Blessed Eastre, Blessed Ostara, and Happy Spring.

Dear Reader,

To my friends in the Filianic and Déanic communities, I wish you a happy Eastre. To my Wiccan and other pagan friends who celebrate it, I wish you a happy Ostara. And to everyone else, I wish you a happy spring. I'm a little late with my post because I have been somewhat under the weather. I've been hard at work also on prepping books for you.

The newest revision of Rose Petals is up on Amazon. I chose to publish through the Kindle Direct Publishing platform because it is more compatible with everyone's chosen e-readers. There is a paperback version also available but I think the e-book is going to be the first choice. These are slightly more expensive than if I had gone through Lulu but the quality and ease of access makes up for it. This revision contains the 'songs' that I had been writing over the last several months.

The first volume of my ritual book series is up as an e-book. The paperback is still under review. When it goes live, I'll post the link to it. The first volume of the series focuses on Filianic centered rituals and rites. The first half of the book is focused on personal devotional practices. The second is a guide for public rituals and proposed rites for things like tending sacred space. The book is rounded out with a partial book of hours.

I am still working on a full book of hours for the Filianic community. I know that we have people who work a really wide range of schedules. As such, they may not be awake at dawn to pray the prayers for the hour of Aurora but they may be up in the late hours of the night to pray the prayers of Vigil or Matins. I honestly can't say when I am going to have the book of hours completed. It's proving to be a particularly challenging writing task. It will be published through Amazon.

The next volume of the ritual book series is currently in vague draft stage. It will be focused upon Wiccan centered rituals and rites. These books are intended to be a starting point for building ones own rituals and creating a body of work focused upon fostering greater devotional practices and spiritual welfare in the community.

The problem with precognition.

Dear Reader,

Perhaps you have experienced precognition. Maybe you're not familiar with this term for a very common experience. It is also known as déjà vu which comes from French and means 'to have seen before'. It is perhaps the most common of psychic experiences.

There's one wee problem with precognition. Context is always hard to pin down. You may have a very vivid dream and it includes details that you later see in your waking life. The trick is, knowing that precognition is about to happen and what it means is two very different things. It may be as simple as watching a pencil roll off your desk at work in the exact way you dreamed about it happening two nights before. It may be a gut feeling that something is about to happen and then watching that pencil roll off the desk. In both cases, however, you're left wondering what's the meaning behind the pencil falling off the desk?

Sometimes precognition is just random and you're not going to find a pattern in it. Other times, there is a distinct pattern that you only recognize after the fact. I think that when precognition happens with a pattern, your subconscious mind is trying desperately to warn you of something but your conscious mind is scrambling the message before it gets through.

I think that our subconscious mind has incredible capacities beyond what we really are aware of. Precognition is but one example of that untapped potential. It is my experience that keeping a dream journal helps facilitate communication between the conscious and unconscious mind. And at times, that helps me figure out when the pencil rolling off of the desk is a warning of something big about to happen in my life. But, there are times when the pencil rolling off the desk is just a psychic sound check to make sure all systems are functioning. Thus, I keep a record of my psychic experiences so that I can identify patterns and use those patterns to predict future patterns as they emerge.

I've had some success with it. I can't claim that I'm going to get the winning lotto numbers. But I can say that I have had success avoiding household messes because my precognition warned me a pot was about to boil over. Given that this was with the stove that had issues with trying to light itself on fire, perhaps that bit of precognition was enough to keep another fire incident from happening. (That stove has long since been replaced and the current one is far superior. We still keep two fire extinguishers in the kitchen because I'm mildly paranoid.)

But, keep a log, track patterns, and maybe you'll find your precognition is actually useful from time to time. And always listen to your intuition.

Moura Accountability Post 3

Dear Reader,

It is hard not to be discouraged by how my hard work cleaning is unraveling all around me. I despair that all of my cleaning will be perpetually for naught because my children are so busy and forget to put things away after they're done with them. I have been spending more time in prayer than in the recent past. It has been chanting the name of Dea with a rosary of 100 beads. It helps quiet the anxiety that I have been feeling.

I am steadily making progress on this manuscript. I am nearing completion of the final round of edits. I am hopeful that this book will be helpful but ultimately its fate lies in the hand of Dea, she who directed me to write it. And she has yet more work for me. I feel under qualified, but I am attempting to keep my anxiety in check as I work.

Despite the bitter weather we have had over the last week, I have been getting in daily walking. I'm not hitting my yoga goals but it's been hard going on that one. The arthritis makes even the simple positions painful. Add in a couple of old injuries acting up because of the cold and it's been hard to do more than 5 to 7 minutes of it on a given day. I suppose that counts as getting at least some yoga time in, but my goal is a minimum of 15 minutes. I'm rather discouraged and disappointed with myself on this matter.

I am still somewhat depressed. It is my hope that with the weather improving and there being more sunlight during the day, my mood will improve. My health hasn't been the best because I keep catching colds. I have a voice that sounds rather like a frog's hoarse croak. Hence the lack of videos. Difficulties seem to be circling around my family and it makes me anxious. When the neighbor starts having problems with their ceiling and you're in the same building, you can't help but eye your own ceiling with suspicion, you know?

Vintage Veiling: Lacy Fascinator notes.

