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Secret Agent Druid: Summer Solstice/Midsummer Rituals and Tips

Posted in Seasonal Things, Secret Agent Druid, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , on June 19, 2013| 1 Comment »

Midsummer is coming up at the end of this week (or Litha, or the Summer Solstice, however you’d prefer).  Here are a few things you can do on the Summer Solstice/Midsummer to keep that Druidic spirit alive – without necessarily doing a formal ritual:

  • Get up before sunrise and go somewhere to watch the sun come up. Then, stay up until sunset and watch the sun go down. It’s the longest day of the year – so honor the WHOLE day. (Yes, that means getting up at the ass crack of dawn. It won’t hurt for one day.) If you can do this at your home, lighting incense to mark the passage of the sun is a nice touch.
  • Grill something! Especially since a lot of places frown on outdoor bonfires, a grill is a good substitute, and you can make incense offerings to the coals.
  • Eat fresh, local, seasonal produce. Depending on where you are, this will vary widely. Here in the Swamp, that means sweet corn, tomatoes, beans, and squash, but berries are on their way out of season here already, as it’s getting quite hot. We’re just starting to get good peaches here too, but they really need another month. Watermelons, however, are in their prime.
  • Charge water with the power of the sun – place water in a bowl (covered lightly to keep out flies – I use a white flour sack towel) and let it sit in the sunlight all day (you’ll have to move it). Then use this water in rituals where you need a little extra oomph – I like to use Sun Water in my well, since I’m not close to natural fresh water that’s acceptable to use in my Well without endangering my cats! (It’s all mucky brackish stuff around here)
  • Make a Sun Wreath (or bouquet) – gather as many sunny flowers as you can, fresh, dried or silk all work, and arrange them as decoration in your home. I like to keep a very brightly colored yellow and orange wreath on my front door during this season. This is also appropriate altar decor, especially if you’re doing a ritual to honor Sunna or Sol.
  • Cook with fresh, summery herbs – basil, oregano, thyme, rosemary, and sage are all thriving at this time of year. In some places parsley and cilantro are in season as well. Cooking with fresh, summery herbs always helps me connect to the season. I especially like making a salad with fresh basil and fresh ripe tomatoes, with a little olive oil and salt. Yum!
  • Make Sun Cookies! These are regular sugar cookies (of whatever recipe you like) cut out with a sun-shaped cookie cutter. Or just in big rounds with yellow frosting. These can be shared with the office for a special treat, and everyone will love you for bringing them sugar.
  • Wear sunny colors – on purpose and with purpose. Your wardrobe doesn’t have to be part of your special celebrations, but if (like me) you’ll be in a cubicle for most of the Solstice day, wearing something sunny – and getting outside at lunch for a few minutes – can help keep me in a good frame of mind.

Any and all of these things can be done without anyone looking twice at what you’re doing, but they all honor the strength of the sun at this time of year, and help keep you in the spirit of the Solstice. I’ll be doing a number of these, along with my actual celebrated Solstice ritual, and will probably spread them out over a few days to remember that this is as much a season as it is a specific date.

Blessed Midsummer!

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Druid Altar Update

Posted in ADF, Dedicant Path Essays, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , on May 14, 2013| 2 Comments »

I’ve made some pretty serious updates and changes to my main altar space lately. It was getting extremely cluttered, and I wanted it to have a different feeling than it had previously. You can see my first and second altar updates at those links, respectively.

This is what it looks like now (apologies for the yellow tone – the room my altar is in is actually painted yellow, and taking pictures in there at night makes the whole place feel like it’s lit by firelight. This is quite cool! But makes for very yellow pictures!)

altar4-13a

That’s the entire altar area. I moved a lot of the meaningful but not functional items up to the shelf above the altar. Eventually I’d like to add some God/dess statues there instead of just the little owls and the green man and the acorn, but for now it works. It also got the taller candles up out of the way, and leaves my actual working space looking like this:altar4-13b

The new things on the altar are as follows:

