Staying Motivated in your Studies and Oh, I Started a Study Group

Dear Neophyte,

This Needs Edited In The Future to Half Word Count

I do get pretty talky when I'm passionate and on a daeadline

Staying motivated in our witchcraft studies can be daunting.  All of us have a lot of life to live, a severe need for instant gratification, and almost no self-discipline. If you disagree this applies to you then answer me this: How much debt are you in that could have been avoided if you'd exercised more discipline?  Not your fault? Well, if someone held a super soaker gun to your head and told you to find a way to get your needs met without going into debt you'd have found a way to do it.  Firstly by prioritizing what was actually a need and then finding out how to get it on your income.

Time is income and the things that we want to accomplish in our magical studies are the "needs" we want to afford it.  Instead of buckling down and fitting our studies into the time we have, we go into debt with ourselves saying "I'll owe a 20 min meditation tomorrow because I wanted to fit in another episode of Oran before bed."  Then tomorrow you don't want to spend 20 min so you owe thirty for the next day.  The time debt becomes overwhelming and you give up.

Stop that.  

Stop time-debting to yourself.  If you didn't meditate today for 10 min then tomorrow you only owe 10 min.  That's it.  The long-term effects of meditation cannot be gained in one 30 min sit if you skipped 10 min sits for three days in a row.  Didn't meditate today?  You missed out.  Tomorrow is a new day and you start over from scratch.  This is both refreshing and frustrating.  You don't owe anything.  You didn't gain anything either.

That's how it works.

My sister and I started a study group.  This is month three and the topic is "Staying Motivated".  Surprised?  Don't be.  It's been three months since the last meeting and we only had two before then since the group was founded.  Oddly enough we chose this topic before we knew everyone was going to flake for three meetings in a row, though one was canceled due to illness and job loss on the parts of two members.

The study group meets on the waxing side of the full moon on the day that at least 75% of members can make it.  This time is the first time we're actually able to meet ON the full moon (which is tomorrow).  The three original members decided that when we get enough information and practical experience under our belts we'd like to form a working group.  We all have Shamanism in common so reconnecting with my totems would not go amiss. In the meantime we gotta get back to that place, hence a study group.

Here are my notes for Staying Motivated in Magical Studies

These apply to members of the study group specifically, though they can be adapted for solitary use as individuals see fit.

1) Study Groups - Staying active in the study group is essential.  Real work and dedication are required to incorporate witchcraft into your everyday life.  We are a self-study group who come together to share ideas.  We don't employ 'teachers', 'gurus', and certainly don't have 'mentors' who are already versed in their craft.  We teach each other.  That means everyone contributes.

Personally, if someone isn't contributing and is instead expecting to sit there absorbing everyone else's ideas then I plan a swift votekick from the group.  I'm not playing high priestess to someone who thinks they don't have to do the work and can just leech off of me while in a circle.  No.

2) Networking - Websites I recommend for general networking are Witchvox, Facebook, and Beliefnet.  For specific traditions, there are always websites for you too.  Kemeticism has the Kemetic Orthodox Church that supports the House of Netjer forums, amongst others.  Search your tradition and join the forums.  See if there are forums specifically for those in your area and start talking to people.  Meetup is a great place to meet new people who share your interests in witchcraft.  A while back I had a LOT of success using Yahoo Groups, though I can't tell you what they are like now.  When I was just getting started they were a great place to give and get ideas, advice, and encouragement.  Don't discount old-fashioned letter writing to people whose information you pull off the message boards of your local occult shop.  These shops might also tell you where to find individuals in your area who don't advertise.  That's how a member of my study group found out there was a sect of Odinist the next town over.  She got in contact and went for a visit to say hello.  Get out and meet other Witches!

3)  Mentors -  While I don't think that we're skilled enough in this group to be really mentoring each other, you may find a mentor in your networking whom you can go to for advice on certain areas.  ASK this person if this is a role they want to play for you and lay down some ground rules.  It is not ok to be calling someone before or after established hours for basic questions.  I recommend meeting up once a week to discuss your progress. Even if this meeting is 10 min phone chat.  Remember, it's not a social call so stick to relevant queries and remember to pay it forward for someone else once you've mastered an area enough to dispense some advice about it.

4) Weekly Check-Ins and Accountability  - I want our study group to have weekly check-ins.  Start a post on the Facebook page once a week and let us know how you're doing with the current topic.  Each member will respond with either a bit of advice or encouragement to keep going.   We don't encourage enabling of people not budgeting their time properly, nor are we going to allow co-dependence of agreeing with people's excuses not to do their homework.

