Kate Braun : Waxing Crescent Moon is Time to Set New Goals

Moon Musings: The Waxing Crescent Moon -- which falls on January 4–5, 2014, is a time to set goals for positive changes in your life.

Waxing crescent moon. Image from Wikimedia Commons.

By Kate Braun | The Rag Blog | January 3, 2013

Waxing moons are times to set new goals, recognize new objectives, promote new growth, and set forces in motion to help you achieve these goals, objectives, and growth. The first weekend of 2014 is an auspicious time to start working, both long- and short-term, with the goal of manifesting positive changes in your life.

On Saturday, Lady Moon is in Aquarius, the sign that foreshadows coming trends and emphases; on Sunday, Lady Moon is in Pisces, the sign that incorporates energy from all the signs of the Zodiac; either of these days will generate nicely positive energy to facilitate your intentions.

It is best to start your activities at or near sunset. Invoke your favorite goddess-as-virgin deities. They will add helpful energy to your ritualing, which should increase the likelihood that you will be successful in your endeavors during 2014. As you organize your plans for the New Year, don’t shy away from the thought that plans may need modification as they progress. Be prepared to be flexible as circumstances may dictate, while not losing sight of your ultimate objectives.

This may also be a good time to plant above-ground crops such as lettuce and spinach. Lettuce can take a light freeze and will do well in the central Texas area if seed is sowed at this time.

On Saturday, January 4, Saturn rules. His emphasis is on self-discipline, which can be helpful as you set your goals and objectives for this year in general and this moon cycle in particular.

On Saturday, January 4, Saturn rules. His emphasis is on self-discipline, which can be helpful as you set your goals and objectives for this year in general and this moon cycle in particular. Use the color black, make sure you have contact with the element Earth in some way (not necessarily barefoot and outdoors; holding a small potted plant will do just as well), and repeat your chant 3 times.

On Sunday, January 5, the Sun rules, giving emphasis to money matters, health issues, and friendships. Use the color yellow, have a candle burning for the fire element, and repeat your chant 6 times.

A suggested chant:

New beginnings, fresh objectives; I’m prepared to do my part. Plans and actions now in sight; this is when and how I start: Sowing seeds in heart and mind, planning steps both long and short, Open to unfolding options of whatever sort.

May the New Year bring us all a calmness of spirit, a joyous heart, economic stability, and delight in all things. I urge you to find something each day that prompts smiles or laughter, for they are the most basic tools we humans have to dispel gloom and keep us moving forward!

[Kate Braun was a contributor to the original Rag. Her website is www.tarotbykatebraun.com. She can be reached at kate_braun2000@yahoo.com. Read more of Kate Braun's writing on The Rag Blog.]

[+/-] Read More...

[+/-] Summary only...

Kate Braun : The First Dark Moon of Autumn

Moonless autumn night on Whidbey Island in Washington. Photo from rprtphoto.

Moon Musings:
Dark Moon
(October 4, 5, or 6, 2013)

By Kate Braun / The Rag Blog / October 2, 2013

"North, South, East, West,
help me to do my best"

A Dark Moon may be honored on each day on either side of the New Moon as well as on the day of the New Moon.

In October, the New Moon occurs at 7:35 p.m. CDT on Friday, October 5, so you may make your celebration on either October 4, 5, or 6. As the moon is not visible during a Dark Moon period, 10 a.m. is the best time of day to petition the Dark Moon, and due to normal work schedules this indicates that perhaps the better day would be Saturday, October 5, or Sunday, October 6, but whichever day is best for you is the day you should choose.

This is the first Dark Moon of Autumn, which can make planning activities more difficult as any confusion, fears, or regrets from the past are likely to arise. It is best to begin with a balancing ritual, then progress to rituals designed to let the past truly be the past. One way to do this is to invite all the directions to work with you: North, South, East, West, Above, Below, Behind, and Before. The words you use should be simple, direct, and to the point. Here is a suggestion:

North, South, East, West, help me to do my best;
Above me, the Idea; Below me, my Support;
The past is Behind; my goal is Before.

Once this is done, then you can start moving the energy forward. But don’t set specific goals at this time; concentrate instead on releasing the past. November will be a better month to use for specifics.

Here is a simple way to put the past firmly behind you: Do a little weeding in your yard. As you pull up each unwanted plant, being sure to remove as much of the root as possible, say to it, “you are no more present here." When you have pulled up several weeds in this manner, bundle them together using either fiber (garden twine, for example) or a nuisance plant such as bindweed.

Once your weed-bundle is made, write on a piece of paper the things you are releasing. Use the color of ink appropriate for the day you have chosen (blue for Thursday, green for Friday, black for Saturday) and select items to release that are in accord with the planet ruling each day.

If you choose to honor the Dark Moon on Thursday, October 4, this is Thor’s day and Jupiter rules. Jupiter is the planet of expansion, so you may easily focus on the positive resolution of financial or spiritual matters. Wear the color Blue; be sure to have water in a bowl or glass near you. Holding the bundle in your hand, dip it into the water, repeat your chant 4 times, then bury the bundle in a part of the yard that is not regularly watered.

If Friday, October 5, is a better day for you, remember that it is Frigga’s day and Venus rules, so focusing on releasing unwanted or unneeded love and attraction will be more successul. Wear the color green, be outside and barefooted so you can feel the Earth beneath your feet, and have some water in a bowl or glass nearby. Drizzle some earth and then some water over your bundle, repeat your chant seven times, then bury it in a part of the yard that is not regularly watered.

If Saturday, October 6, is the best day for you to honor the Dark Moon, wear black, be outside and barefoot so that you can feel the earth beneath your feet, and focus on releasing resistance to change in your life. Drizzle some Earth on your bundle and repeat your chant 3 times, then bury your bundle in a part of the yard that is not regularly watered.

A suggested chant for this Dark Moon:

Past is past, gone is gone;
Lay it to rest, move along;
My path is cleared of old debris,
Forward-looking is the key.

