Post-Spirits of the Earth Festival 2011

Well it's certainly been a while since I've updated this blog. I had promised myself I was going to keep it up to date but I have fallen behind again. Blessed Aphrodite's titties! It's been more than a month since I've posted on here! A lot has been going on so I've got a lot to catch up on. I'll get the book/quest/challenges-related things done before I get onto the fun topics:

1. Meditation - I've been having fun with meditation over the passed month, I haven't kept up with the daily meditations but I do take the time to ground and center before I get out of bed every morning, and I try to meditate throughout the day as I think of it. I've got to get back into doing my daily yoga/t'ai chi routines now that I'm home from Fest for the summer.

2. Aphrodite's Magic - Saturnine and I did the second chord - the eye of beauty - a bit early last month because she was going to be in town and it was kind of one of those things you had to do together, since skype wasn't really a viable option for full-body-viewing and beauty seeking. It was very interesting as far as experiences go - we went to the mall and sat down in the food court and watched women walk by. We noted what beauty we could see outwardly, what we liked about each woman as she was walking by; then we looked for the Goddess in each woman and what type of Goddess energy they were giving off specifically. After we had lunch and did this exercise we went back to my house and did the final part of the ritual, where we looked at each other and found the beauty in each other and ourselves. My second cord (which I still have to buy since I'm slacking here majorly) is going to be a burgundy, wine coloured cord, the word to describe my beauty was, and the name of my cord was, wine. My goddess energy was like that of the sun, bright and happy, but the wine colour and name makes me think of the party goddesses, or if there was a female version of Dionysus.
Anyways, now it is almost time for the third chord so I need to get back on track and buy that 2nd cord before I move on to the third one!

3. The Earth Path - I have been reading this, slowly but surely, and I believe I am on the 5th or 6th chapter of it, in which Starhawk is talking about 'Air', I didn't feel like I had anything to say about the 'Creation' chapter which is where she was discussing evolution and such, so I didn't blog about it, and I got behind on reading it when I started getting ready to go to Fest and completely forgot I owned a purse (which is where my book was) while I was at Fest, so I need to pick that back up and get back into it.

4. Mind/Body/Spirit/Home - Well I started out really strong in this, I was reading a little bit every day for Mind; doing Yoga/T'ai Chi and eating healthily for Body; meditating or contemplating some spiritual thing every day for Spirit; and doing laundry, cleaning my room or cooking dinner for my parents and I for Home. Then I kept forgetting one of the four tasks, or I got sidetracked by packing that I forgot to do yoga, and then I was at fest, where it was all about 'mind, body, spirit', but my tent was a mess so I did horribly at 'home' .... now I'm home and I'm just so exhausted that I have yet to get back into this. But it's only Tuesday and I got home Sunday afternoon, so I will be getting back into this today.

Okay I think that's all I needed for housekeeping on the various challenges, so now on to my experience at Spirits of the Earth Festival 2011!

So first off - BEST YEAR YET! *happy dance* Alright so now that I've gotten that off my chest, it was a really great time. Nick and I went together to Spirits this year, we drove up in 'my' car, all our stuff fit into the car perfectly, since we only had one of everything except for our clothes and shoes. We got along fantastically, no bickering, we were joking and having a good time like the whole week. When we got there, we set up the tent first and then brought everything over to get it all set up in campsite formation. We were camping in this one clearing on the trail to the revel fire, between the two bridges. If you think of it like a quadrant graph, we were in the lower right quadrant of the circle, Momo showed up with a 10-person-tent for himself and took up the entire upper right quadrant; Cally and Ro; Jacqui and Lindsay; Tom; Lisa and Monica; Tovah; Lindsay; and Mike in order around the circle from lower left quadrant up to upper left quadrant took over the other side of the circle with the path running a little closer to the right side than dead center of the graph. ( | ) if you had to draw it out. [*laughs* Gods I'm neurotic sometimes] Anyways, we set up camp and then went off to explore. Still had to cross the rickety-freaking-rope-bridge to get to the revel fire and back to camp, which when you're drunk/baked, is REALLY creepy and it seems to go on forever, like the hallway in The Shining.
The first night, Tuesday, was a big drinking party where they had the 13 Mountain Mystery Brews set up so everyone got to try them and mostly everyone got REALLY drunk! Then there was karaoke! Oh gods it was hilarious and bad at the same time. Nick was in his kilt (actually he pretty much wore the kilt the whole time - it was nice *wink wink*) and was drunkenly dancing around talking in a weird Irish/Scottish accent. It was most hilarious.
Wednesday night was Water Night, which was pretty fun, however the energy wasn't quite as powerful as I remember from previous years, but it was the first night, so it was just getting off it's feet and started to get going.
Thursday was Earth Night, which should've been ridiculously energetic, but they had a Dionysus ritual going on before the revel fire and elemental tribute, so the energy and drummers got divided between rituals and it basically fizzled out as badly as if it had poured down rain again like it did last year.
Friday was Air Night, which in my opinion was the revel with the most energy since it was when the Dragon Ritual Drummers helped us do a voodoo ritual to bless the fire and the festival for another 8 years. Not to mention we also had this amazing band do a concert beforehand, called Frenchy and the Punk (formerly known as The Gypsy Nomads) and they really got the energy in the place going prior to the voodoo blessing ritual. The Air tribute was also really awesome, and Ro started running around and acting like a wood sprite, hiding behind trees staring at people and then running through the crowd to the other side of the circle. It was hilarious to watch and pretty much perfectly described the energy of the night.
Saturday was Fire Night where we had the DRD playing their concert of the night and the Fire elemental tribute, which had lots of dancing (pagan rotisserie dance or you get scorched by the fire!) and drumming and high energy.

