Originally published on Photoblog by Gethin Thomas DECEMBER. 11, 2020
I did suggest in my first Wands post that there may be a follow up, so here it is. Having written up my first Wands post I have had it playing on my mind that I must own a wand. I promised myself that I would seek out the Wand Salesman next time I went to Totnes Market, and that is where I found myself today, having had my attempt foiled last week when the car keys failed.
I foolishly neglected to ask him his name because to be fair he did most of the talking, so much so that I ended up buying two Wands as I felt I may need a spare because you cannot have too much of a good thing. In researching this post I found a very interesting blog featuring Mr Green the Wand Seller.
You have to boot up your wand when you first get it home, there was a word he used which I forget but boot up gives you the general gist of it. The wand comes in a neutral state and you have to impart your thoughts and feelings into it, only good thoughts and happy feelings, it is a bit like charging up your phone when you take it out of the box. Once charged up it has latent potential to heal.
This is all in my words based on what I was told. Then when you are feeling down you hold the wand and it imparts the good thoughts and happy feelings back to you, altering your mood and allowing you to think more clearly.
I wonder if there is any merit in this idea, having encountered the increasingly used CBT treatments now recommended for mental health , anxiety etc. CBT or Cognitive Behavioural Therapy is a technique of training your thought processes away from negative thoughts and there are some theories that certain mental health problems can be caused or exacerbated by the mind getting into bad habits as it were and overly focusing on negative thoughts. Can the mind suffer from bad posture just like bad physical posture of the body which can lead to very real pain?
Could it be that a talisman or object like this wand for example could be used as a mind training device by giving the patient a tangible object to hold that symbolises their abstract thoughts.
I give you one example that I experienced many years ago of overcoming an anxiety with the power of the mind. I had to have an MRI scan and at that time the scanners were a dark narrow tunnel that you were inserted into, nowadays they are a doughnut shape so that there is light at the end of the tunnel so to speak. I was really not looking forward to this machine so decided I would keep my eyes shut and visualise a favourite cycle ride I had done many times through the countryside near where I lived. Before the scan I practised closing my eyes and visualising the route in as much detail as I could conjure up, in particular concentrating on recreating large open vistas, familiar views, and imagining the cool breeze on my face. I retraced every part of the route, drawing trees, and farm gates in my head, even imagining bird song to fill the experience as full of details as I possibly could to occupy all my senses. My idea was that time would pass quickly and it would stop me being aware of the close confines and the loud noise, but it was a real mental effort and I knew I would have to keep it up right until the end otherwise I might reappear suddenly in the present, inside the machine, and panic.
I had one slight incident which nearly threw me off track, when I was slid into the machine with my eyes closed. My arms were placed across my chest and stomach, and they suddenly brushed the side of the machine immediately indicating how tight the space was. It was such a close thing so early on in the scan that my efforts nearly failed. But I instinctively drew my arms in tight so they were not touching the sides and I started out on my cycle ride. It worked, just, and that was a great lesson in life for me as to how powerful the mind can be. Of course that works both ways and it also proves how destructively powerful your own mind can be too.
My Wand is made of Jasper, a beautiful red colour and it also has a chip of Malachite in it.
Every purchase comes with a pretty little bag, each bag has a small slip of paper inside that reads, ‘You are a member of the Wishing the World Better Club.’
Nice - a wand seems to be, as with many talismans, whatever you want it to be and of what you make it. And, it's quite attractive. When I hiked the forests of Western North Carolina, I would pick up stout branches and carve away the bark, making them hard, shiny staves or walking sticks - they helped me carry the sense of place wherever I went.