As example:
Person A)  "Sitting still is so BOOORING.  I don't like meditation!"
Person B) responds with: "Dawg, have you heard of walking meditation?  Google that sh*t!"
Person C) responds with: "I do tai chi meditation.  That way I can move around while I zone out.  Give it a try?"
Person D) responds with: "Stick with it.  It's only been three days.  Get back to me after a week and see if you still have so much trouble holding still.  It could be that your body isn't used to being allowed to relax so give it a few more days and don't give up!"
Person A)  responds with: "Yeah, I'll try sitting still for another few days and if it's still not working for me I'll look into moving meditations.  I not into tai chi, but I'm sure I can do something else repetitive to help me let go mentally."

5) Why Witchcraft? - Knowing what you want out of your studies is key.  It's surprising how a lot of people think witchcraft will replace therapy, hospitals, social skills, self-improvement needs, etc.  When you get past all of that and the answer is you want these skills regardless of it not being a replacement for any of that then you just need to outline what those reasons are.  Example: I want to honor the seasons with appropriate rituals, be able to journey to the spirit world with my totem for self-discovery, and walk the mazes in my head without fear of being lost.  Then you're on the right path.

6) Don't Overdo It - Have a plan for getting where you want to go and know how to pace yourself.  You don't need to do 30 min of practice every single night, spending 10 min on three different exercises cause you want it all NOW.  10 min a night spend on nothing as simple as breathing is still Witchcraft.  It counts.  If you already know that your posture for meditation is fine then work on your breathing next.  Then clearing headspace.  Then the rest.  Step by step.  Figure out which exercises you want to get under your belt and in what order.  Break them down into simple steps and learn each step in its turn.

7)  Be Reasonable - Humans have ups and downs.  Allow yourself ups and downs.  You must fight giving into manic surges of want to study the same way you must fight depressed episodes of disinterest.  The balance it brings will be well worth it.  The Dark Night of the Soul happens to everyone.  Some people more than once.  The breakthrough is worth it as you're pushed to new levels.  Be kind to yourself, but maintain discipline. 

8) Study Guide – Write down what you want to learn. Write down the minimum level of proficiency you'll be ok with before adding another item to your repertoire. Don't think you have to master something before you can start learning something else. Most people never stop practicing to perfect their art. Be practical. Stick with ritual or skill basics such as grounding and centering before adding things like trance work. Break these items down to their simplest forms to see which steps you have to practice and in which order. Meditation as example: Posture > Comfort and Relaxation > Breathing > Visualization > Guided Meditations.

9).  Achieve Goals and Debunking “Perfectionism” - Goal setting can be its own class.  Take meditation as an example: "Each night at 5:30 pm I will meditate on my breathing for 10 min.  By the end of the month, I will be able to keep my breathing strong and steady and will be able to move on to visualization exercises.  By Lammastide I will be able to hold images in my head while maintaining strong breath for 20 min."  Planning to master meditation in a month is bogus.  Not letting yourself move on till you have mastered meditation is bogus.  Once you can do the basics you can move on to other exercises, if that is your wish. If by Samhain you hope to have all ritual basics under your belt enough to do a solitary Ancestor Rite then break down your goals month by month and piece by piece. 

10)  Daily Practice – Having daily practice makes something far easier to do. Don't think of it as extra activities you're trying to squeeze into your day. This IS your day. Practicing your daily shielding to prevent physic plaque should be no different than brushing your teeth to prevent cavities. If you don't believe it's just as important than refer back to your reasons and your goals. Why do you want to do this?

11) Min/Max Limits - What is the minimum you'll do in a day and still consider it as crossed off your list? What is the maximum amount you'll do before cutting yourself off? Finding this middle ground and staying as true to center as you can is the best way to stay balanced and not risk burnout. However, use your support group when you need to. Minimum is better than nothing, so in order to avoid disappointment, you need know what that is.

12) Progress Report and Reward – After mastering the basics it's ok to give yourself a reward before moving on to deeper or different skills. Rewards could be anything from books specializing in a certain subject, an item that symbolizes that skill, a title to use as you please, or a new tool you didn't want to buy because you didn't know if you were that into this particular form of divination. Turns out you're really good at tea reading and want to bigger, fancier cup to use just for readings.

A Note On Your Role in Your Progress: Let it not be said that it is the group's responsibility to drag you along, spoon feed you answers, and be batteries for your own magical endeavors. Book learning does nothing without practical applications to back it up. We can't practice your grounding and centering for you. We aren't the dressing-up brigade and some of us have an ultimate goal of taking a few members of this group and forming a working circle. But that means enough members need to know what they're on about for this to happen.

13)  Holy Days and Moons – Marking the seasons, your God's special days, and the phases of the moons help to incorporate your practices as part of your everyday life. At this point I don't consider someone a Witch if you don't any actual spellwork under their belt, don't mark particular points of the year, are oblivious to anything bigger than them, and just read books. Not good enough. Not nearly. It's what you do behind closed doors when no one is looking, that you aren't doing just to brag about it later, that counts. It's what people don't know you do because it's such a part of your life you can see the craft but not the separation of it from your daily life. The Egyptians didn't even have a word for 'religion' because what they did just WAS.

