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Posts Tagged ‘Druidry’

The Quiet After Yule

Posted in Seasonal Things, tagged , , , , , , , , on January 2, 2013| 4 Comments »

I’m always sad to see the Yule season end. I like the anticipation and the coziness of the season, and while it’s fun to ring in the new year with celebrations and champagne, I always find myself a little let down by the sudden wintry reality that follows. Not just back to work again after a break (which is always too short), or the putting away of warm and cheerful decorations, but the seemingly cold feeling of waiting for spring that follows the celebration of the sun’s return.

There’s quite a lot of waiting in the winter, and it feels strongest to me right around the beginning of January. Our weather is such that we dont have long to wait for spring, but it’s frequently rainy and chilly here right now, even if we do get warm days in between. Though the sun is returning, the light doesn’t seem to change quickly enough. It’s still dark when I leave for work, and almost dark when I get home.

I’m looking forward to driving during the sunrise again, in a month or so, and to the days warming up into spring.

This year, though, I am trying to pace myself and savor this time of year. This time of year is so quiet, and I want to take advantage of that. We know the sun is returning, and the patient waiting offers an extension of the time of reflection that usually follows Samhain. I can make plans for my garden, perusing seed catalogues and diagramming garden beds, but I can also take the time to meditate on the cold (or even IN the cold, for short periods of time).

It’s also a good time to enjoy the quiet in my house after the bustle that defines November and December. The early evenings offer more reading time and time to spend preparing my house for the busier times of year, as well as time for deep reflection and increased devotions.

Instead of always looking ahead, this year I want to try to really dig into this period of stillness before Imbolc and the return of spring in March. I will light candles, burn incense, cook warm and hearty foods, and keep the fire of my hearth bright and welcoming.

Then when spring does come, I’ll be rested and ready for growing things and being outside again.

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Meditation Journal: Week 9

Posted in Dedicant Path Essays, Meditation Journal, tagged , , , , on December 31, 2012| 1 Comment »

Very little meditation got done this week. I did one 10 minute meditation on Thursday, and other than a few moments of mental reflection, or exploring my mental grove as part of my getting ready for bed routine, I didn’t do anything else. (I suppose that probably all counts, but I really do try to get formal meditations in more often).

With the holidays (and lots of traveling), it was hard to fit anything else in. I’m glad that the requirement is only to meditate weekly, or I’d be sunk.

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Secret Druid Tips: New Year, New Calendar

Posted in Seasonal Things, Secret Agent Druid, tagged , , , , , , , on December 28, 2012| Leave a Comment »

If you’re like me, one of your favorite parts of New Years is picking out (and writing in the important dates on) a new calendar. This is an easy place to bring Druidry into your home or office decor in a way that’s really unobtrusive to others, but blatantly obvious to you. Pick a calendar that reminds you of nature or the Kindreds, and use it as a focus to remain mindful and aware of those forces around you.

If you like the monthly, wall calendar kind (or the page-a-week organizer/desktop kind), take a moment and write in the Holy Days while you write in all your cousins’ birthdays. Full and new moons are other good things to add. If you like the page-a-day kind, the imagery will be daily, and you can use the moment where you tear off each page as a cue for a 9 breath meditation and reflection.

And remember, if possible, to get a calendar that’s made of recycled paper, and make sure you put the torn pages in the recycling bin!

Edit: I was asked how and where I got my dates for these calendars, and why sometimes they have different times or dates listed. Usually a difference in date is caused by timezones. I use the US Military Observatory’s data, which you can get here, for moon phases. Keep in mind that these times are UTC (Universal time), so you’ll have to subtract hours for your timezone – I’m in US Central, so that’s UTC-6.

For High Days, I use the typical calendar dates for planning my calendar each year (Samhain on Oct 31, Yule on Dec 21, Imbolc on Feb 1). I know there are more specific astronomical dates (the Solstice doesn’t always happen on the 21st), but since I can rarely celebrate ON the actual day, I figure as long as I get close it doesn’t matter.

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Ritual Redux: Yule/Winter Solstice

Posted in Dedicant Path Essays, Ogham, Seasonal Things, tagged , , , , , , , , , on December 25, 2012| 2 Comments »

My winter solstice ritual was performed on Thursday December 20, in the mid-morning. It was a bright, beautifully sunny day, and so it seemed an appropriate time to welcome back the Sun. Ideally I’d perform this ritual at dawn, but at dawn I was taking a sick cat to the vet, so the best laid plans didn’t quite work out.

