TRAVEL ACCOUNT 2025 – 2026
PART 1, “The Sacred Centre”
It is still foggy as I drive into Abrantes in the morning. I have arranged to meet Marcel there, a dear friend I have known for over 30 years. We have travelled extensively together over the years; to Israel, Egypt, Rwanda, Ethiopia, Tanzania, etc., always in the service of ‘the goddess’. Marcel lives in the east of Portugal, close to the Spanish border; I am from Tomar. Due to a rail strike, we decide to meet halfway, somewhere easily accessible by car for both of us: Abrantes. I remember the place as a rather large industrial town on the Tagus, the great river that flows right through Portugal from east to west. However, when I follow the sat-nav into the heart of the town to look for a parking space, I get lost in the narrow alleyways. Apparently, the heart of the city is much older than I thought. When I’ve parked the car and open my phone, I see the time: it’s exactly 11.11.
When I meet Marcel on a small terrace, the last wisps of mist are rising. Slowly, the sun breaks through. It’s lovely to see each other again, catch up, and hear each other’s stories. Marcel tells me what life is like in the countryside where he has settled, at the foot of an ancient mountain. He has been living there with Monique for over three months now, during which time they have taken their first steps into Portuguese life.
I talk to him about the trip to the Amazon that Anne and me just made. We did a ceremony with more than 500 groups, paralel to the Climate Conference in Brasil. It was an amazing but very tyring experience. I’m trying to do absolutely nothing for a while, I tell him. Resting, looking back, no new adventures or making plans. “Anne and I have even taken out a Netflix subscription so we can binge-watch. We’ve just started the Turkish series Atiye.”
Marcel looks at me with a twinkle in his eye. He knows the series. It’s about a young woman, Atiye, who discovers she is a priestess of the ancient Mother Goddess. As an artist, she has been painting a symbol all her life that leads her to Göbekli Tepe, the ancient temple near Urfa, the city of Abraham. All sorts of aspects of Turkey’s mystical history are explored, as are many sacred sites and special locations. The series jumbles all sorts of spiritual elements together, a sort of mix of The Da Vinci Code and Outlander, but it’s an enjoyable way to pass the time. One of the symbols is the eight-pointed star, which guides the young woman on her path. ‘Why not a seven-pointed or five-pointed star? Eight makes no spiritual sense,’ I think as I watch the series.
Once we’ve finished our coffee, we decide to go exploring. Abrantes seems to have much more to offer than we first thought. It turns out there’s an old Templar castle in the town, and like two old Knights of the Grail, we set off.
It feels as though we were meant to meet in this town that morning. I take a photo of Marcel sitting against a sculpture of a large eight-petalled flower. As we walk past the town hall, I suddenly freeze in my tracks. ‘Hey, that’s bizarre. The town of Abrantes has an eight-pointed star as its symbol!’
Marcel laughs. ‘Ton, you know how it works. That’s no coincidence. We’re being guided.’
‘Yes, but I thought I’d had a bit of a break. I’ve just come back from the Amazon. I’m still processing the jungle and all the stories from COP30 in Brazil. And now the star seems to be leading us to the next story already.’
‘Isn’t the next Climate Conference in Turkey?’ asks Marcel. ‘COP31?’
‘Yes, that’s right.’ I look at him doubtfully. What do Turkey, an eight-pointed star and Göbekli Tepe have to do with one another?
‘It seems Turkey is already calling,’ he says.
I think back to two journeys I once made through eastern Turkey. With a small group, we travelled to Mount Ararat. (see: ‘The Masters of Shambhala’) On the way, we passed through Diyarbakir, the capital of the Kurds; we were almost robbed on the banks of the Tigris; we visited the ancient city of Van, the former capital of the Armenians, we learnt about the Armenian genocide, and how the Armenian empire was ultimately decimated. They were intense journeys and I remember that Turkish history had quite a few dark sides. I’m not exactly itching to return there. But all right, there is a star guiding us.
Once we’ve reached the highest point of the city, we arrive at the entrance to the castle. ‘Hey, that’s strange,’ I say to Marcel. ‘I know this castle; I’ve been here before. A few years ago, with Anne. I didn’t know it was here.’ The memory slowly comes back. It was our first few days in Portugal and we were driving along the N2 through the centre of the country. It was winter and the castle was deserted. We hadn’t found our place yet and didn’t even know of the existence of the Knights Templar in Portugal.
As Marcel and I stand atop the castle tower, we look out over the whole area: the River Tagus flowing from the mountains in the east to the ocean in the west; the region to the south of it, the ‘Alentejo’, and to the north the territory of the Knights Templar of Tomar. Abrantes is a crossroads of all kinds of roads, a sort of centre of Portugal. A railway line runs past the town, as does the GR12, a long-distance walking route.
‘I remember doing a channelling here back then,’ I tell Marcel. I look it up on my phone. ‘Here: Abrantes, 24 February 2022. That was almost four years ago. ’ We sit down in the sun against the castle wall and listen to the recording.
“You are on this quest that is connected to the greater story unfolding on Earth. Be aware of that. It might seem as though you are travelling through fog or empty space, but every detail is important to look at, to be aware of. Here you are at the centre.
You could call it the centre of the compass. Here you have a view in all directions, a 360-degree perspective on things. That means you cannot take sides, you cannot do this or that, up or down. You must remain in the centre and hold all the energies together, bridging the extremes. Holding the sacred centre and connecting the vertical line between heaven and earth.
It is also true of your own journey, your own compass: that you need to remain very focused on your own centre point. Then the path will reveal itself naturally. Everything takes place within you. The outer world is merely a reflection, a mirror of what is happening on the world’s canvas.’
‘Do you know how long this recording lasted?’ I ask Marcel. ‘Eleven minutes and eleven seconds… 11:11.’
