The Mabon ritual welcomes the coming second harvest and gives thanks for the first harvest. A designated leader may say the words that guide the group through the ritual or the speaking portions may be divided among group members. If you enjoy this ritual, you can learn more about the CUSP (Climbing Up the Spiral Pathway) tradition at our website or in the book called CUSP: A New Way to Walk An Old Path. Continue reading “A Mabon Ritual”
With offerings such as Kim Davis and Mitch McConnell, I am courting the idea of inventing a new life story where instead of hailing from my beloved home state of Kentucky, I was instead born to gypsies who raised me in an RV, moving all over the United States and stocking my mental larders with exciting adventures. Continue reading “Kim Davis: Everybody Must Get Stoned”
This week, several articles on Josh Duggar popped up on my Patheos feed as news of his marital unfaithfulness spread across the interwebs. Not on Patheos Pagan, mind you, but throughout the other religious channels. Pagans are not much talking about him since he is not one of us and it is hard to see any relevance to us. He is just another vocal, Proposition 8 pushing, up-in-our-reproductive-business, telling us how to live Christian we prefer to ignore.
Continue reading “Josh Duggar: Why He Is Relevant to Pagans”
Within the past two weeks, I have seen several articles by Pagan columnists whose work I enjoy expressing surprise and dismay at how other Pagans speak to one another in online message boards. Honestly, I can only look stunned whenever I hear this. Like this: O_O Continue reading “Dealing With Pagan Assholes”
Jupiter is such a delight. On August 12, it began a year long trip through Virgo and the aspecting of Jupiter in one’s sun sign is always a blessing. It empowers. It brings luck and miracles. It brings money and stability. Love me some Jupiter. It is no accident that I came out of one of my worst depressions in six years and found my footing again just as Jupiter was about to enter my sun sign.
All that being the case, and appreciative as I am of the clarity and strength that it brings, I still struggle with the accompanying lessons. Sometimes, they just make me feel old and tired, regardless of the value inherent in them. Standing up for myself has never been a talent of mine. I was conditioned in childhood not to do it, that it brings pain and immediate negative repercussions. As I look back on my two marriages (three if you count that I married the first husband twice), I can see all of the ways my life and my relationships would have been different if I had said something like, “Let me stop you right there because we are not going to entertain that dynamic…not for a day, not for an hour, not for a minute.” I didn’t. I heard the words “You teach people how to treat you” but I did not implement them in the right places. Instead, I got angry and resentful over the behaviors I allowed.
At this time, I still have trouble finding the appropriate boundaries of when I should actively speak out and when I should let something go. For me, it is like being in a foreign land and not knowing the language. When I do try to stand up for myself, I will frequently swing too far the other direction and bring a bazooka to a knife fight. It is an ongoing challenge and this weekend, I had multiple occasions to practice that very dance. Since there is really no grade card, I have no idea how I did. I feel uneasy and off balance because of it and really, these incidents were like Pez, with one popping up right after the next. It was too recurring to be coincidence. Some cases were more obvious and others were more subtle, but in every one, I felt marginalized, dismissed, and disrespected, which is not a place where any of us want to be. Dignity and grace lie in how we respond when we are there or when someone tries to put us there.
Setting the scene, I run a magical shop called Botánica de La Reina that is in the same room/shop as my alter ego business, ZenTech Computers. Diversifying your portfolio does actually work and it is a nice left brain/right brain, yin and yang pairing. The botánica side usually gets more traffic, but the computer side is not a slacker by any means. Eric, my husband, works with me and my daughter, Delena (22), usually comes in on Sundays to help because it is a little busier then. We are the only permanent computer shop in the entire 40 acre swap meet complex and are the only shop with a lock the door, turn the key building.
1) On Saturday, the moment Eric left the shop to go to the bathroom, a man came in and told me that he needed me to repair his cell phone. I kindly told him that we repair desktops and laptops, but we do not work on cell phones or tablets. I tried to hand him a flyer of a local guy who does great work on cell phones. The guy said, “No, this shop repairs cell phones and I want mine fixed.” I said, “No. Only desktops and laptops.” He stared at me as if I had suddenly grown a third ear on my forehead. “No. This shop repairs cell phones.” I stayed confident, friendly, understanding that he was confused on some level, even though he looked perfectly coherent. I mean, what can you do when someone insists that your shop performs a service it doesn’t. So I just said, “No sir, we sure don’t. I am sorry I can’t help you with that. I believe you must have us confused with Chris, who was the cell phone guy a few booths behind us. He does great work, but is no longer at this location. Here is his flyer.” He then said, “I would like to speak to the owner because clearly, you don’t know much about this shop.” Yes, my eyebrow arched and yes, that is when I was just done. “Sir, clearly you do not know much about this shop because I am the owner and have been since January. I also personally know the previous owner who founded the business and I can assure you that he also did not repair cell phones. Have a good day.” He stomped out of the shop. I smudged the shop and reinforced the brick dust on the threshold. All of this happened in the space of around ten minutes. Eric came back and smelled the sage and saw the new brick dust and looked stricken. “Oh shit. What happened?” Assessment: Some people are both confused and assholes.
