Tag Archives: ritual

Mar30

Bonding under a Black Moon

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Yesterday was the second, and last, Black Moon of the year.  I hadn’t heard about Black Moons until recently.  A Black Moon (which seems important enough to capitalize) is the second new moon within a month.  January had one and March has one, this year.

Moth

I love the Sci Fi show Fringe- this image is a ‘glyph’ from that show, part of a code used to spell words. For once, not my original artwork! This is a wallpaper picture that was distributed for free. I think it’s a great picture for the butterfly theme I had in my life, and connecting with inner, dark workings. The moon-like symbol at the top is great, too! 2 new moons!

I got started on thinking of doing something for Dark Moon (a witchy term for the period of time that the moon is darkest, no sliver to be seen at all), because a friend said she was going to a Dark Moon ritual for last Friday, which turned out to be inexplicably canceled.  She and another friend are going to use my extra-sturdy merchant tent (technically a storage/garage tent, the kind you screw together) for an upcoming pagan Spring festival.  Our original plan was that I was going to bring the tent to the ritual, we’d put it in her car, and I would possibly join the Dark Moon ritual.  But, as it was canceled, I brought it to her home, then we went out for Chinese food.  We chatted and it was so nice to connect with her.  I have a lot of respect for her; she’s a good friend, a woman just coming into her Crone aspect (wise old woman part of life), and her soul is just beautiful.  And she’s so knowledgeable. Anyway, afterward, we parted ways, each with our own plan to do solitary witchy work for the Dark Moon that night.

Technically, the Dark/Black Moon was yesterday, but I was already feeling the energies of it last Friday.  I read online that the Black Moon is great for oracle readings and magic or psychic work, and I already knew that Dark Moon is great for past life work, working with past pains and wounds, a magical/psychological work that can be intense.  I didn’t get into painful past memories, but I did do some tarot readings and faced something that’s been paining my heart lately.  The reading really just echoed what I already knew, which is alright, it’s good to have support from what I feel is beyond myself.  After the reading, I focused on what I want to change, and made some artwork while trancing a little bit.  My mood was mostly just calm and happy, while still a little pained.  (Typical Cancerian me- always a mix of feelings!) DSC03472 The artwork isn’t spectacular, but it was more of a tool to focus my soul energy.  It was on brown construction paper, with paint pens (fun to work with!) and glitter pens (also fun!).  My inner child was happy while doing this, too.  I picked colors that either called to me or symbolized something to me as I worked/played.  Though I want to keep what pained me private, I will say that I was working toward opening my heart and anothers’ heart for full communication and connection.  There was more to it, but I’ll keep that to myself. I listened to S.J. Tucker’s Mischief and Tricky Pixie’s Mythcreants Albums while doing this.  I lit a candle and had some items nearby that emphasized what I was focusing on.  While I don’t feel like my work was that powerful (though sometimes it can be more powerful than it seems), I feel like I healed a little part of myself that night.  And, it turns out, I started a wheel turning in my life again that had been stuck in the mud for a while: connections with people.

The next day, Saturday, I started the day in a very prickly mood.  I was angry at small things my friends did, which seemed to represent to me that they didn’t care about me, or saw me as someone they could order around, probably because I’m so easy going and say ‘sure I’ll do that’ to almost everything.  I’m like a really flexible tree, bending this way and that for others.  So I was a little mad at myself for creating the situation, but also aware that others may subconsciously – not purposefully – think that they can just tell me to do something and I’ll follow their orders, as if they’re my boss!  It was just in the wording of how they said things, not really their intention, and I knew that; it made me angry nevertheless.  I was tired of always seeming to be the one who works to get things done.  And I was fed up that friends wouldn’t ask how I’m doing as we converse, they talk all about their lives, and I respond, focusing on their lives, but they almost never stop to ask about mine.  And then there’s the other painful thing on my mind.  All of that made me jumpy and driven.  I had to force myself to breathe, calm down and enjoy the day.