PART 2
“It is there where the eight paths meet”
After my meeting with Marcel, the eight-pointed star becomes a kind of beacon of light in the dark days around Christmas. The star appears everywhere. When Anne and I run a Christmas workshop around the winter solstice in Orval, the eight-pointed star becomes a central theme. Everyone has their own associations with it.
When I draw a tarot card, I see the image of the goddess Astarte. She stands beneath ‘the eighth gate’ in ancient Babylon. The eight-pointed star is her symbol. Astarte is related to a series of other mother goddesses: the Greek Meter, or ‘The Mother’, the Phrygian goddess Matar, who was worshipped in ancient Thrace (central Turkey), and the goddess Cybele, who was worshipped around the Black Sea. The mother goddess is the protector of seafarers and travellers, and brings new life, fertility and abundance. Cybele does not have two breasts, but her entire torso is covered in breasts.
A later goddess related to her is Aphrodite, the goddess of love from the Greek pantheon. They all seem to be names and representations of the same primordial goddess. The eight-pointed star is an image of Venus (or Sirius?), and becomes an important motif in Islamic art and religion. Everything they design – from fountains, buildings, decorations, calligraphy – is based on the number eight. Whereas Jewish tradition uses the six-pointed star – the Star of David or Solomon – and Wicca often uses the five-pointed star, Islam uses the eight-pointed star. It seems a remnant from a distant, mystical past in which the goddess was worshipped, rather than the later father-god.
I think back to Abrantes, the town in the centre of Portugal, where I found an ancient statuette of the ancient mother goddess in the local museum, made of polished obsidian. The statue is meticulously crafted and dates from the 8th millennium (!) BC. It could well be the oldest artefact in the whole of Portugal. Most likely, it was brought over by the first peoples who sailed from the Black Sea towards the Portuguese coast and founded the first European cities there: Lisbon and Porto. The black goddess was worshipped there too: her name was Cale.
When the Romans changed the city’s name from ‘Cale’ to Porto, the name of Portugal was born: Porto-Cale. The word Cale still appears in all sorts of words: Galicia, Gauls, Celts (Celtoi), the Irish Gaelic, but also in Arabic words such as Cacao, Cafe, the English Cale (cabbage), and carbon. All of them refer, to a greater or lesser extent, to the colour ‘black’, the origin of the black goddess on the Black Sea.
The Christmas workshop ends with a large, spontaneous peace ritual. The conflict between two men in the group is resolved and we decide, as men, to sit around the altar. We realise that men have the task of ending the wars and conflicts in the world, by no longer seeing one another as enemies but as brothers. The women sit around them to support and sustain the men. On the altar are eight candles surrounding a central candle in the middle. The altar also symbolises the Golden Dome of the Rock, the temple in Jerusalem. It is the longest night, and we feel how important it is that we bring the light back in these dark days.
PART 3
“Fire and Ashes”
When I go to see the film ‘Fire and Ashes’ – part 3 of Avatar – during the Christmas holidays, I am deeply disappointed. The film seems like a repeat of part 2, with whales again, flying rocks, a battle between the Na’vi and humans on boats, endless entanglements between the main characters and trite wisdom. As if they’d thrown everything from the previous Avatars into a blender and churned out another film. A shame, because I was actually interested in how the theme of fire was introduced. But that was precisely what was missing. The ‘fire people’ were rather simplistic villains and the mountain of fire was only briefly shown. Whereas the ‘Way of Water’ contained much wisdom, the fire brought only more of the same: conflict, destruction, war.
In the real world, everything seems to be more of the same too. Gaza is still the same unbearable horror, with overcrowded tents, civilians being shot at random, and aid convoys invariably being refused; the conflict in Ukraine drags on; Trump invades Venezuela and also wants to take Greenland; and Europe hardly dares to speak out, because ‘NATO’. It resembles a sluggish, drawn-out film that is becoming increasingly bogged down in its own script.
“Perhaps that is exactly what is needed,” says Agnes, whom I am visiting. I have been visiting her for years. She is eighty-eight and lives in a stately canal-side house on the Keizersgracht. “The world must first realise that things cannot go on like this. And everything fits perfectly into the bigger picture.” I don’t know if I agree with her, because sometimes I can feel a strong resistance to the way things are going,
but I also know that resistance achieves very little. I can get very worked up about it, but it doesn’t change a thing. Or does it?
Somewhere I sense the message of the Avatar series: that all indigenous tribes, all people of good will, are gathering to form an alliance. Not against one another, or against a religion, or together against a single scapegoat, but to recognise the unity of our humanity. That we are all part of the same human family.
Together with Agnes, I tune in to the guides, as we do every year to see what is on the agenda, and the following message comes through:
“In many places on earth, on sacred spots and holy mountains, there is an inner fire, a mystical fire, that contains all the memories of mankind, that transforms all experiences in history, and that changes destruction into creation. It releases pain and suffering, both on the individual level and the collective level. And it is these fires that need to be lit. The purpose is to light the beacons of sacred fire. Like the fire temples in Iran, Persia; the ancient temples in Syria, Turkey and Armenia; the sacred fires of initiation used by many shamans in South America and Africa; the mystical fires of esoteric traditions in Europe and Russia; the fire dragons in China; and many other sacred fire traditions.
Fire was given by the gods to humankind to create civilisation. But it is not merely a practical fire; it is a sacred fire, and this sacred fire contains the wisdom, the divine inspiration and the divine love that kindles the heart—that kindles the mystic heart, or the sacred heart. It is this heart that is needed to bring a new vibration into the world—the vibration of the Cosmic Christ, the vibration of Cosmic Love and Cosmic Peace.
It helps you to burn away the old memories of pain and suffering, to release trauma, to release old karma, karmic patterns of families, of countries, of nations and religions. And with the burning of the old, the phoenix of the new can rise. It is the energy of this phoenix that you will activate this coming year, but particularly on 9 November at Mount Ararat, to awaken the Nephilim and light the beacon of Urartu.