When your magicking is concluded and the bundle is buried, invoke all directions once again and thank them for supporting your intentions. Here is a suggestion of what to say:

North, South, East, West,
Thank you for helping me to do my best;
My idea floats Above, my support lies Below,
Past is truly past, now my future can grow.

[Kate Braun was a contributor to the original Rag. Her website is www.tarotbykatebraun.com. She can be reached at kate_braun2000@yahoo.com. Read more of Kate Braun's writing on The Rag Blog.]

The Rag Blog

[+/-] Read More...

[+/-] Summary only...

Kate Braun : During Fall Equinox Give Thanks for Earth's Bounty

Honor Mother Earth on Fall Equinox. Image from Seeds of Good Fortune.

Fall Equinox:
A time to seek balance in all things

By Kate Braun / The Rag Blog / September 16, 2013

“Come, ye thankful people come
Raise the song of harvest home...”

Sunday, September 22, 2013 is the Fall Equinox, aka Mabon, Harvest Home, Second Harvest, or Cornucopia. Hours of day and night are equal on this day. As you concentrate on rituals for protection, prosperity, security, self-confidence, and harmony, seek balance in all things.

Use the colors red, orange, russet, maroon, brown, deep gold, and violet in your decorations and dress. Select decorations from an assortment of gourds, pine cones, acorns, grains, apples, pomegranates, ivy, dried seeds, horns of plenty, grapes, autumn leaves, scales or balance beams, and textured fabrics such as velvet, velour, and corduroy.

Serve your guests a buffet that can include breads, nuts, apples, pomegranates, carrot soup, blackberries, nuts, and cider as well as red meat or fowl. Honor all Goddess-as-Matron deities such as Cerridwyn, the Celtic water-oriented Goddess of Autumn whose symbol is the cauldron; her fruit is the apple and all nuts and seeds are sacred to her.

Traditionally, quilts were started on this date, but any project that would occupy your winter evenings could be begun now. You may also make a corn dolly or other poppet, charge it with the qualities and goals you are working on, and bury in the yard or garden as a seed that will see fruition as you achieve the goal.

To make a corn dolly: using about three fresh corn husks, bend them in half and use a strip of corn husk to tie off a small bit at the bend to form the dolly’s head; decide where the waist should be, twist the corn husks at this point and tie them with another corn husk strip. Fluff out the skirt and your corn dolly is finished. Sprinkle her with a few drops of wine and tell her the qualities and goals you choose to work on over the winter. Write this down for future reference.

Then bury her in your garden or back yard or under a tree, as you would plant a seed you want to grow vigorously. Plan to visit the site periodically; use it during the Dark Time to meditate on what you have sown. When celebrating the Spring Equinox, look at what your goals were and see what strides you have made towards achieving them.

This is a festival where you should give thanks for: Mother Earth’s bounty and the feast being enjoyed; friends and family; specific goodnesses in your life (name them); professional success as well as the basics of food, clothing, and shelter. When giving thanks, go around the table Sun-wise, starting with you, the host/ess, and moving to your left around the table.

When you give thanks for the bounty of the Earth, you are maintaining your connection to Spirit in a most elemental way. Without good water, good earth, good air, and healthy bees, there would be no crops to celebrate. Indeed, without these things there would be no people to create such a celebration. By honoring Mother Earth seasonally, we recognize not only our spirituality but also our place in the greater scheme of things.

Kate Braun will be participating in a Spiritual Life Productions Metaphysical Fair on Saturday and Sunday, September 21- 22, 2013, at the Marchesa Hall and Theater, 6406 N. I-35, Suite 3100, Austin, Texas. Saturday hours: 10 a.m.-6:30 p.m.; Sunday hours: 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Kate will also be answering questions on Tarot, Sunday at 1 p.m. as part of the fair’s lecture series.

[Kate Braun was a contributor to the original Rag. Her website is www.tarotbykatebraun.com. She can be reached at kate_braun2000@yahoo.com. Read more of Kate Braun's writing on The Rag Blog.]

The Rag Blog

[+/-] Read More...

[+/-] Summary only...

Kate Braun : Third Quarter Moon Is Time to Banish Negative Energies

Third quarter moon. Image from Leaders in Science.

Moon Musings: 
Third Quarter Moon 
(August 24-26, 2013)

This is a time to banish negative energies, to rid yourself of bad habits, bad jobs, bad relationships, bad choices.

By Kate Braun / The Rag Blog / August 21, 2013

The third quarter moon is a time to banish negative energies; a time to rid yourself of bad habits, bad jobs, bad relationships, bad choices. This is not a good time to attempt to manifest newness, whether it involve romance or finance, but it is an excellent time to manifest energies to help you manage stress, maintain a spiritual protection zone, and to continue the progress of projects begun at the new moon. You may call upon Umbrea or any Crone Goddess to help advance your cause.

It is best to determine in advance how you decide to orient your ritualing. It is not wise to attempt both banishing and manifesting intentions, as their oppositeness may cause them to cancel each other out.

If your focus is on banishing negative energies, it is best to plan your ritualing for Saturday, August 24, or Sunday, August 25. If your focus is more on the continuing advance of projects already begun, the best days are Saturday, August 24, or Sunday, August 25, or Monday, August 26.

If you choose to banish negative energies on Saturday, August 24, the ruling planet is Saturn and you should use the color black, try to be outdoors and barefoot so the soles of your feet connect with the earth, repeat your chant three times. This day is good to use to focus on rituals for self-discipline. Stick to the point and don’t let yourself become distracted.

If Sunday, August 25, is a better day for banishing your unwanteds, Lord Sun governs your intentions, the color yellow should be used, there should be fire flaming in your ritualing area, and your chant should be repeated six times. Center your focus on money or financial matters, health concerns, and friendship issues. In particular, ask for clarity.

A suggested chant for releasing:

I let go I let go as I grow, as I grow
direction and choice is mine to make
I choose the best for my soul’s sake.

