The Earth Tide Ebbs

As the Earth Tide ebbs at the Solstice, the world softens and the Witch’s powers of influence increase.

The time is auspicious for spells of prosperity,  and for manifesting anything on the material plane. The most effective spells worked at this time will have some material bases--talismans, poppets, charged stones.

Winter Solstice

from the Pagan poet Gwion:

We are only concerned with light.
We have given up on warmth,
Have abandoned discernment
Of color and brightness and shape.
We are only concerned with light,
Because the sky, wide vessel
And disperser of radiance, is dark.

We tend our sparkles of fire
In the calendar's frosted eclipse.
We have come to the Season of Man.
This single night
The only light is our own
For all the lands and seas and skies.

The log must blaze!
And every quick branch bear candles,
Not to suffuse us with a cheery glow,
But to ensure that no gust of winter
Will snuff it out.

We are only concerned with company.
We have frozen standing quarrels,
Have abandoned distinctions
Of preference and propriety.
We are only concerned with company,
Because the sky, Great Hall
Of perpetual companions, is empty.

We gather our kind
From withered prairies and crusted shores,
We have come to the Season of Man.
This single night
Ours is the only company
For all lands and seas and skies.

We must be merry!
We must raise a common voice in any song.
We must pledge ourselves without reserve,
For no other rampart stands against extinction
But our bonds.

This single night, this Season of Man,
We are the only gods; the universe is ours.
Behold our magnificence!
If we are diligent
And sacrifice all lesser concerns,
We may keep the light from dying
And our hearts from growing still
Until dawn,
When the gods return
To take the year from our narrow shoulders
And hurl it toward a season bright and fertile.

Lucid Dreaming

Source of image: www.hyperluciddream.com

The Water Tide flowed at Lammas, and now has turned to ebb at the Fall Equinox.   

 

When a tide ebbs, a Witch's power grows. In a flowing tide, the powers of Nature are in the ascendant, and the work of magic is more a matter of divination than sorcery--of reading the course of things, and riding the waves. In an ebb tide the manifest world has less will of its own, and the Witch's will has more effect.

 

Dreams, the creatures of water, are now available not only to our understanding but to our influence, and can even be wielded to influence the course of events.

 

"Lucid dreaming" is a term used to describe dreaming which the dreamer consciously controls. It is, obviously, a powerful magical technique.

 

The most challenging first step for most people is learning to recognize that they are dreaming while the dream is still in progress. You are ready to start working on this when you have reached a point in the work of dream retrieval when you can generally recall at least one dream each time you awake, at least when you are able to wake naturally. (When you are wrenched out of sleep by artificial means, dream-catching is more difficult.)

 

Here are ways develop conscious awareness that you are dreaming;

 

Make a habit of asking yourself regularly, when you are awake, whether you are awake or dreaming. The habit of asking yourself this question can carry over into your dreams. 

 

Ask yourself "Am I dreaming?" in situations that resemble ones that commonly occur in your dreams. Go through your dream journal and not images or situations that appear repeatedly, and which can also occur in waking reality. For example, if you dream often of bodies of water, make a habit of testing your state each time you see a body of water, and each time you swim or bathe. 

 

Go through your dream journal and note recurring images and events that would be impossible in waking reality. Examples might be flying, or watching or experiencing magical shape-shifting. Give yourself the suggestion that the next time you dream about such a thing, you will know that you are dreaming.

 

Stop at some random moment during the day and ask yourself, "Am I dreaming?" Then continue to imagine what could happen next if you were dreaming.

 

Work to become more aware of the subjective nature of your waking perceptions. We construct our waking experience with our own minds, just as we construct our dreams. Form a habit of viewing events from more than one point of view. When you perceive and respond to something, work to imagine other interpretations which could be put on the same events. You do not have to hold and commit to such alternative perceptions if you do not wish to; you are just building mental flexibility, as you build physical flexibility with body exercises.