  • A new World Tree – this one is made of a recycled oil drum, through a craft group in Haiti. It’s something I’ve gone back and forth on, but ultimately decided I liked it. Plus, since it’s wall mounted, it doesn’t take up any extra space on the actual working surface.
  • A new offering bowl – I was using a collection of small bowls, and that was just too much of a pain to work with. I bought this wooden bowl and have been much happier with it.
  • A new goblet – I still have some small bowls and a tiny pitcher for offerings, but most of the time I’m offering drink (lately mead) and so I’m pouring it out of my own cup. This was rather unimpressive when I ended up using a regular drinking glass, so I purchased this aluminum goblet. It works VERY nicely. Eventually I’d like a handmade ceramic one, but this is a good in-between.
  • A new incense burner – one that does specifically well with the type of incense I usually burn. (that’s the little silver disc on the right). I’ve been burning loose incense for actual rituals, in the little blue cauldron burner, but I burn stick incense as offerings during the week. (You can see two unburned sticks in the top picture)
  • A set of tingshas (only visible in the top picture) – I couldn’t find a bell I liked, and wanted some sort of musical signal to start my rituals. These tingshas were inexpensive and make a very bright clear sound. I’m quite happy with them (if not yet always good at striking them properly).

Overall, I think these changes have increased both the visual appeal of my altar space (it’s less cluttered) and the overall functionality of it. I still have the things that are meaningful to me, but I have a more clear working space and better flow for doing ritual.

I know an altar space is always a work in progress. I’d love to get some little Norse statues, especially of the type similar to god-posts or figurines found from the Viking age. I’d also like to get some more symbols for Freyr. I know as time goes on, this little altar will evolve, and other altars are already starting to spring up in my house. I’ve got my “hearth”, which is really just a collection of candles on my stove right now, but it serves as a place for me to keep my hearth-fire lit. And I’d like to add some sort of Ancestor altar somewhere – though finding a good, cat-proof spot for it may be challenging.

I like the process of evolving it though. A good altar is a place where Work happens, and is a functional as well as a beautiful space. I think mine is getting there!

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Ritual Redux: Beltane/Maitag

Posted in Dedicant Path Essays, Seasonal Things, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on May 3, 2013| 1 Comment »

I conducted my Maitag ritual in midafternoon on Friday, May 3. I specifically took half a day’s vacation for this, since doing a ritual after work seems to cause me to struggle with grounding. This was a solitary ADF style ritual that followed the Core Order of Ritual. I used a combination of sources to create this ritual, including the Solitary Ritual Outline on ADF’s website, a published Maitag ritual, and the Solitary Druid Fellowship’s Beltane devotional supplement. I honored Nerthus as the Earth Mother, Heimdall as the gatekeeper, and Frey and Freyja as the Deities of the Occasion. I brought incense for the fire, but forgot the silver for the well (oops!), and mead and poetry for the kindreds and honored deities.

I am really glad I took the time to put together a ritual I liked out of bits and pieces of other published rituals. I still haven’t made the (seemingly insurmountable) step of completely crafting a ritual from scratch, but I added in some sections that I just thought worked really well from rituals I’d done in the past. I will continue to use that language going forward, specifically the language and hand motions I used to open the gates after invoking the gatekeeper. I totally forgot about using the two powers to feed the opening gate, but I will try to remember to use that imagery going forward.

That said, I definitely got little chills once I got the gate open. I think my greater familiarity with this ritual and my increasing familiarity with the CoOR in general is helping with my ability to connect. (I also am having a much lower anxiety level today, and that helped as well.) My grounding and centering took much less time than I’d expected to reach a stable light trance. My overall focus was good as well, though I didn’t maintain the trance state all the way through the ritual. That will take practice.

I also think I like the SDF calling of the Kindreds better than the one I used this time, so I’ll be using that in the future.

This was my first ritual with my new tools, and I think they work swimmingly. Instead of a ton of small bowls for offerings, I now have one large bowl to collect the offerings (which is MUCH easier to handle) and my new goblet works splendidly for pouring offerings out to the Kindreds. I also purchased some new incense to use, and I am extremely pleased with it. It’s available on etsy, and I can’t recommend the seller highly enough. There was a problem with my shipment, and after two weeks she shipped me a second one – rush delivery – to make sure I’d have it in time for Beltane.