2) Across the walkway from our shop is a gigantic junk yard that is sort of like a dirty, pick and pull of a garage sale. This is hundreds of square feet of discarded estate sale remnants in heaps and piles and occasionally, tables. We have a good relationship with the owners, although we interact with the son more than the father. The only qualm I have ever had with the father is that he blares music from his establishment and it is the same 4-5 CDs over and over and over. I never thought I could possibly dislike “Ain’t That a Kick in the Head” by Dean Martin, but when you hear it several times a weekend for eight months, you actually do kind of want to kick Dean in the head. Out of the blue, the father came into our shop, which he never does. We exchanged greetings and he just sort of walked around and looked. It was triple digits this weekend and we do not have any time of cooling apparatus. After a while of him just walking around, I tried to break the silence by saying, “We should find whoever ordered up this heat!” He looked at me and said, “Quit complaining,” and went back to looking around. I just stood there with my teeth in my mouth because I could not imagine what I had said that warranted this reply, especially since I rarely complain about anything, especially not to him. After a few more minutes, he left without saying anything. I looked at Eric and he looked back at me with the “What?” look. I recounted to him what happened and pointed out that the man would never have said that to Eric, not because Eric is such a bad ass but because he is a man. I told him that I am a shop owner just like the guy across the way and I did not appreciate being spoken to like that. The trick is that I do not want to meet animosity with animosity, especially with someone who is in my near vicinity two very long days out of every week. I let it go, but I was not happy about it. He only said two words to me, but I felt marginalized and disrespected. I smudged the shop. Assessment: Some people have little respect for women and are assholes.
3) A woman likely in her sixties came into the shop and asked if we grew our own sage. I told her no, that we live in the mountains and do not have a long enough grow season to give sage a good fighting chance, but that I have an excellent and trusted supplier in Stockton and I order from them. She made a sour face and said, “Stockton?” I smiled and said, “Yes, Stockton.” I then, just in conversation, said, “My own favorite salvia for smudge, however, is not the white sage in the sage sticks, but the sagebrush that grows wild on Interstate 5. It has a sweeter smell and works just as well. I use it in this Witch’s Broom smudge blend (showed her) that is sagebrush, cedar, sweetgrass, and lavender and it works great.” She scoffed and said, “White sage is for clearing out. If you have anything sweet in it, it won’t get the job done.” I smiled and said, “You know, honestly, I have not had that experience. When I clear a room, if I have a salvia base and then layer the sweeter mix on top if it, it works in a piggyback effect with cleaning and empowering. I have had excellent results for decades.” *smile* Like the first guy, she stared at me really hard. Just then, Eric said, “I use the white sage in my sweat lodge” and as soon as she heard that, she was fixated on Eric and they had a long conversation. Anytime after that when he would try to bring me into the conversation, she would never address me when I replied. She would just glance at me and turn back to Eric again and resume the conversation, usually over top of what I was saying. It was so obvious that once, I stopped talking in the middle of my sentence to see if she would even notice I was speaking and she did exactly the same thing… just turned to Eric. It was weird, but she bought the Witch’s Broom mix. Assessment: It was just Eric’s turn that time and not mine but I smudged the shop anyway… with white sage just to be sure.
4) A very loud woman came into the shop with two beautiful blond girls who were, I would guess, around 10 and 12. She told me she wanted a book that was about Wicca, but one that did not discuss Witchcraft, covens, or spell work because “Wiccans don’t do that and aren’t evil.” I told her that would be a tough find since most Wiccans do consider themselves to be Witches and so most books I know of do reference those subjects. She went on to say that the girls’ Nana came to visit and is a Wiccan and “got them all riled up and interested in it, even though “I did it right. I am agnostic, so I don’t want any of that Witch crap. Just the Wicca.” I nodded my understanding that she had done things right. The very young daughters looked uncomfortable. I looked through our book selection and found Raising Witches by Ashleen O’Gaea and mentally dismissed it, since she did not want the W word around. She said, “What’s that?” I said, “It is an excellent book on raising children in Wicca.” She said, “Why did you not suggest it to me?” I said, “Because the title has ‘Witches’ in it.” She snorted derisively and took the book from me. “I just don’t want them doing any of that evil stuff.” I said, “Of course, you don’t. The challenge is that most books about Wicca do not consider any of ‘that stuff’ to be evil any more than saying a prayer or making a wish, so it is tough to find a book that meets the criteria you requested.” I handed her Simple Wicca by Michele Morgan and she bought it. I smudged the shop. Assessment: Ignorance is still out there. I wish I could have met the girls’ Nana. I picture her looking like the aunties from “Practical Magic.”
Overall Assessment: I read too much into stuff, but still need to find my pacing on the whole “standing up for myself” front. I am also glad I live in a very remote location for the whole rest of the week.
I learned when I turned ten that my purpose on this earth was as a utility…a tool for the benefit of others. My mother was often ill and as the oldest and the only daughter in the family, it fell to me to care for my brothers and my father. What I wanted, what dreams I had, what manifest destiny I felt was there for me was irrelevant because dammit, my daddy wanted his eggs. I don’t blame my parents. They were in a no win situation and were making do as best as they could. As they say, “It was what it was.” Both of them are gone now and I wish they could see me now that I am safe and OK. There is another part of me that thinks we would likely have reversed roles of me being the parent and them being the kids and I’m not down for that. I have six children and that is plenty. Regardless, we will never know because they both died far too young before I could find my peace with them. I loved them truly, madly, deeply and I miss them every day.
I carried my impression that I was supposed to become what others needed me to be into both of my marriages and I am sure that is what led to the destruction of my first marriage (twice, we married and divorced twice) and some seriously compromising of my second marriage. I give somehow give off a vibe that I am open to change into whatever my partner needs me to be, then I become resentful that they set goals for me that are either unattainable or do not interest me. I did a lot of apologizing and crying and feeling like a failure, no matter how many successes I had. The end result was that I considered myself to be that failure and so did my partners. It is easy to objectively see the recipe for destruction, but not so easy when you are programmed with thousands of conditioned responses that create the exact dynamic you know is destructive.