It was a lot of fun and having Nick there with me to flirt and dance with, sit in the camp chairs in the afternoon and read books while listening to the open mic workshop come down on the breeze, cuddle up to at night and talk about everything with. It was a blast and I do believe it was my best fest yet, and I've been coming to Spirits of the Earth every summer for 3 years now. I missed having Saturnine with me to be all wisdom and pagan mama-y with me and make me go to the workshops, but I also liked the chilling out and not attending workshops too. I was sad that David Ellis-Barron and Justin Burk were unable to be with us this year due to their passing away, but I swear I saw them out of the corner of my eye around the festival (walking in the woods, dancing and drumming around the fire) throughout the week, and I felt their spirits there with us.

All in all it was a great fest experience, I met a LOT of new friends, had a fun week away from the city and enjoyed myself thoroughly, but I am glad to be home now, as I'm tanned and exhausted from being outside all the time. It was great to get away, but I'm glad to be home now.

Well that's all I have for now, and I will post again when I get further into the Earth Path book, and when Saturnine and I do the third cord later in the week for the full moon.

Blessed Be!

Jade

Confessions of a Pagan Soccer Mom: Domestic Witchery: Hestia 101

Confessions of a Pagan Soccer Mom: Domestic Witchery: Hestia 101: "The Hestia Tapestry 'Hestia full of Blessings' Photo: From 1945 book Documents of Dying Paganism There are many, many domestic deities from..."

This is a really good informative blog if any ye who follow me wish to learn about domestic magic and goddesses.

The Earth Path: Chapter 3 - The Sacred

The subtitle of this chapter is called "Earth-centered Values" and I think that it's a really great chapter if you can keep all the concepts in order in your mind. There is a lot of metaphysical talk, with the differences and similarities of 'Consciousness, Energy and Form', 'How Energy Moves', 'Form and Matter' and how the choices we makes effect the world in the short term and the long term perspective in the whole, the environment/world/and individual ecosystems.

I have really loved this book so far, and I'm happy to finally get to the 'activities' portion of this book. So here goes, my first activity:

The Sacred Intention

What is Sacred to me? My most sacred things revolve around the natural world, and how we were meant to live off the land, taking care of it and it takes care of us in return. Secondly would be intrinsic value of all living things - plants, animals, the very land we live on, and ourselves. Thirdly would be self-worth/self-esteem and health of myself and my family/friends.

What do I care about so strongly that I couldn't stand to see it compromised or destroyed? I see all of the above things as interrelated or connected as a sort of chain reaction, stemming from the health of the natural world. Since if the earth becomes polluted it compromises the health of all the things living on it, which can kill them and/or lessen their intrinsic value. So my utmost sacred 'thing' would be the natural world, or the Earth herself.

What would I take a stand for? I would and do take a stand for the health of the Earth and those living beings that live upon her. I protest the genetic modification and monoculture in today's agricultural world; the biotechnology in our food production and the mistreatment of animals in order to produce food faster for greater profit. I spend the extra money when possible to buy organic produce and I grow my own veggies, fruits and herbs to be able to take part in the natural cycle of growth and producing food for my household and those of my friends whom I gift my extra tomatoes and such to.

What would I risk myself for? I would risk myself in order to protect the natural world for future generations. If I were in an area that was experiencing clear cutting, I would probably be one of those protestors who lived in the massive redwood in order to stop it's being cut down, or chained themselves to the tree to stop the bulldozers from destroying a natural habitat.

Consider for a moment what the world would be like if our social, political and economic systems all cherished what is most sacred to you. In what ways do they already? There are a number of communities all over the world who are already working to support natural agricultural techniques like that of the indigenous peoples who originally worked their lands, organic farms are springing up all over Canada and the USA, not to mention Australia and New Zealand. The Green Party of Canada finally after almost 30 years, got it's first seat in the Federal Government! Organic alternatives are available for almost everything in grocery stores across the developed countries of the world, so people can make the choice to buy organic and support sustainable living.