14)  Art, Journals, Writing, Music, Videos, and Shopping – I've gone through my local craft store and dollar store and mentally figured out what kinds of observances and spells I could do with what is on hand. I do this to keep me inspired. I write myself into fictions of my own life where I am the witch/healer/priestess I want to be and this inspires me to make it so. Magical daydreaming is for real. I look to books for inspiration on deepening my understanding and practice beyond the basics. The Old Craft witches of St. Thomas on the Poke set a high bar, but one that I know I can reach if I dig a little deeper and reach a little higher. Music moves me. Especially Blackmore's Knight and Loreena McKennitt. If you don't feel like doing that moon ritual just put on Dark Lady by the former or All Soul's Night by the latter and – nevermind the one is a Samhain ballad – see if the Powers That Be can even STOP you from lighting those candle and casting that circle! There is YouTube and the plethora of advice and encouragement for the beginners. You can listen to a Ted Talk motivational speaker speaking about how to get on with what motivates you and 10 min in you'll be shutting it off to sit down for some meditations. Lastly I keep progress reports in my BoS/journal. If I don't feel like moving forward then I sometimes look back and see what motivated me to keep going last time I felt like stopping. Selina kicked my arse for almost three months AFTER she was gone. Just the idea that this woman was running around spreading her misinformation and bullshat all over the place made me desperate to feed myself correct information and practices just to balance out the crazy. Record your motivations in your journal and read back on your progress. This should help you want to move forward since stopping would naturally require you to start over from the beginning once you took it back up again.

Magic is a muscle: use it or lose it.

Salutations,

Sesh

Samhain Magic and Divination - A List

Dear Neophyte,

This is a generic list of the most popular types of magic to perform on or near Samhain.  Sometimes the details are vague and the audience is left to fill in the blanks in order to personalize a spell.  You really don't need more than a line or two of information on what components go into a spell anyway.  At this point (past the first couple of years of being a witch) you should be able to formulate simple spells off the top of your head.

Note that most of these list a time of "Samhain Night" but that is not a hard and fast rule.  Unless otherwise stated I put that for everything.  Between the full moon in October (the blood moon) and Samhain is a fine time to do this.

I am straight up going to jack a bunch of images from Google Image just to break up the post a little.

 Magic

Type of Magic: Divination - Various

When: Full moon; Sun is in Scorpio

Topics:

1. What has gone wrong in not bringing about your desired progress.

2. What is to come in the winter months? Abundance, etc.

3. Secrets, personal power, psychic growth, divination, death, romance/marriage

4. Ask for guidance in the coming year. Select something appropriate and ack upon it.

Meathod – Scrying: Scrying is done in a dimely lit room with a either a black bowl of water or dyed water in a regular bowl.

Meathod – Cards: Reading the meanings of symbols on cards drawn from a deck in a particular order.

Always write down messages you receive in divination. Select a couple things to work on in the coming year.

Picture Credit

Typ of Magic: Divination – Nuts, in shells

When: Samhain night

Divination Topic: Romance

Materials: Two hazel nuts, hearth/fireplace

Meathod - Couples: Name each nut for a specific person. Set them before the fireplace and close enough to get hot quickly. Use the chant below. If they stay together than so to will the couple; if they split apart then so will their love.

Meathod – Singles: Two groups of nuts are placed; one for the batchelors and one for the batcheloretts. As the nuts pop and fly the romantic links are made. For this one modify the chant below to be for singles.

Chant:

“If you love me pop and fly;

If you hate me, burn and die.”

Reading: You can decide who's intentions are true based on how the nuts pop.

Variations: Dropping chestnuts directly into the fire.

*These little bastards like to NOT crack open, even with a hammer.  See my samhain post some few years ago for my adventures with finding out I had wild hazelnuts in my backyard.  I even drove over them with the car and they would not crack!

Picture Credit

Type of Magic: Divination – Apple, eating

When: Samhain night

Topic: Romance and marriage

Materials: 1 whole apple, knife, mirror, candle, lighter

Meathods: Slice an apple in half horizontally and eat it by candlelight. Tradition says your future husband will appear over your shoulder. A skull may also appear, signifying the person is doomed to either die or not find fomance that year.

Photo Credit

* The color doesn't really matter but if you're going for love I'd choose red.

Type of Magic: Divination – Apple, peeling

When: Samhain night

Topic: Romance and marriage; life expenctancy

Materials: Apple, knife, window facing east

Meathod 1 - Romance: Peel the apple in one long strand while facing West. West is the element of water, emotions, and the direction of the land of the dead.

This is cheating.

Meathod 2 – Life Expectancy: You can also peel an apple with the intention of finding out how long one's life would be. Longer rind means a longer life.