 

Create a vivid mental image to use while falling asleep, that you can carry between waking and dreaming. One such image in Buddhist tradition is the "flaming lotus," a delicate pink flower with a bright flame in the middle, which is located at your throat (Interestingly, if the Kabbalistic Tree of Life is mapped out on the human body the "hidden sephirah" Daath lies at the throat.)

Moon Festival

This past full moon was the Chinese Moon Festival. I had an in-class essay in which several  Chinese students spilled out their homesickness--it is, most of all, a time for family gatherings. The assignment was a response to an essay that only mentioned someone's homesickness in passing, but in honor of the occasion, I cut some slack for writing off-topic.

There are a number of different stories connected with the Moon Festival. Here is the one I like the best:

Long ago, there were ten suns in the sky. The earth was hot and parched, and no matter how hard people worked, they could not grow enough to eat. The king declared that he would marry his beautiful daughter to the man who could destroy nine of the suns, and leave them with only one that was needed for life.

A mighty warrior presented himself, and true to his word, fought with nine suns and destroyed them all, until at last only one good sun was left in the sky. The king was true to his word, and gave his daughter's hand to this mighty warrior.

The princess, however, was not happy in this marriage. The same ferocity that had given this warrior the power to destroy the nine suns also made him a jealous and violent husband. She soon came to understand that for the good of the land, her own hopes of happiness had been sacrificed forever.

So one night, she went to her jewel box, and chose from it one large, perfect pearl. She went out into the courtyard, and threw the pearl up, up, until it came to rest high in the sky. Then she took a running leap, and jumped high above the palace walls. She flew up to the moon, and there she lives joyfully and alone, giving comfort and encouragement to all unhappy souls below.

At the Dark of the Moon

Introspection, trance work, self-evalution

Dream work

Fast or eat sparingly

Don't overwork

Wrap yourself in a covering or veil of some kind, arranged so you can breathe properly (oxygen deprivation is not an essential part of the experience.)

I especially like some slow and evocative sound for this--Tibetan temple bells, for example.
Close your eyes and go into a cave. As you go deeper in, the light becomes fainter and fainter, and you have to feel your way with your feet and hands.
The passageway becomes narrower, and more difficult to negotiate. You go deeper and deeper into the earth.
Then after a time you will suddenly lose your footing and go floating in free fall, around and around, down the passageway, until you land in a cavern deep inside the earth.
There you may find something, or you may meet someone.
You may be told something you need to know, or you may be given something to take back with you.
Perhaps you will find or be given something that must remain in the cavern, but which you can return to again.
When you are ready to leave the cavern, you will find that you can float up and out the passageway, by the same way you came.
Then you will find your footing, and make you way along the passage, feeling with your feet and hands, until you return to the mouth of the cave.

Discovering the Meanings of Dreams

Examine any emotions which accompany the dream. If the emotion seems inconsistent with the thing you dreamed, pay more attention to the emotional content than to its apparent stimulus.

 Explore your associations with a puzzling symbol. If, for example, a dream person has blond hair, free associate on the phrase "blond hair," jotting down anything that comes to mind.

 After recording a dream, quickly and instinctively give it a title. This will often provide a clue to its meaning.

 Pay attention to any involuntary slips of the tongue, pen or fingers which you make as you speak or write about the dream. These are sometimes significant.

 Pay particular attention to symbols and situations which occur repeatedly in your dreams.

 On waking, imagine endings or continuations for your dreams. Record these and examine them along with the dreams themselves

 Waking, place yourself in the position of another character in the dream. How would the dream appear, and what would it mean, to that person? (For example, if you dream of being pursued by someone, place yourself in the position of the pursuer instead of the pursued.)

 Give creative expression to your dreams in drawings, poetry, dance. This extension will often fill in missing meaning in your mind.

Be aware that any one dream has multiple levels of meaning. The possibilities include, but are not confined to:

• Processing and integrating experience from the previous day.
• Wish fulfillment.
• Messages from your unconscious to your conscious mind.
• Self exploration and analysis; often one possible interpretation of a dream involves seeing each character in the dream as part of the dreamer.
• Symbolic representations of physical conditions in your body.
• Dream symbolism may include puns or plays on words.
• Contact with spirits or Deities often occurs more readily in dreams than in waking.
• There may memory of the distant past, of early childhood, or of other existences.
• Experiences of precognition, telepathy and clairvoyance are more common in dreaming than in waking.
• Your mind may use a dream to take control of a problem and solve it.                                                                                                                                

Waxing Moon

Magical work for fertility, prosperity, growth and plenty:

Harvest crops and herbs that grow above the ground.