In what ways would they need to change? Factory farms need to shut down altogether, or change their practices so that the animals are given a better life while they are alive, workers need to be paid a living wage rather than barely enough to live on, let alone reach the poverty line or get above it. Biotech/Genetic Modification/Monoculture and chemical inputs need to stop and revert back to biodiversity, organic/natural seed and inputs so that we stop polluting our food. "Green" Political parties need to get more seats in the parliament/senate so that we can hear what they are saying in the nation's ears and make the necessary changes to fix the damage we've caused and live sustainable lives. Food would cost a bit more at the grocery stores because people are doing things the natural way, but in turn, people could grow their own food to save on money that they would be spending on products they could grow themselves (local/indigenous fruit and veggies)

What would change, in your daily life? In your community? In the world around you? Can you describe that world in a few sentences or paragraphs? My daily life would probably involve getting up earlier, having a purpose for my day, having more chores and 'To-do-list" items which would involve more gardening or seasonal outdoor care-taking activities. Laundry soap and other household products would be produced by myself and washing the laundry would either be run via solar-energy or by hand, and air-dried on the line outside in the heat of the day. Canning/preserves would be used throughout the winter so that I could still be eating my own produce, cooking techniques would change so that I would minimize waste and what waste I did have would be composted so as to produce natural fertilizer for my gardens come spring and summer. In the community and the world around me there would be more of a true sense of community, of those interconnecting webs that link us all together. People would be more generous with their time, skills and produce, you could use the trade/barter system in real life and not just in a bazaar atmosphere because these changes would mean that a person is not measured just by the amount of money she has in her bank account, but by the skills and produce they have to offer. The world would stop focusing on collecting and hording wealth in the developing countries, and would spread it around so that no one had to live in poverty and die of easily curable diseases because a few people wanted to live like kings.

Do you want to bring that world into being? In a way, I do want to bring this into being, because I think that if people could see beyond their bank account balance to their real worth and marvel at the things they can do with their own hands, they would get a true feeling of success out of their lives. If they saw their fellow man not as someone to compete against to gain the most profit out of their lives, but as someone to share a common meal, celebrate a milestone in their lives, and grow old supporting each other, not only would everyone contribute to society, but they would get more out of their lives than we do in today's society as it is now. But I also realize that this smacks of socialism and communist ways, and we all know what happens when something works out perfectly on paper and someone tries to apply it to real life. It rarely ends well.

Do you feel responsible toward it? I think that if we could actually make people see the truth of what is happening to the Earth and how much damage we are doing to the delicate balance of the world, and take from it the true results that we are heading towards (ie. death and destruction of all life on the planet) that maybe people might get it into their minds and truly into their hearts that they need to make a serious effort in order to effect enough change to reverse our damage to permit our continued existence upon the Earth, then maybe my 'ideal world' might just work. I do feel responsible at least in part for the massive damage we've done to the Earth and I do truly want to change the way I live in order to stop my damage and help reverse it, but I don't know if it will work without a large-scale paradigm shift in modern society.

Now consider how you spend your time and energies. Are your best energies directed toward bringing about your cherished vision of the world? Toward service of what is sacred to you? For the most part - probably not. I get so wrapped up in the daily grind - laundry, school, trying to find a job, etc - that I lose sight of the bigger picture. Most of the time I'm not the one who does groceries in my household, so they go for what's cheaper, not what's better for the environment (hell I had a fight with my mom in Costco the other day about buying biodegradable laundry soap and softener to help out with the environment and lost so how much can I really expect to affect their food choices?) But I do take care of the gardens at my house, I tend and weed and talk my dad out of using pesticide on the trees, and other things like air drying laundry instead of using the electric dryer, and turning off the lights when my mom leaves them on perpetually when leaving the room, burning candles in my room instead of having the big ceiling fan/light on. Trying to keep the AC off and just open the windows on a breezy, less humid day, or at least keeping the number not so drastic so that it feels like winter inside in the middle of the summer. I do a lot of little things to try to make a difference in the bigger picture, even if I can't scale a redwood, name her Molly and live in her for years to prevent clear cutting of the forest.

