Happy Brigid/Imbolc/Candlemas/Groundhog Day!

The maiden comes to bring us light,
The winter dies and all is bright,
The frozen ground shall disappear,
All shall sprout for Spring is near.

We are  still in the grip of winter yet we stand on the threshold of spring. The deepest darkness is past! 

I like to imagine Brigid the Bright stepping from Tír Tairngire , the Land of Promise, to light the darkness and set our thoughts and resolve towards spring.  In her hand is the white birch wand that brings the light of spring to the dark of winter. She invites us to stand with her on the threshold of what is and what is to be--between "now" and "know."  Are you and I ready to join her? 


Brigid is( among her many roles) patroness of the hearth, poets, smiths, craftspeople and healers. With an Irish chimney-sweep husband whose very job is  tending hearths (plus we heat our home by wood stoves so we really do gather round the hearth on cold nights!), a daughter who is both a blacksmith and sculptor (we have a forge complete with anvil in out garage), and multiple musicians and visual artists among our ranks, Brigid is our natural patroness. Of course,  Brigid informs and inspires  my artistic collaborations with my daughter Ellen and it's  no surprise that I named our publishing business Brigid's Hearth Press.

Falling on February second, the  cross-quarter and greater feast of Brigid/Imbolc is better know as Groundhog Day to most people. In fact, the  Puxatony Phil tradition of  weather divination is the part of the holiday that survives in secular society. Brigid was a significant turn of the Wheel for my Celtic ancestors. Usually translated as "in the belly," or "ewe's milk," for first lactation of pregnant ewes, Brigid is a time of first stirrings. 

The sun sets a little later each day, and spring bulbs begin to stir and reach for light; some brave, or foolish, green spears have already pierced the cold earth in my front garden.  

We too begin to stir out of winter's darkness and introspection  and carefully plan and foster new goals even as we plan spring gardens yet to be. 

It is our job to manifest our dreams as well our gardens in the months to come.

May we all find the gifts of firm resolve and true purpose as we foster our spiritual and mundane goals in this time of  first stirrings.

A Winter Walk at the Turning of the Year

4 PM Christmas Day 2012: My husband, nineteen year old son, and seven year old daughter take a walk across the fields and woodland just before sundown. Apart from the honking chorus of a flock of geese, the woods are  still, but not silent.

 

A chickadee natters in the brambles and a crimson cardinal and his drab mate flit across the trail and into the lower branches of a maple. Up the hill, a buck and his doe bound uphill white tails flashing. I look through bare limbs down the sweep of the hill to the stream that flows at its base and to the rising sweep of land on the other side.  Above bare limbs, a waxing moon emerges from the clouds and sails above us.
 

This land is like a chalice--holding the trees, the animals, the sleeping life within roots and dens between its slopes. And as I pause and give thanks, it holds me as well.

 

A few months ago in the glory of fall and summer foliage, all of these small and beautiful details would be hidden. But in the Croning months, the time of severity, all that has fulfilled its purpose has been swept away and repurposed in the earth. Winter gives us the space to be still, to note the small details, to see more deeply and with greater clarity to the roots and depths within and without.

 

May this season of returning light bring you all the warmth of friends and family and the invigorating clarity of the winter woods. Blessings!

Samhain to Yule: Light in the Darkness

My coven celebrated Little Yule in a joyous ritual held at my home during which we welcomed two new members. The Yule tree sparkles with ornaments and multi-colored lights, and the house is perfumed with the aroma of holiday baking. The winter solstice and Yule are almost upon us. With the coming light, three months of shadow work is drawing to a close.  

 This season's shadow work began with an icy wake-up call from the Crone on Samhain night when I found myself in my very own bedroom confronted by a messenger dressed in black who tore chunks out of the  door to a very real crawl space behind my bed, then told me to "wake up." (See, When the Crones Pay A Visit, You Better Pay Attention) 

About a week ago, I performed a chakra cleansing meditation, felt marvelously calm, had a good night’s sleep and took a day trip with my children.  When we returned, happy and fresh faced, I ordered Chinese, put my feet up and thought, “Wow—a whole night and day has gone by—without at tap or a nudge.”  Later that night, as I boiled water for tea, I decided to open the last fortune cookie.  The message inside read, “Before you can see the light, you have to deal with the darkness.”    If I’d known what was around the corner, I would have stopped chuckling.