New Moon

(when the first sliver of the moon shows in the sky)

Divine the future (this is when the priestesses at Delphi prophesied)

Move to a new house

Trim hair or nails in order to make them grow faster

Sign contracts

Auspicious for:

Consecrations and initiations

Marriages and new partnerships

Major purchases

New enterprises, new investments, starting a business

When you see a new moon for the first time, salute Her by kissing your hand and saying, "New Moon, leave me as well as you found me."

(According to folk tradition, you are supposed to kneel on a rock while you do this, but in my neighborhood it is hard to find rocks large enough to kneel on.)

CATCHING YOUR DREAMS

Probably the most important technique is to verbalize, orally or in writing, anything that you remember, as soon as possible on waking. Often memories which are vivid at the moment of waking will fade and disappear very quickly--especially as soon as you get up and move around. Keep a pencil and paper or a voice recording device near your bed, and if necessary a small source of light so that you won't have to disturb your partner. At first, do not worry about the quality or meaning of what you remember and record. If you wake during the night too drowsy to record a dream at length, often a few jotted words or doodled images will be enough to trigger your memory later. In fact, it is generally helpful to start recording each dream with just a few key phrases or devices immediately on waking, and then use these as notes as you write out the dream in its entirety. If you prefer to record your voice, be aware that if you want to use the material in any systematic way at a later time, you will probably have to take time to transcribe it into written form. For most purposes of magic and self-exploration, you need the dreams recorded in a form which you can easily browse through, sort, classify and retrieve.

Do not ignore what at first appear to be meaningless fragments. Usually the process of verbalizing or recording them will trigger a more complete memory. Often a puzzling segment will, on closer examination, turn out to be a sort of telegram from your unconscious--a small but potent message which summarizes a longer dream.

Use the present tense and not the past tense when you record your dreams. You will find that this triggers more complete dream memories.

Treat your dream recording materials with respect; choose aesthetically pleasing ones, consecrate them and guard them carefully.

Incenses are used in many cultures for purposes of dream incubation. The dream-inducing properties of mugwort are well known in European and Native American folklore alike. In the Far East, jasmine is credited with dream-inducing powers. Bay is also known as psychotropic incenses; bay laurel was the incense used in ancient Greece for healing dream incubation, and by the seeresses at Delphi. California bay is somewhat less effective for these purposes than the Mediterranean variety, but is still worth trying. Probably any scent that you choose to use for dream incubation will work well once you have established that association for yourself in private ritual. Ideally, of course, the incubation incense burns, tended by someone else for you while you are sleeping. But if there is no way to do this, (household slaves being a rare luxury nowadays), at least use the desired incense or oil before retiring.

Ritual baths were an essential part of ancient Greek incubation ritual. Before retiring, the incubant was bathed in order to cleanse away all influences which could interfere with the dream, and leave a clean, open place for the Deity to do its work.

Deities who can help you with your dream work should be invoked prior to retiring. I have good luck with Hermes, Lord of Words and Guide Between the Worlds--although the dreams I get by invoking Him sometimes bear the mark of the Trickster as well.

Experiment with ways of focusing yourself mentally as you go to sleep. It may be helpful to induce a trance, using drums or music on a tape or sound file which will play to the end and then shut itself off. In the trance, give yourself the suggestion that you will dream and remember what you have dreamed; if you like, you can narrow it down to a specific subject. Then pass from trance into dream. Another technique is to focus your attention, as you fall asleep, on an image which you know to be of great psychological or spiritual importance to you.

If you have trouble remembering dreams, try increasing your intake of B vitamins. For many people, this seems to affect body chemistry in such a way as to improve dream retrieval. If you take a B vitamin supplement, use one which provides a balanced complement of all the B vitamins since increasing one of them to the exclusion of the others may induce deficiencies of those which are neglected.

