 The power of trees has been used in divination for many years and is a great modern interpretation of Oum. Hey there saplings! Welcome to esoteric moment. My name is Danny. Today I want to talk to you a little bit about how I use Oum as a part of my regular daily and weekly practice. I've done a couple book reviews about Oum kind of interpretations and learning how to read Oum. I've written some blog posts about how I'm crafting my own personal interpretation of native Oum for my Wisconsin landscape. So I've touched here and there on different ways that I use Oum. I wanted to take a minute to do a video to kind of explain how I'm using Oum because it's been really inspiring and motivating in my practice and I hope that maybe it will help inspire you to incorporate more Oum into your own practices. Okay so Oum is a Celtic tree alphabet and it probably was not used in the way that we use it today in ancient Ireland and Celtic lands. Actually it's like 98% sure not used in the same way but I am not a reconstructionist. My druidry is rooted very clearly in the present day and part of that means a new modern interpretation of Oum as part of a divination tool. Each letter is associated with a sacred tree and each tree has a different meaning and message for us. In my practice I use Oum in a few different ways. I have a bullet journal in which I plan my whole week out and month out and my life. On Sunday when I tend to go through a gorsi every week and I do my kind of like weekly sit-down practice it's a lot longer I have more time to really reflect maybe do practices or exercises outside. I draw a single Oum for each day and I include that in my bullet journal and planner so that I have it as I go through the week. If anything really stands out as fitting to that particular Oum I might journal about it or I might just write down a note in my weekly planner. One this has helped me learn the Oum faster because I am touching it I am using it every single day which is great when you're trying to wrap your head around something that isn't part of our everyday life. When I want to kind of reach out to my ancestors or spirits of place but particularly my ancestors I might do a more full reading I guess you might call it of Oum and this actually uses a page out of my book of Oum that is meant for casting Oum solely. So I take my bag that has all of my Oum views and I shake it up and think of my question or topic that I want to start a conversation with and I kind of throw out a few onto this board and look at how each symbol is falling in relation to each other. There are a couple particular prayers that I use to open and close this situation when I'm talking to my ancestors in this way and I don't do it all the time but it's very potent when I do it just takes a little bit more time space and connection to do so and like I mentioned I'm definitely working on developing my own set of Oum that fits for the landscape that I live in. I have a pretty good feel and outline for the whole alphabet at this point and it's something that I'm still developing and working through establishing a relationship with each specific plant like I go out and I have a relationship with each particular tree or plant in my version of Oum and when I pull that Oum in a big full reading or weekly I can instantly go back to that relationship with the physical plant and the lessons and relationship I have with that individual plant so it really enhances my practice and lets me understand the whole system on a whole in a much more rooted and and very soil based plant based way. If you're looking to get started with Oum I definitely recommend making your own set of Oums or you can purchase one like I did from Etsy. I wanted one that used a tree branch that actually fits the symbol that is generally associated with each Oum and some of those plants aren't readily available here. I think making your own set is really worthwhile definitely when you're starting out and then just use them on a daily or weekly basis get to know the symbols and messages and then take those symbols take those tools and go outside with it start developing a relationship with the plants that you have in your landscape and how they might fit with the Oum. I really think that's what turned the tide in my relationship with Oum was creating and establishing an individual relationship with the plant that the Oum is talking about but I also know I'm really lucky clearly you know this is what I call home and that means I have resources available to me that not every druid does so I speak from a place of privilege but I definitely think it's a worthwhile activity to go out and establish that relationship outside. This week's sapling shout out is there's no way I'm going to say this right so bear with me Kara dojik tivi korima sorry so bad they have written tons of comments on this channel and they have a pretty sweet channel that isn't in English per se but I think a couple of the videos have subtitles anyway you should go check them out uh they're pretty sweet and thanks for being here on my channel maybe you can write a comment on how I should actually pronounce your name sorry if you want to be a next week sapling shout out please leave a comment below talking about whether you've worked with Oum and how that's been incorporated into your own daily or regular practice thanks for watching and as always may you find peace in the sacred grove