 The shadow work that I have been engaged in since Samhain has led me deep into my personal darkness with the ultimate aim of nurturing the light within me.  I have meditated, read, journeyed, journaled, and attended illuminating workshops and transformative rituals at Between the Worlds, an interfaith esoteric conference.    In The Gates of Yesterday and Tomorrow, a powerful ritual held at the conference, I promised in sacred space to let go of what I didn’t need and to move forward.

I returned from the conference feeling energized and enriched. School’s almost out! Yule is almost here!  I’d been working hard! Surely, I’d delved deeply enough, changed enough, moved forward enough. But the shadow work I’d chosen to perform wasn’t finished.  I had to demonstrate that I had the strength of will to go beyond my comfort zone and deep clean the house of my spirit. All that work had certainly opened me up for a test that made me dig into the core of my being on many levels. It was a test that I could only pass by casting away self-doubt—it was a test that I almost failed.

Just after Samhain, I’d prayed for fruitful vision quests hardly aware of what was ahead but willing to accept the Crone’s charge to “wake up.” I am not typically a lucid dreamer.  Therefore, when I have a dream where I see with clarity, speak with authority, feel the sensation of being pulled from the soles of my feet to  the skin of my back, I’m pretty sure that I’m being spiritually PMed.

I walk barefoot through the dingy rooms of a dilapidated Victorian house at the top of a steep barren slope with several narrow sets of dirty, old concrete steps.  It is an unpleasant house, upon the drab silent outskirts of a faded disagreeable neighborhood.

The rooms are dim-- the kind of twilight that greets you on a cold, dreary day. I feel squirming underfoot and shudder with revulsion as I realize that I am walking upon tiny mice and insects. Vermin infest every room. 

The house is filled with rusting—whispered secrets, scampering, evasions, and shadows. I know that I need to “wake up” and pay attention to details.     I want to destroy this infestation because I realize with disgust they infest my house.  It may be shabby, dank and inaccessible, the steps to the road may be treacherous and far below—but it is mine nonetheless. I know that it’s my job to clean it.  The job is so huge I want to run away, but I can’t.  Either I clean house or give up and accept defeat.

I feel a very real physical tug like the pull of tide. My body tingles with energy. The room darkens. Just ahead is swirling pulsing vortex of red light.   I know that place is not meant for me—that it’s not a safe place for me. I no more want to enter that vortex than I want to put my hand in an InSinkErator garbage disposal.  But this is my opportunity to get rid of all the psychic vermin once and for all.  It’s my choice.  . Words come to me. I speak them with authority and conviction. I speak from the center of my will and push energy through my solar plexus, “I banish you! Back! Back! Back!”   The darkness and vermin resist.  I push harder.  I feel and see the vermin coalesce and begin to stream away from me into the vortex.

I wake and reach for my husband’s warm, anchoring presence.  I snort softly.

Of course what I want and what I need are at odds. If I were a house—I’d want the world to see me as accessible, well kept, and full of cozy warmth. What the Crone has shown me is a structure far from this virtuous vision.  My outward self—my conscious effort and in fact a good deal of who I am and want to be and become is invested in being this welcoming home. But the Crone sent me farther inward, to this shadowed structure, to fulfill my promise and evict (if I so willed) pain and burdens that I need no longer carry. After the darkest night, the light waxes—in the heart of the shadows my own compassion and will to move forward create light. As I fall into true sleep, I feel a toddler’s delight in her first steps.

Samhain to Yule

  Samhain to Yule --The Journey Inward

Soul-searching N: A penetrating examination of one's motives, convictions, and attitudes.

A deep or critical examination of one's motives, actions, beliefs, etc.

Adj: displaying the characteristics of deep or painful self-analysis.

Collins English Dictionary – Complete and Unabridged © HarperCollins Publishers 1991, 1994, 1998, 2000, 2003

 

 

In my last post, “When the Crone Pays a Visit, You’d Better Pay Attention,” I related my Samhain experience of a mandate from the Crone and a deceased  family member to “wake-up” and start the new year with a difficult and necessary spiritual house cleaning.  As anyone who has found themselves in my predicament knows, this is no easy task.    Shadow work, which could also be defined as soul-searching, is really a quest to find, acknowledge, and/or root out doubt, guilt, baneful thoughts/intent, self-loathing, and old grief  (just to name a few lurkers in my own dark places).  