This was a solitary rite, following the full ADF COoR. For this ritual, I honored the Earth Mother in an unnamed aspect; the Gatekeeper was Cernunnos. Sulis was the primary patron(ess) of this rite. I brought the following offerings: silver for the well, cedar incense for the fire, candles and cinnamon incense for Sulis, and a bottle of good hard cider for the Kindreds (as I can not drink ale or whiskey). The ritual, being for Sulis, is loosely based in the Gaulish hearth culture.

I was very pleased with this ritual. I felt like I had more depth and understanding of the COOR, and though I mixed up some of the offerings, I feel like it was a successful rite. (I forgot to give the silver to the well when I created the cosmos, but I rectified that after I lit the fire!) I’m finding a more comfortable voice to speak my rituals in, and I felt that adding inflection and feeling to my voice added inflection and feeling to the ritual itself. My work with increasing connection helped as well, as I definitely felt the portal open when I asked Cernunnos to open the gates. I don’t know that I felt a strong presence from any particular Kindred, but I did feel like I was doing this ritual with the presence of other beings. I also was more familiar with this ritual, so I didn’t feel as much like I was “just” reading it. Some of that probably is helped by my having put my ritual text in a nice binder, so I have something to hold that isn’t just print outs.

Things I will not do in the future – I am a little unsure if I’ll do an offering that includes alcohol at 10am. Since I used the hard cider both for the offerings and as my drink for the blessings, it was a little odd to be drinking that early in the day. I think I’d have been happier with just plain good cider, and leave the hard stuff for afternoon rituals. I also started out the ritual feeling rather rushed for some reason (probably because I was doing the ritual on a day when I was also preparing for holiday travel). I noticed it around the point of the Two Powers meditation and was able to slow myself down and really feel the energy of the rite.

Omens Drawn

  • Uath (Hawthorn) – Fear, Despair, Cleansing, Challenges
  • Onn (Gorse) – Easy Travel, Wheel, Movement, Fertility
  • Ceirt (Apple) – The Otherworld, Shelter, Choice, Vision

You are going through a period of discovery, and fear comes with all new things. This period will be cleansing for you, can be easy if you don’t fight the process, and will lead to a time of great fertility. Through this process you will gain new vision and wisdom, and see things how they really are.

I’ll admit that drawing Hawthorn is a little unsettling, but I think it’s fitting to the challenges that any new path will bring. It’s also a little odd to draw both “easy travel” and “challenges”, but if I take a very literal approach, it could just mean my holiday trips will go easily.

Overall, I think this omen is positive, indicating struggles now but a good outcome later. My instinct is to relate this somewhat to my search for a hearth culture. I’m thinking too much about it, and not letting the process of change happen. I’m actively resisting some parts of that process, which is leading to a good bit of fear. Also there are some Gods whose presence I am uncomfortable with, and one of those seems to be nudging me lately, which is definitely a bit fearful! Part of me wonders if I shouldn’t have thrown out my planning and done a different ritual, but I didn’t think of that until after I was done. Maybe I’ll do a second one and see how this other hearth culture feels.

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Visualization/Meditation: Connecting to the Cosmic Center

Posted in ADF, tagged , , , , , , , , , on December 19, 2012| 1 Comment »

As a note – this is a fuzzy sort of post. I’m not really sure exactly what I’m doing, since as a meditation exercise, this is pretty new for me. Still, I’ve been asked to put together what I have so far, so here goes!

Before I start my visualizations, I do a grounding and centering meditation, like the Two Powers meditation. You generally want your mind to be stable and clear before you start introducing new imagery to it, and I need to get better at the Two Powers meditation anyway, so I’m using that one. Any grounding and centering meditation will work.

I start my visualization exercise by creating a Hallows (a Fire, Well, and Tree, consecrated as the Sacred Hallows, ADF style). I like to do a simple consecration of each, followed by sprinkling and censing the area while saying “By the Might of the Water, and the Light of the Fire, this Grove is made whole and holy.” This sets up a ritual space that I do need to take down at the end (don’t forget that part), but isn’t a formal ritual where I need to worry about offerings to the Kindreds.