For the omens, I asked “What blessings do you have for me today?” and drew the following runes:

  • Ancestors: Tiwaz (Tyr): Guidance, Justice, Navigation – The right direction, spiritual guidance, the path that leads to right action and justice. The cosmic order is being maintained. Things will be set to right, so long as you live with deep integrity. Willingness to self-sacrifice for the greater good. Victory and success.
  • Nature Spirits: Jera (Year): Year, the harvest, hard work – Each is given their proper due in full measure, good or ill. The golden crop, sown in the past, has come to fruition and is now the full harvest; the results of earlier efforts are realized. Natural cycles will always spin, and the year will always turn again, but for now all is well. The order of the cosmos is maintained, and everyone reaps the benefits of hard work and has a chance to build a new harvest for next year.
  • Gods and Goddesses: Pertho (dice cup, vulva): Chance, the unknown – A secret thing, hidden matters, an unseen destiny. Initiation and the unknown changes it will bring. The gamble that is any new beginning. Female mysteries.

When I set my rune bag down, the following rune “jumped” out, so I am considering it part of the blessing:

  • Gebo (Gift): Gift, Reciprocity – You have given freely and will gain freely in return. The cosmos is in harmony, and you are working properly within it. Sacrifice and generosity, and the balance between them.

Since I asked essentially three separate questions this time, I feel that I’m being given three separate answers. That the Ancestors will provide guidance, justice and navigation – spiritual guidance and the knowledge of the right path to take forward. The Nature Spirits will grant a full blessing, and my hard work will be rewarded. (I hope this means my garden will do well!) The Gods and Goddesses have a hidden agenda for me, but I am on that path, and they will reveal it in time. Perhaps that will lead to an initiation, formal or informal, in time.

Having Gebo “jump out” at me suggests that my ritual was well received, and that my work on it was appreciated. I felt good about this ritual, and I think the Kindreds agreed. All the omens were fairly positive, and I am encouraged about continuing to figure out where my next step will be.

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Ritual Redux: Ostara/Spring Equinox

Posted in Dedicant Path Essays, Runes, Seasonal Things, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , on March 26, 2013| 2 Comments »

My Spring Equinox ritual was performed at 4pm on Friday, March 22, 2013, just after I had gotten home from work. This was a solitary ADF style ritual following the full CoOR. Using the published ritual template provided by the Solitary Druid Fellowship for the Equinox, I honored Nerthus as the Earth Mother, Heimdall as the Gatekeeper, and Eostre, Freyr, and Honey bee as the patrons of the occasion. I brought incense for the fire and silver for the well, mead and poetry for the Kindreds and the Beings of the Occasion, and a handful of sweet smelling flowers for Honey Bee.

After my Imbolc ritual, which felt a bit too complicated, I went with a much simpler format – both for the ritual poetry itself and for the offerings. I had a much more solid connection to this ritual than the last one I did, and I really felt like my offerings were received well (though I think the Ancestors liked the brownie better than the mead). I gave myself a good bit of time after I got home from work to decompress before I started the ritual, and that seemed to go very well. I felt very grounded, especially at the beginning of the ritual.

All the offerings, once made into their various bowls, were spread in my gardens as part of the blessing of the coming spring. I hope the added blessings will give lots of oomph to my seedlings, and they will come up strong and stable and produce lots of veggies.

I really liked the SDF ritual format – I was able to do a little bit of improv around some of the shorter sections, where I felt I wanted to fill things out a bit, but I didn’t feel tied down to just “reading” a bunch of poetry. Also I really like the poetry I chose as offerings, some of which I modified to better fit what I wanted to say. I liked doing poetry as an additional praise offering, even if I didn’t fully write it myself, since it gave the ritual more depth. It also made the “focus” of the ritual longer, something I had wanted to do after Imbolc.

I lost focus about halfway through the ritual, but I think that was largely because my neighbor started mowing his yard right by my windows, and it distracted me. While I can’t control that in the future, hopefully as my focus grows I’ll be able to tune out lawnmowers better.