Several weeks ago, around July 21, I became extremely ill. Those who know me well know that I am never, ever sick. I have been ill more times this year than in the past ten years jammed together. That got my attention. The one that happened in July was a week long doozie. I developed a kidney infection and a tooth infection at the same time. This was after just having my teeth checked in March. Having toxins up top and down below completely took me under. I felt like I was swimming in poison. I couldn’t think straight. My entire body felt systemically ill. I took D-Mannos and Oil of Oregano orally, rinsed with salt water and hydrogen peroxide, and drank gallons and gallons of water. Taking Motrin and Tylenol for the pain helped, but I could feel myself immersed in chemicals as well as infection.
This marries up to a time in my life when I was making choices I did not want to make. Specific situations indicated that I needed to find mainstream work (and fast), so I applied at a local staffing agency and submitted applications all over the place. Even my husband doesn’t know all of the places where I applied to work. Nothing. Not a call back. Not a lead. Not an interview. It was humbling, to say the least. Here I was a business owner, published author, PhD, and journalist and I couldn’t even get a call back to be a greeter at Walmart. I felt less than worthless.
Around the Blue Moon, Eric and I had a sweat lodge that was way, way over hot. It was so hot that he left the sweat three times, which is unheard of for him. I stayed and sweated out the mess. It was quite transformative for me and took me a long way toward burning off some long-term resentment that I feel was manifesting as toxins in my body.
As I healed myself of my incredible illness, I healed myself of my sickness, I healed myself of those damaging beliefs. It wasn’t that I was worthless, this was simply not my path. I came out of that illness a different person than the one who went into it. The thing is, the person who went into that illness wasn’t me and the person who came out of it was more me than I have ever been.
I began to make private decisions in my head and quietly put them into effect in my life. Granted, this was only three weeks or so ago, but the effects were profound and immediate. My head cleared and I could think again. I felt plugged in, motivated, and engaged. My shop started making money. Readings began coming in again. My relationship with Eric re-balanced after being weird for a while.
One of these decisions was to change how I eat. In the past, I have made big proclamations and launched into major reform. This time, I stopped all white sugar, most gluten, all highly processed foods, and gave up soft drinks, which was the hardest sacrifice for me. I miss candy. I miss cookies. Now, however, it is on a mental level of “that would really taste good” rather than a physical craving. The cravings went away around 10 days in. I even just went on vacation to Southern California for four days and held strong, despite being surrounded by cookies and ice cream. I eat a lot of salads and protein foods. I eat fresh fruits and vegetables. For the first three weeks, I only ate twice a day. I ate a huge breakfast and then a moderate early supper. Now, I am working an extra, smaller meal into the day because my two nutritional counselors felt I was not eating enough. I just don’t get hungry at all. In the three weeks since I started this, I have lost nine pounds, but as my friend, Chelsea, puts it, “They were the biggest nine pounds I have ever lost.” The weight I lost feels much denser than the usual ten pounds I lose at the beginning of a diet process.
I feel very optimistic about the weight loss because I have seen the end result in my mind and I know it is assured. I always knew it would happen when it was time and not one moment before, no matter how much it was demanded of me. Now, it’s time.
Yesterday, I told Eric I was ceasing all efforts toward finding gainful employment in the mainstream and now I am focused on the shop, my readings, my teaching, and my writing. Those are my passions and everything else will just have to fall in. He was wonderfully supportive, which I appreciate.
I made other decisions in my life, cutting back on some projects that were not paying off to free up more time and energy for those that were. I am not anyone’s tool anymore. Onward and upward.
Meanwhile, I leave you with this earworm:
Emotion is what fuels magical practice because spell work begins with what you want to have happen. If you cannot feel, then you cannot want and feeling is emotion. All intense emotion is high energy and you can, with rational thought and careful planning, direct all the intensity of that energy toward your goal. Passion will spike energy right off the meter, whether that passion comes from lust, anger, fear, or exultation. High emotion of all kinds: love, fear, sadness, anger, frustration, etc, can fuel your magical energy like a stoked furnace. But should you? Continue reading “High Emotion Magic: Bonus or Bad News?”
“An it harm none do what ye will.”
We cling to these words, among other reasons, because they are our battle cry to legitimize us to other faiths. “Oh, no… We aren’t bad people. We even have a law that says ‘harm none.'” I saw this again with recent comments an ill-informed Florida sheriff made attributing ritualistic murders to “Witchcraft” when of the many replies that flooded my Facebook news feed, “We harm none!” or some derivative was the most common. It is our haughty badge of honor and overall, it is a lie. Why? Because we are human. Continue reading “Harm None: Paralysis & Hypocrisy”
It is hard for me to believe that just a couple of short years ago, I had the house to myself all day long and wrote books. That was my job. It was a glorious moment as I turn 54 in September, I am trying not to imagine that it was the pinnacle best time of my life. Surely there is more than that brief time of joy, right? Now there is never enough time. It runs through my figures like the finest sand. I know that in November, I will make tough decisions about which of my obligations stay and which ones go. I look forward to that time, but I also don’t. It will involve letting go of some dreams and disappointing some people and some brutal self-honesty about what is working and what isn’t (now or yet).
I feel strangely confident about the store, having just received some nice confirmations from the Universe. What I will let go of is the ongoing product and inventory development that is such a consumer of time and money. I love doing it and enjoy the creative process that comes with it, but resources on all levels need a break from it.
I am excited to go to the GH Fan Club Weekend in a week and look forward to seeing my dear friends there. I had resolved to not go this year, but a few miracles happened that paved the way, so I am going to have a fantastic working vacation and I hope some down time as well. Delena is going with me and she is a fantastic travel companion. I will have copies of The Insiders Guide to the General Hospital Fan Club Weekend and both the 2013 and 2014 General Hospital Fan Club Yearbook(s) available for purchase.
