Author:
Qjure
Book:
Wadstories 1
Type:
Remedy
Chapter:
DIOMEDEA EXULANS
DIOMEDEA EXULANS The magnificent albatross
I am sailing I am flying
I am sailing I am lying
Home again Home again
Across the sea Across the sea
Stormy waters Stormy weathers
To be near you To be near you
To be free To be free
During the boat trip we did a proving with Diomedea Exulans 200K obtained at Pharmacie M. Goyens, 2 Rue A. Bequet, Namur in Belgium (tel. 8745242, fax 874752). Most of the homeopaths and all of the crew took the remedy on Tuesday august 29th. We recorded physical symptoms, dreams, sensations and the atmosphere of the gathering. The following was noteworthy.
Physical symptoms
Vertigo: light feeling in the head, swaying sensation Head: pain above the eyes; pain deep behind the eyes.
Head: pain occiput; pressing pain inward occiput; pain occiput extending to vertex; glowing sensation forehead left; pain forehead right; stitching forehead right; heavy sensation forehead right; pain forehead.
heaviness of head.
Face: pain mastoid; cold wind sensation; twitching left cheek.
Throat: lump in throat.
Stomach: tension in stomach; feeling of anticipation; fear in stomach/abdomen (a primal fear of life).
nausea; sensation of vomiting (without feeling bad); eructations.
Rectum: flatus; diarrhoea at 6 o'clock; constipation.
Chest: feeling of openness and burning love for life in the chest; oppression in chest; pressing sensation sternum.
Extremities: pain in wrist (ulna side)(left more than right); tendency to drop things; - Is Diomedea a remedy for R.S.I. (Repetitive Strain Injury)?- circumscribed spot pain in right upper leg; tingling in legs; warm feeling in legs; wound left heel; heavy sensation in leg (right more than left).
perspiration fingertips; right hand colder than left.
Skin: papular eruption on wrist, hand and feet (back of) with honey like Discharge.
Sleep:yawning; sighing; sleeplessness and sleeping as a block.
Generals: shaking from fear; cold sensation; shivering from coldness.
Mind
Dreamy, not focussed, distracted, confused, misty in the head, unreal sensation, confusion loses his way in well known streets.
Restlessness ameliorated by closing eyes.
Themes of the remedy
1 Freedom
Vision of the statue of liberty. Some provers had a flying sensation. Feeling of freedom even in a group.
2 Connection and Isolation
One prover had no contact with the feeling of other people.
On the other side departing is difficult (in a provers dream and in reality). Vision of masks. The owl as symbol of intimacy. Feeling of vulnerability in the contact with others.
Wanting to be seen as an individual.
3 Loneliness
Being alone is painful (in a provers dream).
On the other hand many provers had a feeling of being more easily themselves in this group than in other comparable circumstances. Feeling of being unnoticed in the group, of not being
an individual, a nobody in a big family. Loneliness in youth. Homesickness.
4 Endless, timeless, stillness
Feeling of being endless and timeless in the water.
Vision of sunset in India, the transition of livelihood to stillness.
The polarity is setting boundaries. And the entrapment in a very small box-like house in a dream of a prover is the opposite of endlessness.
5 Peace
Sensation of peace. Sensation of serenity. Sensation of a fan-shaped restful energy.
6 Sudden interruption
Sudden changes of atmosphere were noted, for example from seriousness to laughter. Suddenly
a sail manoeuvre, a waterspout, or another incident would interrupt the ongoing.
Dream of a bicycling accident. Suddenly there is intrusion by others (see seduction and intrusion). Sudden change at sunset. But all the changes were with flexibility and care. The group always came back on unfinished matters.
7 Ascension
Shortly after the remedy was distributed, during a short meditation a waterspout interrupted
the serene atmosphere. Fan-shaped sensation. A sensation of heavy lightness. The statue of liberty was seen as image. The whole atmosphere was light and elevated as if we were all functioning on a higher level. Dream of being in love.
8 Crooked
Sensation as if two sides of the body do not fit, as if there is a torsion. Seeing oblique lines, like reed swaying in the wind.
The waterspout coming from the sky. Association with a double helix.
9 Group and boundaries
The group is threatened by intruders. Taking one's stand is a theme. Saying no to intruders. Intrusion by phallus. Feeling of vulnerability in the group. Feeling of vulnerability and loneliness on deck. Dream of stopping the killing of an Arabian woman (with a knife).
10 Lost children
A book about a black boy who wants to go to the Eskimo’s. There is a dream about a child that
does not belong to the family. A book about adopting a Nepalese daughter. A black child playing with a white child (Sabian Symbol card).
11 Father
The father theme was stirred up in different provers: death of the father, father as dykerevee.
the forgotten birthday of a father.
12 Androgyny
Unicorn as symbol of androgyny. The roles of men and women were not strictly divided.
13 Laughter and quacking
Many bursts of laughter; fits of giggles; animated and loud conversation; we made as much noise as the quacking seagulls.
14 Seduction and intrusion
Four girls on the quarterdeck were seducing. A man on the boat alongside was claiming a kiss for a mussel. Overriding boundaries was a common theme. The unicorn as a symbol of the phallus is part of this.