Unite the tribes, the family of men. Bring the heart back. Bring peace back into the world. And raise the flag of Unity. One family, one mankind, one planet, one earth, one heart.”
(5/1/2026)
PART 4
“The mystical tradition of the Sami”
When I want to fly back to Portugal after New Year’s to lead another men’s workshop, everything in the Netherlands has ground to a halt due to the snow. My flight is rebooked three times and then cancelled again. The only way out seems to be a flight to Helsinki, three hours north instead of south. The next day I’ll have a connecting flight to Lisbon. I ring Anne.
‘Should I really do that?’ I ask her. ‘Fly all the way up to the far north, sleep there, and then fly across the whole of Europe to get from the north-easternmost point to the south-westernmost airport?’
‘Why not,’ she says. ‘Maybe you’ve got something to do there, something to pick up. To summon the powers of the North and then take them with you to the South.’
It sounds bizarre, but I trust her insight. That evening I’m on a Finnair flight to Helsinki, or Helsingor. Due to further delays caused by the snow and the cold, I don’t arrive until 2 am. I take a taxi into the city, where I collapse into bed, exhausted, in a hotel I’ve chosen at random. Outside it’s snowing and the temperature is dropping further below zero.
When I wake up in the morning, I’m in a completely different world. Large, sombre harbour buildings, an old Orthodox church (yes, an octagonal one) towering on a rock above the land, trams driving through the dark, snow-covered streets, and here and there an (octagonal) Christmas star in the windows. It feels as though I’ve ended up in the wrong film, were it not for the fact that the star is still guiding me on my way. I put on two jumpers, button my coat up as high as possible and walk to the church, which is surrounded by water. On the way, I see two women taking an early morning dip in a hole in the icy water. I feel a vicarious cramp in my lungs as I watch them. Then I realise that the temperature is probably well below freezing. It is freezing cold and dark here. ‘Relax!’ I say to myself. You are here on a mission, even though the meaning of it still eludes me completely.
When I arrive at the church on the rock, I feel as though I am walking on sacred ground. But not the sacred ground of the Christian church, but of something much older. It seems this was once an ancient shamanic site, later Christianised by the church.
I tune in and receive the following message:
“Many people speak of the northern lights, but there is also a northern fire. It is a fire from the ground. It is what we used to warm ourselves, to bring fire into our lives, and we cherished that fire, amidst the cold, ice and snow. It is this fire that kept us alive. We knew it was connected to the northern lights, to the fires in the sky, to our home, to our ancestors. We buried our ancestors in the ground, but we knew they would return to the place we came from: Valhalla. Home of the Gods. We are still connected to that sacred place and we kept our traditions alive, because we were so isolated and far away from the – so-called – civilised world.
The ice has a message: “Things can only work in balance. If there is ice, there is fire. You must honour both as human beings to walk upon this earth. Do not forget where you came from, the place of origin. Honour the roots, honour the ancestors, honour the gods. They are closer than you think; they are part of you. Activate the inner fire and connect to the northern powers, the northern energies, the northern beacons of light.”
(7/1/2026)
When I am later picked up by the same taxi driver to take me back to the airport, he tells me: ‘The original Finnish population was animistic. This is where the Sami lived, the people of the reindeer. They revered the land, the trees, the animals, the stones and sacred places. The rock on which the church is built is probably one such sacred place. They called it ‘Seida’. Later, the Sami were conquered during the Crusades by the Catholic Swedes, who imposed the Christian faith on the people. The indigenous tradition was seemingly lost, but in the northern regions of Lapland its spirit is still preserved and revered. The wisdom of the Sami has not been forgotten, but lives on in the hearts of the people. The festival of Santa Claus, who comes from the North Pole, has its origins here.’
I look into the taxi driver’s eyes through the rear-view mirror. It wouldn’t surprise me if he himself still practised the ancient nature religion and was a descendant of the ancient people. ‘So Santa Claus is actually an ancient shaman,’ I think.
As we get closer to the airport, the sun rises above the clouds. It transforms everything into a beautiful, white wonderland. The darkness has vanished. On the news, I hear that Trump wants to take over Greenland, the ancestral homeland of the Inuit people. History repeats itself. Time and again, the white man, with God at his side, attempts to subjugate the land and culture of indigenous peoples. Perhaps this time it is time for the story to end differently…
PART 5
“Warriors of the Heart”
Eventually, I make it to Lisbon via Helsinki. I hear afterwards that many people got stuck at Schiphol. Well then, a little detour via the North Pole (or nearly so) isn’t such a bad idea after all. The men for the men’s group in Tomar are also already on their way or have arrived. We want to take a step forward with our Heart of Men team, with whom we have been 10 years, take a step forward: what does the work require of us in the coming year? We have invited a number of familiar participants to join us. A sort of retreat, but in Portugal. There are 11 of us in the end, and once we’re all gathered at The Gate – our workspace in Tomar – an intense and wondrous process unfolds. Everyone, in one way or another, encounters a sense of being stuck. Old pain, old patterns, not knowing how to move forward, waiting for deliverance.
‘We are stuck,’ says Jan. ‘It feels as though we are in a prison and cannot find the way out.’
Outside, it is bleak, wet and cold. The only solution is to turn ‘inwards’ and explore what is holding us back. Pain and sadness are shared, but so are anger and frustration. Beneath the feeling of depression and being stuck, there turns out to be a lot of pent-up energy. We arrive at ‘sacred rage’. Usually, as men, we want to escape this uncomfortable feeling immediately, but we have learnt to stay with it; not to run away, but ‘to sit in the fire.’ When we draw a group card, we get the image of a skull, death. We descend ever deeper into ourselves, and into the mystery. Letting go, surrender.