I now have two teen sons with driver permits, pending licenses. Soon, I will have no more kids at home. Dylan starts college at the end of August and Nathan will begin his junior year of homeschooling at the same time. They have both grown into fine young men.
Once again, I am working with weight loss issues. Those of you who have followed my blog for the ridiculous amount of time that I have been writing it know that this is something I have failed at countless times. I imagine you are as tired of hearing about it as I am of attempting it. One difference this time, whether it is minor or major, is that I have seen the positive outcome in vision, so I am working toward that. I re-started a week ago this past Monday, so…July 20 and since then, I have lost seven pounds. The cravings and desire for comfort eating even when I was not hungry were extreme and probably a hundred or more times, I thought I would cave in. Each day, I managed to keep my intake below 1200 calories, which is the point where I remain the same or gain. I think it was yesterday, or perhaps the day before, that I realized I was not struggling as hard as I had been before, so my hope is that I am over the hill for now. I am in a sweet place where I can eat minimally and be comfortable. What works for me is very, very minimal bread (then whole wheat), high protein, fruits, and vegetables. Essentially, it is Whole 30 without total bread restriction. I also find that I am not negatively triggered by beans and legumes, so I have chili once every couple of weeks. Lots of eggs, endless salads, lean meats, potatoes that are roasted or baked, steamed vegetables, very occasional pasta, but only tiny bits and absolutely no refined sugar products.
The sugar withdrawal is the worst. Even last night when I am in a really good space in regard to eating and was not hungry at all, I got triggered hard at Walmart and wanted to eat every candy bar and drink every soft drink in sight. It was an act of tremendous will to keep from telling myself “Just this one time, it will be OK” or “seriously, you’ve earned this… just eat the damned PayDay and drink the Dr Pepper and you’ll be fine.” But I didn’t and I pouted, but I survived.
To sound completely pathetic, I miss it so much. The burst of pleasure, the comfort, the “doing something just for me” feeling… It is a moment where no one can get between me and the happy. I don’t have other coping strategies for comfort and yes, these are stressful times in KatrinaLand. I don’t even drink wine or vape or anything that could be construed as pacifying. Eating and drinking all the wrong things was it for me. It worked so well that I never bothered to develop a taste for other vices.
I feel wonderful physically. My body works better inside and feels healthier already, although seven pounds doesn’t really translate out to visible results. I found a nice, supportive combination of supplements that stabilizes my energy, works on my cortisol levels, and boosts my metabolism a bit. I eat a lot of B12 for mood mollifying.
I got around another couple of pitfalls with the Aster of Avalon book and it is moving right along. History took care of me in that respect. I did some deeper digging into a key character and found some historical theories about him that created some fantastic plot points for me. The book is almost halfway done and I think it is turning out to be my favorite so far. It is a bit of a deviation from the formula of the first two, but you can’t have seven sisters and have them all tell the same tale. I am very excited for this series. Then I have to write the next in the porn series, then I have to write some more magical stuff, so the year is laid out for books. Hint: that is not something I intend to give up in November.
That is how things roll with Katrina right now. You can see that it’s about the same as always. I wish I had something wise and helpful to share with the world, but right now, it is chop wood and carry water. Thankfully, a metaphor. If I had 2-3 more days added in between Sunday and Saturday, life would be perfect.
Set Up: The ritual area is decorated with sheaves of wheat, corn on the husks, fresh vegetables, and brooms. The participants make corn dollies ahead of time. Corn dollies are actually, in our limited artistic ability, more often “corn joints” than “corn dollies,” so the aesthetics are not vital to the magic. We use corn husks, purchased in the Hispanic section of the grocery store for tamale making, as the wrapper for our corn dollies, then combine aromatic herbs affiliated with each of the five elements (earth, air, fire, water and spirit) into five different potpourri blends. I recommend books like The Master Book of Herbalism by Paul Bereyl and The Encyclopedia of Magical Herbs by Scott Cunningham to determine the elemental affiliation of different herbs. Sympathetic essential oils may also be added for increased scent. Continue reading “A Lammas Ritual”
So this year I already did something I promised myself I would never do again and although it was likely for the best, I am not proud of it and hope to avoid it in the future. I totally checked out. I think the last time I did that was in 1992 and I had all the stress I could take. I made a series of very, very bad choices. My marriage ended. A rebound relationship that I thought would work out failed miserably. My job was ending and I had no way to support myself and my three wonderful sons. I was pregnant and felt horrible. I basically went into my room and closed the door and was a horrible, neglectful mother when my children needed me most. I got up like a robot and went to work every morning. The base where I worked was closing down and my office was the only one still open in the entire hospital wing. We had only four or five doctors still doing dictation, so between transcriptions, I would put my head down on the desk and sleep and cry and sleep some more.
My boss, a dear but unassuming lieutenant, would drift back to check on me every couple of weeks. My dictations came in by remote on a complicated old cassette system and I put the finished typed product in an inbox at the medical records department after everyone left for the day. It was not unusual for days to pass without me seeing another human in what had once been a bustling, full service hospital. One day, my lieutenant came in and said, “Were you just sleeping?”
“Of course not,” I laughed. Why would you think that?”
He looked confused and said, “Um…because ‘Dorlands’ is written backwards on your forehead.” The Dorland’s Medical Encyclopedia with its embossed title was, indeed, on my desk and served as my face pillow.
My young sons, who were ten, twelve, and fourteen, had to raise themselves for several months. I saw a therapist and he could not help me chemically because of my pregnancy and nothing he said could move me out of my numbing depression. I did not allow myself to think at all. I just did and then only did the bare minimum that I could and still exist. There was a lot of sobbing and sleeping and occasionally, ranting at people who did not deserve my wrath, like my little boys. I had no friends, no support system, no hope at all.