I drew runes as the omen for this ritual and got the following:

  • Kenaz: Torch, Ulcer, Cheer, Pain, Death. Kenaz can be read either as torch (from some rune poems) or ulcer (from other rune poems). As the torch it is power to create your own reality, the power of light. Open to new strength, energy, and power now; the fire of regeneration or the warmth of a hearth fire. It can also be a beacon that draws you home or illumines the dangers of your path. Kenaz provides a clear warning of danger, but danger that can be avoided. It can also be death, a sore that eats away at your insides, a battle that goes poorly. This rune’s dual meanings means it must be read in context, and often is up to a great deal of interpretation.
  • Berkano: Birch, Strength, Flexibility, Resourcefulness. This is the rune of resourcefulness and making something from nothing, and Rev. Dangler speaks of it as the rune of “female strength” (Very Basics of Runes 47). It speaks of birth and rebirth, and physical or mental growth. There is also an element of strength and pride to this rune meaning, alongside the current of fertility and creativity, that you can see in the last two lines of the rune poem. I see self-sufficiency as well, in the first lines of the poem (the tree that brings forth new trees generated from its own leaves)
  • Othila: Stationary Wealth, Ancestors, Completion. This is inherited wealth or property, the kind of wealth that is passed from generation to generation and is stable and secure. Safety, increase, and abundance, or perhaps the completion of a task in such a way that it is stable and secure. Acting from your center, with all the support of your ancestors and your heritage, and being secure in their values.

There are many possible pitfalls on this path, but if you are wary and careful, you will be given the strength and resourcefulness to overcome them, and you will end in a place of completion and wealth.

I swear I mixed the runes up really well, but these are the same runes I’ve drawn for my most recent weekly rune drawings. I can’t help but think there’s a message they’re trying to tell me, but I’m not sure I know what it is.

The question I asked was “What blessings do the Kindreds give to me?”

I’m starting to think I just have a block against interpreting runes. I know what the meanings are (obviously), but actually coming up with how they apply to anything, or make a story together is another thing altogether. Especially when I keep drawing the rune that means “either a good thing or a really bad thing, you figure it out”. I do think there is a middle way to read Kenaz, or at least there could be – it could be that there are dangers and troubles, but that Kenaz will illumine them if you are careful and watchful.

The best sentence I could come up with for this reading is basically a rehash of the rune drawing I did for Imbolc, but with different runes and a slightly more positive spin or outcome. At best, I can take away that I’m going in the right direction, but that hardships aren’t over yet.

Another possibility is that I need to spend some extra time getting in touch with my Disir (Female Ancestors), and that they can help me with this struggle. This particular way of reading could be pointing at some of my mental health problems, though I’m not sure how that specifically answers the “blessings” question.

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A “Buzz” for Spring

Posted in Seasonal Things, tagged , , , , , , , , , , on March 22, 2013| 2 Comments »

I was working on my Ostara ritual last night and just not finding the connection I wanted. I’m going to be using the full SDF ritual this time, instead of trying to piece together my own (more Norse flavored) rite, and I just couldn’t find anything that seemed to be working, from any of the Kindreds, for the ties to the awakening of Spring that I wanted to bring to my offerings.

So I went outside to my gardens and tried to find inspiration there, and it sort of hit me all at once.

Honey bees.

We talk a lot about honoring specific deities in ritual, but it’s always seemed to me like we could do the same with any of the Kindreds (or with a Kindred as a whole, like we honor the Ancestors at Samhain). So while I will still honor Eostre and make offerings to Frey as his energy returns to the earth and brings forth the first plants that will later become his harvest, I am going to make a specific offering to honeybees.

First, because I like bees. I’ve always thought they are cute and fascinating, and I grew up in a family that frequently kept bees for honey and pollination.

Mostly, however, I’ll be making offerings because right now the bees are in trouble (this article is a good starting point if you’re unfamiliar). Whether it’s from a fungus, a virus, a combination of commercial pesticides, climate change, or some massive combination therein, honeybees are in decline, and that’s bad. They’re a crucial part of the food chain, as one of the major pollinators that we have for flowering plants to become the vegetables we eat.  There are a number of theories for what’s behind Colony Collapse Disorder – a phenomenon that has been sharply on the rise for the last decade, where honey bees leave their hive and just disappear, leaving behind a queen and ample storage space and honey. The answer could be any, or some combination of all, of the factors – but the final result is that bees are hurting, and our environment is threatened by the lack of bees. CCD, combined with the devastating effects of a particularly nasty mite that sucks the life out of the bees, is just bad news all around.

