Gifts from the Mother
Today I was planting seedlings in the new vegetable beds we built this spring, and although I was sneezing from the yellow grass pollen billowing in the breeze, I was struck with such a sense of well -being and beauty that I had to stop and bask in it. I am so fortunate to live in a lovely old house on just over an acre of land, with mature trees and gardens that we’ve added to year by year, starting with the faery cairn and goddess garden we put in ten years ago.
My sense of well-being though, didn’t come just from my good fortune. It came, instead from the land; from the blooming flowers and rustling leaves, from the smell of spring. It came from the satisfaction of participating in the growing season. My seedlings may or may not yield vegetables, but either way, we were out there together today with the sun, the spring air, the birds, and the soil.
I wonder how often we miss these gifts given to us so freely in nature. How often we think that there is nothing to be gained by standing in the fresh air, watching the leaves, listening to the birds. One of my favorite chores every summer is watering the gardens because it gives me an excuse to stand and do nothing but hold the hose, just being outside with the trees, and flowers, and birds, and squirrels.
And so since you may not have gardens to water, I give you the gift of this excuse to sit in nature from Richard Louv, author of The Nature Principle and Last Child in the Woods:
“By tapping into the restorative powers of nature, we can boost mental acuity and creativity; promote health and wellness; build smarter and more sustainable businesses, communities, and economies; and ultimately strengthen human bonds.”
I challenge you to experience these gifts of nature and then take them out to your community. The mother gives to us freely, let us not waste her gifts.
Blessed Beltane
Today Thorn Coyle posted the following poem she had written for Beltane.
Walpurgisnacht Manifesto
Today, I stand for beauty.
I stand for apple blossom and finch.
I stand for sun, and wind, and sky.
I stand for the shaking of the fig tree,
And the growing of the lettuce and the pea.
Today, I stand for beauty.
I stand for music to lighten the soul.
I stand for healing balms to comfort wounds.
I stand for kind words in the tempest,
And a scrap of bright cloth in the mud of war.
Today, I stand for beauty.
Heart open to the world.
Today, I conjure hope. And strength.
With the courage and the love to carry on.
Leap the fire with me,
In Beauty’s name.
Blessings be upon you. Blessings, all.
Reading this poem, I was struck by how well it summed up exactly where I am. I look out of the window of the temple and see lush grass, verdant trees. I see the flower bed I spent two weekends weeding, adding plants to and mulching. I see the raised beds built by my husband and our young son, filled with soil, waiting for the seedlings we started in March that will start going in the ground next weekend. I am surrounded by hope already flowering into blessing. I am filled with love and with beauty and see, all around me, promise.
At the same time, I have a friend on my mind and heart, a friend who is wading through anger, pain and despair. And all I can offer is a kind word and a bit of support. For her and all others who stand in similar pain, I conjure hope and strength. For her and all others in need of courage, I invoke the courage and love to carry on. And all this I do in Beauty’s name. And I hope it is enough.
Blessed Beltane.
Silver Branch Open House
Silver Branch tradition is having an open house on April 13, 2012 at 9 pm. We’ll spend time in the temple talking about who we are and what our mission is and then have some time for questions and answers. After that, we’ll do some meditative work to give you a flavor of how we work. And then, we’ll socialize and get to know one another better.
If you are interested in joining us, please shoot me an email at information@silverbranchtradition.com
Blessings,
Sandy
Power, Magic and Relationship
“Sometimes I think that, for many of us in the Pagan world, we found a well that gave us water once, but when it ran dry, we neither searched elsewhere for water nor attempted to dig the well deeper, but instead sat down and worshiped an empty bucket.
“Too much of the conversation I hear among Pagans strikes me as an invitation to worship an empty bucket, and that makes me sad.