Chant:

“I pare this apple round and round again

My sweetheart's name to flourish on the plane:

I fling the unbroken paring o'er my head:

My sweetheart's letter on the ground to read:”

My love is infinity signs?

Type of Magic: Divination – Hearth, Animal

When: Samhain night

Topic: Romance

Materials: Hearth with ashes still inside, live snail

Meathod: Send a snail crawling through the ashes of your hearth and the 'considerate little creature' will spell out the initial letter of your intended as it moves.

Type of Magic: Divination – Apples, floating

When: Samhain night

Topic: Marriage

Materials: Apples, Water, Container big enough to float several apples in

Meathod: Bobbing for apples. Whoever bites into an apple first will be the first to get married.

Type of Magic: Any

When: Sun in Scorpio

Pagan Magic

Topic: Secrets, personal poer, psychic growth, divination, seance death, unfrtility (sterility); put the whammy on that whomb and shrivel those balls! Vines and gourds don't need to be the only withered, dead things that refuse to yield seeds to life this time of year!

About: For many pagans, Samhain, especially the first few you celebrate, are a way to learn new magics: how divination works, how to conduct a séance, and making contact and establishing links and relationships with spirit guides.

Materials: Any

Meathod: Any

Chant: Any

Type of Magic: Banishing - Herbal, Fire

When: Samhain night

Topic: Releasing bad traits, self-reflection, shedding, releasing, cleansing, opening blocks

Materials: Hearth fire, paper, pen, appropriate herbs

Meathod: Strike a fire with the intention of it helping you to shed your unwanted habbits and parts. Offer herbs to the fire and waft the smoke over your body as purificaitno. Write down the outmoded feathers of yourself; concentrate on pushing it out of you and into the piece of paper. Toss it into the fire. As the flames consume imagine it leaving you for good and no longer causing you blocks. In the end picture yourself adopting a healthier way of being. Remember magic does not fix problems if you don't apply the effort outside spellwork. Circle the fire as you dance joy at shedding the problems. Dance in front if it is a hearth. Give the fire your dance as thanks for its help.

Chant: Banishing, releasing, shedding chants

*Note: I write my spells on birch bark because it's the tree of new beginnings.

Birch bark paper.

Type of Magic: House Blessing - Broom

When: Midnight before New Years Day

Topic: Spiritual cleaning

Materials: Broom, either new or old;

My Amish corn broom.

Meathod: Ritually re-bless your broom and use it to sweep out the old year and it's associated energies to make room for the fresh energies of the new year.

Chant: Cleansing, Blessing

Friction Tools

Type of Magic: Need-fire - Bonfire

When: Samhain night till Samhain morning

Topic: Strengthen the Sun and God-in-the-Womb; purification; banishment; protection

Materials: Old-fationed fire making tools, preferably ones which used friction; sacred woods

Meathod – Making Fire: Follow the meathod of friction which your tool calls for. Needfires are only made when there is a pressing need for them, and doing it from scratch honors the Gods and show you are serious and willing to put in the effort for the goal you seek. This fire is sacred to the Gods and is not normal cooking, warmth fire.

Meathod – Smoke/Ashes: Standing in the smoke, or wafting it over yourself has purifying and protective influences.

Meathod – Flames: Running throug, near or jumping over the flames is said to burn up negative influences. Driving lifestock between the fires is common way to cleanse the herd.

Chant: Sun, pregnancy, vigor chants

Traditionally boys would go out and cause trouble while young girls stayed home to play divination games. Pre-suffrage girls were obsessed with finding a man and getting married which is why the older methods revolve around romance and marriage.  I personally feel there are better holidays to do love magic on but in the interest of record keeping I wrote the love divination down anyway.  It's sort of out-of-character but Christians at that time had lost touch with the Celtic roots of this holiday which focus on death, harvest and spirits.  Feel free to change any of the elements of the spells to focus on whatever you want (shedding, banishment instead of love).

Most of this information comes from the internet.  There are literally dozens of sites I read and compiled this list from. Next year I'll probably add to it.  Since there were too many sites I didn't write down sources.  Every third site was copying another site so it's hard to tell where the information originated from anymore.

Salutations and have a happy Samhain!

Sesh

Yule 2014

Dear Neophyte,

How have I never gotten Yule up on this blog before?  Several years I've been jotting down my Yuletide celebrations, but apparently in some paperform on on the LJ site that I took down several years ago.

So here are my notes about Yule this year (sans my own pictures since they're on my sister's phone).

Yule Eve-Eve:  Present shopping at Joann's because we both work there and can get an employee discount on top of most everything in the store already being 30% or higher off.  I'm waiting till the after christmas sales to really spend my money.