So as a response, I’ll be doing both honoring of honey bees as part of the Nature Spirits that are important to this holiday (especially in my area, where everything is blooming *sneezes*), I’ll be offering some of the blessing to them as well. I’ll also be making sure that my bee garden is up to date and planting some new bee-friendly plants to help attract them. My main offering will, of course, be mead, but I’ll also be offering local honey and some sweet smelling flowers from my garden.

It may not be a *historical* way to celebrate Ostara, but to my modern sensibilities, it only makes sense to combine my offerings with my intentions and actions to help the honey bees.

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Ritual Redux: Imbolc/Ewemeolc

Posted in Dedicant Path Essays, Runes, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , on February 5, 2013| 10 Comments »

My Imbolc/Ewemeolc ritual was performed on Friday, February 1 at 5:00 pm, just after I’d gotten home from work. This was a solitary ADF style rite, following the full CoOR. Using the published ritual template found here, I honored Nerthus as the Earth Mother and Heimdall as the Gatekeeper, and Frigga was the primary patron of the rite, as Queen of the Hearth. I may not use this association in the future, but it’s the one that seemed to fit as I was writing the ritual. I brought the following offerings:

  • Cornmeal for the Earth Mother
  • Milk for the Outdwellers, poured out in the back yard
  • Whiskey for Saga and Heimdall
  • Incense and my silver ring for the Fire/Well/Tree
  • A brownie for the Ancestors
  • Oats for the Nature Spirits
  • Whiskey for the Gods and for Frigga, as well as water shared from the pitcher I used for the waters of life

I offered whiskey even though I can’t drink it myself. All the offerings seemed well received, especially the brownie. Apparently my sweet-tooth is hereditary.

This was the first time I’d tried to go directly from “work mode” into “ritual mode” and the transition could have gone more smoothly. I will give myself more time for meditation next time, as I never really settled into the ritual. Also, this particular ritual script, though I like it a lot, was difficult to say at first – lots of alliteration (which is why I like it) was a little tongue-twistery until I settled into the poetic pattern. I’ll definitely use the ritual outline again though, as I liked it a lot – especially the Norse flavor of the poetry.

I felt like opening the gates went particularly well, but I didn’t feel as well-connected to Frigga as I’d hoped in this particular rite. My ease with the CoOR was definitely more apparent though, as I moved through the various steps, easily anticipating what would come next.

One thing I did notice about this particular ritual template was that I spent a lot more time “setting up” than I did actually celebrating the particular reason for the High Day. In the future, I’ll put more into the “celebration” aspect, so that it will feel more balanced. I definitely feel less at home with the Norse celebrations, so I need to do more research into their associations with High Days (or just do standard Neo Pagan celebrations, which I’m much more comfortable with, and give them a Norse flavor).

All the offerings, once made into their various bowls, were spread in my gardens as part of the blessing of the coming spring. My lime tree is in full bloom, so hopefully we’ll have a bumper crop of limes this coming year.

I drew runes for the first time in a long time for this ritual, since I was honoring Frigga, and it seemed appropriate. I received the following when I asked for the blessing:

  • Uruz – Aurochs: strength, dross
  • Nauthiz – Need/Necessity: oppression, lessons learned
  • Inguz – Ing: fertility, ancestors

I’ll admit to being really unfamiliar with this particular divination tool, so the “textbook” keyword meanings don’t mean much yet. I’ve had to do some researching to find deeper meanings, both in the rune poems and in other sources. From the Anglo-Saxon rune poem, I found the following:

Ur
The aurochs is proud and has great horns;
it is a very savage beast and fights with its horns;
a great ranger of the moors, it is a creature of mettle.
Nyd
Trouble is oppressive to the heart;
yet often it proves a source of help and salvation
to the children of men, to everyone who heeds it betimes.
Ing
Ing was first seen by men among the East-Danes,
till, followed by his chariot,
he departed eastwards over the waves.
So the Heardingas named the hero.

I found that just going to the Rune Poems helped a lot with finding a bigger meaning. From this, I get the following impression of the omen.

You will be given strength as you need it to overcome the coming troubles and trials, but that trouble will lead you toward fertility and peace.

