A vision to catalyse a quest

In mid summer 2022 I was minding my own business getting my weekly greens at the local “bio” store in Isle-sur-la-Sorgue, a village in the south of France where I had been living for five years, when I started to feel ill. A faint head-ache I had noticed turned intense in no time and my whole body was starting to ache. I paid for what I had in my basket and rode home.

I lived on my own in a compact three-story house which I used to refer to as my mini chateau. The ground-floor had a small entrance, a garage that I had transformed into art studio. The first floor was a living room, a cupboard-sized kitchen and bathroom, and the top floor was my bedroom and terrace. Having grown up in South Africa where safety is important - security was non-negotiable - so I automatically locked the front door as I closed it.

I had got myself up the stairs, put my things down in the kitchen and managed to muster up enough energy to get myself up to my bed to lie down when my phone started to ring. It was Benedicte, my closest friend in the village. She’s a “witchy-sister” of mine who’s incredibly intuitive and works in the field of energetic healing.

Benedicte never called me.  She would either just pitch up and ring the door-bell (she lived a block or two around the corner), or leave home baked treats in my window-sill with a text message to let me know to come down and collect it. Since she was calling I thought perhaps there was an emergency.

“Are you at home?” - ‘Yes’ - “Can I come and see you?” - ‘No, I’m feeling terrible and I’ve just made it to my bed.’ - “I know, that’s why I need to come. Unlock the front door and go back to bed” - ‘OK’.

So I dragged myself back out of bed, down two flights of stairs, unlocked the door and went back to bed. Benedicte arrived within minutes. She had felt a loud intuitive call to come and see me.

She lit some candles on my altar, lit some sage, and played the music of Armenian monks chanting on her phone. Everything was starting to feel quite abstract. The pain was getting increasingly intense and I was confused as to why Benedicte felt the need to check on me. I was wriggling around the bed almost in tears. I was in so much pain. I didn’t understand. It was unlike anything else I’d ever felt before. Benedicte encouraged me to breathe deeply and as I did, I started to experience an intense vision:

I was sitting on a mountain or hill of sorts looking down at a pog (a small yet pokey mountain) with a cluster of houses and a kind of castle on it. I saw flames. The scene felt violent and tragic. People were being burned alive - I was in agony with the weight of a spectrum of emotions running through my body.  Anger was the first to surface and then a sense of disbelief as nothing was being done to save the people from the horrific death that was playing out down below. No beam of light from the heavens was coming to rescue anyone.

The vision felt overwhelming. I wept and felt such strong emotions that I shouted at Benedicte: 'How could this happen? Where was Jesus then?’ - “I don’t know Tatjana, breathe deeply!” I cried as though I was in that place right then, unaware of the unusual nature of the things I was saying. Biblical figures were not on the forefront of my 2022 reality.

The vision felt like a vivid memory from another lifetime. I could sense with clarity who I was as the person viewing the situation: a young woman, shivering in the cold and from the trauma of what I was witnessing. The people being burned were my community,  my loved ones. I had some things with me and I felt a sense of urgency to leave, but I couldn’t help looking at what was happening. I could smell the forest and the smoke. I felt the humidity of the wintery soil and I felt pangs of pain in my heart… devastation. I felt guilt for the privilege of being safe where I was, for escaping the suffering they were experiencing. I felt the importance of moving on soon and quietly so as not to be spotted by those burning my friends.

At the time that I experienced this vision, I was in the full swing of preparation for my first solo art exhibition, which was to take place in a few months time, and I had much to get done before the “vernissage”. I still had many paintings to paint and I could feel that my time in Isle-Sur-la-Sorgue was coming to a close. This meant that not only would I need to plan, create and execute my first solo exhibition, but I would also need to start putting things in boxes and prepare to leave.

I understood that the vision was more than a random universal tap on the shoulder. There was a reason it had come at the time. I understood what it was pointing at as I’d received a few abstract messages about this place and time and time along my life path.

I needed to go to Montsegur, the pog in the Occitaine region of France.

I have since learned that it was the last stronghold of the Cathar people before they were completely wiped out by the Catholic church in 1242 at the tail end of the Albigensian Crusade.  The Cathars were heretical Christians who believed in a form of reincarnation, rejected the doctrine of original sin, believed in equality,  welcomed women into prominent roles, and remained profoundly resistant to the worldliness and corruption of the Catholic church.

