This autumn, I am bringing Michael Dunning to Victoria to teach his Tree of Life Class.

Michael Dunning – The Sacred Yew Tree: The Embryonic Tree of Life

Michal Dunning is coming to teach the Sacred Yew Tree and Yew Shamanism, Norse Mythology, the Yggdrasil, the Tree of Life and the relationship to humanity.   Michael’s will talk of his own experience and how he got drawn to shamanic-healing following a near – death encounter with an elemental spirit in the far north of Scotland.

A second near-death experience occurred several years later which entirely destroyed his health. Michael began to experience regular visions, prolonged out – of – body states and intense physical pain. He was finally rescued by a friend who lived in a small cottage close to a 2000 year -old, female yew tree. This marked the beginning of a ten-year period of healing and a shamanic initiation through nature, which took place under the vast enclosure of the tree.

Michael believes that the yew tree was once regarded by the indigenous shaman-healers as a great source of occult knowledge holding an ancient and embryonic language of healing and rejuvenation.

www.yewshamanism.com

Hopefully, it will be held at the Sleeping Dog Retreat Centre. http://sleepingdogfarm.ca/ on the outskirts of Victoria.

Here is the 3000 year old  British Ankerwycke Yew

The Pacific Yew ~ Things I would like you to know about our own indigenous Pacific Yew

I am bringing  awareness to and hope to do some replanting of the Pacific Yew.  With a long history of a holy and medicinal tree for the Aboriginals, the tree was seen as a trash tree by the lumber tree, and then harvested by the pharmaceutical companies for its anti ovarian cancer properties.  Five or six trees for a single dose.

It is a slow growing tree which can live up to 300 years.  Deers feed on the young trees. Here is a photo of a Pacific Yew tree in Beacon Hill Park.