Beltane Blessing 2015

I've been celebrating Beltane for...a good long while now and this year has, by far, the most tumultuous energy I've ever felt on May Day.  With everything that's going on in the world it seems appropriate to turn the traditional blessings of fertility and personal prosperity into blessings for understanding and fruitful communication between all people.

A brief aside for Seattle area folks - I've got two events going this weekend. I'm facilitating a Beltane Ritual tomorrow at 3pm in Carkeek Park.  It's going to be fun and low key, so come on by :) On Sunday I'll be teaching a workshop on Psychic Self-Defense for Ghost Hunters at Spooked in Seattle's Metaphysical Market at 4pm.

Beltane Blessing for 2015

As I reach down to feel the earth beneath my feet I feel it pulsing with the energy of new growth.  The seeds we have sown are awakening and burgeoning with new life; changing the landscape with bursts of energy.  I shall ride these currents of growth and change and harness them to my will.  With them I birth a shift of consciousness in my self. The vast and unfathomable energies of the Sabbat flow through me and change me from within.   

The bright fires of Beltane burn within and purify me.  Beltane fire burns away prejudice and privilege so that I may grow true, unburdened by the mistakes and misconceptions of my past. 

The seeds of expression bear the fruit of clear and effective communication.  The seeds of listening grow into true hearing. The seeds of knowledge within me blossom into real comprehension.  The seeds of compassion I've sown flower into true empathy. 

I manifest this growth through right action in my life.  I know that all change begins within but must be brought without in order to take hold.  I walk through the world enacting comprehension and empathy with all those around me.  I model the behavior I would see.  I inspire others to manifest positive change through right action.

Beltane blessings take hold within me and through me move into the world.

Beltane Ritual 5/2 at Carkeek Park

If you are in the Seattle area come join me on May 2nd to celebrate Beltane!  We'll be doing a fun, informal ritual in the always lovely Carkeek Park.  We'll be meeting in the parking area next to the playground at 3pm.

This relaxed and informal ritual is open to all ages, traditions/practices, and levels of experience. Come as you are.  Just bring an open mind, a willingness to participate, and a small offering of flowers or birdseed if you can. 

I hope to see you there!

For full details check out our event listing on Witchvox:
http://www.witchvox.com/vn/vn_detail/dt_ev.html?a=uswa&id=94369

Beltane 2014 - Tesla's Ghost

Wow, it's almost Beltane!  When did that happen?  I've kinda been mentally buried for the last few months, but as my herbs are springing forth so am I.

My big plans for Beltane are to do a little pop culture magick at work.  I do one of those weird hybrid jobs that's impossible to quantify on a resume.  I'm an attorney, but I'm party of our firm's IT group and I implement and manage our case management software.  It has its good days and bad days.  IT is never really given the priority it should be at my firm, so our servers are old, badly patched, and all around terrifying.  On any given day it's a toss up as to whether everything will be functioning when I get in.  I already have a host of action figures and plushies at my desk for my personal protection, but I don't have anything to actually protect the technology that I work with.  I've decided to change that.

I've decided to spend my Beltane creating a server guardian.  To that end I've purchased a Tesla bobble head.  For those of you not in the know, Nikola Tesla is one of the great innovators of the modern era.  He came up with breathtaking inventions and concepts that are still being explored a hundred years later.  The man came up with the concept of cell phones in 1900 - truly remarkable.  Nikola Tesla was essentially the Tony Stark of his era, though not nearly as rich. If anyone can help me keep our servers up and running, it's the spirit of Tesla. 

I intend to do a fairly elaborate ritual to charge my bobble head, as I'm basically going to conjure forth Tesla's spirit and ask him to hang out with me on a regular basis.  I work with the dead rather often, so it's not that big a leap for me.  I intend to spend some time reading a biography of Tesla, and then make some offerings of incense and vodka on my altar.  I'll have a chat with Tesla's spirit and ask if he's willing to help me out.  If he is, then I'll help him take residence in my figurine and give him regular offerings as time passes.  If he's not willing, then I 'll just have to make a servitor to the same purpose.  Either way, it should be some good solid magick.

Oh, and for those of you that are in the Puget Sound region, this Saturday May 2nd I will be over at Avebury Mystikals over in Bermerton for their 2nd Anniversary Celebration.  I'll be signing copies of my book, Defense Against the Dark, and possibly doing a few tarot readings :)  Come by and say hello!

