Cozy, comfortable, and stagnant.....

As a grown up I feel like if I learned my lesson then I should get credit for it. Yet, in practice I find that this isn't how life tends to go. When I work hard for something, I expect to be able to relax and enjoy the feeling of having accomplished a goal... yet that turns out to be the result 1 out of every 4 times that I work hard. The first three times I am learning, and thus I have no reward at the end of my hard work other than knowing that I learned more... that really doesn't give me the cozy feeling. Should it?

I make this note to myself today because I'm doing magick to be more connected with the spirit world and learn more from my ancestors. I want them to help me understand why life isn't filled with more cozy moments of relaxation than it is... specifically MY life. Am I unconsciously choosing scenarios that I'm unprepared for which is creating this 25/75 success to fail ratio? *laugh* That isn't good.

In learning and growing spiritually I have always used the astrological wheel as a guideline to identify the point where comfort *should* be coming. In the first six houses of an astrological wheel, we are learning from the world - evolving. In the second six houses we are taking what we've learned and sharing it with the world. I tend to believe that comfort arrives somewhere between the end of the 9th house and the beginning of the 10th house (hence the 10th house's association with destiny). So in looking at why my life doesn't have more cozy moments, I am wondering: did I judge my distances wrong and set my sights too high in terms of when I should expect to feel comfortable? In short: am I shooting for the Moon and being unrealistic about where I am in relation to that goal?

My mother used to tell me that she was envious of people who were genuinely happy with a simple life. I think the key to this is understanding HOW they were happy.... and defining happiness for myself rather than constantly comparing notes with other people (authors, teachers, gurus, etc). The distance to MY moon is different from everyone else's.

In the end, I think I am happiest when I'm right on the verge of being comfortable. I'm happy in the space between knowing something and mastering it. Yet, oddly I'm only peaceful once I've mastered something. My life's spiritual goal has been very Capricornian in nature: get to the top of my mountain and ensure that I have done much work to assure my place there is secure. Why then do I spend so much time hovering on the edge of mastery? Maybe that is the definition of being a master --> never resting completely, because that would be considered stagnation? Maybe this is what makes a master: the endless flow toward the edge of mastering something but never quite getting there because everything is changing.. the wheel is turning, we are evolving, thus the journey toward mastery is an endless ride of 25/75 success to fail ratios that are eventually ignored because the peace comes in enjoying the journey rather than waiting for the cozy moments of relaxation.

Dreaming of Monkeys....

I had the most amazing dream last night. I was on a spiritual sabbatical in caves in a desert land. There were about a dozen other students in this program with me where we learned everything about magick that was possible: dream guidance, herbalism, healing, spellwork, spirit communication, clairvoyance... it was all there.

I completed the program and as part of the final stage I needed a specific spell that was written in hieroglyphics with a pouch of leaves. I was to use the leaves to chew on (like tobacco) and study the symbols in the spell while the chemicals of the leaves flowed in my bloodstream. This was supposed to teach me my path and what my gift to the Gods and the world would be upon my leaving the program.

Just as the teacher came in with my pouch (they only gave out one at a time to the student who was ready to leave), a tall and pretty girl, who was the typical "popular bitch" from everyone's high school experience, came in and grabbed the pouch out of the teacher's hand and laughed as she said "HA! This is mine now!" I was enraged.

In anger and hurt I ran out of the caves and into the sacred well area where the cave mouths opened out onto a series of cliff edges that spiralled up and down. as I sat at the mouth of a cave looking up at the evening sky I noticed a white baboon sitting about 50 ft above me under a small waterfall. He was smiling and humming to himself as he munched on fruit.