We are supported by a few of our women who are tuning in from home. ‘Let go of all the stories,’ one of them texts. And indeed; we realise that we are mainly ruminating on the past. We decide to clear away the entire altar that lies in our midst, and to dismantle everything step by step. What remains is emptiness, space. And a tiny little key inscribed with ‘gratitude’.
On the final day we gather at Anne’s and my house: The Gatekeepers’ house. We are out of prison, but there is still nothing new on the horizon. As I look around the circle, I see eleven Templars, young and old, brothers who support one another through thick and thin.
What we have to do in the coming year is by no means clear. ‘It will show itself,’ says Jan.
I realise that this year marks 30 years since ‘The Return of the King’ was published. What I wrote back then turned out to be prophetic and has lost none of its value. The world has entered a major process of initiation and the role of men in this is crucial. If we as men do not make a change, and cannot let go of our old role, we will continue to create the same misery worldwide. We need a new image of manhood: no dictators or bogeymen, no machos or conquerors, but protectors and nurturers, connectors and empaths – in short: ‘warriors of the heart’.
Whereas in 2022 we invited 1,000 women to the ceremony on Mount Sinai, I feel that this year, for ‘Earth Heart’, I particularly want to appeal to men: can we, as men, use our energy to serve the Earth rather than seeking to possess or exploit her? Can we invite young men to join with older generations in forming a brotherhood that transcends self-interest or ego, thereby re-initiating young people into the wisdom of the sacred fire?
Can we end our inner and outer wars and conflicts and, together with women, seek a life of peace and harmony on this planet, before we destroy everything?
It is set to be an exciting year, in which the planets promise a major upheaval. On 17 April, seven planets will be in the sign of Aries, symbolising war or struggle, or a new beginning and breakthrough. What will it be?
PART 6, “Be in Jerusalem on 17 April.”
The sun rises above the horizon as I take off from Rome, the Eternal City. It has been three months since I travelled from Amsterdam via Helsinki in the north to Portugal. Now I am once again making a hop, skip and jump across the European continent, this time via Lisbon and Rome to the south-easternmost tip of Europe: Cyprus. From there, the final leap to Israel. Final destination Jerusalem, and then Mount Sinai. On a mission once more.
That mission has its roots in a workshop three years ago, in the summer of 2023. I was telling the group about my work in Israel and Gaza when I suddenly burst into tears. I sensed something dramatic was coming. I could only feel that I had to go to Israel. Date: October 2023. But I didn’t go. The suicide of a very dear friend caused Anne and me to travel back to the Netherlands.
On 7 October, the bloody attack by Hamas took place, followed by an unprecedented act of retaliation by Israel. The entire Gaza Strip, with its entire population, was wiped off the map. An unimaginable horror unfolded in a small patch of land measuring 10 by 40 kilometres and spread like a dangerous and violent oil slick. No one knew how to stop the evil.
Alongside the pain and sorrow over so much suffering, I was plagued by regret. ‘I should have been there!’ I thought at night, even though I had no idea what I would have done there.
Then, three years later, I received another call. ‘Be in Jerusalem on 17 April,’ I heard in a church in Amsterdam. Given the relative calm, that seemed a possibility, but when Trump and Netanyahu declared war on Iran on 27 February, my whole plan seemed to have been scuppered once again. But I kept all options open. The ticket I had booked was cancelled, but in the meantime I checked whether there were other ways to get into Israel. Only Israeli airlines were still flying, barring the risk of Iranian missiles. I discovered a connection between Tel Aviv and the holiday island of Cyprus, where many Israelis go on holiday to escape the violence of war. I decided to take the gamble, helped by my friend Marc, who promised to come with me. So we would meet up in Cyprus and fly on from there. Miraculously, a ceasefire was declared the day after we’d booked our tickets. We were saved by the bell.
Many people, friends and loved ones are travelling with us in spirit. It seems as though everyone feels the importance of our mission, perhaps even more so than we do ourselves. Instead of the endless spiral of violence, everyone longs for peace, harmony and tolerance.
How do we stop humanity’s self-destruction?
Can we do something in Jerusalem that will turn the tide? So far, I haven’t been able to think of anything other than lighting a candle. In the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, a mosque and a synagogue. As a symbol.
Next to me on the plane, someone is watching Part 2 of The Lord of the Rings. I see the scene where Gandalf lifts the curse from King Théoden. The evil influence of Saruman and Wormtongue is already affecting Théoden’s actions, but Gandalf’s light breaks the curse. The king returns.
Perhaps that is what is needed in Israel: the lifting of a curse that keeps the Israeli people trapped in an endless cycle of victimhood, fear, revenge and violence.
It turns out we are not the only ones calling for action on 17 April. A group of shamans from the Amazon are also calling on people to come together and connect from the heart. And in Gaza, there is a call for a day of justice and human dignity. 17 April is not only a new moon, but also the holy day of the Muslims and the beginning of the Jewish Sabbath. How can we, as humanity, unite, beyond our divisions?
In Hungary, a start has already been made: Victor Orban’s autocratic regime is coming to an end after 16 years.
Whilst Marc wakes up in his little hotel in Larnaca, Cyprus, I fly east across the Mediterranean during the night. The journey has begun.
Part 7, “The Wicked Witch”
The next morning, Marc and I take a stroll through the harbour and around the old castle of Kyrenia. It was the transit port for Templars, crusaders and all manner of Venetian and Arab merchants to ship goods and merchandise from the Middle and Far East to Europe, and vice versa. Several boats are moored at the quay awaiting repair, as has been done here for centuries. We don’t have a single plan yet, apart from arriving, settling in and enjoying the country.
We drink coffee in a charming little square, and it seems as though the square reflects the whole island. A road runs through it; on one side is a Turkish café, on the other a Greek-looking coffee house, next to it a small bar run by a woman with black hair and green eyes. We opt for the latter. The morning call to prayer blares from the mosque. In front of us, across the road that divides the square in two, drive small lorries, posh cars, convertibles, old Turkish cars, trendy hire cars full of tourists, and cars that are practically mobile discos.