This is, honestly, pretty similar to other omens I’ve been drawing on this Dedicant Path – that things are going to be rough at first, but that I just need to stick with it, and I’ll be glad for having made it through. I’m taking the similar omen to mean I’m not done with the troublesome part yet, which seems about right, as I’m still feeling a lot like I’m in the “action” part of “belief follows action”. Still, I am further along than I was, and I know this will take time.

This message is applicable to my personal life right now as well, which I can’t really discuss here.

It’s also a little trite, to be honest. It’s one of those divination messages that could apply to anyone at any time, and maybe that’s because I asked a very generic “What blessings do you give in return” question. As a blessing, it’s somewhat of a positive one, or at least has a positive outcome.

Either that or I’m totally barking up the wrong tree – a possibility that I’m not leaving behind, as almost every divination I’ve done (or had done) regarding ADF has said something about being troublesome and difficult but with a good outcome. We’ll see how the rest of this year goes.

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Morning Devotions to the Sun

Posted in General Things, tagged , , , , , , , on January 8, 2013| 4 Comments »

I’m on the hunt for a morning devotion I can do in my car.

This is slightly unorthodox, I’ll admit, but I can’t really greet the sun before I leave for work, because it’s still quite dark when I leave. I love the idea of having a practice at a shrine in the mornings as the sun rises, but that’s just not going to be possible with my current commute.*

Most mornings, the sun comes up while I’m in my car. (I have quite a long commute) I don’t get to watch, since I’m driving North and … well, watching the sunrise while driving in traffic seems like a really good way to get either a ticket or an accident. Still, I enjoy watching the reflections off of buildings and signs, and having the world go from starry night to grey pre-dawn to bright early morning.

So I’d like to do a devotion while I’m experiencing that trip. I really like the morning devotional that the Solitary Druid Fellowship posted recently, but it feels very shrine based. I try to keep clutter down in my car, but I suppose I could keep a little electric candle, a water bottle, and a stick in a little bag for impromptu devotion. (A crane bag for my car?)

I don’t know if the parking garage is an ideal place for a sun devotion though. I will be giving this part a try anyway, I think, since I really do like the liturgy of that ritual. It’ll be limited in time (I can’t do it at sunrise every day, since I’m sitting in the parking garage at about the same time, regardless of when the sun comes up), but having a moment of grounding before I start the day sounds very nice.* I could also easily incorporate a daily divination, since I have my phone with me.

As for greeting the actual sun, maybe my first devotional writing in the Norse hearth will be to research poetry styles and write something simple to Sunna. If I can memorize it easily (which shouldn’t be a problem, since I’ll be writing it), I can say the prayer as I see the first glimmers and beams of light reflecting across the city. Not as good as the actual sunrise, but as close as I can get. Maybe I’ll write the prayer to reflect (ha ha) those reflections!

*While I like the idea of getting up on weekends to do a sunrise ritual, weekends are when I catch up on sleep, so I’m rarely out of bed before 9. Maybe I’ll do a sunset ritual on weekends instead? How do you guys differentiate the various schedules of your week if they have super different timing?

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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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Celebrating Yule

Posted in Seasonal Things, tagged , , , , , , , , on December 20, 2012| 2 Comments »

I’ll be doing my Yule ritual today – an ADF style ritual honoring Sulis, modified slightly from the ritual found in the Crane Breviary. I’ve been enjoying looking through the rituals there, and this one seemed to fit the kind of ritual I want to have. I need to look more into the Order of the Crane – it seems like a good balance of inner and outer workings, and like it might provide more of a community than the DP is currently. While I appreciate everything that the DP has to offer, I’ve not felt that it’s brought me much into connection with other Druids, and that’s something I’d really like to have. Plus I just think the Crane symbolism is really rather spiffy.

Husband unit and I will be opening our gifts this evening as well, since we’ll be celebrating multiple times. It always seems like we end up with our own celebration on or just before the actual Solstice, and then various family celebrations happen around their holiday of Christmas. Still, multiple chances to give (and get) presents is OK with me!