“The gods are real, and there is good water everywhere, if you know--not so much how to look, but that looking is a possibility. “
-Posted by Cat Chapin-Bishop
The above was written by Cat Chapin-Bishop on her blog, Quaker Pagan Reflections. When I read it, it spoke to me because I too, often see our community stuck in a place of worshiping the form rather than dancing with the force. This happens both in magical work and in devotion. All too often we build our relationship with the structure, the practice, the idea, instead of with the power. We sidestep the living forces of the land, our gods and guides, the magic, and even ourselves in favor of the safety of a static form.
Why? It’s easier. It’s less scary. If we have relationship to something that is not real, and is not living, then it requires only that we show up. We have the security of knowing that we’re doing something as long as we go through the motions. Little by little we stop believing because we have cut ourselves off from the source of magic by letting go of our awareness of it.
What if, instead of worshiping the form, we look back to the force – the power of being that is held in everything. What if we looked to our gods and guides as living beings? What if we build relationships to the land, the water, the stars, and each other? What if we see not only the power of the elements, of the magic, and of our gods, but also see the power of ourselves, our covens and groves, our relationships? What if we wake up to the amazing magic we can carry through the world in our time here? What then will we see when we make magic? What then will our practices look like? How much more effective will both our work and our lives be? What kind of compassion can we engender for ourselves and each other when we stop comparing the validity of forms and starting seeing the beauty of the relationships? How much more amazing will our magic be when we learn to believe again?
I invite you to look behind the forms – the potentially empty bucket – of your practice. Look beyond the structures. Look to the power and beauty and magic. Hold to those and then look back at your practice. What do you see? How will you change it? And in doing so, how will it change you?
Clarity
This past month I haven’t written much. Why? I found myself in deep need of silence and listening. The deeper I work, the more clearly I see the need for space in our days and in our minds. Due to some unusual scheduling, I lost a lot of that space last month and had it replaced with a lot of other people’s emotional energy. I found that although I could write, I couldn’t write anything worth reading. There was too much noise.
As I become more and more tuned to my bodies, my work in this world, and my guides, I find that energetic hygiene (how’s that for an un-sexy word?!) is more crucial than ever. I need time to process out the noise of the world we move through. I need physical exercise to help move energy through that process effectively. I need space, and quiet. When I can create these conditions, and process out the noise, it feels almost like clarity is a liquid that pours over me and through me, slowly, making everything more discernible, washing away the noise.
Are you giving yourself enough space? Are you spending enough time and focus on processing the energy you move through every day? Do you know what you need to be able to find the place of silence, rest, and listening within yourself? If you don’t, I invite you to spend some time in silence. What feeds your soul and clears away the chaos of your mind? What brings you to clarity? When you know this, you hold the key.
Reclaiming Gender
I was talking with my friend and mentor a week or so and she said to me, “well, you’re a priestess and a woman.” Her point had to do with having more than one response to a situation and was helpful. But one thing that really struck me, later, was how long it had been since I heard anyone refer to my gender as a part of who and what I am. How, in the well intentioned wording of equality, I became a person but lost being a woman.
Gender is complicated – personal and political. It brings up strong feelings for people in every direction. I am going to side step that at the minute – not to minimize it, but to remind us of something more. There is power in everything that we are. Wherever we fall on the spectrum of gender, there is power in reclaiming that particular expression of gender. Gender can be what someone else defines it to be. Or, in the name of political correctness, it can vanish into personhood. I offer us a third choice – reclaim gender. Not as it is defined by someone else, but as it is meaningful to you. Your gender is part of you. If the definitions you were given for your gender are definitions of powerlessness and pain, or of oppression and anger, let them go and write new definitions.
Gender isn’t binary, and it isn’t destiny, and it isn’t caught in a concrete definition. Gender is ours. It is powerful. It is part of who we are and how we express ourselves in the world. Its definition can be as fluid as we are. Reclaim gender and let it be another expression of beauty in the ways we are the same and in the infinite variety of humanity. Reclaim gender and own its gifts. We don’t need to throw away gender just because it has been misused. We can transform it with love and in return, be made stronger and more compassionate.
