remember spirituality is about growth of the God within and not the bureaucratic fellowship of what ever it is that you have chosen to follow. It is true that we as humans feel the need that a system is not worth working with unless it’s got some sort of order. If the order be true and proper in it’s sense of worth, then all your predecessors will reach nirvana before each of his or her death through the teaching they rather only you follow.

I must say that there are too many cooks in the kitchen of spirituality at the moment as through time over the many centuries we as humans tend to just reincarnate from the beginning each time, hence the lack of growth and absence of evolution.
So what is the best approach to spiritual evolution?

1. Start with self. If there is a reason that you have chosen your religion and or spiritual direction. Ask yourself why and what your initial goals where and why… Just a diet. Set goals for yourself. Be disciplined and very dedicated to all that you want to work towards. From the top down. Take a good look at your leader, your teacher… it’s not to say if he or she isn’t at the spiritual level you think they should be at, they may still be able to help direct you into the correct path until your journey begets you a proper teacher. However, set a limit on your journey with your present teacher so that you don’t waste either of your time.

So is there really absence of spiritual evolution or am I just too blind to see it? Well to pose an answer to my question and to justly provide the statement. “Yes” at the moment, humanity has directed spirituality into a bureaucratic submission rather than working through it to guide us to where we should collectively be. Spirituality truly isn’t about control, (now that would be politics) spirituality is about becoming ONE. From what I stand corrected, we’ve indeed evolved spiritually to become diverse, very divided. Hummmm, what is the saying…”united we stand….” You know the rest. I guess to evolved doesn’t necessarily mean to progress into a certain direction other than to progress, to grow. Do you see your path evolving where you think it should?

Mona Magick
http://www.MonaMagick.com

Image taken on 2007-06-10 09:29:00 by Vasanthakumar.