If you prefer to concentrate on the completion of projects already begun, Monday, August 26, is the better day for this work. Lady Moon rules the day and will assist you in your rituals for inspiration, change, self-inspiration, and increased psychic ability. These will likely give you insights about how to best bring your unfinished projects to fruition. Use the color or metal silver, make sure to have water present in a goblet or bowl or fountain, and repeat your chant nine times.

A suggested chant for manifesting:

Desiring only good I call blessings to me;
in honor and joy so shall it be.

Before you put away your tools and decorations, I recommend you take a moment to reflect on the work you have done this day. Then you may find it helpful and balancing to recite:

May I be at peace;
May love live in my heart;
May I awaken to the light of my own true nature;
May I be open to the positive changes begun today;
May the love within me flow to all living beings.

[Kate Braun was a contributor to the original Rag. Her website is www.tarotbykatebraun.com. She can be reached at kate_braun2000@yahoo.com. Read more of Kate Braun's writing on The Rag Blog.]

The Rag Blog

[+/-] Read More...

[+/-] Summary only...

Kate Braun : Lammas is the Fire Festival

Honoring the First Harvest. Image from Asiya.

Honor the harvest:
Lammas is the Fire Festival

By Kate Braun / The Rag Blog / July 24, 2013

“Lord of the Harvest place your fire in me…”

Lammas, a Fire Festival also called First Harvest, Harvest Home, and Lughnasadh, may be celebrated on Wednesday, July 31, 2013, Thursday, August 1, 2013, or Friday, August 2, 2013. If at all possible, celebrate outdoors and have a fire burning.

You may use candles, or a cauldron, chiminea, barbeque pit, or grill. As long as it’s an open flame it will serve the purpose nicely. If you celebrate indoors, I recommend you include a cauldron in your table decorations and have charcoal tablets handy to ignite when your meal is concluded.

Decorations may include sickles, scythes, corn dollies, sun-wheels, bread, and fresh fruits and veggies. Use small brightly-colored notebooks and pens as placecards on your table. Your choice of colors may include red, gold, orange,yellow, bronze, citrine, gray, and green.

A pot-luck feast is most appropriate for this festival, as sharing food with others is a way to manifest prosperity in all its forms. Encourage your guests to bring whole-grain breads, locally-grown produce, summer squash, berry pies and cobblers, cornbread shaped like little ears of corn, ale, and fruit wine, and all you will need to prepare is roast lamb.

This celebration honors the harvest, honors Lord Sun, honors all grain goddesses such as Demeter and Freya. Begin your meal by asking each guest to break off a bit of bread and present it to his neighbor while saying “May you never go hungry” or “May food be always on your table” or a similar sentiment.

As your meal progresses, encourage your guests to tell or retell myths of grain goddesses, family stories about past harvest celebrations, memories of celebrating harvests. Keep the focus on the bounty of Mother Earth, the enjoyment of eating locally-grown foods, the delight in sharing food and companionship with friends. Make any toasts that seem appropriate, too.

At the conclusion of your feast ask your guests to use their notebooks and pens to write or draw symbols of whatever it is they regret from the previous 12 months. Burn these regrets in the ceremonial fire or on the charcoal tablets you ignite in your cauldron; as the smoke rises, the regrets are dissipated into the air, leaving only wisdom behind and a clear path ahead.

Any leftovers should be shared among your guests, making sure that no one takes home any of the food that person brought. If there are more leftovers than guests to take them home, it is strongly recommended to give those leftovers to the needy or the homeless.

It is considered taboo to keep your own uneaten contribution to the festivities. By sharing we generate energies that promote continuing prosperity.

[Kate Braun wrote for the original Rag Her website is www.tarotbykatebraun.com and she can be reached at kate_braun2000@yahoo.com. Read more of Kate Braun's writing on The Rag Blog.]

The Rag Blog

[+/-] Read More...

[+/-] Summary only...

Kate Braun : Masculine Energies Dominant at First Quarter Moon

First quarter moon at dusk. Photo by A.K.Entingh / AccuWeather.com.

Moon Musings:
First Quarter Moon
(July 9–11, 2013)

By Kate Braun / The Rag Blog / July 9, 2013

“Grow, grow, within and without; moving forward is what I’m about; strength is mine, honor is mine, success is mine, all will be fine.”

First quarter moons are times to start projects, both those you expect to finish within a month and those that will take longer. The focus should be on growth, be it of income, savings, information, knowledge, or whatever you have growing in your garden. If you are still planting things in the garden, this is the time to plant above-ground crops.

While preparing your magickal site, nibble on spicy foods such as tamales and nachos; they will help accelerate your energies. Ripe pears and a good blue cheese also make a delicious and nourishing snack. Drinking tea, fruit punch, and water is recommended, but don’t let yourself become so heavy with food to digest that you lose your spiritual focus.

If you choose to celebrate on Tuesday, July 9, Mars rules the day and will be helpful with developing courage and protecting property. Use the color red, incorporate the element Fire, and repeat your chant five times. You may also invoke Thor’s help. The day is named for him.

If Wednesday, July 10, is your preferred day to celebrate, Mercury is the planet to keep in mind while making your preparations. Use the color yellow and make sure you feel air moving across your body as you repeat your chant eight times. This will be easy if you are outdoors. If you stay inside, turn on a fan. This is a day to focus on career matters most of all. It is also Odin’s day, so you may invoke him or any deity associated with paternal leadership to assist you.

If Thursday, July 11, is when you opt to celebrate, the ruling planet is Jupiter, the planet of expansion. Listening to energizing music with a bouncy beat as you create your site will help keep positivity around you. Make magick regarding money and legal matters. Use the color blue, the element Water, and repeat your chant four times.

Keep your chant simple and to-the-point. You create whatever words most accurately indicate your intentions. Here is a suggestion: “Grow, grow, within and without; moving forward is what I’m about; strength is mine, honor is mine, success is mine, all will be fine.”

Notice that whatever day you pick for your celebrations, masculine energies will be dominant. Call on them to help get your projects off to a good start. Rev the engines, so to speak, and hit the ground running. When momentum is well-built, then you can relax and coast.