It turned out to be a day of unexpected pleasantness.  That morning, I talked with a friend on the phone that I haven’t seen for almost a year.  I’ve missed her and we had recently reconnected.  It was SO GOOD to truly connect with a person again.  I have felt SO disconnected from people lately, which made me feel lonely.  Sure, I go about my day, and I usually talk and converse with people, but I didn’t feel the *connection.*  Talking with this friend as just SO heart-fulfilling.  Her loving and caring attitude made me tear up at the end. Later that day, I went to the art museum with my mom and sister, and it was filled with calm mutual enjoyment of artwork and mutual laughter.

Later at night, I met two of my witchy friends that I haven’t seen for a long time.  We hung out at the new apartment of one of the friends, occasionally being interrupted (though pleasantly) by her two sweet little daughters.  At first, again, I was prickly.  Would these friends ask how I was?  Would they be interested in what I had to say?  I was like a porcupine, having my quills partway out but not totally.  Over the course of the evening, the quills got smoothed down, and by the end of the evening, the quills disappeared as the three of us all relaxed and got a little goofy, even.  It was so good to feel the friendship with these two lovely ladies again, and truly connect with them. We did readings for each other.  One friend had brought her card decks, and we all chose to use cards from a beautiful deck:  The Enchanted Map Oracle.  It was neat to see how we all interacted during the readings:  each of us saying what we saw in the cards, tuning ourselves to that psychic channel and really listening to that channel, and naturally bonding with each other like we hadn’t done in a long time.  It was beautiful.  Each reading had a deeply powerful message for each of us.

My own reading focused on my life in general and career/education path that I’m on for the coming seasons.  Each of our readings naturally evolved into a similar setup of cards:  a card representing the person being read for in the center ‘as we are now,’ with the next few weeks/this season above us, then going around clockwise with Summer, then Fall.  Some of us continued the year with more cards, and one person had one more card for ‘other opportunities.’  For myself, it felt right to have Spring (above ‘my’ card), Summer, Fall, Winter, and ending with next Spring. ‘My’ card was “Peaks of Joy.”  It depicted a woman leaping gracefully, partly flying, among clouds, with a butterfly in the clouds with her.  This felt true for me now. I do have peaks of joy that are keeping me going, I have felt ungrounded, but it also mirrors my whole ‘jumping jumping’ into the abyss symbolism I had going on last year.

Above me, Spring, was the card “Intention.”  It had a lovely owl on top of a large egg, with a dandelion poof in its beak.  There was a field of dandelion poofs in the background.  I love dandelion poofs! I love blowing and wishing things, this is so *me.*  And yes, I’m wishing for things to come true right now, and setting intention.  This card is so appropriate.

Next, the Summer card was called “Heal the ‘Ouch’.”  It was cute:  a little raccoon in a nurse’s cap was tending to a wound of a fox, which had a hot-water bag on its head.  There were small candles all about them and they were in a little clearing in the woods.  I would get the healing I need, so I won’t repeat mistakes I make in relationships- is what my friends saw in this card.

Fall was represented by the “Golden Palace” card.  This was a Taj Mahal type palace on hill, steep on all sides.  There was a shape in the roots near the bottom and I felt that the shape was me, a witchy woman at the bottom.  Next Fall, I plan to continue in the Interpreter Preparation Program at a community college.  My friends read this as: after a Spring and Summer of healing what I need to, it will be time to get back to business of meeting my goal.  I felt that the castle looked secure (Cancerian of me).  Also it’ll be time to ground.  Also, it may be a lot of work I need to do to reach my goal, or there may be a path going around the back of the hill that we can’t see in the picture; it may be easier than it looks.

“Slow and Steady” was the next card, for Winter.  It was a woman with the lower part of her body in a snail shell.  She was going steadfastly forward, hair tendrils wafting backward, more likely from wind than from her own speed.  This card really seemed to match what I would surmise would happen this Winter.  I will need to keep at it.  One of my friends pointed out that the shell is there; I will have my security, so that I’m free to pursue my goal.