Originally we weren't going to do presents but we both started shopping in our heads for each other it eventually came out that I was planning to get her butterfly themed stuff during my next pay period (after Yule)  The idea was that because we were broke we'd do our on "sister santa" where we'd pick a pre-determined amount of money and then see what we can get.  First we weren't going to do anything in the present department, but then changed our minds when we suddenly found ourselves with extra money.  We settled on $20-30 limit and then walked around pointing out the crafts we'd either like to get into (yarn-craft for me and scrapbooking for her) and then split up to get our shop on.

Here are some of the things I found for my sister: Ribbon, Metallic Stickers, Candy/Craft Mold, Sprinkles, and the big finale of Scrapbooking Cardstock.  I had to put back jewelry making supplies because I hit my budget of $30 and actually went over by $10.  I also didn't grab this simple cross stitch because it would have eaten 30% of my budget on one item.  There were several other things, including more stickers, a zipper pull 3D paper butterflies that you can suspend from the ceiling that she's planning to make into a mobile something like this.

What she got me included: 2 skeins of Homespun yarn by Lion Brand (I'm under not impression it's actually spun in anyone's home) to go with my knitting loom!  I like the idea of looms because you don't need special skills so when they started coming out with these and I saw them making things way faster than knitting needles (and no counting stitches!) I wanted one.  Originally I wanted one to make sox with.  Unfortunately I didn't know we carried them at work, so I was unable to point it out in time.  A lady came up to my register with one specifically for sox and I was dumbfounded.  I want this as well.  It's 3 times and then some the price of the round loom (and not good for hats or anything else online, so I'll keep the small loom and just get the sock loom when I can afford it.

She also got me this cross stitch that turned out to be a little outside my skill level.  The current embroidery I'm working on (there is a difference, even if you use the same floss/thread and fabric) has the design drawn on the fabric.  This one does not.  I'm not sure how to do a counted cross stitch, but I'll figure it out latter on when I get my current masterwork done.

Next up we have tiny glass bottles.  I already have these from an earlier trip and plan to get these too at some point.  But what do I do with them?  Well, largely they sit there till I need spell work or to store herbs and pins.  I'm not a hoarder, so I don't just keep them to keep them.  If I have an excess and I"m not using them up then I don't buy more.  All my herbs are in hexagon glass jars and stuck to the side of my fridge with industrial strength magnets.  (Seriously, don't get art store magnets for serious DIY projects.)  I even went back to a single shop on a stretch of road a full 45 minutes from my house three times before I finally caved and bought a necklace with a brass tube attached (about 1' long) that has a twist off top.  I use it for spell work.  Thoth claimed it after my last spell.  I bought an owl necklace locket that I used for spellwork.  Thoth claimed that too...

This only feeds my (and Anubis/Thoth's) obsession with empty things.  If' it's a box or bottle or anything that's empty (drawers, closets, envelopes, etc) I HAVE to open it up and look inside.  A quick trip to pick a friend up from his job at a furniture store ended with an HOUR of me going around and opening up every single decorative box they had on display.  And opening all the cabinets.  And pulling out all the drawers.  I even found a way to open a couple things the employees didn't know opened.  Finding where they stash all the hardware and ugly spots in the furniture is also a plus!

The last thing she got me was a scrap of fabric that won't be "big enough to make anything[e.g. clothing]" but might be "big enough for a purse".  It's white with little cherry stems on it and right up my alley for a purse.  I'm planning a big one with ribbons of many colors. crossing all over the place and some buttons and an iron on design.

For the actual Yule celebration we invited company over.  I gave him two jars of my home canned products; one was pickled radishes and the other was strawberry margarita preserves.  We ate home cooked vegan food, played with the fire and swapped gifts.  Out came the alcohol and we gold embarrassing ghetto stories about our families till we were good and toasted.  He sobered up and then went home.  Afterwards my sister and I do what we normally do on holy days and split up into our own rooms to do our own things.

And how here I am on Yule and I don't know what to do.  Normally we would have held something of a ritual in our living room to this day we did none of it.  Just up went a tree, out came some gifts, in went some food and off we went to our spaces.  Didn't feel like much of a celebration.

I'm Kemetic Egyptian Reconstructionist, of a sort.  + Hakate, and Fox and Hummingbird.  I think Grey Wolf and White Horse were there at one point, but not anymore?.  What I do know is that the Egyptians did the cycle of life like every cosmology.  The Wheel of the Year is the cycle of life sans cosmology.  It can fit the Egyptian cosmology as well.  What I'm not sure of is if I should do the Wheel of the Year Egyptian and then also do the days the Egyptians celebrated their cosmology or should I just do the Wheel genericly and the Egyptian stuff separately? The Wheel is about the seasons.  It doesn't have to be religious at all.  Or do I just mention the Gods during the Sabbats and then do their actual rituals on their actual ritual days?

What I do know is that when I consistently celebrate the holidays (Mabon and Samhain for instance) is that I get ideas for exactly how to own those holidays and make them meaningful and mine.  I don't really have any for Yule because I've always let Melissa do whatever she wished for this holy day.