Before you put away your tools and decorations, I recommend you take a moment to reflect on what you have just manifested. Hold the image of your finished projects in your mind. Breathe deeply. Feel the sense of accomplishment that is sure to come. Then you may find it helpful and balancing to recite:

May I be at peace;
May love live in my heart;
May I awaken to the light of my own true nature;
May I be open to the positive changes begun today;
May the love within me flow to all living beings.

[Kate Braun's website is www.tarotbykatebraun.com. She can be reached at kate_braun2000@yahoo.com. Read more of Kate Braun's writing on The Rag Blog.]

The Rag Blog

[+/-] Read More...

[+/-] Summary only...

Kate Braun : Beltane is a Time of Great Magick

May Pole. Image from deviantART.

A time of Great Magick:
Celebrate Beltane on April 30 or May 1

By Kate Braun / The Rag Blog / April 23, 2013

“All things ripen and grow... Abundance in Eternal Flow/ As one the Lord and Lady...”

Either Tuesday, April 30, or Wednesday, May 1, is a good time to celebrate Beltane, also known as Roodmas, Walpurgisnacht, and May Eve. This is a time of Great Magick, second only to Samhain in power.

The powers of elves and fairies are growing and will reach their peak at Summer Solstice, so be nice to them! One way to do this is to decorate a living tree or bush with bells and ribbons. When these elementals are happy, they will protect your outdoor spaces.

All colors are acceptable to use in your decorations, but be sure to use white, dark green, and red. This is a Fire Festival, a Wedding Feast honoring the union of God and Goddess, a time to take action on the activities and projects planned at the Vernal Equinox. As it is the last of the three springtime fertility festivals, plan to generate energy centered on growth of all kinds: growth in spiritual awareness, growth in the garden, growth in your bank accounts.

Serve your guests dairy foods, sweets of all kinds, red fruits, green salads, and cereals. A menu incorporating these elements would be a buffet of: an assortment of breads, crackers, and cheeses; apple slices; strawberries and yogurt; salad of lettuces, baby spinach, sprouts, and parsley; honey-vinaigrette salad dressing; ice cream and oatmeal cookies; red velvet cake; sweet muffins; sangria; mint-hibiscus tea.

May Pole: Life emerging.

Your decorations should include braiding of some sort. May Poles are a traditional sight at Beltane, the red and white streamers a manifestation of the life emerging in the Planet Earth. A small pole with red and white ribbon woven around it would make an appropriate centerpiece. If your hair is long enough, braid it. The intertwining represents the union of God and Goddess.

You could also provide the materials for you and your guests to each make a May Basket: small woven baskets, greenery (real or artificial) to fill the baskets, flowers and sprigs of herbs (real or artificial) to add to the greenery, red and white ribbons to make bows for the finished basket.

When choosing flowers to use in the May Baskets, keep in mind that roses can represent spirituality as well as the goddess, red carnations will attract fairies who enjoy healing animals, clover is wildly attractive to fairies, lobelia helps attract winged fairies, heliotrope is enjoyed by fire elementals, morning glory repels unwanted night fairies, and rosemary protects from baneful fairies. But do not use mistletoe, as it can attract unpleasant tree fairies and be aware that fairies tend to not like the smell of dill.

Another activity associated with Beltane is to make a joyful noise. Encourage your guests to bring wind instruments and use them at some point in your festivities. Trumpets, recorders, whistles, flutes, and ocarinas fit the category, as do many other breath-powered instruments. Be creative.

Above all, make it a joyful and joyous event. This is a time to celebrate life, love, and vitality!

[Kate Braun's website is www.tarotbykatebraun.com. She can be reached at kate_braun2000@yahoo.com. Read more of Kate Braun's writing on The Rag Blog.]

The Rag Blog

[+/-] Read More...

[+/-] Summary only...

Kate Braun : Waxing Crescent Moon Is Time to Clarify Your Focus

Waxing crescent moon. Image from Missouri Skies / EarthSky.

Moon Musings:
Waxing Crescent Moon
(April 12-14, 2013)

As Lady Moon progresses to fullness, your goals should also progress to completion.

By Kate Braun / The Rag Blog / April 8, 2013

The waxing moon is a time to promote growth, to focus on increasing whatever it is that you would like to see increase in your life, to clarify focus and set short-term goals to accomplish in this moon-cycle, to begin new projects. For gardeners, it is time to plant or transplant above-ground crops. You could easily incorporate planting seeds or transplanting young plants into their permanent location into your celebrations as it is best to begin your activities at sundown.

You may honor any virgin-goddess deities at this time. As Lady Moon progresses to fullness, your goals should also progress to completion, even as the seeds planted in this moon-phase germinate and send their stems up through the soil.

April 12 and 13, Lady Moon is in Taurus. Taurus, a fixed Earth sign, has strong influence on home and the home environment. Should you choose to honor the Waxing Crescent Moon on either of these days, your actions of intention should focus on good health, the state of your home, finances (stocks and real estate as well as savings accounts and IRAs), and a general sense of security.

If you choose to celebrate the Waxing Crescent Moon on Friday, April 12, use the color green, the elements earth and water, and repeat your chant seven times. Remember that in addition to love, Venus, who oversees Fridays, also manages all household matters, including finances and savings account balances.

April 13, Saturday, is Saturn’s day. If this is a better day for your celebration, use the color black and repeat your chants three times. Keep in mind that Saturn is currently retrograde, not going direct until July 7, 2013.

When planets retrograde, they appear to be moving backwards across the sky and the energy they promote is opposite of what it usually is. Saturn, one of the big outer planets, is fond of boundaries, organization, and structure. Normally cautious, when he retrogrades we find ourselves facing blockages and difficulties that can lead us to inaction rather than progress, no matter how slow that progress might be. For this reason it will be wise to prepare carefully and thoroughly if Saturday, April 13, is the best day for you to honor the Waxing Crescent Moon.

