Between the expansiveness of summer and the tranquility of winter, autumn is a threshold for practicing inwardness. Menhirs, standing stones, are particularly inviting for such a practice and lead the self to uprightness.
Autumnal Light
There is a threshold between summer’s expansiveness and winter’s rest. In many areas, including here in Germany and Switzerland, there are upright stones, standing inconspicuously and silent. They allow us to practice an autumnal seriousness—a sincerity and steadfastness—as a transition from our external life in the light to inner contemplation. At the beginning and at the end, a Michaelic tone resonates quietly: not as a watchword but as a question for the ‘I’.
A quiet knowledge dwells in the body: the gaze that reaches far into the distance in the summer months returns home in autumn. In this homecoming, the upright stone can act as a counterpart for us—not a puzzle to be solved but a presence to be encountered. Those who don’t dismiss the stones as simple curiosities but take them seriously as forms will find access to something that is neither mere explanation nor mere feeling: a perception that leads thinking into a polarity with itself, so that meaning is found, rather than invented.
The Stone Makes the Place
Imagine a heathland moor: vast and flat with a carpet of low herbs and grasses, the dull and acidic soil crisscrossed by fine watery veins. Here and there stand a few young birch trees. They barely cut the horizon, speaking more of wind than of wood. Far away lie an inlet, islands, and peninsulas in long, flat lines. The sea is not a flat surface but breathes throughout our gaze. Everything is horizontal, flowing. Nothing calls out, “Here!” Nothing strictly holds the gaze. Sounds come not as voices but as wind—a light draft that caresses more than pushes.
And then, a standing stone—a single guardian before a distant stone circle. No pyramid, no spectacle, more just a determined upright figure. Not completely vertical, as if it carried by some small memory of movement, but unmistakably striving upward. The edges are uneven, smoothed by the weather in some places, sharpened in others, as if left that way on purpose. Lichens soften its hardness; bright quartz veins flash like frozen threads of light. The stone sits deep in the ground, not just placed there but rooted. All around it, the footprints of cattle and traces of moisture darken the brown.
All of a sudden, the scene comes to a halt here. What had been a flowing gaze comes into focus. Lines converge; distances begin to speak. At this point, the great expanse is given an orientation: the coastline responds like a silent frame, a barely noticeable slope rises from the surface, even the wind takes on a direction, as if it were passing by this very stone, not over or around it on its way elsewhere. We could hide the view of the stone with our hand or our thumb, and the scene would fall back to its polyphony. If we let the stone be, the polyphony becomes a “here.”
The menhir is not merely part of the scene; it acts as a silent operator that turns the scene into a place. Its erect stance is more than static; it is a human gesture written upon the Earth: taking a stand. Order emerges without; posture awakens within. Where before there was indifference, now a center forms; where there was drifting, now there’s orientation. The landscape becomes accessible because it can be read from a place, from this stone, next to which the surroundings find meaning.
Goethean Observation: Four Phases
Goethe’s “tender empiricism” keeps perception broad and thinking in check. First the “given,” then the significance—not as a chronological constraint but as a question of attitude. From this, the encounter—with the stone or with inner reflection—can unfold in four experience-rich phases:
- Perceiving. Slow down. Allow the stone to be as it is: high, sloping edges; the matte skin of quartz veins like fine, solidified waves; shadows that shift throughout the day; its placement in the soil; the lean of the slope; the breath of the air. What is missing is also a part: no inscription, no sculpting—just a form. No interpretation yet. Simply presence while the facts arrive inwardly—like an image that ceases to be an image and is simply there.
- Movement (exact imagination.) Every form carries a gesture: rooting and lifting, resisting and standing still. Continue the visible movement inwardly, without inventing anything. Thinking follows perception, not the other way around. You can feel it: something wants to stand here; not stubbornness but calmness under pressure; not rigidity but a collected buoyancy. You notice how your own body responds: your feet widen, your knees soften, and your breath deepens. Not because you “should,” but because the form quietly invites you to do so.
- Resonance. Lingering attention gives rise to a mood: concentration, dignity, a feeling of a threshold—not pathos but a distinct silence; not projection but what the form evokes within me. The stone speaks in form; the soul responds with tone, “Stand—without stiffness, without yielding.” The heart doesn’t become heavy but clear. Perhaps the forehead relaxes; perhaps seeing becomes more effortless.
- Knowing (essence). Transformation: the stone is no longer an object but a presence. “Essence,” “Being” becomes evident—as real as color, as tangible as weight. The landscape now has a center point. The ‘I’ has an uprightness. No either/or of inside and outside, but a harmony: standpoint without, stance within. Thought can now find words—not to replace perception but to bear it.
This sequence is not a recipe. It is a prayer of attention. It allows meaning to emerge without forcing it. And it leaves room for the inexpressible.