Imbolc Blessings
Last week I noticed that it stayed lighter outside long enough to make a difference in our day to day movements through the world. That little extra bit of sun felt like salvation. Today instead of typical February temperatures in the low 40s or upper 30s we’re blessed with something in the 60s. Winter’s hold is loosening, bit by bit. Around here it’s been a mild winter. Instead of snows and ice we’ve had colds and pneumonia. Winter is winter no matter what the weather. Not to imply that winter is bad. It’s also hot drinks by the fire, snuggling up to loved ones under a down quilt, watching snow accumulate and still the world to a magical silence. And by this time of year, although we will get more winter weather, we need that sunlight lingering a few minutes more each day to remind us that winter is not all there is. Spring will come – sooner than we think.
Imbolc always brings us promise - promise of warmer days, longer days; promise of the joy of all living and growing things reaching up toward the sun. On this Imbolc I wish you all hope, and joy, and promise.
As we look toward spring, Silver Branch is growing. After some deep work building our roots Silver Branch is now accepting new students. If you are interested or have questions, send me an email information@silverbranchtradition.com.
Don't Throw it Away
I’ve noticed lately that in our speech, we tend to use a lot of throwaway language. Language designed to dissemble, to give us an out in case we are not well received. I’ve noticed that this habit waters down our conversations, our connections, our power and our lives. It keeps us not quite meeting one another. It sidesteps whatever it is we are saying and tells our audience that it doesn’t matter.
This year, I invite you to look at your own language. Do you use throwaway language to take the power out of your speech? When does that happen? How does it impact what you have to say? This year, I challenge you to stand in the power of what you have to say. Let your words be direct. Don’t throw away the gift you have to offer when you speak.
Why does this matter especially to magic workers, priests and priestesses? It matters because by using throwaway language regularly we get in the habit of being willing to throw away the power we are working with. We get in the habit of intentionally blurring the focus of what we have to say, of undermining it ourselves. Habits are pervasive. If we develop this habit in our speech, in the way we manage the energy of our relationships, we will very likely find it creeping into our magic, our mediation, our prayer, taking the power out of the work we’re doing. Your work is needed in the world. It’s needed in all its strength and power. Don’t throw it away.
Blessings for 2012
As we step out of 2011 and into 2012…
May all of your gods smile upon you.
May you feel the deep blessings of the land and the shining blessings of the starry sky.
May you carry forward the blessings of 2011 and leave the hurts and struggles behind.
And above all, may 2012 be the year you stand in your strength and power and bring your blessings to the world.
Happy New Year from me, and from the Priesthood of the Silver Branch Tradition.
Polarity in Relationship
I have been thinking a lot lately about polarity. If you’re a regular reader, you know I’ve said that at Silver Branch we work more with relationship than polarity. That’s true. I’ve had the opportunity lately, to see polarity in a different light and I am intrigued.
I have always held within me that polarities are opposites, and therefor in opposition to one another. It is dark or it is light and dark is the opposite of light. Somehow this felt incomplete to me. And more, it felt locked in conflict. I held within me the idea that polarities are always moving farther from one another, going on being more and more opposite. I was never comfortable with that. Nor was I comfortable then trying to work magically with polarity when, at best there was tension between the poles, at worst, opposition.
In studying acupuncture I’ve come to look at polarity differently. We are taught that at its greatest extreme, yin turns to seek yang and vice verse. They are not opposites moving ever farther apart. They don’t live on a line, but instead in circle. You can only go so far toward one pole before it leads you back toward the other.
This is, obviously, not a new idea. And I have no idea how it was that polarity, to me lived on a never ending straight line when nature doesn’t work that way. But suddenly, I have started to see polarity more like all the old tales of lovers who change shape so that one is human by day and the other by night. They are always together, but only at the moments of dawn and dusk do they touch in their true forms. What happens when we look at polarities as lovers seeking to connect to one another instead of polarities as enemies, seeking to either destroy one another or to move as far apart as possible? What a different perspective: polarities in relationship instead of polarities in denial. This is a model I can work with – a model that feels both true and helpful.