Now I knew that before leaving France at the end of 2022, for my annual visit to spend a few months with my family in my homeland Cape Town, South Africa, I would need to go to Montsegur.

In retrospect I believe that the vision may have been catalysed by an energetic healing session I had received the day before from an Armenian healer. Mark had told me that during our session he had had a vivid vision of Jesus. He told me that this was only the second time he had ever experienced this.

I sense that my outburst of “where was Jesus then?” came from the perspective of the person I was in the vision. Something relating to a deep disappointment that the people who were being burned at stake, who lived in deep harmony with each other, with the earth and the elements, were not being saved by the “Christ” and the teachings that they were so deeply devoted to. I wanted to devote myself to exploring this mystery, this vision, but I had to focus on my upcoming solo show. Exploring my vision would have to wait.

In late October 2022, after a good few months of hard work, my exhibition opening came. I was deeply grateful for the experience. Friends visited and private viewings were arranged. Paintings were sold and delivered and I felt incredibly fortunate.

As I packed up my belongings to store while I was in Cape Town, I kept watching the weather at Montsegur while juggling all the loose-ends that needed tying-up, and in early November, a week before my flight to my homeland where I’d be living for the next five months, I made plans to go. There was a two-day window where there would supposedly be no snow at Montsegur. I felt that I would want to hike around the area and so there would need to be sunshine - or at the very least, no snow.

I booked a place to stay close to the pog, packed warm things and some food, hopped in my car and drove for four and a half hours to a place I knew very little about.  All I knew was that I needed to physically go there to find clarity about this vision and why it had surfaced.

It is not in my nature to do much research.  At times books and references are recommended to me and I feel a glow of sorts around the suggestion which leads me to find the material and read. Mostly, however, I like to feel my way through places before adopting other people’s interpretations so as to get a pure sense through my own physical, energetic and emotional senses.

Three and a half-hours from my departure and forty-five minutes from Montsegur my heart started beating fast. It was simultaneously overwhelming and confusing.  The landscape - which was new to me - felt so familiar. A spectrum of emotions started to come to life in the loudest way. I could feel may chest expanding with a combination of joy, relief, overwhelm and grief— all at the same time. The experience was quite surreal. My throat tightened and I started to weep while driving, not understanding why.

I eventually made it to Montsegur with a couple of hours of sunlight left in the day. My cheeks were wet with tears as I started to hike up the pog. I was overwhelmed with the familiarity of the place. The air was crisp and icy and the sky was clear blue, forming a beautiful backdrop for the snow-capped Pyrenees that were visible in the distance.

There was a stretch of open field that ended in a long and steep wooden staircase that led into a forest. One step at a time I made my way up. I felt like I was in a different world. Like it was in the present but simultaneously in another era. The forest at the start felt welcoming and familiar. I was making an effort not to cry as I could hear a few people up ahead.

A young man guarded the trail in a tiny wooden kiosk, charging people to hike up a mountain…Business hours were over and he greeted me and let me walk without paying. It all felt so bizarre.

The trail wove its way through the beautiful foresty section and then opened up to a more rocky path. The icy breeze let me and my finger tips know that winter had arrived.

Past the rocky section the castle ruins became visible from the path. It really wasn’t a very long walk but it felt like it was taking eons.

I was struck by the ruins. They were surprising to me. This was not what I had seen in the vision. They seemed heavy and fort-like. The ruins felt strange to me until I walked through to the west-facing wall and out of the second arched doorway. This area felt familiar. I felt overwhelmed by the views, the feelings… all of it. It was so beautiful. I felt a sigh of relief and somehow knew exactly where I wanted to be. I walked to a spot that felt familiar as emotions of deep grief were building in my chest. I saw remnants of ruins of what looked like ancient structures or small buildings clustered all around the west face.

I took out my sarong, placed it on an icy rock to sit down on in a tucked-away corner that felt familiar, closed my eyes and went into meditation. Tears were streaming down my face and I had surrendered my concern for what anyone might think. I don’t recall how many people were at the top on the day but perhaps ten or so. They were all starting to make their way down which suited me perfectly.

It felt as though my body was serving as a conduit for these emotions to be released. There were no logical pointers for the feelings that were surfacing, just a clear understanding that I needed to feel them.