I’m not really ready for the holiday season to be “over” though, and I intend to keep the greenery out in the house for awhile, even if I take down the tree. Though the light will begin to be stronger again, it’s still going to be winter for awhile, and I really enjoy the look and smell of evergreens. Most of mine this year are in baskets with florist’s foam, so they’re staying healthy and fragrant.

If you’re one of the people in the path of the winter storm, I hope you have a beautiful, snowy Yule and that the blizzard conditions don’t cause you or your loved ones any harm. Here in the swamp, we’re going to have a slightly cooler, very windy day, but no real effects from the storm front. It would be nice to have snow for the Solstice, but that is extremely rare around here (as is snow any other time during the winter). Still, the cooler day will be nice for having a fire in the fireplace, and maybe it’ll feel a little more like winter today.

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Morphic Resonance in Druidry

Posted in General Things, tagged , , , , , , on December 6, 2012| 5 Comments »

One of the things I’ve always found interesting is the idea of Morphic Resonance as it relates to thought processes and rituals. Morphic Resonance is Rupert Sheldrake’s idea that as something happens repeatedly, it creates a field that future occurrences can tune in to. While I’m pretty sure this is not something I can believe about biology or chemistry (since the claim is unfalsifiable), it’s something I’ve always wondered about in the metaphysical realm.

It’s something I’ve felt in the past during certain rituals as well. There is a concept in parts of Catholicism that one of the reasons everyone celebrates the same Mass is so you can tap into the togetherness of all the other people in the world who have been, are, or will be celebrating it.  The same goes for Wicca, especially when you consider that a circle is a place that exists outside of time. If the job of a Witch is to turn the Wheel, it makes sense that all the solitary (and coven-based) Witches can turn the wheel “together” while they’re in their separate circles. There’s a lot of power that way.

So how does this all relate to Druidry?

Well, with the concept of the Gate being at the center of all time and space, there’s definitely an element of morphic resonance there. Not having a unified ritual is a little harder though, and I have definitely felt more “on my own” during Druidic rituals than I ever did working as a solitary Witch, even though both were done entirely solitary. I think part of this is also that so many Druids worship so many different Gods from such diverse times and places. There’s not a strong current of unified worship so much as just a unified holiday.

I am hoping, as I develop more of a sense of the Gate and it’s ability to center a ritual in metaphysical space, I’ll feel more connected to other Druids who are doing their rituals, and that my Gate will feel connected to all the other Gates at the Holy Days. I intend to focus some of my energy on that feeling during my Yule ritual, since I know we’ll all be celebrating around the same time.

I also definitely feel that there is a possibility for certain morphic currents in some of the invocations and prayers of ADF. As I use the same invocations over and over, I’ll end up creating my own currents as well as, ideally, tying into the currents that other members of ADF have set up.

This is part of why I’m a fan of a combination of both structured and spontaneous prayer. Structured, repeated prayers have the ability to set up your subconscious in such a way that you know what’s coming. If you use the same invocation, or the same cues for meditation, your subconscious begins to get the idea that “this means it is Ritual/Meditation/Sleep/Dancing/Divination/Waffles time“. (OK, maybe not waffles, unless you eat waffles regularly. Which you should, because waffles are delicious!)

Anyway, those subconscious cues also help to set up a predictable energy current that you can tap into with each repetition of a ritual element.

This also helps the Gods understand what you want. Using their historical names brings precedent – if you use the name or epithet that a Goddess has been using for millenia, you place yourself among the historical worshipers of that Goddess. If you write your own prayer, and then use it as your invocation to the Ancestors in each ritual, they’ll learn that that prayer comes from you (or whomever you share it with) and both you and they will deepen your understanding of what’s expected of each other through its use.

Of course there’s a time and place for spontaneous, offertory, from-the-heart prayer as well. I like to use structured prayer to set up the connection and spontaneous prayer to sustain and nourish it. The balance is key, for me. That structured prayer is where you find the connection with what other Druids and Pagans have done in the past.

All this to say that I’m working on tapping into the morphic resonance that exists around Druidry. ADF is new, so the morphic currents are newer and fresher, but I think they exist, and I want to learn to feel and be part of them, and add my voice to those currents. With our ties to the past, it’s possible that, through meditation and study, I’ll be able to tap into some of the Paleo-pagan resonances as well, and that would be amazing.

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