I do make an offering of incense to the gatekeeper though. I’ve tried this with Cernunnos and with Garanus (the Crane), and it worked equally well both times, though I liked the energy of Garanus better. I ask the Gatekeeper to open the gates and to help me to feel their power as the sacred center.

Because I play video games, the main image I’ve been using for this type of connection is that of a Portal – an oblong “hole” in the fabric of the universe that you use to travel from this place to some other, presumably distant (or just different) place. Depending on the game, these are either cast by magical spellcasters, read from a scroll that enables a portal, or fired out of a dimensional portal gun that you point at things. Still, the image is pretty consistent – you get a glowy sort of oval that you can step through and be transported to another place.

Since that image is one that is ingrained in my brain pretty strongly, it’s something I can refer to easily and that works with the kind of image and connection I’m trying to build. If you have no idea what I’m talking about, think about maybe an arched doorway, or the center of a ring of standing stones, or even a tunnel. Watchers of science fiction television shows might envision something like a stargate. Basically, you want an image that works for you, that suggests an opening from wherever you are now into another place that might be distant or otherwise removed.

After you do your grounding exercise, I start to visualize a portal.* (I’m going to use the term portal since that’s the image I’m using. Feel free to substitute in a word that suits your own imagery better!) I concentrate on seeing in my mind’s eye this dimensional opening that leads into an unknown place. I try to see the edges of the portal grow distinct, and they glow slightly, but are a little out of focus. In the center there are stars – sort of like the deep, universal stars that you’d see in a truly dark place on a night with no moon. Endless sorts of stars.

And as I peer into that portal, from my little Hallows, I start to put together other portals, there in that deep dimensional starry place. Those portals lead to other Hallows, which I can’t quite see, because as a solitary, I really am working off my own imagination (with a little help from YouTube) about what other Hallows might look like. But there are always fires, or  wells, or trees, or all three. Some of them are elaborate, and others are simpler, like my own. They are imaginary Hallows, kind of like my Mental Grove (which, now that I think of it, is a place I should be trying this work from!) You could think of this step like a hallway of other “doors”, or, if you’re using the stone circle imagery, as though you’re looking through stones on one side, but can see portals out between all the other stones.

Basically I’m trying to establish that even though I’m here in my own Hallows, I’m connected through that sacred center to all the other Hallows, both linearly in space and vertically in time. I’ve not tried actually looking for any specific places to visit, I’m just looking to create that connection to something bigger.

Once I’ve sat for awhile and built up the visualization, I slowly allow my mind to come back to center and present, usually by making sure I’m mentally back in front of my own Hallows instead of out looking around. When I’m solidly back in myself, I close the Gates (with the help of the Gatekeeper), and return the fire, well, and tree to their normal, material selves. The whole process makes for a smallish ritual that takes 5-15 minutes, depending on how long you work with the meditative aspect of the visualization.

I think repeating this exercise will help me fine tune it (right now it’s a little fuzzy still, since I don’t have a clear picture of what I want to do). I also think practice will help me think less about the actual setup and more about what the experience/visualization is symbolizing. Right now I still feel more like I”m setting it up, and less like I’m actually connecting to anything. I don’t wonder if the reason I had better luck with Garanus as a Gatekeeper was simply that I’ve got a stronger connection to the Nature Spirits than I do to the Gods and Goddesses, of any stripe. (Not to mention my lack of a true hearth culture – I sometimes work in Celtic, but I have been drawn to Gaulish lately) I want to really *feel* a connection to the sacred center though, especially since creating it is such a big part of the CooR, and since feeling that connection is a big part of having a religious experience, for me.

 

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Secret Druid Tip: High Rise

Posted in Secret Agent Druid, tagged , , , , , , on December 14, 2012| 1 Comment »

This one comes from my own life, where I try to bring some form of Paganism into my everyday comings and goings. I work in a relatively tall building. While I’m in a centrally located cubicle, there are lots of windows on my floor, and so I try to take advantage of being so close to the sky whenever I can. I like watching clouds for a few moments on a coffee break, or just being aware of the way the sunlight hits the building. It can take a little mental work to feel truly grounded from 9 stories up, but feeling the power of the sun and sky is easy from up here. I do a short version (9-12 breaths) of the two powers meditation up here, and it’s fun to feel the difference from when I’m sitting on the ground.