April 14, Sunday, Lady Moon is in Gemini. Gemini is a mutable Air sign. This day is best used to focus on matters involving communication, writing, studies, relatives, and methods to better influence others. On Sundays, Lord Sun’s influence is strong. Use the color yellow, be sure to light some candles to bring in the Fire element, and repeat your chant 6 times.

Chants or incantations can be as short or as lengthy as you choose. I recommend thinking in advance of what your intention is and frame your chant or incantation with that intention firmly in mind. To say “I am safe, my home is secure, my savings are increasing, my future is bright” is only one example.

[Kate Braun's website is www.tarotbykatebraun.com. She can be reached at kate_braun2000@yahoo.com. Read more of Kate Braun's writing on The Rag Blog.]

The Rag Blog

[+/-] Read More...

[+/-] Summary only...

Kate Braun : Vernal Equinox Combines Customs from Many Cultures

"Eoster" was an Anglo-Saxon maiden goddess of the dawn. Image from Vita Marie Lovett.

Vernal Equinox:
A renewal of the land's fertility

By Kate Braun / The Rag Blog / March 18, 2013

“Green, green, it’s green they say, on the far side of the hill...”

Wednesday, March 20, 2013 is the Vernal or Spring Equinox, which may also be called Ostara or Lady Day. Lady Moon is in her 2nd quarter in Cancer; Lord Sun is entering Aries. The blend of Water and Fire can be volatile, producing lots of steam; it can also be gentle, resulting in the balance of energies necessary to properly boil an egg.

The name “Ostara” comes from “Eoster," an Anglo-Saxon maiden goddess of the dawn. Many cultures have contributed to the customs associated with the Vernal Equinox. In the Long-Ago it was believed that the hare was a hermaphrodite and could reproduce without loss of virginity. This belief led to associating hares with maiden goddesses such as Diana.

In the Pennsylvania Dutch area of the United States in the 18th century, German tradition was added with the tale of the “Osterhase” (“hase” means “hare”) who brings good children gifts at Easter, putting the gifts in the “nests” made in caps and bonnets; is it so surprising that today we mention the Easter Bunny with his basket of treats? You may honor the maiden goddess of your choice.

This celebration is centered on balance: balancing a raw egg on its larger end; creating a menu to include legumes, dairy, and grains for balanced protein; remembering the past as we move into the future. Traditionally, the Vernal Equinox was the day on which to begin planting an herb garden; with global warming affecting us as it is, this may no longer be the case. Consider the weather in your area and make your gardening plans accordingly.

All pastels are appropriate colors for this day, but be sure to include pink, to represent fire; green, to represent water; and yellow, to represent Lord Sun as he continues to grow in strength.

Decorate with living plants, equal-armed crosses, representations of rabbits and eggs.

A suggested menu: salad of sprouts and leafy greens such as spinach and lettuces garnished with slices of hard-boiled eggs, crumbled blue cheese, toasted pumpkin and/or sunflower seeds, and toasted pine nuts. Ham-and-cheese quiche. Hot cross buns. Chocolate. (The representations of rabbits and hares in chocolate reflects the lore that Eoster enjoyed sweets.)

At the Vernal Equinox we celebrate the renewal of the land’s fertility. One custom to ensure fertility in the garden is to “plant” (i.e. bury) an egg, raw or boiled or dyed or not, in the east corner of the garden. This is an activity that could be easily incorporated into your festivities with you and your guests singing or chanting as the hole is dug and the egg planted.

A suggested chant: “Grow, grow, my garden grow, this is just the start; sun and rain and hands and hoe, each will do their part.” Or create a chant of your own.

[Kate Braun's website is www.tarotbykatebraun.com. She can be reached at kate_braun2000@yahoo.com. Read more of Kate Braun's writing on The Rag Blog.]

The Rag Blog

[+/-] Read More...

[+/-] Summary only...

Kate Braun : Welcome the Light on Candlemas

Image from The Mystical Kingdom.
Candlemas 2013:
A season of renewal

By Kate Braun / The Rag Blog / January 29, 2013

“Keep on the sunny side, always on the sunny side,
Keep on the sunny side of life...”

Saturday, February 2, 2013, is Candlemas, aka Imbolc, Feast of Lights, Brigid’s Day. Lady Moon is in her 3rd quarter in Scorpio.

Waning moons are times to release and let go of unwanted or unnecessary things. Candlemas is a season of renewal. It is good to use this time to release winter’s gloom and welcome the light. One of the easiest ways to do this is by using light.

Candles, lanterns, flashlights, mirrors, all will serve the purpose: polish all shiny surfaces, window panes, mirrors, tile floors and countertops. Place candles on or in front of mirrors; this will increase the available light. Symbolically, we are encouraging Lord Sun’s continuing growth; symbolically we are assisting in our planet’s rebirth.

If you hang a silk scarf in an open window and let the breeze blow through it, this charges it with positive energy. Then wear the scarf for part of your attire. If it is white, yellow, pink, light green, or light blue, or has any of those colors in its print, it will bring more appropriate energy into your festivities. Use these colors in your decorations as well.

Serve your guests spicy dishes such as curries and chilis, foods which invoke warmth. Brigid is the patron saint of Candlemas. She is the patroness of poets and artists, blacksmiths and midwives. Shepherds and cattle herders honor her. She is a fire/sun goddess. Imbolc, another name for this festival, refers to new-born lambs suckling their dams. This is why milk dishes such as yogurt, quiche, and custards should also be featured in your menu.

At sundown, process through the house in a sunwise (clockwise) manner, sending light into all drawers, closets, corners, cabinets, under furniture, etc. You may invite your guests to join you in this activity. You may also bless seeds that will be planted but do not cut or pick plants today. All your activities should be pro-growth.

If you have a fireplace, be sure to put out and re-light your hearth fire. This represents the reemergence of Lord Sun from his wintry hibernation, symbolizes the rebirth of light and warmth, and stimulates generative energies within your home.

A rhyme associated with this date is:

If Candlemas Day be fair and bright,
Winter will have another flight;
If on Candlemas Day be shower and rain,
Winter is gone and will not come again.

