May 2013 - Belstone
- alifedivined
- May 26, 2013
- 4 min read
A Second Anniversary - and a New Direction on Dartmoor
International Dowsing Day, 2013
Belstone, near Okehampton, UK
Belstone isn’t the sort of place you come across by mistake. Being up a cul-de-sac, off a side-road, is an excellent way of preserving an awareness of the slightly different - and, more importantly, the sense of a special place.
Participation in the second International Day of Dowsing (IDD) was seized upon by new Chair of the Devon Dowsers , Paul Gerry, as a fresh opportunity for an outing for an established group in transition. We in the Tamar Dowsers (TDs) invited ourselves along - and it was the first time in many years that the area’s two Local Groups had managed a joint outdoor dowsing session.
Not only were we marking (what would have been) the 86th birthday of Hamish Miller, who inspired a whole generation of modern dowsers, but we were also celebrating the birthday of Angie, partner of Paul - which seemed rather appropriate. The IDD itself, brought in to existence by Yorkshire dowser Mike Barwell last year, seeks to promote awareness of the ancient craft in the modern media, and provides a focus for the whole dowsing community to come together on a set day at a set time. Anyone who has ever tried to co-ordinate a dowsing event will know that this is no mean feat. Dowsers are, by nature, inherent individualists, for whom the concepts of time and space are formless mysteries.
To get the show on the road, Winkleigh Morris - a mixed border side - danced outside the village pub, The Tors Hotel. This not only ensured that the proceedings started in a colourful and traditional style, but enabled the meaningful dowsing to commence straight away.
Prior to the arrival of the Morris, I had examined a number of energy lines in the vicinity, and chose a couple that would be directly under the feet of the dancers and their accompanying musicians. Over the years, I have become fascinated by a phenomenon, which Hamish sent out into the public realm, that ‘the earth is listening’ - that there seems to be a dowsable, measurable interaction of the people with their planet. One of the best places to carry out this pseudo-scientific experiment is in full public view at a ceremony (such as those performed at the previous week’s Beltane Sunrise) or at a cultural event, such as a dance and/or musical performance. Morris Dancing outside a pub is as good a laboratory as you could wish for, for this purpose – and I found that the initial widths of the two chosen lines were 6 paces and 9 paces across respectively.
Following the conclusion of the Morris, those same lines had expanded to 10 and 16 paces wide. This was, doubtless, partly in response to the activity of the dowsers, but also partly due to the activity of the artists. As, to the best of my knowledge, only one of the dancers is also a dowser, and the others were only there for the fun of it, it would be a massive leap of judgment to conclude that the dancing and playing had deliberately inserted energy into the natural matrix of energy lines. The intent was simply not there - unlike at a religious ritual which, it could be argued, at least incorporates the intent of communicating with the intangible. Yet the expansion occurs, often with very variable results, and the phenomenon is demonstrably real.

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