You could just as easily take an underground train or have class in a basement room that might provide a different perspective, or a stronger connection to the earth power. Are there any places in your daily routine take you high above or underneath the Earth?

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Solitary Druid Fellowship

Posted in General Things, tagged , , , , , on December 13, 2012| 6 Comments »

There’s been a lot of talk this week about Teo Bishop’s new project, the Solitary Druid Fellowship. It’s designed not to be an online community, but more of a spiritual resource for solitary Druids. There will be posted liturgies to use for each of the High Days, as well as blog posts – but no comments except on certain occasions (namely High Days).

I’m not sure what I think about their reluctance to become an online community. I understand that a threaded forum or email list isn’t everyone’s idea of a way to stay connected, but I’m also not sure there will feel like much of a connection simply through using a pre-created liturgy, especially since the liturgies will need to be customized to an individual’s hearth culture. (I also understand that the desire to avoid a community avoids the need for staff to moderate threads and forums and comments, which is a very real thing and isn’t everyone’s cup of tea.)

On the other hand, having resources for working as a solitary is a good thing. I struggle with working in a vacuum, and it’s been the connection to other Druids, through the DP and the Discuss and Dedicants lists, as well as email, that have kept me thinking about my own Druidry past the initial period of interest.

Having a shared liturgy, one that uses the CooR, is an interesting idea as well. It brings to mind that idea of the Sacred Center, and of being in a shared “sacred space” when we’re all participating in ritual at a Hallows. I definitely like the idea of a shared practice, but then I haven’t seen the liturgy yet either.

I guess the part that makes me wonder how this will work as a shared path is that there doesn’t seem to be a lot of opportunity for actual sharing. Yes we would all be doing the same liturgy (or variations on a theme, as it were), but without the chance to talk about it, unless they’re expecting us all to become bloggers, I don’t know that it will feel much like a community.

I definitely think it will be a good resource, and I’m looking forward to the various blog posts. I especially liked the recent post about how a community fire is fed by individual fires, and the importance of a solitary practice even for Druids who have access to a Grove. Cultivating a strong individual practice is something that’s important to me, and has been for several years.

Grove work is an odd subject for me at the moment. I’ve had trouble getting responses from my local Grove about much of anything, and I’d rather not have my first meeting with them at someone’s house (for safety and comfort reasons, call me paranoid). So while I have the ability to access a Grove, for now I’m essentially solitary. And I’m OK with that, though I do think having a community is important as well. I think best in conversation, and it’s important to me to have people to discuss my ideas with. (This is part of why I blog as well.)  I’m also paranoid, extremely uneasy in groups of people I don’t know, and reluctant to really settle into a group, for fear that it will not work out again. So I go back and forth about the Grove thing. Fortunately there’s no requirement to join one, even if there is one nearby.

Hopefully the SDF will become another resource to me as a solitary and will inform and guide my practice in a meaningful way. I have my doubts about it’s ability to feel like a fellowship, but I can see how it could become a very useful place and starting point for solitaries.

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Introducing Harold

Posted in Druid In This Place, tagged , , , , , , on December 12, 2012| Leave a Comment »

I usually have birdfeeders up during the winter. They’re usually a hotbed of jays, cardinals, titmouses (titmice?), sparrows, finches, and doves. And squirrels.

This year, I put up the feeders, and to date I’ve seen a few squirrels and two doves.

To say that I was confused would be an understatement.

I replaced the seed, wondering if maybe something was wrong with it, but still – no birds.

Then I got to talking to my neighbor, who is also a bird lover. She has a yard full of birds every year, doubly so because she has a pool, so the birds can get fresh water. She doesn’t have any birds either, but she kept finding piles of feathers in her yard. The first suspicion was cats, but we have no more roaming cats this year than we have had in the past. Then, one afternoon, she spotted the problem.

Instead of lots of little birds, we have Harold.

Harold, you see, is a Cooper’s Hawk. And Harold apparently figured out that bird feeders are literal, and can be used to feed finches to Harold as well as to feed thistle seed to finches. In fact, Harold was treating her bird feeder like a 24 hour, all-you-can-eat buffet. He has even figured out the bird-feeder-system so well that he will flyby the feeders, sending all the birds into the bushes, and then stalk along the ground, poking his head into the bushes and rustling out the songbirds. And then eating them.

