Recording this show was exhilarating and scary in equal measure. I am deeply grateful to Energy for his compassionate and skilful presence throughout. Our conversation includes many aspects of my life here in the Community, including current issues.  I speak my truth as I see it at that moment. I am not claiming to know ‘the Truth’ and I hope I am not offending any sensibilities.

My childhood was not the easiest. My parents were both traumatised by World War II, resulting in my father’s alcohol addiction and my mother’s depression and ill health. I became the ‘social worker’ for the family at an early age, trying to make things better for everyone.

I also suffered from an undiagnosed birth defect leading to regular renal colics until the kidney was removed when I was 10 years old. At that point I decided that I wanted to become a doctor – an unlikely prospect for a worker’s daughter. In the process of achieving that goal I changed schools and enjoyed my first real community experience. After university and completing a hospital job I took a sabbatical and came to Findhorn.

beach babe in Bali 1994 photo Alan Watson

beach babe in Bali 1994

Following my sabbatical, I completed the vocational training as a GP in Germany then I returned to Findhorn in February 1988 and have lived in the Community ever since.

I love the fact that spirituality is part of daily experience, interwoven with all aspects of life.

For the first five years I was a Findhorn Foundation member. From 1989 I worked in the Health&Wholeness Department. In 1993 that work was transferred into an independent charity, Holistic Health Care Ltd.

In the partnership with Alan Watson I had the joy and privilege of travelling to many amazing wild places in the world. Initially we lived in Cluny and then moved to The Park in 1990. In 1995 our son Kevin was born and we became the Featherstones – but that is another story.

Cornelia and Sylvia wedding 2020 photo Hugo Klip

Cornelia and Sylvia wedding 2020 photo Hugo Klip

My sense of belonging to ‘One Incredible Family’, the people – past and present – who have co-created this Community is reflected in several of the pieces you can hear in the show.

In particular the two songs I consider almost like ‘anthems’ – I Dreamed a Dream and One Incredible Family – reflect for me the underlying values. I Dreamed a Dream was played at both of my weddings. You can enjoy the second wedding ceremony by clicking here.

Children's Sanctuary 1995 photo Findhorn Foundation

Children’s Sanctuary 1995 photo Findhorn Foundation

The songs connected with Children’s Sanctuary have a very special place in my heart – and All God’s Creature have a Place in the Choir conveys a fundamental spiritual teaching that for me is at the core of living in community.

One song – Von Guten Mächten Wunderbar Geborgen – deserves a bit more interpretation as it is sung in German and has had such an impact on my life. I initially came across it in the School Bible Circle which was my first experience of community. I embarked on learning as much as I could about the author of the lyrics, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, as I needed help with my pervasive sense of guilt for the atrocities which the generation of my parents and grandparents had been a part of (one way or another). Over the decades the song was a companion for me in many ways. For that reason I chose it as my soundtrack for the little video I did in a Findhorn Foundation workshop with Daniel Greenberg in 2022 entitled Finding ‘IT’. It is not easy for me to translate the title of the song and in the show I plumped for a very freely adapted ‘Cradled by a benevolent universe’ as it reflects my own visceral sense of it.

I have permission to share here the translation by Hilmar Werner which is much closer to the original text. The website also gives a little bit of information about Dietrich Bonhoeffer.

Please click on the arrow for the translation

By loving forces silently surrounded,
I feel quite soothed, secure, and filled with grace.
So I would like to live these days together,
and go with you into another year.

Still matters of the past are pressing our hearts
and evil days are weighing down on us.
Oh Lord, to our souls, so scared and sore,
give rescue, as it’s that you made us for.

And when you pass to us the bitter chalice,
filled with suffering to the brim and more,
we take it, full of thanks and trembling not,
from this, your caring and beloved hand.

But if you want to please us, over and again,
with our shining sun and wondrous world,
let us muse on what is past, and then we shall,
with our lives, in all belong to you.

Warm and bright be our candles’ flame today,
since into gloom you brought a gleaming light,
and lead again us, if you will, together!
We know it: you are beaming in the night.

When silence now will snow around us ev’rywhere,
so let us hear the all-embracing sound
of greater things than we can see and wider,
your world, and all your children’s soaring hail.

By loving forces wonderfully sheltered,
we are awaiting fearlessly what comes.
God is with us at dusk and in the morning
and most assuredly on ev’ry day.

Caledonia by Dougie Maclean and Guests: In 2015/6 I went on a sabbatical and lived for five months in the Adelaide Hills. I was really open to leaving the Community and finding a new calling. I had a wonderful time, then one morning I got the clear message: a friend had posted this video by Dougie Maclean on Facebook – and it called me home – to Caledonia, to the Community, to Scotland.

The last song is another Community favourite – One Incredible Family by Hans Poulsen. Click here for more of the inspiring Music from the Magic Garden.

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The photos without credit are by Cornelia Featherstone and Alan Watson Featherstone