I did not come out of it until we drove away from that house in July of 1993. Delena was then eight months old. Joe was embittered because so much of the work defaulted to him. I managed to pick up a job at Edwards working for NASA on a top secret jet fighter project. That sounds like a fake story you’d give someone at a bar, but it is true. We lived in a hotel in Lancaster, California for almost two months while I tried to work all day and find house we could afford to rent in the cracks of my time. Ultimately, we couldn’t afford the house and that did not go well, but at least, we had a roof for the remainder of our time in California. I worked three jobs: the NASA job and ultimately back into medical transcription when that drew down, a job reading Tarot cards at a shop in Lancaster, and teaching childbirth classes. There was no rest and there was no hope I would pull through, but I was at least more engaged than I had been before we moved. Not a lot, but more.
It is the time in my life of which I am most grievously ashamed. There were no successes and I could not see any joys anywhere, although I am sure they were there. My children, even for all their current struggles, turned out better than they had any right to. Some are more wounded from that time than others.
Last Fall, my life took a turn I should have seen coming and yet, did not expect, and it unseated me. I tried several different angles to work on it. I sought the advice of some of those in my wide and wise network of friends and did a lot of praying and centering. I realized that my previous self-assessment that said I was actually doing OK and had found my sovereignty was, in fact, off target. I fell hard. I journaled here about it a few times, trying to let the catharsis of written word work its magic on me. I rebounded more than once, only to fall back harder again.
This year, the unthinkable happened. I got sick. Those who know me know I *never* get sick. I have always been in good health and it is rare that things like even common colds or flus get hold of me. I have been ill more this year than I have in the previous fifteen combined and the year is only half over.
This week was the penultimate of sick for me. I know it could be worse, but this was pretty bad and I am taking the hint. Talk about toxic from top to bottom. A tooth I was pretty sure my dentist cracked at my last cleaning began to ache horribly and I developed a very angry case of cystitis. I was a spectrum of pain from my head to my seat. I felt horribly ill on top of the pain. I could feel that a good bit of what I was saying made little sense. I did not sleep well.
I needed to go speak to a staffing agency about picking up some part time work and I have no idea how I made it through that ninety minute experience and I remember very little of it except them giving me the Janine From Ghostbusters assurance that someone with my extensive experience could easily find work in the food service or housekeeping industries. That is what happens when you are self-employed and run your own businesses for eighteen years after leaving a thriving workforce.
I then had a marathon lunch with a dear friend and I mostly remember what we discussed. From there, I went to visit with another friend and talked about employment options with her. As I did so, I realized how absolutely sick everyone was with my own perceived helplessness and my own resignation from the life force. Once again, I had given up. Once again, I checked out. Once again, I stopped caring or investing or trying and once again, I was only doing the bare minimum I could to get by. I was working my ass off, mind you. I never stop working. But I was not emotionally invested in even one thing I was doing. I was angry over how my life went despite all my hard work and so I retreated while leaving my body to keep working. There was no self care. There was no emotional engagement with anything at all. Once again, I was figuratively (although in 1992, it was literally) going into my room and closing the door and crying and sleeping.
My body was reacting to all of the poison that my anger and resentment put into it. My body was reflecting how that poison just sat in me and festered and hurt. My mouth hurt because I was not saying what needed to be said. My bladder hurt because I was really pissed off and holding onto instead of eliminating my wastes.
Yesterday, I had a huge list of things I needed to do for the shop, but I let them all go. I wrote a column for Patheos in which I reseated myself in an effective method of problem solving and made sure to take my own advice. I slept. I read. I prayed. Yes, I cried a bit. I took a lot of Oil of Oregano and d-Mannos and cranberry supplements. I drank gallons of water. I used high concentrate oil of peppermint topically on the tooth, which will be fixed when we have medical and dental benefits again.
The toxins have now mostly left and the rest are cleansing away. The sick part is gone and I am now working with pain management. My head is clear and I feel wonderful and plugged in again. I am engaged enough to notice that my floors need to be mopped and my desk is suffering from piles and piles of *stuff*.
Today will be a busy day of getting things done, including more work on my beloved Aster of Avalon book. She definitely deserves the attention she is getting and I look forward to publishing book 3 of Seven Sisters of Avalon. I am grateful for a day of intentional effort instead of automated responses.
For those of us who follow the CUSP (Climbing Up the Spiral Pathway) spiritual tradition, Harvest is a time of reward and celebration when all of our hard work through the year pays off. During this time, the “crops” are tall and strong in the field, heavy with the fruit of the first harvest. Far from a time to rest at the end of the cycle, harvest is when we work harder than we have at any other time of the year. The next twelve weeks of harvest between now and its ends on October 31st will be challenging to say the least. We harvest until we feel as though our backs will break and our legs will give out on us…then we harvest some more. Few of us are agricultural farmers beyond a small, backyard production and it is rare that ability to survive the winter rests on the success of the harvest as it did in more ancient times. Instead, we harvest positive life goals that we planned through the winter and planted in the spring. Continue reading “Harvest: Bringing In Those Sheaves”
First, a musical interlude:
Now, a little over halfway through my 2015, it seems like as decent a place as any to evaluate. I was told by several independent sources that this is “my year,” whatever that means, and I invested in the idea. I can honestly say I have never worked as hard in any consecutive months of my life as I have in the past six and that includes working two part times jobs and a full time job as a single mother in the 1990s. I am tired beyond belief and that doesn’t change even when I rest. It seems to be my default status. I am in this uniquely magical place where if I close my eyes for more than a few minutes, no matter where I am or what I am doing, I will immediately fall into active dream time. It is like being a little bit high all the time.
