A New Year

So much has happened. Perhaps that story is for another day. Suffice it to say, this evening, I find myself quite... solitary.

I am thusly by my own choices... mostly. But regardless, this evening seems to be the perfect time to have a clean slate.

There is a practice amongst some pagans whereby they study for a year and a day before they are rightly initiated into certain traditions. As I have not found a group, I am a solitary practitioner. I have been a solitary practitioner of sorts since August 2010. I still have the note I made to myself the year I committed to giving myself a year and a day to sort through my former practices. I found them mostly easy to discard as they had become burdensome and toxic. The year was more a time of unravelling and deconstructing.

In the following years, I found small ways to begin following my pagan leanings. Mostly, my practices involved watching the moon and being aware of her phases. I would cast my wishes into a fire, set intentions, pray and sing and dance beneath her light. I became free to stand in my own intuitive beliefs.

This evening of new moon and thinning veil, I wish to dig deeper. I am reading through two books to assist me in my study. A year and a day to study more deeply, more earnestly. To find my weekly and monthly practices.

One of the lessons is to consider a list of words:
wicca
witchcraft
power
ritual
occult
pagan
spell
earth religion

I confess, I find myself comfortable reading about them and writing about them behind the privacy of my laptop. But I don't engage in daily conversations where these words are part of my normal vernacular. Why? Fear of negative reactions of others? Oh yeah!!

As I have studied, I come more and more to believe in a kind of magic. Not in some hocus pocus way. I find magic to be more of the change in me. It is as if I am more energetically connected to the Universe. Unfortunately, I don't always trust my intuition. Or maybe I just don't listen to it. The magic is when I do pay attention. Things happen. Are they coincidences?? I don't think so. I think it is more like Jung says... synchronicity. It is like being tuned in. When the Universe sends the message, it is important to be aware of it. Then when things come into our paths that we were already aware of, we are ready. It seems coincidental, but really, we were just tuned in.

I mention synchronicity because all the things that are coming together right now in my life seem heavy. But perhaps it is the right time for a clean slate. How appropriate is it that I find myself at this eve of a new year (according to pagan calendars) relationally free? And even more so that I took the initiative in each situation. Some, I may have dwelled in too long. Emotionally, I may have a harder time disconnecting from others. But I did not leave the ideas hanging... waiting... open ended. I closed the doors. And how interesting is it, as I think upon it, that there were three endings within a week? A trifecta. That is my sign. It is the smallest of nudges in my spirit that helps me to know this is the right path. A breadcrumb. A reminder. A cairn in my spiral path reminding me that this is the way.

As I sign off, this hallowed evening, I offer this prayer:

Ode to the Full Moon and Summer Time

Stonehenge: wikipedia

On Tuesday evening (6/21), I carved out a little time for my full moon ritual. It was also Litha or summer solstice. Even more reason for me to acknowledge the calendar.

The thing I love about mish-mashing my way through these times is that I can make them as elaborate or as simple as I like. Tuesday was simple, but meaningful. And powerful. I would have loved doing this outside, but it wasn't going to happen... heat, humidity, haze... not a great view of the beautiful moon. And I live underneath a bunch of 100 year old trees so it is late in the evening before I see her rise. This evening, I held my ritual inside.

I gathered my tools first...

matches

candle 

(I recently purchased a small while pillar candle for this evening)

white sage

incense

(my favorites are dragon's blood and nag champa)

slips of paper

pen

fireproof bowl

I settled in front of my altar. I smudged the area and all the tools I would be using. I started off by thinking about what things I needed to release or what behaviors needed changing. These full moon rituals are like a small New Year's resolutions. Each month, I get to purge energy that is dragging me down. I wrote the things that came to mind on my slips of paper.

I arranged my altar with things that are meaningful for me. Shells, ocean water, selenite, a large shell that holds the sage, sage, candles. 

One by one, I read my slips of paper out loud... "I release this... Be gone!" One by one, I placed the strips into my bowl and set them on fire. 

When each slip of paper had been reduced to ashes, I thanked the Moon and the power and energy that surrounds this kind of evening and welcomed the summer. This was my ritual.

Each one of us can find a meaningful way to mark the sabbats and esbats. The rules, for me, are meaningless. I try to create a template and then fill it in, depending on the time and setting. It takes the stress out of the planning and makes if feel free rather than restrictive.  

If someone tries to tell you... "You need to do it precisely this way or else"... just smile and walk away. 

If you are mish-mashing your way through this journey, creating a new path, I hope you will share your thoughts with me.