Everything passes by here. It’s like the conveyor belt from Mies Bouwman’s ‘Een van de Acht’ (for the older viewers among us).
Petra texts that Hilarion Castle, perched high on the mountain overlooking the coast of Kyrenia, served as the model for the castle of Snow White’s wicked stepmother. Suddenly it clicks. Isn’t the wicked stepmother the same as the ancient black goddess Cale or Caeilliach, who is depicted as an ugly old witch? The same as Maleficent from Cinderella, or the ‘Wicked Witch’ from The Wizard of Oz? The woman who is seen as evil, but who actually taps into a very different, deeper and forgotten layer of our psyche? Is that Aphrodite’s message?
Later, as I lie in bed and Marc meditates beside me, I hear the goddess’s voice.
‘You can only find me deep within yourself. Look at your deepest fears and there, behind them, I am. The woman and the goddess, the mother and the whore, the graceful and the ugly, the one who embodies both spring and winter, both birth and death. I am life itself. In the Bible, I was known as Lilith, the dark goddess. Men have always found me attractive, but at the same time they were terrified of me. Afraid of my power, of my beauty. They preferred to choose Eve, the graceful one. They preferred to worship Aphrodite, the blonde goddess of love. The dark goddess was certainly seductive, but supposedly associated with evil. It is time for you to honour me once more. In your hearts, in your minds and in your loins, for you are my children.”
Are we visiting this island – two men – to honour the feminine once more, and to speak her name, to hear her voice? To restore what has fallen out of balance? To transform the long patriarchal tradition of waging war, conquering and abusing into a new, healthy masculinity that is not afraid to honour the goddess in all her aspects? Is that the reason for our visit?
As we discuss the following evening, it seems as though we have just one thing left to do before returning to the airport: visiting the castle of Saint Hilarion, the ‘abode’ of the wicked stepmother…..
PART 8, “the castle of Hilarion”
As we drive up in the taxi, from the coast to the high peak where St Hilarion Castle towers over the island, I am struck by the beauty of the landscape. Yellow mimosa everywhere, trees in bloom, flowers, palm trees and plants in abundance. The island once rose from the ocean floor and emerged above the surface. Suddenly, something occurs to me. Could it be that Aphrodite – or Astarte or Ishtar, as she is known in older cultures – is the island of Cyprus itself, which rose from the foam of the ocean to share her beauty with us? The pearl in the shell?
Marc chats cheerfully with the taxi driver, and I find myself increasingly entranced by the island’s beauty. But it also feels as though I can hear Her voice, the voice of the goddess herself, revealing herself in all her splendour.
Yesterday we were still strolling along the promenade with all its casinos, the temptations of tinsel and power; today we find ourselves in a completely different realm. From the underworld to the realm of the gods.
The taxi driver drops us off at the castle entrance. He’ll be back to pick us up in an hour. I put on some music on my iPhone and start climbing the various staircases leading to the highest point of the castle. The deeper I go, the more I am intoxicated by the immense beauty. I once read that beauty is the Greek-Orphic path to enlightenment, alongside the Eastern path of meditation. Marc goes his own way but stays nearby.
When I reach the ‘royal apartments’, I walk inside as if I’d never left. Without realising it, I fall into a trance, and the process is difficult to describe in words. It feels as though I am experiencing a total union with the ‘divine feminine’, as though I am meeting her in her deepest secrets and taking her whispers and confessions into my heart. I think of the image of tantric union.
From the heights, we look down upon the ‘human world’, deep below us on the coast. ‘Forgiveness,’ she whispers. ‘All are my children. Everyone has their own path to reach me.’
Reaching the summit is like an apotheosis, a divine rapture, a complete fusion between the human and the divine. ‘Don’t touch me for a moment,’ I say to Marc. It
feels as though my body is under high voltage, completely absorbed in a higher vibration.
Then the descent begins, and I cry because I know I must leave this realm of unity once more. Back down, into the world. But somewhere deep down, I feel that something crucial has happened, not just for myself, but for the world. As if the feminine has been seen, heard and recognised in its very essence. And I feel how crucial that is for the unification and healing of the world.
On the way back, I read that Saint Hilarion came from a village just north of DAB in G. His nickname was ‘the Joyful’,
hence probably the word ‘hilarious’. It was only at the end of his life that he went to Cyprus, where he died. I do not know how the castle came to bear his name. But I do know that this whole detour via Rome and Cyprus to Jerusalem is not without reason. ‘Everything is in divine order,’ Jos would say, a dear friend who is now watching from the other dimension.
PART 9, “Initiation”
I once read in ‘Initiation’, the book about ancient Egypt, how people were initiated to overcome their fears and lower selves. In the temple of Sobek, the crocodile god, there was a pond full of crocodiles. The initiate had to descend via a shaft at the side of the pond, only to emerge into the pond at the bottom of the shaft. Hungry crocodiles swam above him, and his heart was filled with fear. How was he to get out of this alive? The solution was simple: swim calmly to the other side of the pond, where another shaft leads you back up. The reality, however, is different….
The past week was, in fact, exactly like this initiation. I saw all my demons of worry, powerlessness, sadness, anger and mortal fear. It began with the flight that was supposed to take Marc and me from Cyprus to Tel Aviv. The Israeli airline’s plane was full of mainly Orthodox Jews. They were all taking the opportunity to return to Israel following the ceasefire. The last two seats were for Marc and me.
‘Aren’t you afraid?’ asked the woman who checked us in. ‘Not at all,’ said Marc. But personally, I felt anything but reassured. The flight passed very close to Lebanon, and there was still no ceasefire with Lebanon. Even though the flight only lasted an hour, I was terrified. I felt not only my own fear, but that of an entire plane full of people who are used to suppressing their emotions; otherwise, life in Israel would probably be unbearable. I just hoped the plane would be back on the ground as soon as possible. Added to that was the fear that I might be stopped or sent back at check-in or at border control in Ben Gurion.