As I watched him my anger dissipated and I smiled as well. He spoke to me without looking at me and asked "Why do you think you need that pouch to be a magician"?
"Because that is the last piece to this training, without it my training is incomplete." I answered.
"What do you think we did before someone created those little pouches with the spell on the inside?" he asked me.
"I don't know," I answered. " What did you do?"
" Well, we measured the leaves ourselves, and the spells were given to us by the Gods and the spirits. What I want to know is why you would choose to rely upon someone else's work when you can create the whole thing yourself?" He said as he smiled up at the pink and purple sky of an evening sunset.
I closed my eyes and sat with his words for a while, and marveled at how narrow minded i had been assuming that without the pouch I was useless. My anger was more at the how little control I felt I had over that horrible woman who stole my pouch, but after he explained it I realized that I had given my power away the second she tried to take it from me.
When I opened my eyes the white baboon was right in front of me, smiling. It would have been a terrifying image to see up close if it wasn't for the deep loving energy that he projected and the wisdom in his eyes.
He chuckled to himself because I jumped a little when I opened my eyes and saw him there. Then he said "If I give you the spell, will you get the herbs yourself and work the magick?"
I nodded.
Then he said " Go and find the herbs, I'll be here when you get back."
So I got up and walked back into the cave. And the master teacher was there, sitting peacefully by a fire. He looked up at me when I walked in and said "I am sorry that you lost your pouch."
I smiled at him and said " It's all right, I don't need it anymore."
When he heard that, he looked shocked for a minute. His expression slowly changed from shock to pleasant understanding.
"You have found a way, haven't you?" He asked. I nodded.
"Yes, we have the leaves, we use them for all kinds of spells." He said. Then he paused and pointed to a wooden shelf along the cave wall, and continued, "There is a big pickle jar full of them over there on the shelf." On hearing that I walked toward the shelf, intent on getting leaves for my spell and going back to the baboon.
Then he warned me, "But you must measure the exact right amount for the final spell."
I took the jar off the wall, and reached inside and pulled out a few fingerfuls of the leaves and looked at them in the palm of my hand. I wondered if I could guess how much of the herb I needed from the size of the pouch that master had brought in hours before. Then I remembered what the baboon asked me:"why would you choose to rely upon someone else's work when you can create the whole thing yourself?". I closed my eyes, felt the leaves between my fingers and rolled them around in my palm. I held my hand over the open mouth of the jar and let some of the leaves fall back into it, and with my eyes still closed felt the weight of the leaves in my hand. It felt right, so I poured the leaves into a small square of paper laying on the shelf, and folded it up.
As I started to walk back out of the cave I noticed that the white baboon had walked into the cave and was sitting on a ledge looking at the rest of the students seated in a circle, discussing lessons. He was smiling at them and seemed happy to see so many people learning together.
One of the students looked up at me, then followed my focus and saw the baboon sitting on the ledge. She shrieked and jumped up, pointing at him. All the other students stood up just as quickly, sending books and papers falling to a jumbled pile on the floor.
A male student picked up a rock and threw it at the baboon. I suddenly realized that they didn't see him the same way that I did and were intent on hurting him. I ran down the small slope toward the ledge where he was sitting and climbed up to put my body between his and the other students.
They shouted at me to move, and threw rocks to scare me off the ledge. I was full of emotions: shock that they would hurt me to get to him, sad because they couldn't see the wisdom in his eyes, worried for his welfare, anxious to get him out of the cave and away from the enraged and frightened students.
From behind me, the baboon said,"What makes you think I'm in danger?"
I turned slightly and looked at him in shock, and then saw him smiling at me.
I realized that again he taught me to stop and examine a situation before I reacted and assumed that my initial perception was the right one.

He jumped down off the ledge, and casually strutted back out onto his ledge at the mouth of the cave. The students shouted behind him and threw rocks, which all fell short of hitting him by feet. I jumped down and followed him out of the cave, dodging rocks as they came in.

Once outside, the night sky was bright blue with millions of stars. In the nights before this one I felt like a small child wrapped in a magick blanket under that sky. Now I felt more like an adventurer whose map was laid out before her in white dots against a blue background. While I stared up at the sky, the baboon asked me "Since you have your leaves, are you ready to learn the spell?"