If you awake with no dream memory, try moving your body into its sleep habitual sleep position(s); often this kinesthetic cue will trigger dream recall.

Find ways to give creative expression to your dreams. You can do this with poetry, art, movement. The creative process will often trigger memory of forgotten parts of the dream.

Dreams are best remembered from daytime naps, or from periods of morning sleep when you wake and then fall asleep again for a few hours. In the latter case, a dream may summarize other dreams which you have had during the night. Try to arrange opportunities for this kind of sleep. 

Women tend to crave more sleep and have more vivid and important dreams just before or during their menstrual periods. Try to allow time for sleep and dream work at this time of the month, if you can.

Dream charms can be made to keep under your pillow while you sleep. Mugwort dream pillows are popular, due the the well-know dream-inducing properties of this plant. Another charm is a bit of the herb or a bit of red string, tied in a circle to represent unbroken memory and magically charged for that purpose.

The Time of Harvest

(The flowing Water Tide, from Lammas to Mabon)

This, like the planting time from Eostara to Beltane, is a period of intense hard work. It is a time when work comes to fruition, and the rewards of past work can be reaped. There will, however, be a lot to do to accomplish this, and it may feel as though the time is too short. It is a time of intense activity, both work and play.

The Mother at this time is at the height of Her power, her breasts flowing with milk at the very sound of a child's cry. Honor Her with works of healing and compassion, and by with a portion of each thing you earn or reap. The Mother of All Living tells us that she demands no sacrifice. She tells us this because she needs make no such demand; a portion of every labor and every love returns to Her by the law of Nature. When that return is brought to Her consciously and with gratitude, she rewards Her children by opening to them the storehouse of Her wisdom;  the truth which lies there is our own, which She has saved for us from our gifts of past seasons. Thus at this season we eat new fruit and old meat, new achievements and old wisdom.

Love and labor are one in the Mother at this season. Seek to perform all your work with love, and work to sustain your love for others.

 Like the Planting Time this is a season which, in the old days, required the give-and-take of community effort, as large teams harvested one farm after another. Look carefully at the patterns of reciprocity in your relationships with those love and care about, ask yourself whether they are balanced and fair, and what you can do to improve their equilibrium.

Try to float to the surface of the Tide, to take a long and broad view of things so as to maintain your perspective. Take time from your full and busy days to study and contemplate the huge expanses of space and time--the shape and time of the Universe, karma, your past lives. 

This is the most productive Tide for trance divination, for traveling in trance and dream the roads that lead to the future and the past.

Wort Moon

The full moon that falls in Leo is sometimes called the Wort Moon because its waxing is the auspicious time to gather certain worts, or herbs useful for the leafy part that grows above the ground. (Dried herbs of this type are medicinally and magically effective for only about a year after they are picked, a fact that is ignored by most businesses that market them.) Two herbs traditionally associated with this time were mugwort and vervain.

Mugwort is plentiful in California, and known since Native American times for its power to induce dreams. Drink it as a tea, and fall asleep intending to dream what you need to know. Some herbals give warnings about its possible toxicity, but you would probably have to drink gallons of the stuff to do any harm, and there's no reason why anyone would do that. You'd be up all night peeing, and never get any dreams at all.

Vervain is traditionally used for kidney stones and bladder problems, also to drive away vampires. The Iroquois used it to drive away anybody they didn't want to deal with, but this strategy doesn't seem to have stood the test of time. It apparently works better on vampires than on white people. Vervain has general protective qualities, though, and is also used in divination; you can see the future by gazing into a fire through vervain. Or add some to your mugwort tea for prophetic dreams.

Magic in the Tides

The Tide of the year influences the kind of magic which will be most effective in dealing with a given problem, and the magical purposes for which work is most effective.