For next Spring, the card was “Magical Map Shifter.”  This is of a man who is blindfolded, and juggling wondrous items- a rocking horse, a beetle, a fish, and before him lay a bloody heart on a scroll.  The man is confident in his skills.  To me, the way the man held his hands and arms looked like sign language.  My friends interpreted this card to mean that I will become a Master of Signing, which sounds wonderful, but I’m sure it would be too early for the Master level!  At least, I may be confident in my skills as a signer by next Spring.  That would be awesome.  One friend said this card deserves more thought about its meaning, and I agree.

The re-connections keep on happening.  Yesterday, I met with a friend I haven’t seen for two months.  It was so good to see her again and to reaffirm our friendship.  We hung out and talked for a long time.  It was really good.  This reunion was especially touching because we both thought we had lost each other as friends (or were on our way to losing each other.) We hadn’t; we had been a little bit silly in thinking so.

Though yesterday was the true Black Moon, I feel satisfied with the magic work I’ve experienced the last two nights.  I’m grateful that my wish for a stronger connection with others and a open heart from myself and others is coming true.  This has healed the part of me that had started to despair of ever feeling that connection with others again.  The possibility was always there, but I was feeling frustrated in myself and with others.  I’m so glad it’s possible, and so grateful for my friends and family who truly do care as much as I do for them.

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Jul3

A Magical Midsummer’s Night

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I want to tell you about the most magical night of my life.  It is so rare to experience it, and it was so wonderful, that I want to share it with you.

moonlight through tipi smokehole

Looking up through the tipi smokehole, I didn’t actually see the moon; we had to go out of the tipi to see it. But the moon’s energy was definately suffusing everything we did. Our chants and music making was magical and honored the divine.

Recently, I went camping with a group of pagans for Litha, which is the midsummer sabbat.  I have attended many rituals and most of them have been lovely.  I have bonded with a good group of friends and meditated with them.  However, none of those wonderful, lovely times compare with this particular time.  This one tops them all in the way the group jived and grooved with each other, and how we worshiped the divine together.

I think the astounding magical time we had bubbled and frothed and expanded from several ingredients.  First of all, not only was it Litha, it was also the full moon, and supposedly a moon that appeared closer to Earth than at other times during the year.  Second of all, everyone there have good heads on their shoulders, are relatively sane and smart, and are overall good people.

This was in the mountains of Colorado, and it was a particularly beautiful summer day, with meadow flowers blooming, everything green, and yellow swallowtail butterflies flittering about.  I arrived mid-day and greeted the people there.  The adults were hanging out and chatting, and the kids were running around and playing.  I set up my tent, and though I had very little to carry in from my car, the priest (I think of him as a good ol’ boy nice grandpa type) got the kids to help me carry my stuff in.  So nice.  He also helped me put it up even though I had thought I could do it on my own.  (It was also nice that he didn’t come in to help until I really needed it!)

Anyway, I had brought my hula hoops, and after hanging out a bit chatting with people, I took them out and shared a hoop with a new friend.  We hula hooped a while, with much heckling from Gramps.  Though the heckling didn’t seem to bother my new friend, much.

A little while later, I was invited to help plan for the ritual.  We all agreed pretty readily on things and it went pretty quickly; our priestess (who is a lovely lady) had already planned out most of it, and still asked for our input on various aspects.  One lady there volunteered to organize the kids in gathering items for the altar to symbolize the elements, as well as pencils and tags.  I volunteered to welcome Mother Gaia.  Another guy volunteered to welcome the Oak King and Holly King.  And others volunteered to ‘call in’ the elements. There were more roles and planning and details to be ironed out, and in about half an hour, we were done.

After the planning session, the priestess and I got chili going.  She had all the ingredients ready; I helped her open cans and dump in the beans and her other ingredients, and we took turns stirring and keeping the cooker going.  I’d hula hoop, stir, sit and chat, stir, hula hoop, and so on, until it was done.  I felt quite witchy (double double toil and trouble, fire burn and cauldron bubble) stirring the pot, and quite fairy-like while hooping.  As we cooked the food, more and more people came and in the end, we had about 20 people and about 5 kids.