It didn’t take long for all the little birds to leave. Not even the doves are coming to the feeders. He’s also chased off the wrens, a bird I have a strong affinity for (and have since I was a child), for which I’m rather sad. We’ve had several mating pairs of wrens at the house since we moved in, and this year they didn’t raise any babies, and I couldn’t figure out why. Now I know.

She has taken her feeders down, not out of spite for Harold, but because it’s a little unsettling to find the messy remains of Harold’s lunch on your lawn repeatedly. Regardless of how useful he is to the ecosystem, the piles of bloody feathers are a little sad.

I have to agree that it’s unsettling to see Nature take its course so obviously on your front lawn (I feel less unsettled by all the bugs in spiderwebs. Apparently I’m a bit sentimental about songbirds.) Harold has as much right as any of the other birds to be here, and predators are a crucial part of the ecosystem, be they red tailed hawks, cooper’s hawks, barred owls, or buzzards.

As much as I have an affinity for raptors, and as much as I like Harold’s stripey feathered pants, I feel a little bad attracting other birds to be his lunch. So I’m taking my feeders down as well.

Hopefully, without the feeders there to attract the songbirds, Harold will decide to go elsewhere for his all-you-can-eat buffet. And maybe next year we’ll have better luck birdwatching.

I’m going to take the rest of my birdseed and put it out for the squirrels though. No sense wasting it, and they’ll enjoy the snack as much as anyone.

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Winter in the Swamp

Posted in Druid In This Place, Seasonal Things, tagged , , , , , , , , on December 11, 2012| Leave a Comment »

We’re having our first actual bout of Winter here in the swamp this week. The front came through late Sunday night/early Monday morning, and it got down close to or just below freezing last night. I’m expecting a freeze warning tonight again. Actual frosts are very rare here, and snow is even more rare, so even the native plants can take damage from a particularly long cold snap.

The sun is bright today, which is part of why it’s cold. The air is drier than usual, so there’s not a cloud cover to keep the warmth up next to the Earth. Later this week, when the usual coastal moisture comes back, it’s going to warm back up.

Dealing with frost down here in Zone 9a is a tricky thing. We have drop cloths and old sheets in a bin in the garage that get dragged out and spread over all the delicate things that live here. I keep a small citrus tree in my yard that’s particularly susceptible to frost, and things like a dieffenbachia (dumbcane), a pencil cactus, and a plumeria have to get moved into the sun porch and sheltered well against cold. This can be challenging, especially because the plumeria is nearly as big as I am.

I also have a large hibiscus – by large I mean it’s taller than the garage doors – that I don’t think I’ll be able to really cover well this year. It didn’t die back last year, so it’s gotten enormous. I really hope it doesn’t end up frostbitten!

We have lots of areas in the yard for small critters to shelter, like our woodpile and in the shrubs next to the house, but I always worry a little about the toads and lizards. We frequently find them trying to stowaway into the house, which is a dangerous place, as I have cats!  This is a good place to live, if you’re a cold blooded animal, but these periodic cold nights have to be tough.

People who live here tend to get grief about not knowing what to do when it’s cold, and to some extent that’s true. Not even the native things that live here are really designed to deal with the cold. I grew up in a northeastern state, where the squirrels are fat and furry and have enormous tails. Squirrels around here are skinny, with skinny tails that you can almost see through. They’re not accustomed to the cold because they really don’t need to be.

Which is why I’m wearing my warm things without shame.

It’s chilly, but it won’t last long.

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Meditation Journal: Week 6

Posted in Dedicant Path Essays, Meditation Journal, tagged , , , on December 10, 2012| 1 Comment »

This wasn’t a particularly innovative week for meditation. I did the two powers meditation twice, plus my usual evening meditations. I continue to “visit” my mental grove, though I haven’t seen any new animals there. I see the Stag there most often, and Toad pretty regularly as well. I’m working on some outlines of a meditation journey to do at an established Hallows, as a way to better connect to the cosmic center that is created there, but that’s still embryonic. I don’t have any concrete visualization exercises for it yet.

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