A Few Good Reads
Earth’s Children series by Jean M. Auel
Bambi: A Life in the Forest by Felix Salten (not a children’s book)
The Black Jewels series by Anne Bishop
Anything by Marion Zimmer Bradley & Diana Paxton
Greenmantle & Into the Green by Charles de Lint
The Sea Priestess by Dion Fortune
Practical Magic by Alice Hoffman
Sing the Four Quarters by Tanya Huff
The Fifth Sacred Thing by Starhawk
The Emberverse series by S.M. Stirling
Anything by Mary Stewart & Jack Whyte & Morgan Llywelyn
Boudicca: The Warrior Queen by M. J Trow
Boudica series by Manda Scott
The Eagle and the Raven by Pauline Gedge and Donna Gillespie
Misted Cliffs series by Catherine Asaro
Walking the Path that Fits
We are brainwashed folks. Let’s face it.
We shove size 9 feet into size 7 shoes. We starve ourselves down to fit a specific dress size. We laugh at people wearing socks that don’t match. We assume that just because someone does something a different way than we do, they must think we must do as they do as well.
Conformity runs so deep in our society we do it without thinking.
We are so used to having to fit ourselves into an established institution that we often can’t fathom anything else.
You don’t join Wicca because it’s almost everything you believe, except for a couple of things, and then change those opposing beliefs just to be Wiccan!
Your clothing should fit you, not you fit your clothes. The same goes for your spirituality.
Of course we all want to belong and today you need a label to get anywhere.
“What Trad are you?”
But aside from finding a name, or BrandName, how do you build a spiritual path around … yourself? I suppose this is why Mystery Schools have the words “Know Thyself” abouve the doors eh?
It used to be that we had no choice but be all… Continue reading
If we don’t need tools, why even bother to use them?
So they say the only tools you really need is you, and that is true. But we all still start with tools anyways. This is a good thing. Not only do these tools help us learn to focus our minds and hearts and to help create a ritual atmosphere, they also help give us something to do, something to pick up to hold on to etc during ritual.
But there is another reason why we start with tools. We need to learn the energy of each tool.
If you want to cut something psychically or energetically, like a Circle, using just your hand you will need to know how to use your hand like a knife or how to create a knife with energy to go cutting negative energy surrounding someone. But in order to do that you first need to know, and know well, the feel of a knife in your hand, the energy of a blade, the feel of cutting energy with that tool.
To learn how to cup and pool feminine energy in your hands, you start by holding it in the cup or chalice. You learn the feel of that cup and the energy pooled within,… Continue reading
A Hedgewitch’s Booklist
Call of the Horned Piper – Nigel Jackson
Cunning Folk and Familiar Spirits – Emma Wilby
Hedge-Rider: Witches of the Underworld – Eric de Vries
Secrets of East Anglian Magic – Nigel Pennick
Shamanism: Archaic Techniques of Ecstasy – Mircea Eliade
The Nature Path – Starhawk
Masks of Misrule: The Horned God & His Cult in Europe – Nigel Jackson
Natural Magic – Doreen Valiente
Shamans – Ronald Hutton
Psychedelic Shamanism: The Cultivation, Preparation & Shamanic Use of Psychoactive Plants – Jim Dekorne
The Way of the Hedge Witch: Rituals and Spells for Hearth and Home – Arin Murphy-Hiscock
Popular Magic: Cunning-folk in English History – Owen Davies
The Way of the Green Witch: Rituals, Spells, And Practices to Bring You Back to Nature – Arin Murphy-Hiscock
Spiritwalking – Poppy Palin
Leechcraft: Early English Charms, Plantlore and Healing – Stephen Pollington
Encyclopedia of Natural Magick – John Michael Greer
Craft Of The Wild Witch: Green Spirituality & Natural Enchantment – Poppy Palin
Healing Wise (Wise Woman Herbal Series) – Susun S. Weed
Ecoshamanism: Sacred Practices of Unity, Power and Earth Healing – James Endredy
Ancient Herbs – Marina Heilmeyer
Plant Spirit Shamanism: Traditional Techniques for Healing the Soul – Ross… Continue reading
Some Notes: The Hearthstone
The hearthstone symbolizes the ancient hearth, as well as the very heart of a family or coven, it also helps to connect us with our ancestors and other household spirits. It can be used to symbolize hearth and fire deities as well. Any items to be blessed can be laid upon the hearthstone as you do so. This is a very useful tool indeed.
The most popular places to hide witch bottles used to be under the hearthstone or doorstep. The seventeenth century witch-bellarmines of East Anglia have mostly been found buried beneath the threshold or the hearthstone of old buildings.
It is interesting to note that in old Mexican lore the umbilical cord is to be burned in the hearth to detach the baby from unclean, antisocial prenatal influences. In this lore the hearth symbolizes the unity of those who live together and endows this unity with sacred characteristics.
There is an old Somerset tradition that says you must draw a cross on a new hearthstone before you light the first fire – but not with an elder stave.
It was at the hearth where communication with spirits and ancestors was practiced and it was on the hearthstone where… Continue reading
To Fly By Night
Hoofprints in the Wildwood
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