If the rhyme has a sense of familiarity, remember that Candlemas and Groundhog Day are the same date.

[Kate Braun's website is www.tarotbykatebraun.com. She can be reached at kate_braun2000@yahoo.com. Read more of Kate Braun's writing on The Rag Blog.]

The Rag Blog

[+/-] Read More...

[+/-] Summary only...

Kate Braun : Samhain Is a Time for Transformation

Time for transformation: Acorn Carved with Dremmel Tool. Image from Skull-A-Day.
Celebrating Samhain:
A time for transformation

By Kate Braun / The Rag Blog / October 31, 2012

“Under the moonlight we dance/ Spirits dance, we dance/ Holding hands we dance...”

Wednesday, October 31, 2012, is Halloween, aka Samhain, Third Harvest, All Hallows Eve. It marks a time for transformation and growth of the soul while in a spiritual hibernation between Samhain and Yule (Winter Solstice, when life begins to bloom again on Mother Earth).

This is the beginning of the agrarian year, a time of “being in the womb of the earth." We now have time to study, to reflect, to prepare land and soul for the next cycle that will begin at Yule. Honor the Crone (old, wise woman): she holds the tribal lore, stores the records of the clan. Now is the time to listen to the wisdom of the ancestors. Use this knowledge/lore to make plans for the coming year, not only for work, but also for your own spiritual growth and enrichment.

Samhain is also a time of great magick, when the veil between worlds is at its thinnest. Do not be surprised if you sense contact with spirits that have crossed this veil or are in transition between the worlds. If you choose to enhance whatever possibilities of communication might be, there are many methods: you may scry, using either a black mirror or water placed in a dark-colored bowl or cauldron; or contemplate the flame of a single candle in an otherwise-unlit room; or create a dumb supper, to name just three.

Be sure to use the colors black and orange in your decorating scheme. You may also use red, brown, and/or golden yellow as accent colors.

If possible, celebrate outdoors and have a fire. Begin your outdoor activities by sweeping the area with a besom or straw broom. This symbolically cleanses the area, sweeping away the past and opening the door to the future. If you invite your guests to each bring a broom or besom, this could become a group activity that could be turned into a celebratory dance.

Lighting a new candle for the “new year” that is now in gestation is also something that could be incorporated into your activities.

Serve your guests a bountiful feast that may include pumpkins, apples, nuts, turnips, all gourds, squash, beets, corn, mulled wines, cider, beef, poultry, pork. Any crops not harvested by this date should be considered taboo and left in the ground, and it is also taboo to share leftovers at this festival. You may, however, bury apples along a road or path for spirits who are lost or who have no descendants to provide for them. Apples are food for the dead.

Decorate with pumpkins, jack-o-lanterns, cornstalks, cauldrons, brooms and besoms, apples, root veggies, images of black cats. Throw any bones from your feast into the fire as an offering to the Gods/Goddesses for healthy and plentiful livestock in the coming year. Then, when the ashes are cool, spread them over your garden. This blesses the land as well as nourishes the soil.

Be aware that various Nature Sprites are out and about and are said to enjoy playing tricks on humans. In olden times people dressed in white or wore disguises to fool these entities; today we put on costumes just for the fun of it.

[Kate Braun's website is www.tarotbykatebraun.com. She can be reached at kate_braun2000@yahoo.com. Read more of Kate Braun's writing on The Rag Blog.]

The Rag Blog

[+/-] Read More...

[+/-] Summary only...

Jim Rigby : Religion is No Longer Adequate

The Dalai Lama. Image from Nulla dies sine linea.
Dalai Lama:
Religion is no longer adequate

There is a growing realization that something is being born in between what we call “religion” and what we call “atheism.”

By Jim Rigby / The Rag Blog / September 19, 2012

Last Monday the Dalai Lama posted on his Facebook blog:

All the world’s major religions, with their emphasis on love, compassion, patience, tolerance, and forgiveness can and do promote inner values. But the reality of the world today is that grounding ethics in religion is no longer adequate. This is why I am increasingly convinced that the time has come to find a way of thinking about spirituality and ethics beyond religion altogether.

Religion has always been the lamp, it has never been the flame. Religion is whatever skillful means we use to remember we are all interconnected. It is whatever practice we use to stay grateful and alert. Unfortunately those who do not fall asleep into religion are rare.

I doubt the Dalai Lama was actually calling for the end to those disiplines that brought him to this clarity, but I do think he was realizing that religion that does not die into compassion, becomes a hindrance. He is calling for a new way of speaking about ethics.

I began this blog in part because I believe we are living at the death of an old worldview and the birth of a new. After Galileo, Darwin, and Einstein, much of what we once called ”religion” lies in ashes. But it is the nature of human understanding to die and then rise from the ashes.

There is a growing realization that something is being born in between what we call “religion” and what we call “atheism.” It is a Colossus with the clarity of a scientist and the reverence of a mystic. We do not yet have words for it, but I personally find it a thrilling time to be alive.

[Rev. Jim Rigby, a human rights activist, is pastor of St. Andrew’s Presbyterian Church in Austin, Texas. Jim Rigby blogs at jimrigby.org. He can be reached at jrigby0000@aol.com, and videos of his sermons are available online here. Read more articles by Jim Rigby on The Rag Blog.]

The Rag Blog

[+/-] Read More...

[+/-] Summary only...

Kate Braun : Celebrate the Blue Moon with Sea Water

Image from Fast and Flurrious.
Moon Musings:
Full Moon/Blue Moon
(August 31, 2012)

By Kate Braun / The Rag Blog / August 27, 2012

"If they say the moon is blue / We must believe that it is true" -- 1500’s proverb

Lady Moon is in Pisces, a Mutable Feminine Water sign, for this Full Moon, and the day, Friday, Frigga’s day, is adding to the abounding feminine energies. The second Full Moon in the month of August, it is called a Blue Moon because of the rarity of seeing two full moons in one calendar month. There is no particular metaphysical significance to a Blue Moon, no reason to give it more emphasis than any other Full Moon.