I pulled my gaze away from the sky that seemed to be calling me to read more and learn more, and looked down into his eyes. He was smiling, still. I was amazed at how peaceful he was, no matter what happened around him he was always smiling. I nodded at him, and sat down in the loose dirt and sand.

He extended a long finger and began to draw swirls and symbols in the dirt. He motioned for me to put the leaves into my mouth and let them dampen with my saliva. He continued to draw, and as he did the herbs started to work on my senses. I began to hear the stars whispering, and the swirls and designs in the dirt moved in front of my eyes. They danced and morphed back and forth between being hard symbols and dancing images of Kokopelli, jackals, and snakes all mocking me and luring me to listen to their trickster words.

I looked up from the symbols in the dirt, and the baboon was gone. He had climbed back up the cliff walls and was now disappearing over the top edge of our mountain. For a moment I was scared without him there to reassure me throughout this journey, then I realized that if I needed him, he'd be there. So I must be ready to make the journey on my own.

I looked back down into the dirt, and the symbols had faded back to the spells original form. And I closed my eyes and saw a setting sun on the ocean, heard a man's voice in my ear singing, and smelled the warm-sweet smell of curried food cooking.

Right before I woke up, I heard the voice say: " There is no single answer, there is only the open heart that takes each step of the journey and allows the moment to unfold before them."

Namaste ~ Let the journey begin with an open heart.

Old woman, old woman, will u do my washing?

The Deaf Woman's Courtship.

Old woman, Old woman will you do my washing?

Speak a little louder sir, I'm very hard of hearing.

Old woman, old woman, will you do my ironing?

Speak a little louder sir, I'm very hard of hearing.

Old woman, old woman, can I come a-courtin'?

Speak a little louder sir, I think I almost heard you.

Old woman, old woman why don't we get married?

Oh my goodness, mercy sakes! Now I really heard you!

These are the lyrics to an old Apalachian folk song. They teach that we hear what we want to hear, and tend to NOT hear what we don't want to hear. It is a gentle, loving reminder that all of us have the tendency to not register things that aren't pleasant or that we want to ignore.

Mercury goes retrograde on the 8th, in Gemini. Mercury is the ruling planet of the sign of Gemini, and they both represent the energies of communication, mundane (daily) tasks, and short distance travel (around town).

With Venus and Mars conjunct in Aries, and square a retrograde Pluto there are also energies that are milling around boundaries, power, and forging ahead... READ: Antsy energies.

I posted the lyrics to the song because there is great power in simple verse that makes people smile while reminding all of us that we are bound by a great equalizer: humanity. So through this equalizer, we learn that we don't always hear what was said, we don't always say what we mean, and as such we must smile and try again.

Who's Dream is This?

In my mind's eye I keep seeing a house with beautiful, hard wood floors that are shiny. They reflect the twinkle lights that adorn the bannister of a long stair case, the red velvet ribbons, and a string of gold and silver beads that are woven into lush green garland. I hear jazz holiday music in the background, and when I look around the corner of a double doorway into a living room there is a huge tree with packages under it that are wrapped in silver and gold wrapping with big bows on them all.

The house smells of baking turkey, and the kitchen is full of people who are each working on part of a big meal. In another room I can hear a chorus of cheers as some sports team scores, followed by laughter.

I stand in the hallway of the first floor of this house, it's warm inside and it's snowing outside. I feel the energy, a bit of tension here and there which is a natural part of life, but also alot of love. Everyone who is here together WANTS to be here. They all love each other to varying degrees. Each of them struggles from time to time to declare their own independence and individuality, but no so much that they'd ever be unwelcome in this place. Everyone knows that everyone else is at a different stage of life, but somehow we're all together and happy no matter what stage we're at.

I hear dog nails on the floor, and a big fluffy dog waddles around the corner from the kitchen where it's been patiently waiting for crumbs to fall. He comes and sits down next to me as I sit down on the bottom of a long staircase. I wonder if anyone else adores this feeling as much as I do. I wonder if anyone else even notices how much the energy changes, thickens, and settles on all of us like a warm blanket of protection when we're together.