We ate the yummy chili, with cheese and sour cream and pitas or chips, and hung out and chatted.  (Much chatting to be had at this event, not unusual for a pagan event!)

Then we gathered in a small little meadow for our ritual.  I won’t go into the ritual too much, ‘cuz my point here isn’t to educate you all about rituals, but I want to come to the point of what was magical and wondrous about it.  A little perk for me was that a guy I consider sexy and cute stood next to me.  He’s taken though, so I won’t pursue it, but it was still a perk.  The group energy was soft and loving, everyone appreciating each other and finding each other special and precious.  Everyone was relaxed and and most were smiling  at least  Mona Lisa smiles, some more, and some less.  Everything went pretty smoothly and everything we said, we meant.  We held hands and some hugged.  It was overall just lovely.  Someone also called Pan into the circle, and as it happens, we forgot to say goodbye to Pan at the end.  I believe that’s another lovely element to the magical times that ensued afterwards.

After a little break, we started gathering in a tipi that someone had brought and set up.  The man and woman who owned the tipi were just lovely people, the types you meet and are instantly showered by their peaceful love, and you just know they love just about everyone they meet.  I had brought my drum (which is a djembe, an African drum), my water, and a thick hoodie to the tipi.  Another guy I had just met who has a lovely peaceful energy and I were first in the tipi.  We drummed and chatted as more people came in.  He had brought a didgeridoo. More and more people filtered in until we had about 15 people in there, and it had a fire pit in the middle and a hole in top of the tipi for the smoke.  We were a little bit crowded, but it was cozy.  We sang and chanted and drummed and at first it was like other drum circles I’ve been in – getting some good rhythms going.  Then it evolved into something unexplainable.

The group energy became one and we tranced and worshipped the divine as one.  It was like we were transported as a group to another plane of reality, among the stars.  I have never experienced anything like that while chanting or drumming before.  Well, not quite like that.  I have felt like I have ‘touched’ the divine while dancing.  But nothing like this.  It was beautiful.  We hummed and made noises and sang and did whatever we felt called to do to contribute to the music, and it was just out of this world.

The priest and priestess were a little distance away, deep in discussion as they sometimes get, discussing business of the group, when they heard the sound of our magic-making.  They were drawn to the tipi, so they tabled their discussion for another time, and joined us.  The priestess especially joined in and started some other chants she knew.  Then she said “We’ve got to go out and sing to the moon!”  So everyone filtered out and stared and loved at and sang to the moon.  I was drawn to the side in a conversation with someone as this was happening.  Some of the group went off… and came back naked.  I just had to laugh.  They had become “skyclad” for the moon and were full of moon energy.  It was lovely.  But it was cold out!  I have no idea whether I would have stripped down if I had been with them- maybe a little but not quite so much- I don’t like being cold!

They went back into the tipi and I excused myself from the conversation and joined them.  We all drummed and sang some more, and I joined in their nakedness by stripping off my top.  The energy of everyone was very respectful and loving, no ‘meat market’ feel at all; it was just beautiful.  People singing to each other “We honor you, we  empower you to be what you are… I am a strong woman, I am a story woman, I am a healer, my soul will never die; We honor you we empower you to be what you are; I am a strong man, I am a loving man, I am a warrior, my soul will never die…We are an old people, we are a new people, we are the same people stronger than before…”  and then we settled down and the priestess started singing a song about Inanna that I remembered learning when I lived in Iowa.  We started singing it together… when someone fell face first in the fire because he was … drunk and sleepy.  He was O.K. though, people around him caught him in time and escorted him to his tent.  That kinda killed the vibe (!) which was alright; so we all filtered out.  Some went to bed, and some of us gathered on the way to our tents to sing some more with each other.

This time we sang more ‘mundane’ pop culture songs:  the owner of the tipi who was also Rainbow gathering person told us about Rainbow gatherings, (which started out of singing Rocky Mountain High by John Denver, which apparently was about the first Rainbow gathering), and we sang all sorts of other songs together.  It felt like we were all brothers and sisters and one with the trees, stars and moon.