 

Soul searching is fraught with danger and sacrifices, but also with self-knowledge and positive transformation.  As in any quest, the goal is to grow from the chosen initiate and become a hero/heroine.  We are, in a sense, on a quest to save ourselves from all that holds us back and keeps us form realizing our potential and doing the work we are called to do in this incarnation.  It’s hard to make spiritual progress.  It hurts to forgive and to ask forgiveness.  It is hard to commit—to become the hero/heroine of your spiritual quest.

 In Joseph Campbell’s The Hero with a Thousand Faces, the central character’s primary purpose is to separate from the ordinary world and sacrifice him/herself.  To answer the challenge, complete the quest and restore balance.   The balance I restore (see, I’m thinking positively here!) within myself will be reflected in my words and deeds and will (in a small way) resonate across many planes of existence.  My personal shadow work will involve ritual, meditation, and journeying to speak to my totem spirits and guides.  It will also involve reaching out and making changes in the way I interact with the physical world.

Quests also involve mentors, guardians, and guides. My mentor is the goddess as The Crone.  From our first encounter, she has provided motivation, insights and training.  The Crone is a tough coach. She  tets me, and expects hard work and commitment. But she also believes that her guidance will have positive results.  

Soul searching is a transformative process involving many steps.  Much to my solar Leo’s chagrin, my Virgo ascendant insists on asserting itself here.  Stripped down to bare process these steps are: initiation, selection, exploration, formulation, collection, and closure.  Because linear time is irrelevant to beings from other planes—and a mandate from a goddess is a very big deal--I have a strong, feeling that this quest is likely to be cyclical in nature and go on for a very long time.  As I continue on this journey, I will share my progress.  But for now—what I share involves: initiation--my  recognition that I have been selected to complete my quest; selection--my selection of an area I need to address; exploration of the sore spot in order to gain new personal knowledge; and formulation, when the seeker starts to evaluate  gathered information and a focused perspective begins to form. 

 For me, walking in nature is a meditative process.  I learn a great deal by being attentive to what I see and perceive physically and spiritually. I look for synchronicity (another Jungian term describing the alignment of universal forces with one's own life experience). I take in what I can and, later, meditate upon "co-inciding" events or alignment of forces in the universe to create an event or circumstance. Part of my quest involves becoming intuitively aware and acting in harmony with these forces.

 

The wrath of Hurricane  Sandy and the cold fury of the nor'easter that followed has --ironically-- been followed by mild, spring like weather--much nicer weather than we will experience in March and April. But the silence of the woods, the barren limbs, and the shorn stubble, and the sun setting before five o'clock in the extreme southwest reminds me that the Brandywine Valley is locked in The Crone's embrace. 

It is a Saturday in mid-November when I walk into our woods.  The woods are so still!  The breath of plants, birdsong, and the powerful energy of growth has stopped.  On the surface, like a blanket of snow, the earth is still.  A flock of black birds   perches upon bare limbs--dark, silent silhouettes.  Two women on horseback greet me and bemoan the overcast.  I rather enjoy the muted sky and the silence.  This is an excellent atmosphere for the shadow work which The Crone has charged me to complete. 

 

I clamber over the tree brought down by Sandy that keeps most people from taking this path; walk on past unharvested soybean fields where I stoop to pick up the blood-red and pumpkin orange berries of Bittersweet. Attentive to the changes of this cycle, I ground and center before turning a sharp left and walking down the steep path into the heart of the woods. Into the now barren womb.  This is the realm of The Crone.  The wise woman who understands the reality of letting goes of stripping away. The leaves are all but gone. The forest floor is carpeted with their fading golden and ruddy glory. 

As I walk the leaf strewn path I  speak softly of all that I was lost--my mother, father sister, brother--of all the old wounds that cause me to wake and cry silently in the middle of the night. I say, “I acknowledge you. I loved you. But you are gone." or "You hurt me," and   (most difficult) "I am guilty of inflicting this wound."  There is grief I must release or be forever chained to the past,  hurt that  I must acknowledge and release like leaves that flutter to the  earth to be renewed in soil and new life.

I walk and touch old griefs.  If I have done all that I can to heal a painful event—I must let it go.  If there is something I can still do—some swallowing of pride—some contact that would help heal a wound—I must think about how I can accomplish that task. Are these hurts monsters to be defeated?  Some are for sure.  Some, like my estrangement from my only brother, are griefs that I must acknowledge and accept.

