Going with the Flow — meet Aileen, Priestess of Cerridwen

Going with the flow

As soon as I’ve finished writing this article, I will be chasing the sun and dashing off to spend time with three of my great loves: Cerridwen, the sea and the sunset. 

As we follow Cerridwen’s wheel of the year, we are now in the season of water. However, my love of water, its power, its energy, tend to follow me all year round. It’s one of the spaces where I can connect with Cerridwen most powerfully and deeply and it’s an elemental energy that I love learning more about. 

But I digress. My name is Aileen, and I initiated as a Priestess of Cerridwen in October 2022 by the shores of Lake Bala in Wales, after spending two years learning with Bee Helygen through her first two online Priestess of Cerridwen training spirals.  

As I look back I can see that I have always been drawn to a spirituality, a faith, a practice which was very different to the relaxed but conservative Scottish Presbyterian Christianity with which I grew up. I had a dedicated altar space as a child and loved to spend time there in silence, bringing little flowers and leaves to a central point. We spent several years on a remote farm and I would spend hours in the river, navigating to various points where there were flat rocks, cauldron pools, gentle waterfalls, and again I’d lay offerings of flowers and plants because it felt right. Latterly we lived on the shores of a Scottish loch (lake) which, I came to learn during my training, has much in common with Cerridwen’s Lake Bala in terms of geology and wildlife (both are home to particularly rare native fish).   

I first poked my nose out of the broom closet around 2016/17 and started to explore Wicca, welcoming with open arms the opportunity to work with a feminine Divine as well as other masculine deities. I bought a book on Celtic Gods and Goddesses, and kept coming back to Cerridwen. The story of Her shape-shifting journey enthralled me but what really drew me in was the sense of Her understanding of our frailties, our humanity, our flaws, our challenging, sweeping, overwhelming emotions – because She had experienced them as She sought to help Her son, Morfran. 

At first I didn’t think it would be possible to work with Cerridwen because I am Scottish, and She is Welsh. But She had different ideas. As I read and explored more and more, Cerridwen’s name popped up everywhere – or I would find people who were working with Her. 

I first visited Glastonbury in 2019 and found leaflets and posters everywhere advertising ‘Priestess of Cerridwen Training with Bee Helygen’. When I say everywhere – I mean everywhere! I first saw them in a rack of training leaflets; my shadow said it wouldn’t be possible to come to Avalon for so many weekends in the year, given the distance from where I live. I put the leaflet back. But I kept an eye on the course online. You can imagine how I felt when I discovered that Bee was offering an online option – a first, I understand, and one that made it possible for me to even dream of training as a Priestess to serve this mysterious Goddess who kept whispering to me in all sorts of ways. Without that opportunity, it is safe to say I would not be writing this article today and would have missed out on an absolutely wonderful and life-changing journey which I know will continue for the rest of my life.  

I signed up for Bee’s first online spiral, starting in September 2020. The journey ever since has felt much what I imagine that shape-shifting sequence to feel like – constantly spiralling, full of the most powerful emotions, incredible personal triumphs followed by deep shadows and back round again, evolution and transformation and, to my utmost gratitude, initiation two years later by the shores of Her lake. 

And the mention of Her lake brings me back to my love of water. The season of water, on our Cerridwen wheel, is that of clearing emotions. Of facing the overwhelming waves and storms. Of allowing the gentle current of a summer’s day to carry us joyously forward to some beautiful place. Of resting our bodies in a deep, warm bath. Of allowing the tears to course down our cheeks and through our heart and soul in whatever form they need to, be it rage, sorrow, joy. And in all of it, cleansing, moulding, clearing, washing away all that no longer serves, but washing in something different, something better. 

As one with empath and highly sensitive tendencies, I value very deeply the power of water to help me manage and work with feelings, emotions and energies which may otherwise overwhelm or swamp me. I remember the message of the season, the alchemy of Cerridwen and water, and the magic it will work in me if I will but go with its flow, whatever pace and form that may be. Sometimes it’s in the shape of a good cry; other times it’s a still pool; yet others, only a storming, drenching waterfall will do. 

At the times when I need to really, deeply connect with Cerridwen I go and stand in the sea you see in the picture at the top and talk with Her. There is an island out to sea; like Cerridwen, she appears to be a mistress of shape-shifting as she never looks the same twice. Sometimes she looks close enough to reach out and touch. Other times she is distant and not-quite-there, masked by the mist and the sea-spray. Always, though, she takes the form of the Goddess in the landscape and between Her form and the cleansing powers of the waters in which I gratefully rest, I am restored. 

Aileen

 

Aileen initiated as a Priestess of Cerridwen in October 2022, by the shores of Lake Bala. She is the Scabbard-Bearer for the Cerridwen Kin and available for sacred listening to help you clear any challenging emotions you may be experiencing. She lives on the wild west coast of Argyll in Scotland but you can find her on Instagram at @crone_in_training or on Facebook at @Sounds Fyne