What do you need to be able to make that change? Support? Opportunity? Courage? Luck? Who can you turn to for support, in the human world? In the larger realms of the universe? In order to make that change I would need to have a job where I could do something I am interested in, which can help benefit my change - I'm in school for Massage Therapy now, which uses my hands to naturally heal people of issues they deal with and incur in their daily lives, so once I am done school and get registered, I can begin to work at that change in my job. Once my financial issues are slightly less up in the air, I can begin to work at the other parts of my life that I can change - getting more of my daily life into line with the change I wish to see in the world - making my own household products, canning my produce and making preserves to hold me through the winter without having to spend extra on frivolous things. Eating only organic foods to support those who follow my world vision, voting and campaigning for the Green Party to help them get more support from the community, working in the community garden to help build a living sense of community and working together. I would need the support of my friends and family so that I don't back down on my vision and dreams. Living in an area that gave me the opportunity to foster this life change, would help, as would having a community of friends to work with on this mission. The courage to stick to my guns and not give in to selfish desire for the 'easy life' but instead to put in the extra work so that I can make the changes I need to protect my sacred intention - the natural world. Oh and a bit of luck to help it all work out! In the human world I can turn to my family (at least my immediate family) to help me by conserving, composting, recycling, buying green products instead of chemicals and not working against me on this road to a cleaner, healthier life and world. I have my pagan community who is constantly working in the same direction as me on this life goal. And those environmental activist who may not be pagan, but see the same things in our current world and wish to change it for the better. In the larger realms of the universe, I turn to the Goddess and God, and all the faces thereof and ask for their support to help me, and my allies, to make the changes and help others to see the error of the current world-view which seems to be a "use what you want, you'll die soon enough anyways and who cares about the future, I wont be here to see it" type of standpoint.

It is my sacred intention to create a world that cherishes the natural world.

Opening to Help

Great powers of creation and transformation in the universe, ancestors, allies, all beings who love the diverse and beautiful dance of life, I am open to your help and I reach out to you. I thank you for the gift of life, for the help and support I have already received, and for the great opportunity of being alive at this crucial moment. I need your help, the opportunity to work towards a sustainable future and the courage to live my dream to serve my sacred intention of creating a world that cherishes the natural world. I give you my gratitude for the help I know is already coming. Blessed be.

~ Jade de Rhiannon ~

A bit of this and that...

So I've been mainly blogging when I've got a challenge going on, or about something I read in one of the online bookclub books I've been reading. And I guess this kind of ties into the Aphrodite's Magic thing, but at the same time it's kind of about something that's been bothering me lately.

Some of you who know me in person, know that my sister-in-law is pregnant with my first nephew, Liam. She's just passed her first trimester and is due at the end of September. She's always been a skinny girl, she gained a bit of weight when she first started living with my brother up in Port Elgin, but I didn't notice it much, if anything I thought it was just her getting used to her new surroundings and my brother's eating habits. Everyone in my family is "bigger" but mostly I think it's poor eating habits, metabolism and heredity. So if anything she just fit in with my family a bit better. Then they were getting married and she started losing weight to fit into the dress - this gorgeous white mermaid dress, she looked stunning, etc. So one weekend they come down to visit (pretty sure this was before they got married, back when she was just putting on some weight) and her dad makes some comment like "Oh hey porky, how's it going up there? I see you've gained some weight." or some other insensitive asshole comment. She was floored and started getting self-conscious after that- have I mentioned I hate her parents? Yeah anyways. So now that she's pregnant she's getting all angry about and touchy whenever someone mentioned her belly. I get that she's had some self-conscious issues in the past, but seriously?! It's a baby belly! You're pregnant. It happens, you're growing a whole new life inside you. Your body changes to accommodate this growth and when he's born you'll probably bounce right back since you're a skinny person by nature. But don't get self-conscious because you've got a baby belly! If anything it's just proof that you're fertile, beautiful and going to be a great mother.

Gods, I WISH that my belly was because I was pregnant (not that I want to be pregnant, I just wish it wasn't because I was lazy and unhealthy in my eating habits, but from some legitimate excuse)... hell I don't even know if I can have kids, so I wouldn't be judging myself for gaining weight or having a belly, if it was because I was actually growing a whole other entity within me. If I could have a perfect pregnant body like Jill, or her friend Steph, I would probably be the happiest woman alive. It just drives me a little nuts when skinny women, or slender women, who have always had rockin' bodies get all "oh my god, I'm getting fat!" when they get pregnant. I kind of want to yell at them "YOU ARE NOT FAT. You are pregnant. There is a difference!"

Okay so how this kind of goes along with the Aphrodite's Magic thing is that the second cord, called "The Eye of Beauty" is coming up in a couple weeks and so I read over the chapter the other night so I could begin to get myself ready for it - with all of the reading I've been doing for The Earth Path I'm feeling very in touch with the Goddess, and I've been working on the meditating on Aphrodite and keeping up with my altar too, so I've begun to prepare for the next cord. Anywho - Beauty. In the eye of the beholder, which is usually not looking at yourself. Well I've been thinking about what I consider to be beauty, beautiful, 'perfection', or 'feminine ideal' and I've come back with a lot of different things.
I find nature to be beautiful - a lush forest, a breathtaking view of a waterfall, a beach, flowers, a well-planned garden, a thunderstorm. I find beauty in children playing outside, in a newborn baby swaddled in a blanket and wrapped in his mother's tender, yet strong, embrace. I find a woman's curves to be beautiful. The solid strength of a man can also be beautiful, but not in the same way. On the topic of feminine beauty, I have a few different thoughts on the perfect example of feminine beauty - because women are ever-changing, as is beauty. I find little girls who are being true to themselves, the bright beaming smile of a little girl learning and having fun adventures in the backyard to be beautiful. I find the slender young woman with ample bust, and wide curving hips to be beautiful. I find the silvering hair of an elderly woman, her face carved with smile and laugh lines to be beautiful. And I find a young woman glowing and heavy with child to be more beautiful than all. She is the perfection to me. Maybe it's because I don't even know if I can have children that I found myself drawn to pregnancy as the ideal of beauty, but I do.