I felt a kind of devastation. Like these feelings came from a place so deep that my mind couldn’t comprehend the expanse of it. Sometimes my mind would seek to find logic in what I was feeling but there was no point as it wasn’t logical. When I allowed myself to simply feel the emotions and express them I felt relief. I looked around and felt such warmth and joy for being there. I felt like it was my first return to the site since the day long ago that I had experienced in my vision, and as devastating as it was, I felt happy to be there again…  as though I was visiting an my old friend, the pog. The being upon which I was sitting that had witnessed so many expressions of humanity over thousands of years.

When it felt like I was done for then, I hiked down and found my way to Les Contes, the accommodation I had stumbled upon online.

I was the only guest at this B&B for the night. It was a big, old building with little insulation, big single-glazed windows and creaky wooden floors. It seemed like there weren’t many visitors at that time of year. Pete, the guardian and care-taker, a beautiful and kind man of few words, built a fire, pointed at the epic bookshelf and left me to heat my food in the kitchen.

I lay in bed with the luxury of an electric blanket and looked around me at my Joan of Arc-themed room contemplating the wild ride I had taken myself on.

The Bed and Breakfast was owned by an English couple, Aletheia and Pete. They had purchased the property during Covid in 2020 and Aletheia was an author and mystic who guided retreats that connected women with the sacred feminine. I had stumbled upon it as the closest most affordable last-minute option for my quest.

At breakfast the day after my arrival I met Christie, an American woman who had been living at Les Contes for a few months. She was on a path of learning and exploring mysteries of Mary Magdalene and the sacred feminine. Christie shared some stories and knowledge with me that would be pivotal for my journey.  Alethia was away on a retreat at the time, and it turned out that she had been teaching and guiding processes around Mary Magdalene. Christie tied the Mary Magdalene story to the story of the Cathars, which blew my mind (for reasons I will elaborate on in another post).  A golden thread was starting to weave various, random elements on my life’s journey together - thanks to my vision of Montsegur.

I had no understanding at the time of who the Cathars were and what Montsegur meant to them. I was learning a lot and quickly.

After breakfast I prepared my backpack with water and snacks. I drove up to the Montsegur village, parked my car and spent the morning walking a full loop around the Montsegur Pog, starting with the dense forest at the base. The sun was shining and the hunters and their dogs were out. It must have been a Saturday or Sunday.

The hunting dogs were anxiously sniffing their way around the forest ground. Their bells would let me know that they were coming. It made for a slightly tense atmosphere in the forest as the winter sun dappled its way through the trees.

There was something about the presence of these hunters. Perhaps I was in some kind of altered state, but something pointed at the idea that these were the murderers who had surrounded the pog in my vision. The same energy was present.

It’s not often I feel appreciation for the hunters in the French forests. It’s easier for me to lean into judgement and resentment, but on that day I felt something different. I couldn’t quite place it until I had walked past a few of them with their rifles. I felt animosity towards the first few that I had passed but something told me that they were stuck in some kind of karmic loop. I greeted them with a smile and genuine care in my heart. I understood that forgiveness was the medicine that I needed to liberate myself and maybe them from some part of that ancient story.

Further along the slippery, muddy track, a little beyond the depths of the forest, I had reached a low peak that had a beautiful clear view of the western face of the pog. There was a perfect little spot for me to sit with my flask of herbal tea.

I sat, took a deep breath and closed my eyes. Again deep emotions surfaced as though they were being released through me… not from me. I don’t know how better to describe the sensation but it felt like the energy moving through me in the form of emotions was collective, not mine alone. I felt energy of the hunters to be reminiscent of the “bad guys” in my vision. The edge of their stance and their attitude. They were literally surrounding the pog on that day. I cried my tears, placed my bare hands on the earth to ground, drank my tea and walked on.

I wanted to contemplate the amazing experiences I had just had, but instead I had to hop in my car and return to Isle Sur la Sorgue.  Just that morning I had received a voice message from my landlady. She had changed her mind about letting me leave some of my things in my “little house of dreams” while I was in Cape Town. I had to return at once to move an entire house on my own in the space of five days.

With the support and help from a beautiful bunch of humans, the move manifested in no time. Before I knew it I was on a plane bound for Cape Town, the place where my loved ones lived.

I spent five months in Cape Town with my family, integrating and digesting what I had just moved through. My first exhibition, the departure from my home, the departure from a dear soul-sister and a chunk of life-experience that had been lived in Provence for 9 years… and this tangent. Montsegur, Cathars, Mary Magdalene. I knew I would need to return for clarity to be found.