Autumn as the Time to Pause and Reflect
We arrive at the wide plain, our gaze wanders, and suddenly we see something upright. This is our counterpart. Its presence brings the place together, but it also brings us together. It’s as if the stone holds up a silent mirror in which something of the quality of our own ‘I’ shines through—a quiet uprightness, neither stiff nor yielding—simply, present.
Autumn doesn’t ask for performance but rather for attitude. This is how it can be experienced: standpoint without, stance within; not a rule but an event. The stone shows a certain way of being—a way of being present within oneself. As I linger and look, I gently examine myself: Does my own uprightness bear me? Where am I on the threshold between summer’s expansiveness and winter’s inwardness? This examination is not a power game, not a challenge, but a friendly seriousness, an inner exploration asking myself whether I’m ready for the step into a more conscious existence, in which the ‘I’ is not merely a spectator but a participant.
A Guard at Lochbuie (Isle of Mull)
In western Scotland, on Mull, lies the valley of Lochbuie—secluded and quiet. Anyone trudging across the marshy meadows from the small parking lot to the stone circle will pass a single menhir. Even from a distance, it doesn’t appear lofty but rather broad in its gesture, flat and slightly bulbous to the side, as if it were holding its elbows outwards. Its lower section has a weight that anchors it firmly and deeply in the ground. It’s barely taller than a person—and yet tall enough to act as a counterpart.
I’ve led many groups to this stone and paused here. Something inevitably changes as we approach. Footsteps slow down, voices become quiet. Some stand at a distance, as if the air became denser. Others approach cautiously, almost step by step, and a few touch the stone. Everyone becomes silent. Not every menhir is like this—there are cheerful, communicative ones, ones that make a group laugh, and ones that put people in a poetic mood. This one is serious. It’s as if it asks a question without words: Are you ready? Are you clear about yourself? Are you standing in your truth before you continue on to the sanctuary?
Whether you go through the four phases in a conscious way or not, most people notice that something is going on here. Something inside them resonates with this guardian. It doesn’t want anything “from” us. It calls out to something inside me. The question is quiet, not threatening. You are free to walk past. But whoever gives it space—whoever responds to its gesture—experiences this gentle yet serious probing of their steadfastness, not as a judgment, but as a clarification.
The most powerful effect comes from a direct encounter with a menhir. Photographs, such as those accompanying this article, can be helpful. But one can also simply follow the description inwardly: a horizontal expanse, a single upright figure, an easing of the flow, an emerging focus. The place is not the crucial thing but rather fidelity to the experience: perception, inner movement, resonance, knowing—silent devotion to a presence.
Whoever works just with the images can try the same game as in the landscape. Cover the stone in the photo with your finger and then uncover it. Check how the motif and the center change. Pay attention to how your own gaze responds. This is not a substitute but an approximation—a reconstruction that shows that form does not only have an effect “out there” but also in the act of looking.
Isn’t this just projection? That’s a fair question. Three countermeasures can suffice:
- Anchor: Enduring sensory perception before any interpretation.
- Polarity: Don’t interpret. Let perception lead and thinking follow.
- Convergence: Where different observers mention similar qualities, the form itself speaks.
This isn’t proof, but it does provide clarity, which grows the more faithfully one serves it. And clarity is often enough to act with dignity: not faster, but more awake.
Righting
An upright stone transforms the everywhere into a here. The here creates presence and calls forth presence in the ‘I’. At the same time, such stones guard the threshold. They probe—not harshly, but quietly—for moral sincerity, alertness, and the willingness to grasp what summer has ripened within us as inner fruit. Letting go of illusions, releasing our dreams, coming to an energetic, awake steadfastness in truth: that is the quality we attribute to Michael. And it is the same quality that the menhir evokes in the landscape.
How fortunate that there are so many of these witnesses in Scotland and the British Isles—and that their siblings are found all across Europe! Perhaps we can remember a stone we’ve encountered in the past. Perhaps an image can open the same silent door. Perhaps our path will actually lead us to one of these upright stones—be it to Arran, to the edge of the moorland, or to Mull along the path to Lochbuie. In every genuine encounter with one of the upright ones, we encounter a bit of Michael in the landscape.
In the beginning, there was the question. In the end, a tone remains—bright in thought, faithful in perception, calm in standing. That is all it takes to cross the autumnal threshold with dignity.
Translation Joshua Kelberman
Image McLeod’s Stone on the Isle of Harris. Photo: Renatus Derbidge
Thank you very much for this beautiful article about the living nature of menhirs and the threshold. The author has, with careful sensitivity and language, opened an appreciation of these stones as beings. I have had my own experiences, so am all the more grateful. Jean-Luc Banale has written a more exoteric but similarly sensitive description of the stones Jean and Jeanne menhirs on Belle-Île in Britanny in his novel Island of Suspects.