All sorts of doom-and-gloom fantasies ran through my head, from crashing planes to Israeli prisons. Marc, however, remained in good spirits throughout. ‘It’ll be fine,’ he said regularly.
Once we’d cleared customs, Eran was waiting for us with a broad smile. ‘Welcome to Israel.’ The first major hurdle had been cleared.
Eran took us to his parents’ house in Jerusalem, which is close to the Old City. The reunion with his parents was very warm. As we lay in bed at the end of the day, the good news came through: there was also a ceasefire with Lebanon. A sigh of relief swept through the whole country, and through me. How was it possible, I wondered? That, in all those weeks and months of war, we should be travelling through the country on the very days that a ceasefire was in place? I saw thoughts winking at my guide…
The next day – 17 April, the day of the new moon and the seven planets in the sign of Aries – Marc and I took a walk through the Old City of Jerusalem. This was the moment we had been waiting for to perform a ceremony. A ceremony for peace and healing. The city was exceptionally quiet and there was a convivial atmosphere. The Old City is divided into four parts: an Armenian quarter, a Christian quarter, an Arab quarter and a Jewish quarter. We wanted to connect all four quarters. We began our journey in the Armenian quarter, and were welcomed with great warmth by an Armenian priest. He took our hands in both of his, and his eyes radiated love. ‘Welcome to Jerusalem.’
We then continued on our way, through many narrow alleys, stairways and covered market streets, to the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, right in the heart of the Christian quarter. The church looked deserted and was under construction. With hardly any tourists around, it was a good time for renovation. Here too we were welcomed by a priest, who led us to a beautiful altar dedicated to the Virgin Mary. There we performed our ceremony for the Christian quarter: we lit candles that organically formed an eight-pointed star.
The Arab quarter presented itself in a very different way: in a small falafel stall where many Palestinians were eating or smoking shisha, the water pipe. A delicious lunch and a relaxed atmosphere awaited us. Even the Israeli police came here to get their falafel balls. Seated at the table next to us were four elderly Jewish men. It was clear that some people do not wish to go along with the war rhetoric and continue to put humanity first, despite everything.
Marc told us how furious his daughter was that he was going to Israel. ‘How can you?’ she asked. Understandable, because more than ever I feel how difficult it is to maintain a quiet centre in a world that is so polarised. Everyone has an opinion, a judgement, but can we still see the human being behind the judgements, whether they are Jewish, Arab or Christian? Certainly in this country, in this city, that is the ultimate challenge. Our task was to journey through this labyrinth of opinions, conflicts and trauma to the centre and light the flame there.
The path through the labyrinth led via the Via Dolorosa to the Chapel of the Flagellation of Christ, where an immense crown of thorns was depicted on the ceiling, surrounded by eight-pointed stars. We connected with all the victims of the war, and especially with the thousands of dead in Gaza. I thought of Murad and Amal, my friends who are still holding out in that ravaged patch of land. My heart was close to them, even though I could not reach them.
As we walked out of the chapel, Friday afternoon prayers at the Al-Aqsa Mosque had just finished, and thousands of Muslims were streaming into the city. Marc and I found ourselves in the middle of the crowd, on our way to the Lion’s Gate, and I almost lost Marc in the throng. Suddenly I spotted his cheerful face in the crowd, and he was chatting enthusiastically with everyone around him.
As we left the city through the Lion’s Gate, we walked to the Mount of Olives, the site of the Garden of Gethsemane, the Church of All Nations, and the Church of Mary Magdalene. In this city, you stumble across historical and religious sites, each one more significant than the last. We looked out at the ‘Seventh Gate’, which is bricked up and will only open when the Messiah appears. ‘It’s about time,’ we said to each other. ‘In this darkness, everyone is waiting for the return of the light, for this is untenable.’ The only thing we could do was light our third candle, this time for the Jewish section.
This took place at sunset, just as Shabbat began. We had, in fact, been invited to join Eran’s parents for the Shabbat dinner. Eran’s father is a rabbi and – just as on previous occasions – we were part of this ancient tradition of prayers, ceremonies and the lighting of the candles by the women of the house. Schlomit, Eran’s partner, and Raphael, their one-year-old son, were also present.
As is fitting in Jewish tradition, profound and sometimes difficult discussions are not shunned. It is only through debate and listening to one another’s viewpoints that one gains greater insight.
And so the long day drew to a close, during which we honoured the Christian, Islamic and Jewish traditions and were able to feel the essence of all three. We thought that our mission was over, but that turned out to be far from the truth. The initiation had only just begun.
PART 10, “the only way is down”
Whilst Eran, Marc and I descended from the heights of Jerusalem to the lowest point on earth, the Dead Sea, passing Jericho among other places, something quite different was happening in the Sinai. We only found out about it at the end of the day, but it would completely shape our journey. One of the participants in the planned men’s trip through the Sinai was from Colombia. His name is Fabio. Just as we were driving carefree through the Dead Sea Valley towards Sinai, he was arrested by the Egyptian police on suspicion of drug possession upon arrival in Sharm el-Sheikh. Whilst we were already in bed at our hotel in Dahab, I received a phone call from his wife Monica. Her husband was behind bars.
The next day, we gained a clearer picture of the whole story. He had brought some Traumeel homeopathic pills with him, and the police mistook them for the opioid Tramadol. Importing Tramadol carries the most severe penalty.
A rollercoaster of developments and decisions followed in quick succession. At the same time, Eran, Marc and I understood that this is part of the Open Space process: Expect the Unexpected; whatever happens is the right thing to happen. That sounds fine in theory, but what do you do when someone ends up in prison?
Meanwhile, all the other participants were steadily arriving at the hotel for a week in the Sinai. We decided that Eran would continue with the group and that I would travel to Sharm el-Sheikh to consult with the Egyptian lawyer and see what we could do. Marc would come with me and fly back from Sharm.
