MerryWeather and RainSky

  Photo by Kateryna Hliznitsova on Unsplash Like I said in the last post, I really appreciate the thoroughness of Krystle's approach - right from the start of the book, the reader is joining in, not just reading or recapping knowledge, but engaging with it - if the journalling and/or spell exercises are also done.  I'm as guilty as the next person of being an armchair reading witch.  But I'm going to do this book properly - interactively, even if it slows me right down.  Better to be slow and thorough and actually see what works, than cramming in information and then it having nothing to really hook into in my mind because I didn't back it up with actions and considered thought.  So, here are the next set of answers about the introductory section, where the reader is planning their magical wellness journey: mixing magical spirituality with nutrition, movement based practices, meditation and journalling. Ok, here we go - my answers... *** What do you consider to...

   I really really like the work of Krystle L Jordan.  It seems like the most obvious idea to mix the goals of being more spiritual and magical with being more healthy - body, mind and soul - but I haven't found another witch author doing it in the way she does.  Its all very simple, very intuitive and very deliberate.  On her website, she also offers 2 courses, one about beginning to have a vegan kitchen witch practice , which is reassuringly thorough as Krystle is a qualified  nutritionist as well as a magical practitioner; and one about magical wellness in more depth .  I'm enrolled in both of these - they are very reasonably priced - but for the purposes of this blog, I'm only going to be referring to her book, The Witch's Guide to Wellness (Adams Media, 2022) , and working through the exercises, spells/rituals and suggestions there. (The links for the 2 courses may change as its Black Friday week as I write, so she has sales on; but if you click a...

Photo by Conscious Design on Unsplash  ***   I had far more enjoyment with this meditation style.  It was hugely relaxing! I found a meditation on YouTube that would work for this week's theme, free - I used this one:  https://youtu.be/wGFog-OuFDM?feature=shared The idea of this one was to listen to the chime of a bell, just one chime, and listen as the sound continued, fading, to be replaced by the next one.  The idea of Western concentration pulled into a wider field of mental capacity by the silence after each chime, when you would concentrate on everything else you heard: the sounds of the house (or wherever you are, so few places are silent), would take over.  You would be giving them your attention too.  But the concentration in the silnce becomes different, wider and more all encompassing. Its like two different discplines in one meditation.  The initial laser-like concentration on the sound, followed by the wider more open concentrat...

  So - here's one of the books I'll be working through.  This is quite a new one, but the approach called to my faddy self.  His idea is that there are many ways to meditate, but a lot of us seem to have an idea we have to be peaceful to begin, sit on the floor with incense, and compose ourselves to think of nothing for maybe ...an hour!  In other words, our idea of perfect meditation right from the start.  It's so perfect, it's not doable. He suggests we junk this idea, and instead spend 3 minutes every day doing a meditation technique.  Each technique is practiced for 7 days, so you get a feel for it.  Then you move on to the next one.  And go on like that for 14 weeks.  So that because its such a small amount of time, you'll feel its doable to try. One of my biggest problems with anything spirituality related is my inability to be consistent with a practice.  I'm either working 14 hours a day (summer) or I'm frantically trying to catc...

  Photo by Alex Dukhanov on Unsplash This Rain Sky post is about a person not there any more, and me over thinking it.  *** Full Moon Day and Grieving, 28.10.23 I have a best friend, my eldest son, who doesn’t want to see me at the moment.   He is depressed and talked to me of reaching out to people and being ignored.   But then he shuts me out.   I was willing to be there, but when I offer, I am repeatedly told no.   Which I don’t understand.   If you are lonely and want companionship and I am your best friend and I offer, but you don’t want me? That means: (a) I am the wrong companion – I am now boring, or I make your mood worse (when I thought I did the opposite); you want a girlfriend, not a friend – or a mum. (b) You are worried you will be unkind – people seem to think depression is just flat or weepy, when in fact it can be very hostile – pushing people away to prove how shit and useless you are to yourself; it’s actually monumentally...

  Before we start - pic taken by an old friend, near his Sainsburys.  Amazing sun, huh?  Anyway... It's quite amusing that I laid out what I was going to do, then didn't do anything for months! This was for 2 reasons: (a) my summer facing job just stayed busy - people at the restaurant took holidays, I was needed to ccover, as was my eldest, one of the chefs, who is wasting away for lack of holiday time off as we speak, and then there's my other job, also extremely busy, and then theres home life...and (b) I was/am overwhelmed with the amount of reading and study I've already done since the 90s - which was when I got into my spirituality in a big way. I'm a total bookworm.  If I like a subject my first thought is to buy a swathe of books about it from various angles, create a mini library and then begin.  In a sort of hither and thither slapdash way, bit of this, bit of that, on the subject.  Then, as I always know it will, my focus will change, and I'll be...

I created this blog ages ago, then sort of forgot about it, as I wasn't sure what its main theme should be.  I have another main blog, that used to have everything on it, but has now shrunk to book reviews, as I slowly lost confidence in my own meandering voice, after several years.  There's been nothing there since January this year.  That's partly because I got very busy in the physical world, and partly because I had no clue what I wanted to say.  Its not necessary that I talk for an audience, thinking aloud; but then I wondered if there were others out there feeling as lost as I have come to feel.  The strange and unsettling combination of being an introvert, an instinctive pagan (societal cues from my growing up in the 70s, sure, too), and quite lefty in a world of loud and angry rightwingers.  Cognitive dissonance on so many issues from the minute I wake to the minute I sleep. There's the cost of living crisis, which has prompted me to have to have tw...