Truthfully, I find all women to be beautiful, I think that personality, self-esteem and curves are beautiful in every body type, however I don't find myself attracted to the skeletal skinny that you see in models and magazine covers, where you have to airbrush the picture not to cover a couple patches of cellulite, but the ribs that are jutting out of her sides because she doesn't have enough flesh to cover them. It doesn't speak of health and happiness to me. It speaks of diets and sadness, of unhealthy eating habits and self-ridicule and truly being sick, to get to being this skinny. I think if I could stick to a diet or change the way I think about food and my relationship to it, and make healthier choices, exercise more and truly be as healthy as I want to be, I would NEVER want to be this skinny (points at picture of Twiggy) it just looks like she's suffering from a wasting disease to me, not that she's beautiful. Sorry, not beautiful to me. I much prefer someone that I can grab on to and enjoy their curves. Not someone so skinny I would break them with a feather.

The book Aphrodite's Magic has a couple of activities to do to get ready for the second cord, and this first one is called 'The Beauty Parlor of the Goddess' which is where you write about, draw, or otherwise creatively put to paper (or blog in this case) your answer to the following question "What were you handed out in the beauty parlor of the Goddess?" You can answer this by cataloging your favourite parts of yourself; your best features, whether they be quirky and individual, classically beautiful, sex, refined or elegant. Then afterward you give thanks to the Goddess for your beauty. So here we go.

1. My eyes - I have always loved my eyes. I love the colours of blue in them, the yellow-green that circles the pupil depending on my mood and gives them a slightly ethereal look. I love that they are beautiful without makeup but can be striking and breath-taking when I put on makeup. I love how they express my emotions, or give away my fears. I truly feel like they are a window to the soul (but I don't believe that whole soul-stealing-camera phobia, or I would have no soul left with all the pictures I've had taken of me in my lifetime).
2. My nose - Okay I don't think it was until recently that I really began to like my nose. I've always thought it too big, too freckly, too sniffle/stuffed-up with allergies, or just ignored it altogether. But I've recently come to like it. It's me, a little pointy, definitely lots of freckles, but it's got character and I like it.
3. My smile - I guess after all the money and time put into it, I ought to like it. I'm always told that my smile lights up a room, I smile when I'm happy, embarrassed, when I can't take a joke, it's both my best display of my feelings but also my best mask to cover them up too. There's a line out of the movie 'Mona Lisa's Smile' where the girl says to her mother "Look at her, Mona Lisa, she's smiling, but is she really happy?" Which is kind of what I think sometimes, and know from experience - a smile can hide all manner of emotion.
4. My breasts - Well that's kind of self explanatory. It's breasts. How do you not like them?! I've always bemoaned them being so big, or whatever, causing back aches, getting in the way, attracting too much attention when I just want to wear a low cut shirt cause it's pretty, but not get male attention. But I do like them. I hate having to wear a bra, but I love my boobs.
5. My derriere - Okay... my ass. I've struggled with accepting and loving my ass a lot over the years. Most of the time I still think that it's too big, that I hate how far out it sticks, but I've come to terms with it, and I've decided to love it.
6. My legs - I've got swimmer's legs, dressage legs and I love them. I've always liked how strong they are. I took up running for a while and man could I see the definition in them! Sometimes I worry about cellulite, but then I remember my stomach and my legs don't look so bad comparatively. Okay so that was a bad joke, but still. I like my legs. I think they have their own kind of beauty.
7. My feet - Not an area that most people find beautiful (okay most people without a foot fetish) but I like mine. They're rough and calloused and have cracks and don't have enough girlishness to them. I'm pretty sure the last pedicure I got months ago is still there in the form of clinging nail polish, but I like them. They help me get around, I've walked over gravel roads, dirt paths, splashed in the mud, danced in the rain and stood for hours on end at work on them. They're well worn, and loved.

That's just about it. I still have insecurities, I still dislike parts of myself and I'm still working on it. I'll do the other exercise later. So far, I think it's pretty good that I came up with 7 things I love about my body. Which is a whole lot better than when I used to just flat out hate my body. So I thank the Goddess for helping me begin the journey of self love and self esteem, and for giving me the courage to look at myself and see the beauty there, not just the things I want to change.

Blessed Be,
Jade

The Earth Path: Chapter 2 - Seeds and Weapons

So I read chapter 2 and it took me a little bit longer to get through just because of all the stuff going on in my life - looking for a job, taking care of the dog, finding time to hang out with my boyfriend and keep my parents happy with housework and such. But I read it and then barreled on to the third chapter. So I'm slowing myself down and getting the chapter 2 review done before I forget about what it was all about.

The chapter starts off with a story about how in 2003, Starhawk and friends were protesting the U.S. Secretary of Agriculture and the USDA's plans to promote biotech and industrial agriculture to be used in the third world and developing countries, when they got a call that the cops had swarmed their headquarters and were trying to find weapons and such, assuming that they were hostile protesters. When they got there the cops were circling their parking lot and trying to confiscate their seedballs (clay balls that contained organic fertilizer and seeds from a plethora of bio-diverse plants that would grow well together in whatever area the balls landed), thinking that they were weapons. They tried to explain about how biodiversity was needed in order for a stable ecosystem to occur, and how they were NOT weapons, but merely a unique way to seed and populate abandoned lots or hard to cultivate areas of the city. In the end the police couldn't see them as anything other than weapons because their frame of reference disallowed free thought and they couldn't see outside that box. It then goes on to discuss frameworks that allow our minds to comprehend the world, and how they are different depending on the person, their life experiences, as well as their choices.

The main thing that I got out of this chapter (aside from a want to make seedballs and go lob them over fences of abandoned lots in Windsor) was the issue of biotechnology and genetic manipulation of agriculture. You are what you eat, and if you eat healthy, organic food, grown as nature intended it, then you will be healthy, full of energy and hopefully digesting and living as nature intended. However, just as you never know what will happen when you press the red button on a space ship, any number of possibilities extend from one simple tweak to a genetic code of a plant. Scientific thought has proceeded passed simple cause and effect centuries ago, so it makes no sense, rationally, why scientists in agriculture today are thinking that putting the DNA of a salmon into that of a tomato will ONLY cause the tomato to withstand colder temperatures. It can cause any number of issues, which we wont know until we know them. It's not the known outcomes we have to worry about, but the unknowns and the things we don't even know that we don't know. Which is why I've been crazily against genetically modified foods since I first heard about them!

I don't know if any of you who will read this have ever read any books by Kim Harrison, let alone the Rachel Morrigan series, but it's a fiction series where Kim Harrison writes from a present day perspective, but she's altered the course of events in history so that present day is nothing like what we know it to be today. You see, in the universe of these books, back in the 1940s while striving for biochemical weapons to use during the World Wars, the government was also fiddling with the DNA of tomatoes to try and make the best, most longlasting and freshest tasting tomato just down the laboratory hallway. So when one lab tech walked past the tomato lab while still having the coat on from the biochemical weapons lab, the weapons of mass destruction DNA just happened to float into the lab where the tomato DNA lay about germinating, and popped itself into one of the missing links of the tomato DNA that the scientists had changed. No one noticed this, and they approved, grew and shipped these tomatoes all over the world. So naturally, 2/3 of the world's population died horribly, and then they noticed that of those leftover people, there were witches, vampires, werewolves and elves just hanging out in what used to be the shadows of human civilization. Oops. Anyways the thing to get out of this was that you shouldn't fuck with food.

But that's exactly what we're doing today. We're genetically modifying our plants so that we can get the highest yield, the longest life, the freshest taste even weeks after being picked, and can withstand bugs and chemicals and such. While this is all happening, they are firstly killing the soil bacteria which are needed for a healthy crop, so they have to replace it with chemical fertilizer; secondly, they're getting rid of the natural biodiversity that allows for a balance in the ecosystem of our land - hundreds of different species of corn and wheat and other plants existed all in the same place so if a disease attacked one species, there were still hundreds left to survive and produce food - now they're only having one species of corn, so if a disease comes along, the whole crop could be destroyed, which would leave the soil open to the elements with would (thirdly) cause the soil to erode and all those chemicals and other toxins they put into it, would run off into the rivers (fourthly) polluting our water supply and losing topsoil which takes centuries to be produced naturally. And after all of that, you still don't even know what the genetically modified foods will do to us!

The other thing that this chapter talks about is that we have gotten so much into the world view of humans>nature, to the point where we only see nature as a resource to be used and thrown away, only good to us when we can get a profit from it. What we need to get back to is the natural world view, or the animate worldview where everything in the world has consciousness, where all plants and animals, insects and bugs, water, earth, air, fire... everything in the natural world is part of an interconnected web of consciousness that is a part of us as we are of it. Think of it like a spiderweb, if you cut one string in it, that whole half of the web collapses. It's much like the human body in that if one cell dysfunctions, it throws off the whole tissue, which can shut down the whole organ system which can kill the whole person. We have gotten so disconnected from nature that we forget that we are a part of it! So the whole point of this chapter is that we need to change the way we think and view the world, or we will cause the destruction and death of all that are a part of it - which includes us humans too.

The Earth Path: Toward the Isle of Birds

So apparently this summer is fast becoming about reading, interpreting, applying to my life and learning; about fixing my hurts and discovering the areas I need to accept, and those I need to work on. But it's also about my faith, and that is based in nature, the earth and the Gods. The Earth Path by Starhawk is a fantastic book that myself and two of my friends have undertaken to reading and discussing each chapter and the different activities that are in it as we do them.

This book is about "many people who call themselves Pagan and proclaim nature as sacred are unclear on the processes by which nature actually works. The Earth Path addresses the profound spiritual and conceptual disconnect at the root of our environmental destructiveness, and shows how we can reroot our spirits, our politics, and our day-to-day life in deep relationship with the Earth," as Starhawk describes it.

So the whole point of our little book club is to read and interpret, discuss how we saw the content and form our own opinions on things. My background has a bit of everything in it: I have a degree in History, some of that degree included Earth Science courses and Political Science courses, I am now in school for Massage Therapy, so I've got a very good understanding of how the human body works and how all our systems interact with each other and maintain homeostasis within us - otherwise known as balance. The first chapter of The Earth Path was very much about balance and how humans have lost our balance with nature. It starts out talking about how the native peoples of California knew how the cycles of the year worked in their environment and their own bio-diverse ecology. They burned their forests every-so-often to make sure that the small shrubberies didn't overtake the larger trees, and the deep roots of the plants would ensure they came back in the spring. Now, however, we don't do that anymore, too many people live in the forested areas, or what used to be forests before clearcutting took away the forests and the footholds of the topsoil (but that's a whole other issue!), and they don't burn, which caused the overgrowth of small dry bushes and shrubs which cause a major fire-hazard. When the natives used to burn regularly, it would be a cool-burn, done and over-with fast and controlled. Now if the forests catch fire it would be a deathly inferno. There was a lot more to it, but the main thing is that we live in an area now more for jobs or pretty scenery but we don't know the land, we don't take care of it as we should, we don't listen to our land, and it has caused major issues with the careful balance that needs to be maintained to have a stable ecosystem.

I thought it was a very good start and I'm excited to get into the rest of the book and on to the exercises and rituals. The end of the chapter says to

"Close this book. Walk outside, if you can, or at least go to a window and open it. Close your eyes and sniff the air. Listen. Who do you hear calling on the wind? Are the birds chattering? Are the tree frogs chanting in chorus? Do you hear the rhythmic throb of city traffic? The cycling trill of car alarms? The cries of children at play? Everything around us is always speaking. We can heal only by first learning to hear, to understand, and, in time, to respond. As we do, the world becomes richer, a more complex and vibrant place. Open your eyes; see the patterns of light and shadow, the play of the wind. You have already begun your education in the language of nature. You have already set foot upon the Isle of Birds, which is always right here, wherever we are."

So here we go.

Aphrodite's Magic: First Cord

Okay so tonight is the first full moon since we started this quest. Meaning that it's the first cord ritual tonight. Well it would've been, but extenuating circumstances caused Saturnine and I to bump it up to 4pm today. I'm a bit behind the times in actually blogging about it all, but I've kept up somewhat, so I'm only a little bit behind. I'll do the catch up and then blog about what it was like.
Prep:
Okay so I was running a bit behind today, but I was talking to a friend about the altar and what I wanted to do with it, and I was kind of torn - I wanted to put it in the gazebo so I could do my rituals outside and still have it protected, I was just going to do something simple, statue of the Goddess, an apple, maybe a red rose and a sea shell. But I can't get internet connection out there, and since in the last post we determined we were going to do it via skype, that means I have to do it inside the house. So I basically took my regular altar and tweaked it. My regular working altar is on my old headboard, which is screwed into the wall of my old bedroom - now my study, and it has the main portion of it as a shadow box for when I competed in dressage shows, I would but my ribbons in there. But I have had it cleared out for a while now, and didn't know what to do with it. So I went online and I searched for a whole bunch of different pictures. I searched for 'Aphrodite' 'Venus' 'sexuality' 'self esteem' 'love' and I found 10 different pictures that I thought helped to express what I wanted to get out of this journey. Then I printed them out and taped them into the shadow box(see close up photo), and hung the cords I already have on the wire inside. Then I closed the plexiglass and my aphrodite altar is now combined with my regular working altar. Ta-da! So this is what it looks like all together (see photo).