I hear a little voice, a little girl's voice asking for something sweet. I realize that no one is really paying attention to JUST her, but instead we are all kind of watching her together. Since I'm not cooking right now, I start to get up and go to her to give her some attention. She gets what she asked for and runs off to play with the other kids in the house. They're older than she is, but they don't mind her being here. She's part of the family and as such can come and play with everyone else.

I hear a car in the driveway, struggling to get up the hill a little, skidding. It stops and then tries again and this time getting up to the top of the driveway and parking. I hear the men in the other room shout as they realize who is in the car, and they all leave the game and run out into the snow to greet the person in the car. He hasn't been home in a few years, and when he comes home like this, he makes everything more fun for the guys. They'll be up in the den all night now, drinking and telling stories. In the morning, the women will come downstairs to start making breakfast for all of these people, and they'll all be snoring away until Noon.

I will be out in town tomorrow, shopping for more supplies because we don't have refridgerator space to stock up for this many people. There is nothing like the feeling of shopping for food for your house when you know it's full of people who will all be sitting down eating together. Tomorrow night's meal will be something special, because my husband ordered a special cut of beef that has been marinating for two days.

I feel whole, alive, and connected. I feel like I am successful but in a way that can't be measured by tangible things, but more through the smiles that I see, the resting faces that I see at the end of a good meal, and the tender gestures and words that each person exchanges with each other when they think that no one is watching.

Is this my future? Or some past that I've inherited from someone else who never got this but wanted it so badly that they passed it on to me? As I pass through a time when my Mercury is opposed by Neptune, I wonder how much of what I'm seeing and feeling is coming through the veils, and how much of it is my connection with my higher self.

Of Frogs and Rabbits..

We hear frogs and it is a sign of spring.
Some say that the song of the frog brings rain, others that frogs are the bearers of healing energies.
We see rabbits and the essence of spring settles over us. Their silent entry into an open field seems like a natural ballet between the fiery energies of survival and growth and the chaos of an open universe making room for an expansive dance to ensue.

I notice the energies of the seasons more and more every year. I am comforted by them as I feel more deeply and recover more slowly from deeply emotional experiences. The turning of the wheel is the metaphor for how a witch sees the progression of time and the earth's changes that ensue. It is also a symbol for how humans are affected by what each of these seasons represents. Spring is a rising of energy, warmth, and hope. Our focus changes and turns to the things inspired by frogs and rabbits. We "sing" for the rains to come and water in our seeds, for the sun to rise earlier every day so we have more natural light to cheer our hearts, and for the quiet of a warm night to embrace us at the end of hard day of work. Like rabbits we creep out into the wide expanse of the universe looking and listening for signs to go ahead, listening for signs that our path ahead is safe and clear.

Of frogs and rabbits, of singers and listeners, of spring and the passing of winter I write and I celebrate. For no one place on the wheel is more sacred than another, but no one place is as hopeful and full of wonder as the time of frogs and rabbits, the time of spring.

Getting on the road of life...

I notice that as I grow older, I tend to avoid certain stretches of the road. To clearly define this metaphor: the road of life is the place where our daily activities take place from when we get up to when we finally fall asleep.

I notice that there are patches of the road that I tend to avoid without really even pondering what I'm missing. Last night's un-game with the Sox taught me that.

As I sat in a rainy Fenway stadium in a plastic bag with Red Sox logos on it I realized that happiness is about what is perceived and nurtured in a situation rather than anything else. I was damp, cold, and happy even though NO game was going on, and it didn't look like one was going to happen.

The reason I avoid these areas of the road is that I have convinced myself that the trouble that it takes to go over them isn't worth the experiences that lie within that time. I am wrong in that... there are great experiences on those patches of road even though they're rough.