 

There is beauty and truth in the severity of this season, as there is beauty and truth in the severity of self-examination. Bare, smooth silver limbs of beach and the rough, scored limbs of  huge tulip poplars are exposed. But there is harmony and stillness after the great storms of November passed.

 

 

Here is rest. Here is silence.  Every curve, knot, and twig--seemingly dormant--yet here too is life!   The silence is palpable as I leave the path and walk up the rise to the majestic tulip tree.  This is my friend.  Its deva calls to me. I place my offering of Bittersweet on a cairn of stones that I have built up over the years as an offering to the nature spirits of this sacred land. I run my hands inches away from its surface and feel its heat --the energy it has stored deep within. As I run my hands downward toward its roots and feel the pulse and energy increase.  Here is the hidden treasure--the heart and source of the tree's life.  It beats deep beneath the earth and deep within the bole of the tree. I place my hands upon its rough, deeply scored bark, close my eyes and feel and visualize the pulse of life--steady and deep.  I hail the presence of Tulip Tree and ask its blessing. As I open my eyes I feel the air pulse and shimmer. Rarely have I felt so at peace--so lightened.  My offering has been acknowledged.

 

 

I walk up the hill, turning once to look back--knowing that I have to move forward. I climb the rise leading out of the woods. As I reach the woods borders and look toward open meadow--I freeze. My eyes lock on the eyes of a solitary white tailed Buck who stares at me as intently as I stare at him. Is the buck a new totem animal that I need to journey to for guidance? He is the Horned God. -- The God of joyful virility, radiating power and life force--even here in the Croning months. But he is also cautious, poised to recognized and avoid danger. As he turns and bounds back into the woods, he reminds me that the life force is never far from us—but we must be poised and aware. I will take all of this in meditate, and journey, journal and continue on my quest

 

When the Crone Pays A Visit, You Better Pay Attention

 

 Samhain 2012--I wake in pre-dawn hours, my heart pounding.  I've placed photographs of my beloved dead on my altar, placed welcome offerings of my dad's favorite candy and whiskey, and lit a candle.  I’ve  asked for my ancestors and any supportive powers to PM me in my dreams. I am anticipating something like the  warm and loving messages I received during Audience With the Ancestors, a Samhain ritual performed by my coven (Grail of the Birch Moon) and  member covens of the Assembly of the Sacred Wheel.  Something along the lines of" I'm fine," and, “follow the way of love.” But the Wise Woman, the Crone, (the matriarch of matriarchs) has visited me in the darkness of night, in the waning of the moon, bringing the chill of winter and a stern message.  It's not what I want, but it is the strong medicine that I need. 

I have never been a lucid dreamer.  So, when I find myself in my very own bedroom confronted by a messenger dressed in black who is--shall we say--brutally frank, I'm pretty freaked out.   First, the specter makes sure that I am icy cold (which certainly gets my attention), then she dissolves the headboard of my bed and tears chunks out of the  door to a very real crawl space behind it while my father (who passed in 2008)  tells me to "wake up."

 This dream is not a nightmare—but its message is certainly stern.  So, I wake to a room not quite as frigid as the astral room. When my heart rate drops to normal, it's time to figure out my spiritual game plan.

 As I’ve said, the crawl space is quite real and exactly where it was in the dream. There are a lot of things in that crawl space—old manuscripts, old books, old clothes, old memories good and not so good—things that I'm not quite ready to part with because they hold a part of me for good or ill.

As the space is behind the very large, very solid oak headboard of a behemoth bed, I can’t get at it without putting in a lot of effort.  I put that stuff there for a variety of reasons—nostalgia, the hope that they’ll be repurposed, and even (in the case of the manuscript)  because I couldn’t bear to look at it but couldn’t bear to throw it away either.

Clearly, it is time for me to do some shadow work. But I don't want to!  That's why all that stuff is packed away in an almost inaccessible physical space and in an equally inaccessible space inside of me.   I have a hunch that the Goddess and my dad expect a New Year’s cleaning that involves more than sorting through the tangible junk that lurks behind that closed door.

As I do a lot when I’m working through “things,” I take a walk in the woods and farmland around the Brandywine River Valley.   Sometimes, the land and the beings that inhabit it, have lessons to teach me. Sometimes the process of walking in the quiet countryside helps me find my way to an answer or at least  helps me pose questions that point me toward more clues.

