Visioning: A New Year of Possibilities

Great site to talk about gathering seeds

Happy New Year.

T and I went down to the garden one more time.  Monday they plan on plowing everything under.  We spent a good two hours picking green tomatoes, peppers, dill and dug up carrots and turnips.  We cut the arugula and lettuce for a last week of salad.  I went around cutting dried cosmos, zinnias and marigolds – seeds for next year.

The sky was over casted and the wind picked up.   It took me half a book of matches to get the incense lit.  This happened back in April when we started planting….  The wind made the smoke rise in little spirals.  One more time I thanked the garden and then turned and walked away.  It’s hard to say goodbye, but I know this isn’t the end.  The flower seeds tell something different.

A gardener knows this season is needed.  It isn’t final, but a part of a never ending pattern.  The gardener knows this death is necessary to bring about a successful harvest next year.  Everyone needs a rest – even the dirt and the spirits.

~#~

"When we realize the extent of the myriad interconnections which link us to all other life, we realize that our existence only becomes meaningful through interaction with, and in relation to, others." ~ Buddha

~#~

This past year I’ve been reading from many of my old friends.  Authors who I found tucked away in my bookshelf.  I’ve discovered new nuances in their writings – a “Mary Poppins Factor” so to speak.  I’m amazed at what I missed the last time I read the texts.  Specifically, how essential it is to see a goal completed – even those goals which seem overwhelming like seeing a world where everyone is fed, everyone feels safe, or everyone shows empathy for their neighbor. 

In Dreaming the Dark, Starhawk talks about the interconnected principle.  Meaning – nothing on this earth or universe exists in isolation.  We are all linked together.  If one changes we all changes.  When talking about dreams and goals – these won’t come to fruition if we don’t do some work.  This work includes seeing the goal completed and saying and doing one concrete thing.  An individual who does this changes themselves energetically and this causes everything else to change due to the interconnected principle.

As a gardener, I can hold the seeds in my hand and easily can picture the flowers blooming next summer.  Seeing people not in need of food pantries, I admit this is something I struggle wrapping my mind around.  And, maybe this is one of the reasons why energetically speaking hunger, domestic violence or any social justice issue is hard to tackle.  We can’t see it and we all have different ideas on how to begin.

I keep going back to Starhawk’s book and the interconnected principle.  If we each set a goal to do one small thing; “we make a change in relationship in which we take part” (44).  I might not be able to see the ending of hunger, but I can help hand out food or grow tomatoes to share in my garden.  I can see this and I can do this.  This in turns helps transform the energy around me. 

~#~

Activity

New Year Goals to help change my world

Make a list of 3 things you could do to change the status quo energy of exploitation, pollution and destruction.

1. In 2013, I will grow nine tomato plants strictly for the food pantry.
2. On Earth Day 2013, I will participate in my community’s activity of cleaning up a corner.
3. During Sexual Assault Awareness Month – April 2013, I will post daily on facebook information about promoting healthy relationships.

River of Souls by Dan Fogelberg

 

 

Storytellers, Singers, Poets and Bards

The Boyhood of Raleigh by Sir John Everett Milais 1870, Tate London

“How impressionable and vulnerable we are in the faith of a single story.” ~ Chimamanda Adichie

“If stories come to you, care for them. And learn to give them away where they are needed. Sometimes a person needs a story more than food to stay alive. “ ~ Barry Lopez, in Crow and Weasel

“It takes a thousand voices to tell a single story.” ~ Native American saying

“In seeking truth you have to get both sides of a story.” ~ Walter Cronkite

~#~

I like a good storyteller, singer, poet or bard (I’ll refer to now as storyteller).  A day off from work in the winter equates to snuggling up in an afghan with my nose in a book.  And that dreaded housework, blast some good songs out and it seems to get my mind off scrubbing the tub.  Every culture has someone who has these gifts that go beyond entertainment.  This person is able to manipulate their medium to instill moral lessons and provide inspiration to move us beyond what we are.  A good storyteller makes you say: what if or I can do that or how can I change the world?

One thing I have enjoyed this past year is reading all the blogs on the Pagan Blog Project.  Each person has been my guide in shaping my journey towards the Light.  Each has continued to challenge me to review my personal truth and stories and most often changing my perspective in how I live magically.  The Pagan Blog Project has allowed me to hear multiple stories from different and the same faith tradition.  Each is a piece of the puzzle or a beautiful square in a quilt to wrap around myself.

I think it is human nature to want one way of knowing – a single story to hang our witch’s (name your faith) hat on. I believe it’s very easy to resist hearing others’ ways of seeing holy and spiritual even when you are practicing the same faith tradition.  When we do this, I believe we’re ending up with an incomplete story.  Our story becomes one dimensional and dulled as we look through our single lens.  And, ultimately what winds up happening is discord and lack of respect for those who have a different story because we are in The Only Truth zone – us versus them.  I believe our experience is flattened by this dependency of having one story or one recipe for the truth. 

I recently read the minutes of a spirituality group I’m part of.  I’m not able to attend many meetings due to being a soccer mother and going to college.  I was very saddened to hear a person who offered to teach for the evening was disrespected.  The teacher was presenting an element of his practice.   Apparently, there was a lot of heckling and jeering to make him lose his train of thought.  The more I read the minutes; I felt the audience was caught up in their single lens story and not opened to hearing something new.

I’m guilty of immersing myself in a single story.  I tend to fall back to my favorite books and authors that started my journey.  The same can be said on the Pagan Blog Project.  I’ve found myself leaning to the familiar – specifically looking at what my age group is saying and those with similar practices.  When I have caught myself doing this – with purpose I get on the home page and read subject matter that I’m not familiar with.  I have discovered ideas that I are strengthening my magical living - such as learning about Norse faith, seeing Goddess symbols out in nature, learning more about herbs, or learning new ways to celebrate the holidays. 

Activity:

Pick a spiritual subject and read three different blogs about the subject.

Go to a meet-up on a spiritual topic and be open to learn something new.