Belated Beltane

Well, I was going to have a nice blog post all about shadow work on Beltane ready to go for Wednesday, but then I caught a very annoying cold and decided to watch television instead.  However, some groups still celebrate Beltane on the 5th of May (Old Beltane) so I don't feel too badly.

In general, Beltane is all about sex, fertility, growth, and color.  It's definitely the most uninhibited holiday we Pagans have, with giant phalli abounding and folks going off for "alone time" in the forest.  Traditional symbols like the Maypole, bonfires, and fresh flowers are all about the explosion of new life and the sympathetic magick of human fertility inspiring crops to be equally fertile.  It's about as un-shadowy as you get.  Of course, there is Walpurgisnacht on April 30th to counterbalance all that sex and joy (Walpurgisnacht is sort of a mini-Samhain).

Much as I do love Walpurgisnacht and doing ritual while listening to Night on Bald Mountain by Mussorgsky, this year I wanted to actually celebrate Beltane.  Wellesley's been in my thoughts a lot of late, with the marathon bombing and my upcoming 10 year reunion, and Beltane was always a big deal for us there.  We'd wake up before dawn and go around the lake to do ritual while the sun rose and then have a big celebratory breakfast.  We'd make May Baskets (paper cones filled with candy and flowers) and give them to our friends.  My senior year we went all out and had a maypole in front of the chapel and a massive bonefire by the lake.  The Beltane is one of my favorite memories of undergrad and I still have the picture of all of us in front of the maypole up on my altar.  This year I really want to recapture some of the joy from that day.

Since I spent the 1st asleep on my couch with a big box of tissues, this year I'm celebrating Beltane on the 5th.  It's supposed to be a stunningly nice day so I'm going to get myself out into the woods to hike up to Fragrance Lake.  I'm going to get up as early as I can make myself, since it's about 2.5 hours up to the trail head, and get out into the forest.  It's early enough in the season that the forest will still be dark and rather dank in the morning and will gradually get warmer as the sun rises.  I think the progression of the hike should nicely mirror the progression of the season and the heat and sunshine I'll get by the time I get up to the lake will be a wonderful reflection of the energy of Beltane itself.  Hiking is always meditative for me and I feel that it's fairly reflective of the old practice of going out into the woods to have a mystical experience. 

Maybe I'll swing through La Conner on my way south to see if any of the flowers are still blooming.

Did I mention that the gods have an interesting sense of humor?

Despite having a truly wretched cold last week, I got well just in time for Beltane.  I was able to do my Walpurgistnach meditation on Friday night and then get up early Saturday morning to head to Spokane.  I was a bit snuffly on the drive over and managed to dehydrate myself pretty badly, but was otherwise fine.  We picked up our race packets and had a nice carb-tastic dinner.

Beltane morning dawned foggy and freezing, but the mist soon burned off and we were looking at a spectacular clear day.  After a light breakfast we, and 50,000 of our closest friends headed down to line up for Bloomsday.  In line people sand, played Frisbee with tortillas, and tossed sweatshirts into the trees (they later get picked up for charity).  Finally, after standing around for about an hour, our wave got to begin the 12k walk.

There’s nothing like some good physical activity to get an out of shape person to really live in the moment.  I spent my time thinking about my feet and knees, my posture, and my breathing and let stress melt away.  It was actually quite lovely.  I enjoyed the Beltane sun, listened to garage bands set up throughout the course and just let myself be.  I could see the new leaves budding on the trees and watch birds flitting about and was able to really appreciate the new life that’s finally returning to this part of the country.  It was a very cold, bleak winter and even a curmudgeon like me could really appreciate the warmth and greenery.  The walk felt fantastic and I think it may have actually killed the last dregs of my cold.  I felt better afterwards than before.

Of course, there’s always a price.  I spent last week so worried about being well enough to do Bloomsday that I didn’t really think about any of the other things that you need to worry about when doing a 12k.  I didn’t stock up on electrolytes or high energy snacks so by the time I got to the end I wanted a gallon of gatorade and about a pound of peanuts.  I also completely forgot that I had not been in the sun, at all, in about nine months.  Now I have a fair amount of melanin when I’ve been out in the sun off and on (thank-you mom).  I do not have melanin when I haven’t even seen the sun for more than five minutes at a stretch since last August.  Oh yes, I am sunburned.  I often get a tinge of red on the apples of my cheeks and that doesn’t really bother me, but my chest is burned like toast.  Yes oh gods of summer and sunshine, this winter baby went outside unprotected and got exactly what she deserved.  *pouts*