In the afternoon, Marc and I arrived at the courthouse in Sharm, a somewhat seedy place with even shadier characters. Fortunately, we met Mr Mohamed Abdel, the lawyer, and his younger colleague Mahmoud there. In a little café where all the men go to watch football and smoke hookah, we discussed the situation. The lawyer asked for $5,000: $2,000 for the bail, and $3,000 for his services.
By now, I had called on all the reinforcements from home, from people who could assist me legally to a network of people who were meditating to secure Fabio’s release. The help from the Dutch embassy and my bank was a huge let-down. They could do little and barely understood the seriousness of the situation.
The lawyer went back to court and managed to reduce the bail amount to $200. In negotiations with him and his partner, his fee was reduced to $2,000. Marc remained positive under all circumstances, whilst I had my reservations about everything.
We were thoroughly caught out in this country, where we had no support. We drove to the bank to withdraw money, and I transferred the fee via the bank.
This meant we could visit Fabio in prison. A large, square building loomed in the darkness of the desert. After some discussion, we were allowed inside, and there – behind a fence – we met Fabio. He was overjoyed to see us. I briefly explained the situation to him. I hoped that once the bail had been paid, they would release him on bail. All that remained was a decision from National Security, but neither the lawyer nor the court had any influence over that.
A long period of waiting began. Marc flew back the next morning; I stayed all day in a little café near the airport. Meanwhile, more and more people were tuning in.
PART 11, “the art of patience”
Now that Marc has left, I am left alone in a café at Sharm el-Sheikh airport. I wait all day for news from the lawyer. But when it gets dark, and I still haven’t heard anything, I decide to book a hotel near the prison where Fabio is being held. Fortunately, ‘Serenity Lodge’ is exactly what it says: an oasis of calm, overlooking the Red Sea. To the left and right of the lodge, endless rows of holiday resorts loom up, with rows of palm trees, restaurants, romantic apartments, karaoke and other activities for tourists. What is apparently an ideal holiday for others is a kind of hell for me. But anyway, each to their own.
I have other things to do, and am focusing on all the options available to get Fabio released. I’m receiving all sorts of advice and suggestions from lawyers, government agencies, friends and family. I’m also in daily contact with Monica, Fabio’s wife. Anne is now organising all the women to form a circle around Fabio. The most important thing I can do is stay close to him and find ways to visit him in prison. A long process of waiting, coordinating, phoning and coming to terms with the situation begins. I buy some extra underpants, swimming trunks and a T-shirt, as I came to Sharm with nothing.
Monica suggests writing a letter to Fabio, and I tear a few pages from my diary. The next day I take a taxi to the prison. It is a square building in the middle of the desert. The man at the gate lets me through, and a few minutes later I am standing at the prison reception desk. I hand them the letter, which they try to read and decipher. I explain that it mainly contains messages from his wife and children, but I don’t mention that I’m explaining something to Fabio about ‘Open Space.’ Sometimes someone takes on a role in a constellation that symbolises the pain, the trauma or ‘the prison’, just like in the game of Goose. I explain the rules to him: ‘ Whatever happens is the right thing to happen’, ‘Sitting in the fire’, and ‘Expect the Unexpected.’ Not easy when your life is on the line, but it’s the only thing I can do: create awareness. Bring light into the darkness.
Afterwards, I return to my lodge by the sea. The building is quiet, save for the odd tourist. As the days go by, it feels as though I’m on a silent retreat – or a self-imposed imprisonment – though in a different way to Fabio. The men in our group have now delved ever deeper into their own processes. The days string themselves together, and I feel an increasing sense of resignation. It’s about acceptance. It seems like an endless exercise.
I get permission from the lawyer again to visit him, and decide to take a large bag of fruit and water with me. The guards know me by now and the rapport is becoming increasingly friendly and relaxed. ‘Why don’t you bring McDonald’s?’ asks the guard. They check the fruit, tell me that some things are forbidden, but let everything through anyway. I can speak to Fabio for another five minutes. He already seems better and is also coming to terms with his situation.
When I’m still in Sharm after three days, two men from the group ring me. ‘We miss you here. We have two empty cushions in the circle. We actually want to come and pick you up. Enough of that prison.’ The next day they take a taxi.
The evening before, I take part in an online meditation session which Monica is also attending. We all tune into Fabio, and in my imagination I walk into his cell. I hold the key to the Temple of Ramses in my hands and hand it to him. ‘Here is the key.’ In the meditation, we both walk out. Others share different images. Everything resonates and helps.
However often I have doubted this lightwork, it proves its worth once again. Not only for our inner peace, but also in very concrete terms. That very evening, I receive a message from the lawyer that Fabio is free. However, he must leave the country. With the two men who have come, we go to the prison to pick him up. Unfortunately, they won’t let us in. We can speak to him at the airport. But that doesn’t work out either. Fabio is leaving on the next flight back to Colombia.
With the two men, I travel to Camp Moussa to join the group. When I hear Fabio’s voice over the phone, the first tears come. He is free and on the plane. He tells me that the letter, the bag of fruit and the water were all of great importance. Once I reach the Bedouin camp, I feel completely exhausted. I hug the men and crawl into my bed.
PART 12, “You never walk alone”
If Cyprus is Aphrodite, then the Sinai is the goddess Hathor. Throughout this journey, I increasingly feel that the gods are not merely names for energies or archetypes, but literally the names of regions, islands and planets. The sun is Aton, or Ra; Egypt is Osiris, the God of the land; Isis with her wings is the sky goddess Sirius.
Hathor is also known as the ‘Lady of Turquoise’, the type of stone mined in Sinai. She has sixty other names, some of which refer to Sinai. On a previous trip, I heard through meditation that her main temple lay at the foot of Mount Sinai, but that St Catherine’s Church was built on top of it.