I'm doing research and compiling information about Yule.  Here is what I have so far:

Credits

Cosmological Information: Fire festival, shortest day and longest night, waxing sun overcomes the waning sun. Midwinter feast.  Winter solstice.
Purpose: The young overtaking the old.  Death of old and rebirth.
When: December 20-31st, depending on when the exact Solstice day falls.  Begins on "Mother Night" and ends on "Yule Night", lasting a full 12 days.
Correspondences: Fire, colors of red and green and gold and silver and white, holly wreaths and other evergreen decorations, fancy cookies and breads.  Symbols of rebirth such as stags.  Baybury for wealth and happiness.

Credit

You'll notice that by Pagan standards this feast it suppose to last for 12 days.  It's suppose to bring people together mid-winter when folks are normally starving to death (or could be) and allow them to pool their resources to sit beside the good fire and stuff themselves for 12 days.  Merriment, magic and friends reside within these halls.

Credit

Most Pagans I know of just do a few things to celebrate, which consists of the usual decorating, eating, gift giving and a ritual that probably doesn't last half an hour start to finish (assuming no meditation).  My Gods are the reason for the season and I want to celebrate the shit out of them!  Not just celebrate but honor and I can't think of a better way to honor the Gods than with days and days of appreciation for all they do for me.

I decided to piggyback thise 12 days theme into my love of activities.  Below I'm going to lose activities that anyone can do to celebrate Yule.  My hypothesis is that if I just pick one activity every day then I can make this one day celebration into a full 12 days without going bank and without wearing myself out with 12 huge activities crammed into just two days (Yule and Yule eve).  This list is in no real order.

1. Decorating the house.  Digging out and putting up whatever decorations you have.  Else seeing what you'd LIKE to have and acquiring them.  In my case I wanted a wreath so I drug home a fallen branch from an evergreen and stripped the smaller branches off to make wreaths.  Decorations can be a full day activity if you include things like researching different crafts, purchasing/borrowing craft materials and the time consuming task of actually hand making your own decorations.  This is a good day to make tree decorations as well, such as popcorn and seed strands which can latter be given to birds.  One way to call good spirits into the home is to hang silver bells on tree branches outside the home.

2. Planning activities, meals and gifts.  Gifts should be something appropriate to the season that does not become tacky after Dec 25th, such as silver and white candles.  Alternately something that a person might need, such as a pattern for making warm fleece booties.  I would either acquire the materials for activities on this day or the items for the meal, but not both.  This is also a good time to call and affirm if anyone you may have invited over is indeed coming.

3.  Cleaning and cleansing.  This is it's own thing.  Yes, four times a year your house needs to be deep cleaned both physically and spiritually.  Allergens from just a single person, non-pet home build up after just one month, as well as negative/stagnant energies.  After three or four months you seriously need to dust the tops of your doors and scrub down the greasy fronts of your kitchen cabinets.  'specially if you have company coming over.  Your wards should be strengthened and the blessings renewed.  Start here for help if you've never had to clean a home before and here if you've never done a house cleansing and blessing.

4. Burn the Yule log from last year.  What is the Yule log?  It's the stump of your Yule tree from last year.  If you put up a fake tree and have no Yule log then now is a good time to start the tradition.  Some peeps don't like cleaning pine needles out of their carpets, but you can at least get one of the little $9 trees from the lot that fit on office table tops.  It's real and will produce the required "log" when the branches are stripped after use and only the stump remains.  This log is saved for the next year and burned in the fireplace for good luck.  I still have mine from several years ago, but I've been sans fire place since I got it and now it's stuck in Tennessee :(

5.  Tree.  Get a real one if you can.  It's going to cost anywhere between $20-45 but the guys on the lot will give you a stand for it and put it on your car for you.  Most of them come trimmed.  If you don't want to pay that much for a normal sized tree then you can buy defected and tiny table top trees for as little as $9.  Plastic trees work too but nothing like a real tree in your living room slowly dying to emphasize the death process, or the fire that will spring to life out of the new wood next year to show rebirth!  This getting of and putting up and decorating of the tree is it's own full day activity.  Trust me.  People who hate all the holiday work just burn out trying to do everything in one day.  Take your time and enjoy.

6. Feed the critters.  Put out bird seed, popcorn balls, peanuts and other foods far enough away from your windows that you can watch them with binoculars but not give them the impression that diving through your open window will net them the rest of the bag of goodies.  This is the middle of winter and they critters who's homes we moved out homes up into have a need for food as well.