 The woods have turned towards winter. A cold breeze rattles bare limbs.  Dry leaves spiral down onto damp, cold earth and fields of dun colored corn stubble. In the meadow, horses stand in groups, nose to nose. A maple tree felled by Hurricane Sandy lies across the path pressing down the electric wire enclosing the pasture.  It branches are filled with the tight knots of next year’s  buds-- life and potential that will never be realized in its current form--although it will be transformed and used. Nothing in nature goes to waste. 

Near the last unharvested soybean fields migrating robins chirp with alarm, then fall silent as a local red tailed hawk wheels overhead. I'm like the robin, chirping, alarmed. Then, silent...listening...watching.

The woods hold death and danger –felled trees, downed leaves, and the feathers left from a kill--this is a cycle. I must embrace this--for it is my story as much as the tree's or the bird's.   But it was also full of life. In strong roots that held firm despite Sandy's fury.  In the animals that are foraging or hibernating.  In the last red clovers blooming low to the ground.  In the Red Tail soaring high above crying its glorious “Keeyerr!”  I whisper, "She changes everything She touches and everything She touches changes." 

It’s time for me to touch, to draw out, acknowledge, and change. Nature is filled with harsh truths that I need to apply to my spiritual habitat.  I have held on to old grief and hurt too long.  I lock them away, unexamined, because they are too painful to acknowledge, but too much a part of me to easily relinquish.

It’s time to ground, center, pray for compassion and take them out of the darkness. It’s time to do the hard work of removing barriers that give false comfort and open the door to that shadowed place within myself.

Shadow work is as painful and healing as the nettle plant. Sometime the sting has to come before healing can begin.

When I get home, I know what I must do.  This is my first task of the new year. Mastering my fear, I must open physical and spiritual doors, reach into the darkness, and bring what I’ve stored and hidden into the light to be examined, sorted, kept or discarded. 

At fifty-two, (to paraphrase the Bard) I’m a tree approaching winter. A tree shaped and weathered by many seasonal cycles.  My roots are strong, deep, and I can withstand this shadow work.  But I am still a vibrant, sexual, life-embracing woman. I acknowledge shadows and darkness and will to examine the things that I have hidden with care…but I will not hide there –I will open the dark door, embrace the Crone and embrace this new and powerful cycle of my life.

Samhain--lifting veils

November marks a time of transition and turning inward. The veil between the worlds thins, dry leaves rustle, cool darkness falls early and we turn inwards as well.   It is a time of leave-taking. Fall migrants ("snow bird" humans and other species) depart for warmer spots on the globe, and trees and animals prepare and slow down.  While acknowledging and taking leave of warmth & light, Samhain is also a time of remembering and welcoming our ancestors and seeing to  "shadow work" as we examine, come to terms with, and/or heal the  darker aspects of our natures.

The "Feast of the Dead"  is also a part of my Celtic heritage. My ancestors left food offerings for the "wandering dead". Today,  we might light  a votive candle, put in in a safe container, and place it in a window to help guide the spirits of ancestors and loved ones home. We might also place an extra chair and place setting, a glass of wine, or even some Halloween candy, for the unseen guest.  Apples, candied and otherwise, have always had a strong association with Samhain/Halloween.

Wonder about wearing costumes,  bobbing for apples or pumpkin carving? My Celtic ancestors buried apples along roadsides and paths for wandering spirits who had no descendants to provide for them. On this night of magic when the veils between the worlds grew thin, people hollowed out turnips and carved them to look like protective spirits, dressed in white (like ghosts), wore disguises made of straw, or dressed as the opposite gender in order to fool the Nature spirits. Crops unharvested by Samhain were left as offerings to the Nature spirits. 

My ancestors built bone-fires (bonfires).  After slaughtering the livestock that would be their food for the winter, they feasted and threw the bones into the fire as offerings for healthy  livestock in the New Year. Hearth fires were also lit from the village bonfire to ensure unity, and the ashes were spread over the harvested fields to protect and bless the land.   It is a time for us as well to do necessary shadow work, and cast aside all the hurts and burdens that we no longer need to carry with us into the future.

Wishing you all a blessed  Third Harvest.

It's a dark, misty moisty day--but right now I am glowing! Solstice Moon Solstice Sun HAS ARRIVED and Ellen's magnificant illustrations just shine! After almost two years of work and planning, we have a finished product--a beautiful book--that we are very proud to present to you.

You can order Solstice Moon Solstice Sun,  posters, and cards at:
www.brigidsherathpress.com.