Named the Piscary or Wort Moon, this Full Moon is a good time to celebrate your accomplishments since the most recent New Moon, a good time to move energy forward toward goals to be achieved by the next New Moon, a good time to keep positive energy moving through and around you.

Feminine energies are nurturing, loving, supporting, encouraging, respecting. I recommend that your magickal workings focus on these positive qualities. Prepare yourself in advance by deciding what topics you find it best to focus your intent upon. The possibilities include: artistic endeavors, health and fitness, knowledge, change and decisions, money, motivation, protection, self-improvement.

Sea water is an important part of Full Moon magick. Sea salt dissolved in tap water is an acceptable substitute. The sea salt should be thoroughly dissolved and the water should then be charged in advance of your celebration.

The simplest way to charge water is to put it in a glass container and let the container of water sit in sunlight or moonlight for 8–12 hours. If your water is being charged outside, be sure to cover the container to keep bugs/leaves/dust out. If it is not convenient to charge the water outside, you may place the container in advance of your celebration on a window ledge for the appropriate time.

One use of the charged water is to invoke Matron Goddesses such as Aphrodite and Cerridwen to assist you in your efforts. You may do this by sprinkling some charged water to the East, South, West, and North, calling on the Matron Goddess of your choice at each direction.

Pour some charged water over your bare feet if you are able to celebrate outdoors under the light of the Full Moon. If you celebrate indoors, spritz yourself from head to toe with charged water, being sure to include the soles of your bare feet. Put charged water into an atomizer or mister for this purpose.

Any leftover charged water should not be saved but returned to the earth. Using it to water houseplants, shrubbery, or trees is said to give extra positive energy to the plant.

[Kate Braun's website is www.tarotbykatebraun.com. She can be reached at kate_braun2000@yahoo.com. Read more of Kate Braun's writing on The Rag Blog.]

The Rag Blog

[+/-] Read More...

[+/-] Summary only...

Kate Braun : Lammas is the First Harvest

Lammas: the First Harvest. Image from Cambridge Community Television.
You can burn your regrets on
Lammas, the First Harvest

By Kate Braun / The Rag Blog / July 24, 2012

"The corn is as high as a elephant’s eye..."

Tuesday, July 31 or Wednesday, August 1, 2012, is a good time to celebrate Lammas, First Harvest. Lord Sun is in Leo and Lady Moon is in her second quarter in Aquarius. As both Leo (Fire) and Aquarius (Air) are masculine signs, I encourage you to incorporate the feminine elements Water and Earth into your celebrations. This will create a better balance.

Use the colors red, gold, orange, yellow, bronze, citrine, green, and grey in your dress and decor. Lammas means “Loaf Mass” and refers to the first loaf of bread (or cornbread) made from the first-harvested grain of the season, so serving your guests foods that use corn, rye, and/or wheat in their composition is appropriate. Some possibilities are: gingerbread, cornbread, and popcorn.

In addition, include any locally grown produce that is in season, berries and berry pies, roast lamb, ale, and fruit wine, according to your budget and preference.

Begin your feast by giving thanks for the positive things in your life. Encourage your guests to do the same. Honor grain goddesses such as Ceres and Tonantzin. Tonantzin was an Aztec goddess of corn and the earth. Lore says that after the conquistadores destroyed Tonantzin’s temple, the Virgin Mary appeared to Juan Diego and told him to build a shrine where the destroyed temple had stood.

The story of Juan Diego’s efforts to do so, the appearance of the Virgin on his cape, and the eventual building of the shrine, is well-known; what is not so well-known is that many Indians took the Virgin Mary to be another aspect of Tonantzin. Their allegiance to this representation of a familiar goddess is, therefore, not surprising.

If you bake a loaf of bread for this occasion, do not slice it but let each guest tear off a bit of bread from the loaf and feed it to the person sitting to their right while saying “May food be always on your table," “May you never go hungry," and other phrases to that effect. Be sure to reserve part of the loaf to be thrown in the ceremonial fire. Bless the tools of your trade in the smoke of the fire (you may add some herbs or incense if you like). This is said to ensure prosperity and positive action in the coming year.

Encourage your guests to tell and retell tales of and myths of Grain Goddesses. The story of Demeter, Hades, and Persephone is but one. You and your guests may also write down words or symbols of things you regret on a piece of paper, wrap the paper in corn husks, and toss into the fire. As these regrets burn to ashes they are released into the air and drift away, leaving you and your guests with the opportunity to begin anew.

[Kate Braun's website is www.tarotbykatebraun.com. She can be reached at kate_braun2000@yahoo.com. Read more of Kate Braun's writing on The Rag Blog.]

The Rag Blog

[+/-] Read More...

[+/-] Summary only...

Kate Braun : Summer Solstice Marks the Midpoint

Summer Solstice fire. Image from Desert Green Goddess.
Between Beltane and the First Harvest...
Summer Solstice: Wednesday, June 20, 2012

By Kate Braun / The Rag Blog / June 13, 2012

“In the summertime when all the trees and leaves are green....”

Wednesday, June 20, 2012, is the Summer Solstice, also called Litha and Midsummer. The Summer Solstice marks the mid-point between Beltane and the first harvest festival, hence the term Midsummer. Lady Moon is in her first quarter, in the water sign Cancer. The Goddess is now a matron and ripely pregnant, foreshadowing the coming harvest. Wednesday is Odin’s day, implying that fathering, generative, paternal energies will also abound.

Midsummer lore says that any herbs gathered or harvested on this day are exceptionally potent. The general rule for harvesting herbs is to do so before 10 a.m., while the essential oils in the plants are more abundant.

Choose among the colors white, red, golden yellow, green, blue, and tan for your decorating. Serve your guests any yellow or orange food such as summer squash, carrots, sweet potatoes, bananas, peaches, oranges, lemons. Foods cooked over flames are also welcome: shish-kebab, grilled veggies, grilled salmon or other fish, grilled meats. Ale, mead, and fresh fruit juice are traditional libations, as are lemonade and sangria.