Finally, I went to my tent and sleeping bag.  After that came a fitful sleep of trying to stay warm (lesson learned, bring warm things even in the summertime when camping), and a morning of coffee, some healthy dried fruit and packing up the tent, eventually to drive back home.  As usual, the magic vibe stayed with me strongly at first, and now remains as a beautiful memory.  I am so blessed to have experienced this in a group of lovely people.  I hope this story shares some of the beauty with you and blesses you, too.

Mar3

Sitting in a Clay Fetish Bowl- a Dream

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I dreamed this dream while sleeping at my boyfriend’s house, two months ago.  After dreaming it, I sent this message to the two other women involved in the dream.  For the sake of their anonymity, their names have been replaced with Dancer and Horse Woman. This is what I typed to them:

fetish bowl dream

Original artwork

I received from someone (as if being smudged for ritual) a lump of gray clay, already formed into a 1/2 inch thick disk. I tried to work it and it was stiff and hard to work. Several feet away, Dancer prepared the place for ritual by working deftly with the clay, flattening it and making it into a large bowl. Although I never saw myself giving you (Dancer) the clay, my impression was that those involved each brought some clay that contributed to the bowl. Then, as dreams do, time skipped and the three of us sat *in* the bowl. The bowl was hard and secure, and the night sky sparkled above us. I get the impression of a fire but didn’t see one. Dancer, I get the impression that you were leading in the ritual and that Horse Woman and I were hanging out on your invitation.   Horse Woman turned to me and told me with an air of anticipation of something rare that she was going to get a “natural tattoo” from Dancer and I got the impression that this tattoo was ‘natural’ in the sense of ‘magic in nature.’  Time passed as it does and doesn’t when you’re in a magical space, and Horse Woman turned into a crow. My arm was stretched out along the bowl as if my arm had been around your shoulders before you changed, and you (Horse Woman as the crow) love-nipped my hand. At first I reacted as if bit and then I realized it was a love bite, as in “you’re my friend.” I got the impression that you, Horse Woman, as the crow, were still just hanging out in ritual space, and had decided to hang out as crow. Then I woke up, before the ritual was finished, but I have the feeling that I woke up at the time I was meant to.

As it happens, I’m spending some nights at my boyfriend’s house. He lives with two roomates and we are all either new age or pagan inclined. His roomates have a book which drew me to it the next morning after the dream. It’s called Animal Speak by Ted Andrews. As I always do when encountering a new pagany/new agey book, I browsed it to see if what he said jived with my experience, and it did, so I came to trust what he said in the book. It looks like he draws from many different cultures for the book, with a Native American focus. If you know the book, I would appreciate your impressions of it as well. As I looked in the sections on birds, he described ‘fetish bowls.’ He explained that inside the (clay) bowl is ‘unmanifest’ as in the things unseen and outside the bowl is ‘manifest.’ It’s a way to commune or call to your spirit animals; put fetishes that represent your spirit animal in the bowl along with other items that can charge the fetishes while not in use, and when you take it out of the bowl, you are making the unmanifest, manifest; you are calling to the spirit of the animal.

I started to read up on crows but didn’t get far. I already know some things about crows and will investigate further.

The meaning I got from the dream was that, at least for myself, I need to manifest myself as a magical being and live in spirit daily. I also feel blessed after the dream as if already having been part of a ritual with you  even though it may have only been my own experience and not shared. I feel like I already am living as a magical being (and my awareness has been brought to this fact after the dream) and like I have been charged up like a crystal has been charged by the moon’s energies (though I don’t feel charged specifically by the moon, but by spirit guides).

The spirit animals that accompany me are monkeys. If you are interested I could tell you more about that. They didn’t come forth in the dream as “manifest” but they are always with me. They just weren’t represented in the dream. Perhaps the crow is calling to me, or perhaps it represents or accompanies Horse Woman.

Anyway, I would appreciate it if you let me know how this dream strikes you, and your own takes on it, especially if you got any messages for yourselves. At the very least, Horse Woman, meet Dancer, and Dancer, meet Horse Woman.

May the powers that be all around us bless you.