7. Charity, friends, neighbors and family.  Yule is not a holiday where you're required to invite people over, especially since so many of them are not going to be Pagan (if you're from a typical family) and probably won't understand why you're celebrating "Christmas" up to five days earily.  Or why nothing you have decorating your house involves barn animals and women in mumus.  If you're feeling froggy you could invite them over anyway and play them your favorite "Christmas" songs. What I mean is to make sure your relatives on the fringe of the family, or who are lower on the socioeconomic scale, are doing fine.  Check in on your neighbors as well.  Long ago peeps used to gather in feasting halls to take care of themselves and others with cheer in the middle of a dreary time of year for many.  The hungry got fed, the lonely had company and elderly shared stories.  In lieu of having our own giant feasting hall we can at least pick up a phone and hand over a can of cran-jelly to the single father of 3 next door who just lost his part time job.  This should be where your excess food goes, as most people you actually know are too polite to tell you that your taste in clothing is atrocious and no they don't want your old ripped up rock star shorts.

7.  Charity, strangers.  Go through your house and get rid of all the things you aren't using.  Declutter and give it all away.  Take three bins with you through the house.  One says "Give Away", the other says "Fix" and the last one says "Throw Away".  You're required to fill the first one up and take it immediately to the car and drive it immediately to your prefered drop point.  I like the Salvation Army, since Goodwill now charges more than retail and I don't support dishonest charities.  You have till the next solstice to fix the things in the "Fix" bin or they get moved into the "Throw Away" bin.

8.  Feast.  Yes, the eating.  I'm sure you can figure out how to google recipes and turn on an oven.  I also don't need to tell you how to chew and swallow.  Since you're not required to invite people over it can be a simple meal of just affordable things you like or you can go all out and invite everyone over to celebrate and have it be a potluck style deal.  Most peeps do something in between.  My sister and I use the holy days as an excuse to get company out to our house, since we also cook a lot of different foods and want help eating it all.  We also take the time off work for before and the day of every holiday in order to have time to do everything.  Company just makes it better on Yule because they appreciate the fire, usually bring their own food and booze and there is an increased chance I'll get more yarn for making more socks.  I'm all about layer and layers of socks during the winter months!

9.  Ritual.  I'm sure you already have a type of Yule ritual you like to do.  If not then a google search will find you a plethora.  I'd recommend a simple ritual if you've never done Yule before.  I'd also recommend doing it along if you've never done it before.  I've been doing it for years now and I still find other people distracting when I'm trying to call my gods because no one else I could celebrate with even has the same gods as me. Ritual, by the way, does not involve jumping into a circle, saying some words, playing with fire and snuffing out candles.  The entire DAY should be ritual, with you making offerings and doing meditations and magic and dance, etc.  You get up, ritual purify yourself via shower and then cook breakfast for you and the gods.  You do it again at lunch (sans shower, but with ritual purification no less) and again a dinner.  You do spells and divination and whatever other activities you decided to do to rededicate yourself to your gods.  If, for instance, you were a devotee of Sobek you might spend the day putting together an altar for Him (assuming you don't have one) and welcoming Him into your home.

10.  The elderly.  Yes, the Crone goddess manifests Herself in every woman and the Elder manifests Himself in every man.  Honor them.  Call, write and visit your elderly.  Make sure they have what they need and get a list of what they aren't getting.  Follow through.  This is a ritual of honoring the real people in your life who paved the way.  Honoring the elder in yourself is also a good idea.  If you don't have any elders in your life then perhaps now is a good time to acquire some since so many are left neglected at nursing homes or other such facilities.  The elderly aspects of our Gods should be celebrated at this time.  For instance, Isis is a grandmother.  Yeah, most people don't know that.  And She's certainly an elder, seeing how She's thousands of years old.  Acknowledging Her elder aspect may make Her feel good that you see Her as a whole woman and not just the parts you might find convenient.  A goddess like Hekate, who has a permanent elder aspect, could receive offerings at a crossroads, since this is Her domain.

11.  Pregnancy.  This concept doesn't just revolve around parenthood but ideas you and others have been pregnant with for a while.  This is about emotions you're pregnant with and dealing with them.  This is about a situation that is so pregnant with stagnation or rust that it needs some help to be born. Make a list of all the things you'd like to do.  This is kind of like your new years resolutions.  Make plans for how you are going to accomplish your goals.  How to write goals can be found here.  This makes you pregnant with hope for the future and allows you to get a clear idea of what you might hope to accomplish over the next several weeks and months.  Just to get the ball rolling you should make one of your goals something you can easily accomplish the next day.  I'd suggest something like eating all three of your daily meals and not skipping any of them.  Celebrate your Gods who are about to be parents.  Celebrate Isis and Osiris, who are pregnant with Horus at this time.  Do a ritual that will mislead Set in His search for Isis.  As Isis' is protected by you in Her time of need then so too might She return the favor when you have your own goals to accomplish.