The name Hat-hor means ‘House of Horus’. Horus is the god of light who defeats the evil Seth, the brother of Osiris. Seth chopped Osiris into fourteen pieces and scattered them across the Nile. Isis gathers the pieces of her husband, but cannot find the fourteenth piece: the phallus. She makes a penis out of gold, is impregnated by her husband and gives birth to the god of light, Horus. He ultimately defeats evil in the form of Seth.
It is, as it were, the struggle between the old, corrupt masculinity and the new, healthy masculinity. We are currently seeing that struggle taking place all over the world. It is fitting that the Secretary of War in America is called ‘Heg-seth’. He is bent on unbridled destruction, with the American Christian God at his side.
Now more than ever, we need the healing power of the feminine, of goddesses such as Isis and Hathor, so that healthy masculinity can re-emerge. It is one of the reasons we are here in the Sinai with a group of men: to transform the harmful influence of the old patriarchal religions into a new energy.
When the men climb Mount Moses to spend the night there, I decide to stay down in the Bedouin camp. I have already climbed my mountain, but in the form of a prison in Sharm. I feel I am ready for rest and integration. Fabio is now on his way home to his wife and children. Eran is leading the group and I hear nothing but positive comments from the other men about his gentle leadership. It reassures me and sets me free to follow my own path: letting go and winding down.
During the night, it all clicks into place. A teacher once said that the spiritual headquarters of the earth is currently shifting from the masculine Himalayas to the feminine Amazon. Suddenly I remember that we called the first trip to the Sinai a few years ago ‘the tipping point’. Perhaps the Sinai is the tipping point between the Himalayas and the Amazon? It feels as though through this journey – from Rome, via Cyprus, Israel, Jerusalem and Sinai – the balance has shifted: the tipping of the scales. It reminds me of the two statues of Lady Justice I saw in Cyprus and Sharm el-Sheikh. In the first statue, the scales were broken; in the second, the pans were balanced.
On the altar of the men’s group lies a small singing bowl.
‘Perhaps we should send that to Fabio,’ says Eran. ‘Then he can work with it in South America.’
‘Or we could organise another men’s group in the Amazon and take the bowl with us…’ I muse. It’s an idea that’s been simmering for a while. To take a group of men to the Amazon, to connect with the powerful feminine energy of the rainforest.
First, however, we need to wrap things up here, bring the energies back to rest, and ground myself again. I notice I’m still caught up in all sorts of energy fields and have a strong need to return to the ‘ordinary world’.
As we walk through the village of Santa Catarina with a small group of men and sit down in a little café, I hear the song ‘You’ll Never Walk Alone’. ’ It sounds as if an entire football stadium is singing the song, and that is exactly how it feels. I think of the many people back home who tuned in, empathised, and meditated for Fabio’s release, and I am grateful and filled with a sense of fulfilment. We did this together, for which I am deeply grateful.
PART 13, ‘The Book of Hathor’
When I first climbed Mount Sinai, I had a vision: I saw how the priestesses of Hathor were murdered, how the Golden Calf, symbol of Hathor, was destroyed, and how a few thousand followers of the Egyptian goddess were killed. Moses wanted to eradicate the Egyptian goddess cult root and branch. The age of monotheism and patriarchy had dawned, the religion of God the Father: Jehovah, Allah or God. The mother goddess slowly faded from our collective memory. But I also saw how the last high priestess uttered a curse as she died.
‘From now on, all men who oppress or despise women will have a problem with sexuality.’ With this curse, the matriarchy came to an end…
Twenty-one years later, I am back in the Sinai. Nine men are keeping a night vigil on top of the mountain. They are accompanied by the Bedouin guide Samesh?, a very gentle young man. When Eran and Wietse, two of the men, see him unrolling his prayer mat, they ask if they may pray with him. Three men, on their knees atop the mountain: a Jewish man, a Muslim man and a Christian man, praying together. It is one of the seeds being sown to heal the immense wound and rift in our present world.
Meanwhile, at the foot of the mountain – in the monastery of Saint Catherine, also known as the Temple of Hathor – I am performing my own ceremony. Anne’s book – A Feminine Answer to Crisis – is due to be launched shortly. A beautiful book that once again invokes and describes the wisdom of the feminine. In my view, it is a unique and powerful book in these times when the masculine has completely lost its way. We try to solve the world’s problems in the only way we know how: billions are invested in weapons, we wage wars and try to ward off our fear through control, borders and technology. But it is clear that something completely different is needed. Not the masculine way of solving things, but the feminine. After tens of thousands of years of patriarchy, it is time for something new, and Anne knows how to put this into words like no other. I had the privilege of designing the book’s cover and, after 30 attempts, we are very pleased with it. It is the face of a woman covered in flowers, created by the Japanese artist Yoshiko.
As I sit in meditation in the church of St Catherine’s Convent, I offer the book in my mind to the goddess Hathor. The remains of the Hathor temple must lie here beneath the ground, and it seems to me the most fitting place to ask for a blessing for Anne’s book. In my mind’s eye, I see the goddess’s temple rising again and being consecrated. The sacred fire is lit and priestesses from all cultures come to pay their respects. Supported by eleven men: nine on the mountain, one in St Catherine’s Monastery and one in Columbia – each honouring the feminine in their own way.
A day later, we close the ritual space of Open Space. The work is done; the time has come to return home. Via Dahab, Taba and Sharm el-Sheikh, everyone makes their way back into the world. In the Netherlands, it is King’s Day. ‘May the true king return,’ says one of the men. For what would the goddess be without her male counterpart? Perhaps, after the era of matriarchy – the Divine Mother – and patriarchy – the Divine Father – the time has now come for us to do this together, men and women as equals.
the END
ANNE’S BOOK IS AVAILABLE FOR PURCHASE VIA www.connecting-the-dots.eu/boeken-2