15 Death and fire
Seeing two dead animals on a stroll (a dead seagull and a dead cat). Girls spitting fire. The fire
in the hand of the statue of liberty.
The one liner summing up the sensation of Diomedea could be:
I am a poor lonesome cowboy and a long, long way from home or the word: Gringo.
About the bird.
The albatross family consists of many different birds varying in size and appearance (colour and beak shape). Nine of the thirteen species live in the southern seas, near Antarctica.
Diomedea Exulans, the wandering albatross, is the largest albatross with a wingspan up to 12 feet (3,24 meter). It is nearly totally white; a few dark spots on back and wings stress the alabaster impression. Youngsters are of a brown colour and mature in five years. At seven they are usually sexually mature. The bird has webbed feet and needs a long take off run. The albatross glides more than that it flies, gaining height against the wind and gaining speed by turning around, in a plunge downwards to the sea where the bird fishes its food by ducking its head and curved beak in the water. When the wind is strong, the wings are bent backwards in the wrist joint. It eats sea animals, squid or garbage from ships. The albatross breeds in nests in the mud, laying one big white egg, eventually coloured with red markings on the obtuse pole. It takes eighty days to brood the eggs, and the male and female take turns sitting on it intermittently for ten to twenty-one days. The male bird is the first to start breeding. The chick is fed with vomited food. After nine months the young albatross (Exulans) can fly. The total cycle thus takes eleven months. The big birds only breed once in two years. During their sabbatical year they fly but not incessantly. The newest research (Nature 31-8-2000) places these wandering birds each in their own sector of the sea. It is important to know more about the behaviour of these magnificent birds, because they are threatened by fishing with bait.
The Rhyme of the Ancient Mariner
This beautiful ballad by Samuel Coleridge, written in 1798, marked the beginning of the romantic period in literature characterised by idealism and love of freedom in contrast to the rationalism of the eighteenth century. Back to nature, feeling and simplicity was the device. While Wordsworth wrote about daily life, Coleridge painted the supernatural, bringing the reader to a 'willing suspension of disbelief '. The poem is about an old sailor who tells a story to a reluctant young listener, a tale of a boat run aground on the ice of Antarctica and surrounded by fog. The old sailor shoots down an albatross against the will of the crew. But the fog dissolves suddenly and everyone rejoices. But now the ship is cursed and as it drifts to equator, the water supplies run short and thirst torments the crew. As a punishment the dead albatross is hung around the shoulder of the old sailor. Despite the windless weather a ghost ship appears, a skeleton representing Death at the rudder. He is accompanied by Death in Life, a white female figure. The two play dice and Death wins the crew. Death in Life comes to own the old sailor who does not die of thirst but is doomed to survive. In his loneliness he starts to see the beauty even of slimy sea snakes, and by this repentance the spell is broken and the ship brought back to England by the spirit of the crew. There the ships sinks, a hermit then rescues the old sailor. The rest of his life the old sailor is condemned to tell his story.
The poem is about the conflict between dark and light, about the albatross as an omen, repentance and penitence and the transformation with the help of ‘higher forces’ to freedom.
Archetype of the albatross
The albatross is a bird of omen, not only of ill omen like in the poem of S. Coleridge. To have an albatross around one's neck is a phrase depicting trouble and bad luck. But the bird doesn't only represent ill fate.
As it takes seven years for the bird to mature sexually, the albatross stands for a cycle of seven years in which groundwork and education can prepare one for the coming years. The albatross can live to be seventy years of age, reflecting the success after proper maturity. The albatross is a bird of sea, the ancient archetype of creativity, inspiration, mothering and nurturing energies.
Patience is another symbol of the bird. People who have an albatross as totem are dreamers, wandering from job to job, without goals or direction. But inspiration and success come if searching is continued. It is all about conserving and using one's energy in the most beneficial manner. Without some commitment one will never succeed.
Diomedes
Diomedes, son of Tydeus was the ruler of Thraskus in the north of Greece. He violated the holy duty of hospitality in a terrible manner, feeding guests to his four wild merries. Herakles liberated the mares, dug canals so that sea water streamed in the land and in the end served Diomedes himself as a meal to his mares. Before this unhappy ending Greek mythology tells us about Diomedes (or is this another ruler with the same name?) fighting in the Trojan wars, killing many with his spear. He hits Aineias in the hip with a colossal stone. But his mother Aphrodite protected Aineias. The insolent Diomedes dared to go after Aphrodite and injured her wrist with his spear. From this wound the blood of the gods flowed, the 'ichoor'. Diomedes had a grudge against Aphrodite because Helena whom he worshipped had let him down. Aphrodite was saved by Apollo. But Diomedes was so possessed that he fought the Greek gods like a mad man.
Literature
1 Andrews T.; Animal-Wise, Dragonhawk Publishing 1999.
2 Bakker E.; Een albatroskuiken onder de trui, Volkskrant 1-7-2000.
3 Coleridge S.; The Rhyme of the Ancient Mariner.
4 Zeevogels, Thiemes natuurgids
5 Ramont S.; Mythen en sagen van de Griekse wereld, Fibula- van Dishoeck, 1979
6 Weimerskirch and Wilson R.; Nature, 31-8-2000