Dear Reader,

I've been wrestling with that darn pattern. Changing hook sizes and yarn sizes in an attempt to get the fabric to open up into that 'lacy' look that it has on the original pattern images. I have also tried really aggressive blocking. I am forced to admit defeat. Apparently this requires a yarn that is no longer in production for me to get this to work out right. I've tried everything I've got from baby yarn to gauge ten thread. Nothing works up in to a lace pattern. Only thing that came close to it was when I made the mistake on my last attempt and I was working moss stitch and a variation through out the whole thing. But that was too much openwork for it to have the look it was supposed to.

So, I have frogged this project multiple times and decided that I am going to move on to a different pattern from the vintage crochet site. The only yarn I haven't used is my handspun but that is because it is even finer than the cotton thread. In my frustration right now, I have moved on to a simple triangular kerchief pattern and am expanding it into a triangular shawl. This is something I can do with out wanting to throw the whole project across the room.

The kerchief pattern is on Ravelry. It's just a basic top down double crochet triangle with a button fastening once it is large enough to fit comfortably on your head.

Spinning Magic (3/3)

In my first and second posts in this triad, I discussed the mechanics of how to spin yarn with intention. I even gave a few examples of how I use the yarn that I have spun with intention. This post, I'm going to talk a little bit about the historical aspects of spinning magic in world folklore and mythology. Pretty much every ancient culture of the world has deities who are spinners. Many of them are associated with fate and wisdom.

The spinners of antiquity are as diverse as their descendants. The magical folklore surrounding spinning is equally diverse. The Norns of Norse and Germanic mythology are the beings who spin out, measure, and cut our life thread. Frigga is the goddess who spins with the clouds in high Asgard. Freyja, goddess of love and war, holds out her spindle and thread over the married couple to bind them together in matrimony. The Valkyries weave war upon their mighty loom with the sinew and innards of humanity as their warp and woof. Hulda is a goddess of spinning who is also a matron of childbirth and who receives the souls of deceased infants and children, also a mistress of the Wild Hunt. All of this comes from but one cultural region. There is yet more that has been lost to antiquity.

When spinning, one may bind their intentions, dreams, and essence into the thread they are working. When creating with said thread, one may work weal or woe against others. A weaver may influence battles, it is said, by the tying of knots and the loosening of them. Same could be said for other handcrafts using yarn, thread, and string. It is all a matter of focused intention directed by will upon a target. This is the root of all magic. The action taken to provide that focus varies. Spinning is but one of many actions that can be the focal point of magical work. It happens to be one of the most ancient ones in the world.

So, what's all this 'Moura' stuff about anyways?

Dear Reader,

Moura is the fifth season and thirteenth month of the Filianic calendar. It is the time where one focuses upon practicing self-discipline and growing in faith, much like the Christians do during their holy season of Lent. Unlike Lent, Moura is not a time for the mortification of the flesh. The focus is upon preparation for the coming spring and the holy mysteries of Eastre.¹  It is a time where cleaning and purification is a focus both within the home and for the practitioner.

It is a time that many work on resolutions to improve themselves. I am personally working on deep cleaning my home and improving my self-care habits. I am working on establishing a daily exercise practice and getting back into daily yoga. This is an exercise in discipline and self-improvement. It is also an example of how Moura is different from Lent. Many who practice Lent focus on denial of the body and the denial of the pleasures of life as a function of this.

Moura does not call for us to deny the pleasures of life but to refrain from over-indulgence. Moura calls for us to be disciplined in our consumption of pleasure to be more keenly aware of it and the blessing that it is. Moura is not, however, a festival of delights. It is a generally solemn time because of the holy mysteries of Eastre.

The Daughter aspect of Dea journeys into the underworld and suffers trials and humiliation before dying. This is a journey that she takes willingly and surrenders her immortal divinity by joining us within the incarnate world, by becoming mortal. We must remember that the reason for her doing so is the fact that it is necessary so that Dea's light might reach into all hidden places and all souls be liberated from the cycles of suffering that goes with cycles of reincarnation. It is for our sake that Dea herself descends into the world and dies.

While this is a thing that is both wonderous and terrible, we must be aware that it is necessary. It is out of respect for the Daughter's journey and ordeals that Moura is solemn. It is out of grief for the coming death of Dea that Moura is solemn. And it is out of grief for the necessity of it all that Moura is solemn.

Now, the solemnity of Moura is relieved at Med Moura (which is in a few days) and this gives the faithful a moment of reprieve from their solemn observances. They who are abstaining from pleasures may take Med Moura as a day to celebrate the pleasures of life with gratitude. Med Moura is also the feast day of the Janyati who are closest to representing the three aspects of Dea. Thus, Sai Raya (the janya who is like the Bright Mother, Marya), Sai Candré (the janya who is like the Daughter, Anna), and Sai Rhavë (the janya who is like the Dark Mother, Deam Mysterium) are honored this day. This is also the day that mothers, creative people, and people of spiritual mastery are honored within orthodox Filianic communities.

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1. I use the British spelling of Easter to distinguish it for my fellow USA readers from the typical Easter which is culturally dominated by the Christian mythos of Easter. They're pronounced the same. I don't use Ostara because the Filianic community uses Eastre and their celebrations and observances are different from most communities that use the term Ostara.