REALLY looking forward to Samhainn this year! I am usually working in Japan, where health and safety makes it really difficult to have a fire, and as it is a fire ceremony, it always feels as if something is missing, even though the company who invite me out there do a great compromise with a group of LED lights!
This year I am inviting people to join me on 30th, which is when I will be facilitating my monthly spiritual circle to celebrate this festival of honouring the ancestors. We will be in my stone circle, calling in the spirits with rattles, drums, clap sticks, bells etc, and placing any messages, wishes and outgrown negative beliefs into the flames. After the ceremony we will share a little food, and give thanks and blessings for the gifts and talents our ancestors have given us.
Traditionally Samhainn was the time for withdrawing into oneself, for summing up our year, and looking to our future path in the present lifetime.
It is a time for sitting by the hearth, telling tales and sharing divination readings. The harvest is past, and hopefully we have enough food to keep us going through the coming Winter months. We look to our neighbours, making sure that no-one goes without, is cold and hungry, or lonely.
Of course, this is a fantasy of mine. These days we tell ourselves that we don’t have time for self-reflection, for gathering together to share tales and predictions learned from watching the changing seasons in Nature. Our modern lifestyle is unnatural, but don’t you think it would be good to celebrate the essence of Samhainn, instead of focusing on the dread of the expense, worry and expected over-indulgence which most of us associate with the lead-up to Christmas?
Bring back the simple celebrations of the changing seasons, that’s what I say! Plus there is the bonus of a party every six or seven weeks!