Water has been on my mind lately, and I thought it might be a good topic for this month's column. After all, spring cleaning, blessing sacred space, ritual purification, garden planning, and a host of other spring activities all involve water. It's personally one of my favorite elements, being a Crab myself; plus, we're we're currently traveling through the watery sign of Pisces (February 20-March 20). I recently attended a conference (during the sign of Scorpio) where several esteemed Pagan elders in our community held a panel discussion on what Wiccans, Pagans, and Witches can do for the environment. It was a fascinating discussion and, needless to say, many of us consider ourselves ...
As summer begins to wane, we begin to harvest what we have sown. Lammas, or Lughnasadh, celebrated on August 1, honors the first harvest. Perhaps all summer you've been growing fruits, vegetables, or a little herb garden. You can't wait to share your bounty with others. But before you put your harvest to use… how do you appropriately gather that which you've tended for so long, in a way that will honor its sacrifice? I always look to the pros for advice. One of the best-loved Wiccan authors, Scott Cunningham, was truly on one wavelength with herbs. He wrote numerous books on how to interact and make magic with plants, herbs, foods, oils, incenses, and more. He put years into ...
One thing that always fascinates me is the way certain traditional magickal technologies are recycled and made viable to new generations. Usually this involves nothing more than renaming the old technology, perhaps introducing new jargon, and announcing that it is new, powerful, and, to use an old expression, "the greatest thing since sliced bread." One of these powerful new techniques is a method for creating your future. The basic idea behind it is that each of us has a "time line" that goes from our past (and even into past lives) and extends into the future. Working with this time line in the past can help you get over various mental, physical, and spiritual problems caused by past ...
<?/div> A friend of mine recently posed an impossible hypothetical question. If you had to choose to live your life enjoying just one of the following—books, movies, or music—which would it be? I thought about it for about a quarter of a second and said books, like it was a foregone conclusion. Books have always been my main muse, shaping my education, life path, and career. But, in letting the question sit for a bit, I realized that I was wrong. My answer is music. Movies entertain me. Books speak to me emotionally and intellectually. Music, however, has an absolutely pervasive quality that moves "me" completely, including all those parts of existence that can't be ...