This marks my fourteenth year of transitioning into menopause. I started with symptoms almost the day I turned forty and back then, it included hot flashes, palpitations, erratic periods, irritability, hair loss, and night restlessness. My symptoms are nowhere near as aggressive now. I went through over-the-counter treatment as well as hormone replacement therapy. The over-the-counter stuff worked well for me for two or three years, but then lost its effectiveness, so I switched to a different one for a few months, then quit altogether. The HRT never worked well for me. My goal is not to replace my reduced hormones, but to help my body adapt to the new levels successfully.
I hydrate well. I supplement with lots of B-12 and other supplements and that seems to take off the edge.
Life has changed so dramatically from this time last year. On January 1st, I took over a computer sales and repair business and learned more than I ever wanted to know about repairing laptops and desktops. I invested what I had to spare and then some into the business and as it turned out, much of what the previous owner represented to me at the time of purchase was incomplete or inadequate. I was not told that a good bit of his disclosed income from the business came from working on people’s computers in home, which is not something I feel comfortable doing. The contract he assured was ours that was to cover our store overhead every month never manifested as he was certain it would, even though he is the IT director for the company with which we would contract. They took two months to pay on our first and only transaction, which had the terms of “payment on delivery.” These issues are common to business owners, but I was not positioned to manage them at that time.
My business is located deep inside a giant swap meet in Roseville, California and computers are not typically impulse buy purchases. Most people do not want to pay for parking, carry their heavy PC or laptop into a swap meet, and possibly wait a week to get their repair job back since we are only open on weekends, even though our prices are significantly lower than our competitors. After several weekends of sitting in the store without any revenue at all to show for it and two months of the store not coming close to breaking even, I decided I needed a different variety of things to sell in the store and opened a botanica on one side. A botanica, for those who do not know, is a store that specializes in handmade magical items and aromatherapeutic items. I worked night and day to produce an inventory, which was tough enough as it was, but even worse since I’d already invested beyond the extent of available funds into the computer side that was not paying off.
The botanica does well. Some weekends, it is he driving force in profits, and sometimes, the computer side does better. We still do not break even, but we are getting closer. I meet amazing people and finally I am starting to see a stable inventory instead of throwing stuff to the wall to see what sticks. I have a few new items to roll out over the next month, but mostly, I think we have found our market. My daughter, Delena, is my store manager and helps out every weekend. She just graduated from college with two degrees: Fine Arts and Social Sciences.
On March 20, Eric worked his last day at the Veteran’s Support Office in Placerville. He now works with me in the shop and is otherwise here at home.
Dylan officially graduated high school in May and turned 18 earlier this month. He starts college in August. Nathan pulled his grades up through home schooling and made up some lost credits with summer school. He will continue home schooling this academic year and with California’s new vaccination law, will likely graduate through this program rather than mainstreaming back into traditional high school.
In February, I was honored when Patheos.com accepted me as a full time blogger for a column on Energy Magic. I produce two posts a week, each of approximately 1000 words. I barely get one posted and it is time to post another one. I feel as though I am running out of words. The job pays, in theory, but I have to get to 12,000 hits in a month before it kicks in and this month, I made it to around 6,000. For now, it is an insane amount of work with no return other than to say that I write for Patheos.com.
I am part of a group called North Western Circles Association and we put on a festival in June called PanGaia Festival. A ton of hard work paid off and the festival was extremely successful.
I published my most recent book in January, Weather or Not, and I am still working on the third Seven Sisters of Avalon book, Aster of Avalon, that was due out in December. Life got in the way and I was also a bit stuck on a few things. Delena brainstormed with me and got me through the bottleneck and it is flowing well now. I hope to be finished by the end of Summer. My editor has finished the first quarter of the book and says it is my best work yet.
The year has been a significant personal struggle and I find that I feel lost and confused a lot of the time. I look for guidance inside and out and find none. I see so many life changes and I feel as though it is all passing me by. I remember feeling strong and vibrant, but more as an abstract than a true memory. I am grateful to have had that at some point in my life because I know many never get it at all. I hope to have it again some day.
For now, it feels like that was a brief moment in a very long day. Life is such a series of choices and I am working to find the right ones, including the choices to be healthy, happy, fulfilled, and gracious. It is difficult when a person is on output so long without positive return. I can find blessings, absolutely, but the challenges often feel overwhelming, then I feel weak and ineffectual for feeling overwhelmed. I see others dealing with greater struggles with far more dignity and I wonder what’s wrong with me.
I was raised in a way to believe that if you work hard, you can be successful. I feel as though I never stop working and the breaks just do not come. At June, in the CUSP cycle, we expect to see our crops out in the field and to know that our goals are manifesting beautifully. So far, I have not had that confirmation. I am looking out onto a wasteland of a field…that needs weeding…and watering…and a lot more work. I do not see little mini-corns or beanstalks wanting to be something when they grow up. I see a whole lot of work invested into a harvest of weeds.
It may sound as though I do not have faith and nothing could be further from the truth. In fact, faith is about all I have right now. I cling to it like a life raft. I pray it is not all some huge cosmic joke. I know I have to keep moving because this is the active time of the year. I do not intend to let go of anything in particular I am doing until after November 1st, when I will re-evaluate and decides what serves and what doesn’t. For now, I am the living embodiment of that old joke about “how far can you walk into the woods?” Halfway because after that, you are walking out of the woods. Once I am halfway in, I can turn around and go back or I can keep walking and see what is on the other side of the woods.In this case, there is no going back because what I left is no longer there. There is nothing for me except walking forward into the unknown hoping that what I am doing is the right thing and is enough.
