Tattoos - personal symbolism...

Nearly all of my own tattoos have been designed by myself. If I am to wear something upon my skin forever, I want that image to be one that is significant to me - one that expresses an idea from deep within myself, my psychi.

Each design can take months: the Green Man above took over a year to design. They can also take a while to complete: this one is a full back piece, and I expect it to take several years and numerous visits!

Each design incorporates various ideas: they mark special points in my personal growth; represent a desire to embody a particular ideal; or identify to myself a lesson I have learnt. Each of them incorporates traditional, magical and personal symbolism. When designing a new image I study books on symbolism, meditate and ask for inspiration. Each element of the design becomes invested with meaning, and is there for a purpose: colour, shape, line; why this flower, or that leaf?

The Green Man here represents my personal understanding of the Divine. Being a pagan I believe that the Divine (God, Goddess, or whatever you wish to name It) is embodied in the cosmos. For a pagan the earth itself is alive: She sustains and supports us, and She is in a very real sense our Mother.
But the Divine is also within us.

The Green Man symbol is an old one that expresses these ideas.
He represents:

• life itself: bursting forth as vegetation;
  
• the Divine power of speech: as life springs forth from His mouth;
  
• the Mystery of rebirth: as plants die and return each year.
  

• Ivy represents Bachus and Dionysis and the loss of oneself into Divine ecstasy;
  
• Anemone symbolises Adonis and the beauty of the spirit;
  
• Corn, the slain and risen Gods who die in their love for the Goddess, and in doing so ensure her fertility.
  
• The Poppy is the flower of Persephone, Mother of the Underworld.
• The spider's web represents the Goddess as the spinner of the Web of life (a nice thought for all of us 'Web citizens!).
• The bee reflects Diana ("and the sound of her first fascination was the humming of the bees, and the spinning of the wheel").
• The deer's skull represents the horned Lords - lords of the winter and the Great Hunt like Herne and the Lords of life, death and rebirth such as Cernunos.

Bee, dragon and Celtic band	Dragon and part Celtic Band

My other designs include

• a Labyrinth on one ankle - marking my dedication to the inner soul-quest, one foot always on the inward-spiral path to the center, the source;
  
• an ant on the other - a totem animal representing the need for patience and inner strength;
  
• various bees in various locations - the bee being one of the ancient symbols for the Goddess, and sacred to Demeter in the Elussian mysteries...;
  
• a celtic band of thirteen intertwined double knots - representing the Masculine and Feminine in eternal interplay, creating the thread of life through the lunar year; and
  
• two snakes round my upper right arm, twisting together in a further representation of the balanced and bi-polar nature of the divine and our own souls - the Masculine snake in blues and greens and carrying the solar disk upon its head, the Feminine snake in reds and yellows and carrying the lunar crescent; Both carry the Wadjet eye of Horus, and their twined bodies form both the elemental-quartered circle and the figure of 8 symbol of eternity.

Having created the symbol, the act of having it tattooed 'seals' it. Tattooing is at best uncomfortable, at worst painful; but the endurance of pain and discomfort has been used as a way to mark moments of growth for as long as mankind. Most societies have a "coming of age" ritual, and many involve a symbolic meeting with death. The initiate faces pain and death without fear, and thereby shows themselves capable of rising above the fear of their individual ego. Bio-chemists also tell us that pain stimulates the release of natural opiates in the brain, which create a sense of euphoria and "otherness". They have also found similar chemicals released during experiences of religious fervour.

For me, like the Shamans, having the design etched into my skin is akin to the formation of a rune script. I use the process to induce a state of higher awareness - often chanting to "channel" the pain and using visualisation to allow the ink to sink into my self as much as it sinks into my flesh. When most successful I experience a feeling akin to ritual, and feel my body being transformed as an outward expression of inner transformation.

People often react negatively when they see tattoos. They think they identify trouble makers or social misfits. Some people have even accused me of "defiling" my body. But for me it shows a lightness, a frivolity with life. Billy Connolly expressed this once as: