On Being a Druid and Walking a Druid Path – A Druid’s Garden Guide and Free Online Book on Druidry

Can a price be put on the life in a forest?

Druidry today has both ancient and modern roots. Druids today seek spiritual connection with nature, using nature to guide, inspire, and ground us. Nature has always been a source of everything to humanity, and those of us who pick up the druid tradition work to reconnect with nature in a multitude of ways. The modern Druid tradition has many branches and paths, and I try to be comprehensive in my coverage of this vibrant and growing tradition. The modern druid tradition is inspired by the Ancient Druids, wise sages who kept history and traditions, and guided the spiritual life of their people. The ancient Druids had three branches of study: the bard (a keeper of history, stories, and songs), the ovate (a sage of nature or shaman), and the druid (the keeper of the traditions, leader of spiritual practices, and keeper of the law). Much of what we know about the Ancient Druids today comes through their surviving legends, stories, mythology, and the writings of Roman authors: the druids themselves had a prohibition against writing anything down that was sacred, and so, we have only fragments. The modern druid movement–from which all present druid traditions descend–started in the 1700-1800’s as one response to industrialization. Today, Druidry is a global and vital tradition. I’ve been walking the path of druidry for almost 20 years and currently serve as the head of the Ancient Order of Druids in America (www.aoda.org). As such, I’ve been sharing a great deal about druidry for a long time on this blog. The ecological crisis is a spiritual crisis as much as it is a crisis of culture. Druidry is us finding our way “home”; back into a deep connection with the living earth. Many people today are drawn to the druid tradition, there is “something” missing for them and it is that connection to nature. Continue reading.

Solace Stones: Retreating into Stone Spirit Medicine ~ Krista Mitchell

There is a solstice occurring tomorrow, Saturday Dec. 21st.

In the northern hemisphere at dawn this will herald the rebirth of the sun and the return of the light.

In the southern hemisphere at sunset there will be a gala of light meant to raise us to ascendency.

Both are rites of passage and devotion that were once held sacred by the wise ones of old.

They would gather or retreat within stone circle and dolmen. They would purify and pray. And then they would prepare to commune with their higher powers, receive the Earth’s song, and heal from the geomagnetic energy that poured through the stones themselves.

While in our modern times this no longer occurs, the stones still stand, and they remember.

I can feel within our own community here an increased desire for fellowship, communion, and to have a genuine experience of the sacred. This is understandable in a world that feels increasingly unsafe, uncertain, disconnected, and cruel.

But it’s also something in our blood: I firmly believe that all of us here walking the spiritual path now have walked it before, in lives past, and we remember the circles and rites of old.

We remember the stones, too.

It’s why we feel a pull to crystal and stone, water and trees, the sun and stars, and each other.

Crystals for deep listening: Nuummite, Moonstone, Labradorite, Amethyst

When I feel lost I know now to retreat into Spirit. I take hold of a crystal that sings to me, close my eyes, and listen for its voice. I drop down deep within, and I listen for my soul’s voice, too.The collective crystalline consciousness that I channel teaches us that Spirit finds us in silence. That all we need to do to reconnect with the Sacred is to simply go quiet, let ourselves have some peace, and listen.Tomorrow there will be plenty of circles (you can join the replay of mine, here), and ritual ideas and tips, but for some of you it may be the simple act of finding your own inner sacred that will bring you the greatest healing, or peace, or revelation.Spirit and consciousness is in all things, which means it’s in you, too.If you can tomorrow, or any time leading up to the end of the year, see if you can carve out some time for quiet for yourself. To sit simply with a crystal, and listen. To let the Earth’s song rise up through and around you, and remember your magic. Wishing you all the best of the season. ~ Krista Mitchell

Herbal Grief Ritual for Healing of the Soul

The Druid's Garden

2020 has been challenging for nearly everyone in a multitude of ways. One of the things that we are faced with right now is grief: grief over lost friends and family who have passed, grief over a previous way of life that seems to be gone for good, grief over lost careers and uncertain futures, grief over continued suffering and uncertainty with regards to our climate and life on this planet. I have certainly been experiencing many of these things. Perhaps the two most central things that happened to me this summer was the loss of a good friend after a long and difficult battle with cancer and the destruction of a large part of our family’s property to put in a septic line. The loss of many trees that I had grown up with and a beautiful ecosystem that we had cultivated into a botanical sanctuary. These losses happened…

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Drought workings: A Druid’s Perspective on Drought and Dry Weather

The Druid's Garden

2020 is certainly a year to remember for many of us in the human realm. Here in Western Pennsylvania and up along many parts of New England, we’ve had an additional serious problem affecting the natural world—an extreme drought. This summer, the jet stream is way off of its normal course and so most of the major storms that would typically hit us have been forced south of us, creating the “moderate” drought that we are now in and causing uncharacteristically dry conditions. know there are other serious droughts around the world, such as the three-year drought currently happening in Germany. Climate change is making these kinds of weather events all the more common and teaching us powerful lessons along the way. In today’s post, I’ll share some drought lessons, drought land healing, and ways of working and honoring water.

Honoring Water and the Scarcity of Water

Altar for water…

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3 magical ways to nurture yourself during a retrograde & Eclipse Season

3 ways to nurture yourself during a retrograde & Eclipse Season

This is our final eclipse of this eclipse season and this one might actually be visible for many on the northern hemisphere!

This is a penumbral lunar eclipse which happens when the Sun, Earth and Moon are aligned, but not perfectly. This means that the Earth blocks some of the sun’s light from reaching the moon and covers all or part of the moon with it’s shadow.

The lunar eclipse will be visible for many of us this time if the sky is clear. For others it might be eclipsing while the moon is rising or setting.

Here is a link with the timing and a map of the eclipse.

When it comes to an eclipse… even if you can’t see the event you will definitely feel it, especially when our intuition and emotions are in tune with the moon!

Remember that eclipses shake the current energy up so that we can see what isn’t working, and release it or heal it so we are free to expand and move forward. This gives you the power to integrate the lessons that have been coming up over the last month or two.

This full moon eclipse is also in Capricorn. Capricorn is very goal oriented and helps us stick to our plan and intentions with it’s gentle nurturing hand. With careful planning and diligent daily effort, this week can help you make the changes you’ve been wanting to make for a long time now.

Read original article at: Spirit de la Lune ~ 3 Magical Way To Nurture Yourself A Retrograd & Eclipse Season

ASCENDING SOUL: CRYSTAL TALISMAN MAGIC FOR THE FULL MOON LUNAR ECLIPSE IN CAPRICORN

We have yet another full moon lunar eclipse, this one in Capricorn, happening at 12:44am Sunday July 5th.

The download I received continues to guide us through the healing cycle and archetypal patterns initiated by the recent new moon solar eclipse.

I opened to channel and this is what first came through:

“Cycles and patterns, cycles and patterns.

The world goes round and round.

Moon in an earth sign, sun in a water sign,

The earth eclipses the water.

From fire and water, to earth and water,

Building, creating steady ground.

This is the earth forming anew under our feet.”

The moon will be in Capricorn, an earth sign ruled by the planet Saturn, relating to building and structure and toil and triumph. Saturn is the structurer, Father Time, the sacred masculine.

The sun is in Cancer, a water sign ruled by the moon, relating to the home, family nurturing, the emotions, intuition, imagination, and the sacred feminine.

Capricorn builds the world. Cancer builds a world of its own, within.

The sacred feminine is the energy, the flow.

The sacred masculine forms the metaphysical structure or vessel.

It is a time of creating.

This will be a very magical eclipse, one that can initiate us into a new way of being – individually, and collectively.

Don’t miss out if this calls to you and speaks to your soul, because it means your time of becoming is now.

Read original article at: Krista Mitchell ~ Ascending Soul; Crystal Talisman Magic for the Full Moon Lunar Eclipse in Capricorn

CRYSTAL HEALING RITUAL FOR THE SAGITTARIUS FULL MOON ECLIPSE

Crystal Ritual for the Sagittarius Full Moon Solar Eclipse with Blue Kyanite: Deep Listening, Inner Activation, Truth, Understanding / www.krista-mitchell.com

Many people might expect awakening and evolution to be light-filled, radiant, even peaceful, but awakening is an act of creation and becoming, and the creative forces of this world are often also required to be those of destruction, unravelling, dismantling, or un-making (ie: fire, ice, death, water, the shedding of skins) in order to create.

Growth, healing, and change are often painful or creative/destructive/creative processes because they force us to let go of things: how (and with what) we identify, our beliefs, comfort zones, old wounds that have become companions, our gremlins, parts of our past, dreams of the future.

(Important note: I am talking about creative forces of destruction in nature and in the nature of healing, NOT destruction purely for the sake of causing pain, harm, or chaos. The former is in service to the cycle of life and the healing process, the latter I see in service to the dark spirits of this world).

These processes bring challenges because they trigger what needs to be seen, heard, faced, accepted, healed, resolved, and reintegrated.

In essence, we cannot evolve without facing our inner shadows. There is no awakening, growth, or positive change without facing the shadow.

It’s never easy or comfortable, or pretty. It’s badass territory, where angels fear to tread. And this is why so many people choose not to go there, choose complacency, apathy, even silence.

I had a teacher once who said “Tyranny reigns over silence.” The power of that statement has never left me. And I had another one who said “Sometimes you have to go to war.” That one’s never left me, either.

There’s great turmoil in the world right now – uprising, revolution, demands for justice, and they’re happening because this is part of the evolution. We can’t be awake while still being asleep to what’s happening around us, to social injustice, to systemic racism.

We also can’t be awake if we’re asleep to our own shadow selves.

I’ve been in deep listening this week, and I’ve also been unpacking and sorting through unconscious bias and conditioning in my own shadow. As a healer, and human, my inner work and outer work never ends. There’s always another layer of the onion, there’s always another shadow aspect to work through. And conditioning can run deep – through generations and lifetimes of ancestral and spiritual DNA, as well as what we’ve experienced in our own time.

This full moon solar eclipse in Sagittarius (exact on 6/5/20 at 3:12pm ET), while the sun remains in Gemini, is an opportunity for us to look within, to learn, to grow, and to face our inner duality.

Healing happens in the space between light and dark. Expansion of consciousness happens in the embrace of light and dark.

It’s important to sit with that for a bit.

Read original article at: Krista Mitchell ~ Crystal Healing Ritual for the Sagittarius Full Moon Eclipse

Honey Moon Eclipse Candle and Fire Ritual

This Full Moon is known as the Honey Moon, the Strawberry Moon and the Rose Moon, but you might find very little is “sweet” about this Full Moon! We have been experiencing a lot of tension all week as many have watched or attended the protests and riots going on all over the country.

This is a Lunar Eclipse and it squares Mars which can create some tension while bringing out anger or causing emotional pain to surface.

This Full Moon is also squaring Neptune, the planet of illusion, causing a lot of people to feel vulnerable towards deception and confusion on how to act. This Full Moon will continue to open our eyes towards the injustices and deceptions going on in the world.

Pressures have been building throughout the year. 2020 is a very remarkable year and this full moon is stirring up some big changes.

This Eclipse takes place in the sign of Sagittarius. Sagittarius is usually an optimistic and sunny sign, but when squared with Mars and Neptune you might be feeling that emotional tension, a stir towards action, but frustrated that there is little you can do right now.

Read original post at: Spirit de la Lune ~ Honey Moon Eclipse Candle and Fire Ritual

Full Moon Flower Essence Ceremony

Flower Moon Essence Ceremony - Spirit de la Lune

We are in the season of blossoming and blooming though it may not feel like we can do this at the moment. The Flower Moon opens your heart to the potential you have no matter what situation you may find yourself in.

Under the full Flower Moon we will teach you how to create a flower essence to literally capture the energy of blooming, blossoming, ripening & abundance to sustain your heart during this time. Flower essences capture the essence of the energy and personality of the flower that you are working with. When you take in the flower essence you are inviting it to shift the subtle energies of your aura and energetic fields. These shifts are subtle and do take time to notice working at a spiritual/energetic level. This is not the same as taking herbal tinctures, for example.

Read original article at: Spirit de la Lune ~ Full Moon Flower Essence Ceremony

Eve of Bealtaine/Beltane

Good Witches Homestead

The Celtic Festival of Bealtaine/Beltane which marks the beginning of summer in the ancient Celtic calendar is a Cross Quarter Day, half way between the Spring Equinox and the Summer Solstice. While the Bealtaine Festival is now associated with 1st May, the actual astronomical date is a number of days later. The festival was marked with the lighting of great bonfires that would mark a time of purification and transition, heralding in the season in the hope of a good harvest later in the year, and were accompanied with rituals to protect the people from any harm by otherworldly spirits, as well as, the movement of animals to summer pastures.