Being wet, drinking coffee, and talking about the Red Sox in Fenway Stadium is an experience that I will remember for a long time. Mostly because I loved being around all those people who love baseball, who didn't care that we were getting soaked, and who WANTED to see the Sox play. I felt like we had better things to focus on than whether or not we were in the rain, and it felt good.

So my lesson this week is to re-examine the parts of the road in my daily life that I avoid and see if there are other good experiences in there to learn.

Ashe Mercury.

Venus Retrograde, and how magick changes us...

Venus is the planet in our natal charts that indicates how we relate to loving relationships, but also how we view beauty and the other experiences in our lives that "feed our hearts".

With Venus being retrograde the energies "above" (from the phrase: as above, so below) are supportive of our working on our inner truths around beauty, love, and nurturing our hearts.

For example: I tend to allow alot of things to go by me for the sake of not being judged as being high maintenance. One of the little things that bothers me is when my family drinks out of cans or bottles instead of glasses. Now, in the grand scheme of things that is a *very small* issue. But during Venus retrograde I noticed how many *small issues* were being overlooked and how it was making me feel about my immediate world. So I spoke up and asked them to try to use glasses.

This kind of thing exemplifies how Venus Retrograde can affect our relationships, our daily lives, and our views of ourselves. We have a great opportunity right now to note the details of our lives that have stripped us of the beautiful things we could be experiencing. *more on this*

Of course, there are always dozens of other astrological energies that are at work at any given time, so focusing solely on Venus being retrograde as the cause for things happening in your life or your relationships isn't a good idea.

However, using the Venus Retrograde energies to fuel small changes, tuning the world around you to be more beautiful, and honoring your inner voice with regards to how you nurture yourself are a good investment of these energies.

We are either moved to USE these energies, or they will move us to do things with them without our permission.

Sway with me...

Love is about saving... yourself, your lover, your heart, your patience, your endless imagination. What is it about dancing with someone that you love that seems to defy all other forms of expression? Even if you're just swaying to a song that you love, there is something so intimate and powerful about being wrapped around each other and wrapped up in each other's arms moving to a beat simultaneously that makes life's troubles seem like they're a million miles away.
I read, digest, journal, and review all the pieces of life that I've taken in thus far on my path of being a woman and a Priestess and there are aspects of love that still just facinate me.

I think that is why Love is such an endless facinating subject for me. Loving ourselves, loving someone else, loving children-parents-siblings-friends.. it truly IS the most powerful force in the universe.

What else can take something that looks a little silly and mushy without music, and turn it into a powerful experience with a little music and some deep felt emotion?

What is romance when we boil it down? It is the feeling of warmth that rises in your chest when you think about how you feel around a certain person, and how that person feels when they're around you! It is about taking the simple and the mundane and turning it into an artistic expression of emotion.

Whether I am dancing, singing, or just listening to the music that reminds me of Kevin I still smile. Even if I'm angry at him, wish he lived miles away from me, or am dreading going home to deal with him -- I can listen to certain music and remember dancing with him and smiling so much that my face hurt. I can remember the look in his eyes when he was coaxing me out onto a dance floor as an expression of how much he loves me, a little mischevious, a little loving, and always fun.

So I save... I save my best energy for our times together.
I save my best words and my most creative self for the projects that we do together.
I save the precious, tenderest parts of my secret joys for him to see and experience.
Love is about saving, it's about sharing what you want with others.. but saving the best for that one person who makes you feel like whatever you are, however you are, you are the most valuable person in the world to them.

Magick flows like water following our emotions, feeling our way through the winding paths of darkened woods that are the days and nights of our lives.. love gives us courage to keep going and to face the untold dangers that we imagine to be right around every corner. Magick is love, and love is magick.. magick for yourself is echoed your love for yourself, magick for others is echoed in the love that you feel for them or for those who are sacred to them, and magick for the world is service to the Gods via serving humanity.

But remember, that you are the sacred vessel of magick and thus are always deserving of pleasure and love yourself so save the best for yourself to ensure that you are always in the best possible state.