It has been a long time since I updated this online journal, partly because I am burned out from writing for Patheos, partly because there it little new to talk about, and partly because it is even more work to find a positive spin for my current journey. I remade my website yesterday, hoping to invest new energy into it and by proxy, into me. Now I will go develop oils for my shop and make beautiful spell bottles for people who need an extra boost in their lives.
Like a typical Virgo, I might struggle pulling my own life together, but I sure know what everyone else needs.
Maybe I need to find my own Virgo.
The “third eye” is a concept embraced by many cultures. This uniquely empowered area of the physical body is associated with the brow chakra and with the color purple. Friar Richard Rohr speculates that “First Eye” is what we perceive with the five physical senses. The “Second Eye” is our reasoning and reflection. The “Third Eye” goes further still and is, as Rohr puts it, “Having the mind of Christ.” It is a coming together of sacredness that puts one in a very holy and receptive state of mind. Many paths of yogic study use the third eye for inner focus.
The Hindu people honor the inner guru by placing a dot of red sandalwood on the brow or Ajna (Aadnyaa) chakra. Their interpretation of this chakra means “command center.” When a person closes their eyes and the distraction of visual stimulation is removed, often their eyes automatically shift upward with their “vision” directed toward the area of the third eye. Relax, close your eyes and see if they naturally drift upward to this sacred area.
The Ajna chakra is said to be the exit point for the kundalini, which is the coiled life force of energy that resides in the first and second chakras. It is traditionally called the “sleeping serpent” or the dormant sacred power because it is the life force that awakens during times of great enlightenment and spiritual bliss. At those times, it begins to uncurl and ascend upward through the other chakra points, lighting them up as it goes. Many say this accounts for the tingling feeling of true magic’s activation and movement through the body to exit out toward its intended purpose. When raising magical energy to direct toward a specific purpose, notice the increase in power that comes from starting the process in the lower two chakras and sending it upward to the third eye area to direct it toward its goal.
Some cultures cover the area in front of the third eye, both to protect the gateway to the kundalini from outside contamination and to contain the energy within the person. The most common form of third eye or Ajna protection is the “bindi” or “bindu,” which is the “dot” that you see sometimes see between the eyebrows worn on the practitioners of the yogic traditions. This may be accomplished by paint or gluing on a jewel or other decoration.
The third eye is thought to refer to the pineal gland, a tiny part of our endocrine system embedded deeply between the two hemispheres of the brain, surrounded by a web of carotid arteries. Its location tracks directly back into the brain from the center of the forehead, generally considered to be the “third eye” point. Philosopher René Descartes studied the pineal gland with great interest and referred to it as “the principal seat of the soul.”
The 19th century Christian mystic, Max Heindel theorized that the human pituitary and pineal gland were much more active in the past and has said “when man was in touch with the inner worlds, these organs were his means of ingress thereto.” Other theorists have joined with his notions that these essential glands are very dormant versions of how they operated in our ancestors.
Certainly, the pineal gland controls some of our most important functions. It is responsible for releasing melatonin and therefore, governing our circadian rhythms. This is accomplished through the pineal gland’s interpretation of light and darkness, which itself is a concept with mystical overtones. A disruption in the health of the pineal gland can result in sleep disorders and bipolar-type imbalances. A minor example of disrupted circadian rhythms is the effect of jet lag.
If you think about it, the pineal gland is the “Guardian at the Gate” of sleep and really, what could be more magical than that? Sleep is the time when we dream, so the pineal gland is the gateway into our most free and sacred self. Dream time is where many of our divinely inspired messages reside and is a line of direct access to the Divine where our own reserves and boundaries are non-existent and our Higher Self roams free.
When the third eye, the aura, the chakras, the meridians, and the lymphatic system are considered as a system of energy management, it is easy to see how intricately our bodies and spirits are wired to function as fully magical beings. The individual chakras act as hearts pumping energy into vital areas of our lives. The meridians work as blood vessels, transporting the energy throughout our bodies. The lymphatic system cleanses out impure energy and discharges it from the body. The aura readily identifies the health of the entire system, identifying problem areas of blockages and dis-ease while the third eye is the gateway for our energy exchange with the Divine, much as our lungs oxygenate and empower our bloodstream. We are not only a sophisticated biological entity but also a meticulously crafted energy circuit board that comes to life when the console knows how to light up properly. The energy network that runs through your body is every bit as important as the system that sustains your biological life. They are, in fact, perfectly interwoven and when both systems are healthy and working in harmony, you have achieved true spiritual balance.
Katrina Rasbold writes books that are available at Amazon.com and runs a magical shop full of cool, needful things in Roseville, CA (also with online sales) called Botánica de La Reina.
Welcome to the list of my own 10 Favorite Witchy Movies. Are they predictable? Absolutely. They are at once predictable and cliche. There glaring omissions that will cause readers to say, “But what about…?” and “YOU LEFT OUT..!” This is not a list of ALL Witchy movies or the BEST Witchy movies, but my own favorite Witchy movies. Because it would be like choosing my favorite children, these are listed in no particular order, but are the top ten favorites from a wonderful line of magical films I have enjoyed in my life. Continue reading “10 Favorite Witchy Movies”
Slowly, silently, now the moon
Walks the night in her silver shoon;
This way, and that, she peers, and sees
Silver fruit upon silver trees.– Walter de la Mare
From the first moment that humans looked up into the sky, they felt an intense draw to the ever-changing moon. While the sun offers us assurance and reliability, easing up into the sky each day and dipping behind the horizon every evening, lengthening and shortening the days as the earth moves around it in orbit, the moon reminds us that all things are transient. The moon rides her month long cycle, showing her bright, full face and then gradually turning away again to leave us in the darkness. Continue reading “Moon Magic: The Ultimate Versatility”
It can happen to all of us, although thankfully, not usually to the degree we see in the graphic above. Rituals fail. It is easy to raise one knowing eyebrow and say that it failed because it was intended to fail and all things are exactly as they should be and blah, blah, blah, but there is a huge difference in knowing that rituals sometimes do not go as planned versus understanding why rituals sometimes go in the ditch and how to manage that inevitability. Continue reading “Ceremonial Interruptus: When Rituals Fail”
“It’s HOT!”