         

Generally speaking, events in the flowing Tides are less susceptible to active, instrumental magic than events in the ebb Tides. When a Tide flows it carries events with it, and often the Witch’s best magical approach is divination to discover how things are moving and how best to deal with them. On the ebb Tide, events become more fluid and the Witch’s power to mold them increases. Sorcery has its greatest power at full ebb Tide, just before a new Tide flows.

The effect of any magical working will be colored by the Tide in which it is performed; an initiation, for example, might open up powers of divination or sorcery, of healing or of posessory trance, depending on the Tide which governs it. 

The ebbing Air Tide, from Midsummer to Lammas, is auspicious for spells of freeing, cutting and release.

       

The Time of Ripening

(The ebbing Air Tide, between Midsummer and Lammas) 

This is a time, most of all, for attention and care. Things are growing close to fruition, and the only thing to worry about is that ill luck and carelessness may be the ruin of all you have gained. There is little to be done now in the way of strenuous work, but much need for watchfulness. 

Take reasonable precautions against accidents and natural disasters. Trust your own wisdom and intuition, but also seek out the advice of those wiser and more knowledgeable than you. 

Take stock of uncompleted jobs and unfinished business in your life, and give yourself to the possibly tedious or emotionally demanding tasks of wrapping things up, bringing things to closure, or polishing and perfecting. 

Set yourself the exercise of striving for perfection in some piece of work. Seek also to perfect knowledge, skills, and relationships. Marshall your energy and organize your resources for the busy and demanding Harvest Time to come. 

The Goddess and God at this time are the mature Mother and Father of creation, crowned Queen and King. They are Titania and Oberon, recovered from their Midsummer mischief and confusion, ruling together reconciled and fulfilled. Let their joy and playfulness lighten the mood of a serious time

Midsummer Hymn

(Sung to the tune of the Gaelic song "Samradh, Samradh")

Summer, Summer, milk of the heifers,
We have brought the Summer in
Golden Summer, Wind and Water,
We have brought the Summer in,

Hail to the God, who brings us His blessing,
Hail to the sun a-rising high
Hail to Him now in his hour of crowning,
Hail to the King who’s born to die.

Summer, Summer milk of the heifers
He has brought the summer in
Sowed the corn and wisely tended
He has brought the summer in.

Hail to the bridegroom, love of our Lady,
Hail to the plow that tilled the ground
Praise to him now for all he’s given
Bringer of life to wear the crown.

Summer, Summer milk of the heifers
He has brought the summer in
Sowed the corn and wisely tended
He has brought the summer in.

Summer, Summer, milk of the heifers,
We have brought the Summer in
Golden Summer, Wind and Water,
We have brought the Summer in.

Song for the Winds

Fall wind sing 

Winter wind cry

Spring wind stirs the heart to fire

Summer wind brings the heart's desire.

North wind bound and 

East wind free,

South wind blows so soft and sweet,

West wind takes the soul to sea.

Grey wind heavy

Red wind bright

White wind raise the spirits higher

Black wind carry be through the night.

Night wind wild and

Dawn wind chill

Wind at mid-day brings no ill

With the setting sun, the winds are still.

 

THE TURNING OF THE TIDE AT MIDSUMMER

 Image from http://deskarati.com/2012/05/12/pre-historic-science/

Midsummer marks the time when the air tide turns and begins to ebb. The air tide began to flow at Beltane. The season past has been one of change; things have been in transition, and there has been an element of chance in everything as some seedlings took root and others were stillborn.  With the turning of the air tide, the season of ripening begins.  Now we know which of the seeds of time have taken root and will grow.  It is a time for dedication, patience and awareness.  The work of the coming season will be watering and weeding, watching and protecting that which has taken root.

The turning of this tide is best observed in a circle of stones made in the old manner, out of doors, when the sun is high in the sky.

Take with you a stone to establish you’re altar, and a little water or oil to use for anointing.  Find a clear place in the sunlight.

Lay out a Circle by marking the four directions with stones around your central altar stone. As you do so, invite Spirits from the four directions to guard your Circle.

Welcome the God as King of high summer; as you invoke Him, feel the Sun enter you through the crown of your head, crowning the God within you.

Speak to the God who is both within you and in the sky above, voicing your intentions for the coming season.