Honestly I felt a little scrambled this time because I had such a buildup to the first chord and I was so excited for it, and then at the last minute I was like "OMGs I have so much left to do!" It didn't help that I got up today and my dad gave me a lecture about not helping out, so I had to do all the prep work for dinner tonight, and then find the pictures... I was still taping them into the altar case when Amanda skype called me to start ritual. Then I realized that I didn't have my dedication written out when we were in the middle of beginning. We did the casting the circle, calling the elements/quarters, welcomed the Goddess and God and we finished the chanting to raise energy before I realized I didn't have my dedication done. Ugh. Well fly by the seat of your sarong it is.

Dedication: I dedicate my work both written and spoken to accepting that things I cannot change about myself, changing the things I can, loving myself holistically no matter what I look like, and I offer my love and gratitude to the Goddess in return for helping me work on my self-love and self-esteem.

Looking for Aphrodite: The Goddess of Love is found everywhere that love is present, in the heart, in the mind, in the eye of the beholder, in the bathtub when I'm enjoying a bubblebath, in the bedroom during those more intimate moments, under the full moon, on the beach (she is a water goddess too, after all.

Invoking Aphrodite: I call upon Aphrodite, sea-born Goddess of love and beauty to help me to love myself holistically, inside and out, completely so I may love others more fully as well. Please teach me to see you in myself and other women.

The ritual of the first cord: Saturnine and I, as previously stated, skyped up and then called the circle and all that jazz into order. We chanted "Strong like the Ocean, Gentle like Rain, River wash my tears away, Aphrodite" to raise energy, and then we started in on our 'Guided Journey' Saturnine reading it for me and then I read it for her. Despite the static that broke it up a bit while she was reading, I actually did have a pretty good experience with it. I've gotten to the point where I think I understand how I meditate and I visualize things differently than everyone else. I don't see things with my eyes the way most people do, instead I see things with my sense of touch and hearing. It 'looks' almost as you'd expect a bat to see things, through echo-location, it's almost as if sound is bouncing off everything, and then I interpret it when I hear it. So everything is a bit fuzzy, but I get the general idea of what it's supposed to be, and then I get a gut instinct that clears it up, not so much visually but internally. So when you step out of the time stream into the gardens, my first feeling was that I was standing on lush green grass, surrounded by carefully trimmed rose bushes that formed almost like a labyrinth of living things as I walked towards the Temple. When Saturnine read that I was to look down at the path and notice what I was walking on, I saw the well worn dirt path with the lush green grass next to it, every so often I'd find a 'main path' which was paved with cobblestones, and grass peeking out in between the stones. When I got to the Temple the steps were white marble with gold veins through it, well worn from years of women walking up the steps, sitting on them to read or enjoy the sunshine and the scent of roses from the gardens. There was a fountain with dolphins jumping out of the water, three of them, almost touching and between their noses was where the water poured upward. Inside there were conversation couches, big overstuffed pillows around altars on the outside walls so women could meditate by their candles. Dead center from the entrance of the Temple was a giant statue of Aphrodite, somewhere between the Born of the Sea like in the painting, and the Venus de Milo statue, but like no statue I've ever seen before. Her eyes seemed to look into your soul as you entered the Temple, but her mouth smiled down at you. To either side of this statues was a door. I took the door to the right, and came upon a medium-sided room with pillars forming a perfect circle in the center of the room, a large altar just behind the circle of pillars, blazing with candles and incense. There were big pillows in jewel tones, rich purple and deep red, amber, blues, greens, at the feet of the pillars, making their own circle. I stepped into the circle, said my dedication and called out for Aphrodite. She joined me, but she was more of a glowing presence, and I couldn't see many details other than the general shape of her, a perfect hour glass, not at all the skeletal thinness of todays models, but owning her own sexuality, with full hips, luscious curves and a Girdle, or belt, slung sexily around her hips, seemed to be formed of the heavens themselves. We danced together and she gave me a silver strand from her Girdle, which became solid in my hands, and then I left the inner sanctum, and went out to sit in the main Temple, there were women laughing and talking, children playing with toys of dolphins, running around giggling. I sat in front of a mosaic on the wall, on a purple pillow and felt the radiating energy from the cord in my hand. Then I got up, went outside and noticed an apple tree I didn't realize was there before, picked an apple and started walking back towards the time stream and home.
We concluded after both of the meditations by dancing to 'Aphrodite and Pan' by Kellianna. Then we closed circle, logged off and I danced to some DRD before coming in here to blog about my experience.

Afterthoughts: I'm glad that I did this, already I feel a bit stronger. I liked the Guided Journey, and I can't wait for the next one, I'm already excited about going back the next time I meditate. I think that I need to figure out a better way to hear, either by calling Saturnine instead of using skype, or something, because the crackling was a bit hard to hear the words while she was talking, but I'm sure we'll figure it out. I also don't think we raised enough energy before beginning, but I'm sure the more times we do it, the more energy we'll get, just from residual energy of the same working over and over. Oh - and the word she whispered to me was 'love'.

Anyways, I'm off to go eat my dinner, so hope this finds everyone in good spirits.

Blessed Be,
Jade