“Um, you live in California!”
“BUT IT’S HAWT!”
There is little I enjoy less than a day out in the hot sun. My husband puts on his “Aztec Princess oil” and sits in the sun to bake, reading, surfing the internet with wi-fi, or playing his didgeridoo. He will plow around the lake on his boat, romp in the ocean surf, or work out in the yard at top temperatures. Not me. I go to the beach, play in the water for four minutes, stretch out in the sun for ten minutes, then complain that there is sand in my butt, it’s crowded, and I want to go home. Of course, I do that in my head because everyone else is having an amazing time and I don’t want to be the wet blanket in the bunch. Once menopause hit thirteen years ago in what – based on evidence – is a never-ending process, I am even less tolerant to high heat and yet, there is powerful magic in the Sun’s mighty rays.
Hot days may not seem like much of a weather phenomenon, but they bring with them their own intensity and therefore, their own magical power. The closer we get to Summer Solstice, the stronger the male energy grows. Because high heat originates from the Sun, which is a masculine celestial sign and from Fire, which is a masculine element, High Sun energy instills us with the strongest male energies.
Words that go along with an infusion of male energy are:
That is never to imply that women cannot also embody those traits anymore than men cannot also be intuitive, nurturing, healing, life affirming, mystical, or any of the female attributes. We are all beings with both masculine and feminine attributes.
On either side of the Summer Solstice, in the waxing or the waning of the height of male energy, we can have long, blistering hot days. Since the dawn of time, humans have worshipped the Sun as a life source and powerful deity. There is nothing like seeing the Sun break through the clouds after days of rain and gray skies. Before there were alarm clocks and electric lighting, the light of the Sun told us when to wake up and when to go to sleep. The absence of the Sun from the sky during an eclipse was a profound magical event in times gone by.
The power of the Sun is profound and so as with classic favorite weather events like rain, wind, thunder, and lightning, this is a power that can be used in our magic.
We all have times of vulnerability and weakness and the pick-me-up energy of a burst of sunlight is quite a boost Without essential Vitamin D from the sun, we do not thrive. In complement to the Mother Earth, the Sun is also a sustainer of life. One of Aesop’s fables tells a story about The North Wind and the Sun who have a debate about which one is strongest. They agree that whichever of them can force a traveler to take off his cloak first is the strongest. You can see this is sort of a rigged gig. The North Wind blows hard at the traveler, using all its ferocity, and the man only pulls his cloak tighter. The Sun smiles and beams proudly, covering the traveler with its warm rays. Within a few minutes, the man takes off his cloak and the Sun wins.
Choose a yellow or orange stone, even a flat glass marble, and lay it out in the direct sunlight, allowing it to absorb the rays and the heat of the Sun. Once it has collected energy for a few hours, take it inside and place it on your personal altar or put it somewhere safe for future use. When you know that a situation is coming that will require you to exhibit endurance, strength, intensity, or effective strategy beyond what you normally possess, carry that stone with you knowing that it is charged with the energy of the Sun to bless you and fuel your efforts.
Use the long days of summer much as our ancestors did before us. For all of the medical advances we now possess, ancient people knew a secret to healthy life that we do not now employ. They followed the cycles of Nature in their lives rather than continuing the same level and type of productivity throughout the entire year. Consider the harvest cycle. They planted and fertilized in the spring, nurtured and protected in the summer, harvested in the fall, and then rested and planned in the winter. They used the long days of the summer months to put in some of their hardest physical work and then went inside and used the introspective, feminine time of the year to plan and learn.
In our modern life, we tend to demand the same level and type of productivity with no shift to accommodate the changing seasons and the cycles we go through internally that reflect those natural transitions. Just as our bodies and minds are meant to rest in the winter, we are meant to be active and engaged in the summer.
High Sun days are great for motivational magic to build stamina, strength, and aggression in ourselves (or in others!). When the Sun is high and hot, our magic can light a fire under a situation, stimulate it, and get it moving again.
Author’s Note: My group and my spiritual path are both called CUSP (Climbing Up the Spiral Pathway), detailed in the books CUSP: A New Way to Walk the Old Path, The Real Magic, and Energy Magic Compleat and on the website, www.thecuspway.com. We use the ancient agricultural cycle of planning, planting, nurturing, and harvesting in conjunction with the eight high holidays to create a process of manifestation that makes life improvements every singling year, building on the manifestations of the previous year. We invest magical energy into what we wish to harvest in the fall and also invest physical energy into making that happen. By using the blend of magical efforts and mundane follow-through, we work aggressively toward creating the best life available, tuning into our own manifest destiny and taking full accountability for our own life experiences. Continue reading “Midsummer Ritual: How I Kick It Litha-Style”
Of all of the holidays, it can be argued that most cultures at some time or another celebrated Midsummer. The Sun reigns at its full power and dominates the sky for the longest day of the year on Litha. It is commonly believed that the Faeries are most active during this time and that idea was perpetuated by William Shakespeare’s famous play, A Midsummer Night’s Dream. The power of herbs and plants is said to be strongest at this time, so many of the summer herbs are harvested on this day. Continue reading “Midsummer: Purge, Protect, & Burn Stuff”