12.  Birth.  Choose one of your ideas from the list that is easily accomplished and accomplish it.  For the above mentioned example you would simply eat three meals a day.  A meal consists of one vegetable, one grain and one fruit or dairy.  Anything other than that (in this example) is just a snack or junk food and not a meal at all.  Your goal hear is to get focused on giving birth to your goals and allowing them to come forth naturally.  The Goddess is also giving birth to the God at this time of the year and should be included in your celebrations.  For me I would imagine Isis and all Her helpers giving birth to Horus in a reed marsh and the birth of Horus, who is a sun God, is the light of the sun returning to the world once more.  The days, after all, get longer and longer after this and celebrating birth last on the list will tie the death holiday into the lighter half of the year, creating wondrous continuity.

So, those are just some ideas on how to celebrate the 12 days of Yule.  Certainly you don't have to do all this or any of this and you can change what you don't like.  Heck, even change what you do to suite your tastes!

Salutations,
Sesh

Bards Duel, Beltane Poem

Dear Blacky,

At the beginning of my Celtic Spirit Wheel class every day we take role by doing a Bard's Duel.  We cover the topic of the day and each person has to say what that topic means to them.  It starts out something like "Who is the Dagda?  Not hard to tell..." and then you say what the Dagda represents to you.  Some people get quite poetic, with rhyming and moving about, and some people just say a line or two.  There is no judging for your overly-flowery prose, just like there is no judging the one guy who never shuts up and never stays on topic.

For Beltane we mixed it up.  Each person was allowed to pick one of the types of Bardic Arts (we're studying the South quarter and all that it represents in the Spirit Wheel belonging to the Celts) and either write or perform or find something related to Beltane, the Celts or the Sidh.  I chose a poem from my childhood regarding the sidh (elves) of Celtic lore.

I read this poem to my Celtic Spirit Wheel class on Beltane and I got thunderous applause.  Believe it or not I used to have the entire thing memorized.

Elves, by D.J. Conway

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By the fern brake, deep and shady,
There I met an elfin lady.
Dressed in cobweb silk and flowers,
There she whiled away the hours,
    Waiting until dark.

On the soft green moss beside her,
Lay a baby wrapped in eider.
Skin so fair and hair like midnight,
The lady watched the coming twilight,
    Waiting till 'twas dark.

Silently, I sat beside her,
Hoping for some words to gather
In my numb and starled mind.
Said the lady, "You're most kind
    to wait with me till dark."

"Are you lost?" I asked lady.
"Is this your home, this fern barke shady"
Will others come by star and moon?"
She only smiled and began to croon
    To the elfin child.

The baby slept. The lady told me
Deep magic of the Earth and Sea.
Spells she whispered, strong and old.
"Use them well," she said. "Be bold
    when spelling in the night."

"Can I work these?" The lady smiled
Gathered up her sleeping child.
"Oh yes," she answered, "Tis a boon
For waiting with me till the Moon
    Slips up the sky."

Thinking deep, I sat beside her,
Keeping watch.  I heard the rider
Coming through the fern brake shady.
"Are you there, my lovely lady?"
    Called an elfin voice.

An elfin lord, his clothes all viney,
Armed with sword and dagger shiny,
Rode his horse into the fern brake.
Then my heart began to quake
    On seeing his dark eyes.

Twilight gathered; birds were still.
The Moon came up above the hill.
Suddenly I felt alone.
"Have no fear, for your have sown
    Good friendship."

The lady smiled and raised her hand.
Upon her brow a shining band
Glistened by the light of the Moon.
"Would you to give forth a boon?"
    She asked her lord.


"For here is a friend, a watcher bold."
"But they are enemies of old,"
The elf lord answered.
    "No," she said,
"But guarded us in this fern bed."
    He smiled.

"So there are some who wish us well."
His voice was like a distant bell.
A ring he took from off his hand.
"This will tune you to the land
    and magic."

Its stone was pale, just like the Moon.
The air was filled with eldritch tune,
As they mounted, lord and lady,
Rode off through the fern brake shady,
    I stood alone.

People say elves are not there.
But I have heard their voices fair,
When I sit down in the brake.
Magic spells I've learned to make
    All from the lady.

Elf lord's ring is on my hand
To help with magic from the land.
Sometimes I talk with lord and lady
In the fern brake, deep and shady,
    Secretly.

Is there magic? For me 'tis so.
For when the sun is sinking low,
I feel Earth's power within my heart
And know that I shall never part
    From the lord and lady

Salutations,

Sesh

Random Bits of Magic

Dear Neophyte,


This is a list of random bits of magic that I practice regularly.


~~ I purify the offerings of dry tea leaves ‘that they be made pure to aid growth and flourishing’. I add to my Basil, which is blessed to bring abundance to my household.

~~ My aloe is to ward off accidents in the home. 

~~ I water my plants with a Jack Daniels shot glass that my brother gave to me. Each time I use it I pray for emotional healing.  The person who gave me the shot glass caused a great deal of trauma to me early on in life.  In constantly reminding myself of the trauma I bring it to the foreground of my subconscious thinking process so I can work on that for emotional healing. 


Blessings,
Sesh