 | Will is a Shaman and student of the Occult and Esoteric Arts, he was born on the Full Moon Lunar Standstill in 1987 in the West-Midlands. His parents were both Priests of the Anglican church and originally of Jewish descent, bringing Will immediately into the world of spirituality and ceremony. With a liberal religious upbringing, Will has dedicated much of his life to the study of alternative spirituality, world religions and philosophy. Will was brought up and educated in Newcastle upon Tyne in the North-East of England. At the age of twelve he began his study and training in the Witchcraft tradition, Tarot, and the Pagan religions of Europe; this quickly became the central focus of his energy. As well as his study of the ‘Craft’, Will also spent much of his teenage years training as an actor and working in theatre. At sixteen Will was invited to take part in the Oak Dragon Camp. This was his first exposure to other Pagans, to the concepts of group-process and perhaps most importantly, to the world of Shamanism. After being taken through a Shamanic Initiation process at this first Camp, Will was invited by Simone Silverpath to enter into a two-year training at the Coventina School of Shamanic and Creative Arts Therapy. This pivotal moment would change Will’s life forever; it brought an end to a potential career in theatre, as Will chose to dedicate his life to Shamanism and the Craft. |
At the same time as his training in Shamanic Therapy, Will undertook a two-year training in Acting at Newcastle Performing Arts Academy and a year of training in Humanistic Counselling Skills at Newcastle’s Kenton Community College. This combination lead him to write two dissertations on ‘The Relationship Between Shamanism, Theatre and Psychotherapy’ and ‘Shamanic Archetypal Sociodrama’ – a new therapeutic technique of Will’s own design. Will also spent much of this period involved in a Psycho-Analytical ‘Encounter Group’ where he participated in and observed further, the concepts of psychological and sociological group-process. Between the ages of sixteen and nineteen, Will continued his relationship with the Camp Scene, teaching workshops on Shamanism at Oak Dragon and Rainbow2000 Camps, and participating as part of the Tipi Valley Sweat Lodge Crew at the Big Green Gathering festival. After the 2005 Oak Dragon Camp, Will was asked to co-focalise with Ros Briagha for the following season. This was the beginning of a strong bond and working relationship between the two practitioners. In September 2006, Will travelled to Australia, where he spent three months living in the Rainforests of northern New South Wales and three months in Melbourne, Victoria. During this period in the Rainforest, Will spent time with the Aboriginal Bunjulung Tribe, observing their rituals and ceremonies. He then travelled onto the Rainbow Temple where he spent two months living in and working for the Temple, before going on retreat and spending a month in solitude in his jungle hermitage. During his time alone in the Rainforest, Will underwent a long period of extreme Shamanic Trance ceremonies, using a variety of techniques which led him to the vision of creating the Oak Dragon School of Initiation into the Mystery Traditions on his return to Great Britain. Will then spent a further three months in Melbourne where he continued his practice as a Shaman and Tarot Reader, before returning to Albion in April 2007 where, with the enormous help and support of Ros Briagha, the Oak Dragon School was founded at Elfane, West Wales. | |
 | Ros Briagha has spent the last 30 years working in the field of the occult, after becoming interested in astrology and Tarot when introduced to them by a friend in 1974. She worked at the first Festival of Mind, Body and Spirit at Olympia, with Russell Grant, and set up a branch of the British Astrological-Psychic Society, where speakers came to talk on various aspects of the occult, as well as teaching her own classes in astrology, from 1976. She then joined a Alexandrian coven, and became its High Priestess for 7 years, during which time she and the High Priest, her partner Bel Bucca, moved to Wales and set up the first open pagan celebrations of the Eight Festivals. In 1984 she attended a gathering in Glastonbury, which lead to her involvement in the first Glastonbury Camps, and then Oak Dragon, where she became managing director at the end of the first season, and had a major influence on the development of the camp scene, always encouraging a friendly connection between the different camps. She sponsored the first Peace through the Arts camp, by providing them with an Oak Dragon site and equipment, and encouraged the Unicorn camps too. Teaching Astrology has been an ongoing theme of Ros’s work, at camps and at her home, Elfane, and she has also tried to bring into being a modern form of ceremony, based on her Wiccan background, but open to the participation of all, including children and those on other spiritual paths. There have been many ceremonies at Elfane, and at camps, and these have been important Rites of Passage for those involved. |
Another form of ceremony that Ros has been deeply involved with has been the Sweat Lodge, which she first encountered through Brian Mongere, the founder of the Kings Hill community at Glastonbury, who lived on the land at Elfane for a year, working his Earth Dragon project, creating Sacred Space within the landscape. This concept was brought to Tipi Valley, a community in west Wales, and she went on to do many sweat lodges there, and eventually moved to the Valley, in 1996. During her time there, she learnt much about the realities of astronomy and geomancy, living on the land and under the light of the Sun and Moon, and shared in many a wonderful tribal celebration. | |