Using the oil anoint both feet, saying, “Let my feet go in Your ways.”  

Anoint both hands saying, “Let my hands do Your work.”

Anoint your third eye, saying, “Let me see the way before me.”

Sit or kneel in silent meditation for awhile.

Give thanks to the God and the Guardians.

Open the Circle by walking widdershins (counter-clockwise), and kicking the stones outwards.

  

At the Dark of the Moon

Introspection, trance work, self-evalution

Dream work

Fast or eat sparingly

Don't overwork

Wrap yourself in a covering or veil of some kind, arranged so you can breathe properly (oxygen deprivation is not an essential part of the experience.)

I especially like some slow and evocative sound for this--Tibetan temple bells, for example.
Close your eyes and go into a cave. As you go deeper in, the light becomes fainter and fainter, and you have to feel your way with your feet and hands.
The passageway becomes narrower, and more difficult to negotiate. You go deeper and deeper into the earth.
Then after a time you will suddenly lose your footing and go floating in free fall, around and around, down the passageway, until you land in a cavern deep inside the earth.
There you may find something, or you may meet someone.
You may be told something you need to know, or you may be given something to take back with you.
Perhaps you will find or be given something that must remain in the cavern, but which you can return to again.
When you are ready to leave the cavern, you will find that you can float up and out the passageway, by the same way you came.
Then you will find your footing, and make you way along the passage, feeling with your feet and hands, until you return to the mouth of the cave.

Sun Moon

Sun Moon, Dyad Moon, are names for the Full Moon that falls in Gemini. (Incidentally, the "moon falling in Gemini" is a different matter from the Moon being "in Gemini" in an astrological chart. When I talk about the Full Moon that falls in Gemini, I mean the Full Moon that falls sometime from May 21 to June 21.) The Dyad Moon will be full on Monday, June 4.

It's a time when opposites attract; magically good for working on relationships. It's a time when differences can turn from a liability to an asset.

To Open

 Now, with the moon nearing full and the Air Tide rising high, is a time for opening awareness, for paying attention, the first power of a Witch.

The conditions of modern life compel a lot of filtering, more and more as the years go by and the information age whelms. We get very good at screening out what we have decided is irrelevant.

Years ago, I taught adult school ESL classes for Mien tribespeople from Laos. Those people were time travelers, among other things. The middle-aged adults had grown up a world rather like that of our ancestors a thousand years ago (I remember one man telling me about the first time he saw matches used, when he was a teenager). One striking thing about them—aside from some obvious things like gingerly picking up a pencil and turning it around to figure out which end of it you write with—was their awareness of everything around them. In class, they were easily distracted, noticing every sound in the street outside, every footstep in the hallway. I realized that they came from a world in which there were no irrelevant sounds. Everything they heard was significant. Another time we went on a field trip to a regional park, and they kept pointing out plants and asking their names, surprised that I did not know the name of every plant and tree we saw. 

We live in a world defined by the sounds we have learned to notice, the things we know the names of, the  ideas that we have not dismissed. It is a world that we would not be able to negotiate in any other way.

To open to growth, consciously open awareness. There is a familiar magical exercise of closing your eyes and for a short time hearing everything that is there it hear—street sounds, indistinct voices from a next door apartment, bird calls, the humming of appliances, the wind—whatever sounds your environment holds. Pay attention, and give each sound some meaning, no matter how fanciful or contrived. It is best to close your eyes because then, by opening them, you can return to the filters that you normally rely on—but you might want to make a record any meanings you have discovered, if they are meanings that mean something.

Another exercise, perhaps a bit scarier, is to open your mind to ideas and opinions that you have rejected or disagree with. What if there really is a God who sends people to hell? What if torturing suspected terrorists really is somehow necessary to national security? Maybe the Kardashians are actually interesting and important people, and you should bookmark their blog. You don’t have to commit to any of these ideas, or act on them. As Aristotle said long ago, “It is the mark of an educated mind to be able to entertain a thought without accepting it.” But roam among the thoughts you reject, and see where they take you.