Plan your festivities to celebrate vitality, creativity, health, and abundance. Celebrate all things in your life, work and play equally. Make magick for love, healing, and prosperity. Rejoice in creation and creativity in all forms.

Include your animals in your festivities. Fairies and garden sprites will be pleased if you set out some food for them. You may also leave bits of mirror or crystal about to reflect light, which pleases these beings. Remember that part of this celebration is to not give away fire or food, and to not sleep away from home.

Make a fire if possible. Any fire will do, from a big bonfire to flames in a small cauldron. Any amulets that have lost their usefulness and/or fulfilled their purpose should be destroyed by casting them into the fire. When the ashes cool, strew them across your yard. This is said to bring blessings to the land.

First quarter moons are a good time to begin projects, to declare intentions to be completed by the full moon. It may be helpful to create a self-dedication ceremony to fix your intentions more firmly in your heart and mind. One way to do this is to speak your intention or define your project to the flickering flames, speaking across the flames to each of the equinox and solstice compass points, East, South, West, and North.

The balance shifts from the Waxing Year to the Waning Year. This cycle of abundance leads to “the time that is no time” when fields lie fallow and there is time to reflect and renew before the next movement of the Great Dance begins. The Summer Solstice marks mid-year as well as mid-summer.

On Saturday, July 21, 2012, I will be participating in a Feed Your Spirit event at the Holiday Inn in Round Rock, Texas. On Saturday and Sunday, July 28-29, 2012, I will be participating in a Spiritual Life Productions Metaphysical Fair at the Holiday Inn Midtown, in Austin. All the information about both these events as well as how to schedule an advance reading is posted on my website.

[Kate Braun's website is www.tarotbykatebraun.com. She can be reached at kate_braun2000@yahoo.com. Read more of Kate Braun's writing on The Rag Blog.]

The Rag Blog

[+/-] Read More...

[+/-] Summary only...

Steve Russell : Traveling by Water

Mar Caribe: Traveling by water. Photo by Jefry Lagrange Reyes / Wikimedia Commons.
Traveling by water

"We pray in English so we understand each other; we pray in Indian so God understands us." -- Lakota elder

By Steve Russell / The Rag Blog / April 11, 2012

"Coffee more... you want?" A young man, brown but of indeterminate nationality, is walking by with a carafe. My mind replies "Si, por favor," but I quickly realize I have not identified his accent and his features do not look American Indian (as most Latin Americans do), so I mentally retreat to "Yes, please."

I have yet to find an American working on this ship or, as a friend of mine maintains, a "USian." Her position that Canada and all of Latin America are "American" is geographically unassailable but linguistically confusing. Whatever you call them, every individual I've seen so far is not, in the immortal words of the New Jersey bard, "born in the USA."

The skipper is a Dane. The other folks important enough to have mugshots in the ship's guide are from the UK, Canada, Austria, Croatia, and Ireland. Our waiter is Mexican and the barmaid is from Grenada. One of the dining options every day is Indian food... from India, that is.

I take my coffee out on the deck and sit down to drink it. There's nothing but ocean as far as my eyes see, but I'm proud of myself for beginning to think in Spanish since I know the nearest land is the Yucatan. Of course, being happy at thinking in Spanish makes me ashamed of having surrendered the battle to think in Cherokee.

The only time I even come close to thinking in Cherokee is in ceremony, when English feels like a square peg for a round hole. I am reminded of a multi-tribal meeting where a Lakota elder who followed a Shoshone who had followed a Cherokee said, "We pray in English so we understand each other; we pray in Indian so God understands us."

I’ll never forget that witticism, and “Indian” as a language makes pretty much the same sense as “Indian” as a race. The memory brings back my mellow mood.

Being at sea is oddly relaxing. Oddly, because of the obvious peril. If the boat breaks, are we going to swim home? My bemusement at non-swimmers who take cruises departs with that thought.

Speaking of peril, I was once inside a scale model of Columbus' flagship, the Santa Maria. I remember thinking of the distance those genocidal goldseekers traveled in that little thing... with horses, yet! Leaving guns, germs and steel aside, our ancestors were not conquered by men without courage. Those Spaniards had to be tough SOBs to even make it here. SOBs, thieves, murderers -- of course, but also tough.

Surrounded by ocean to all horizons, it's easy to visualize how men think they can dump waste into it forever but still take fish out of it forever. It's an understandable mistake. I find it harder to forgive what I saw in the reconstructed ruin of Ft. Laramie, Wyoming: a multi-hole outhouse jutting over the river. Upstream, cold and clear trout water. Downstream, a sewer. How could the colonists have thought that was right?

Of course, I'm biased. Our elders admonish us as boys not to urinate in the river. I can't say we all obeyed, but I can in my own elder years drink in the metaphor, pun intended, as harsh reality. In fact, we humans have overfished the oceans and we have trashed them to a degree hard for those of us born landlocked to contemplate. Perhaps our mistakes are more significant than we are.

The peaceful feeling from the sea is also a feeling of insignificance. The absence of land or birds or other ships makes it easy to wrap my mind around the plain facts that the Milky Way Galaxy is not the center of the universe, the star we call Sol is not the center of the Milky Way, the planet we call Mother Earth is not the center of the solar system, North America is not the center of the earth, Oklahoma is not the center of North America, and Cherokee County is not the center of Oklahoma.

The Pope wanted to lock Galileo up for these kinds of thoughts, a pope like the one who sent those Spaniards to steal and kill and rape. Yet we indigenous peoples, who are thought to be the most primitive people on earth because we were last into the Iron Age, take that insight with our mother's milk! We understand we are not the center of everything that matters.

How can I presume that the ocean will tolerate humankind’s mistakes and so we will always have fish to eat? Or that the whole planet will learn English for my convenience? Next time, I shall answer the man in Spanish.

[Steve Russell, Cherokee Nation of Oklahoma, lives in Sun City, Texas, near Austin. He is a Texas trial court judge by assignment and associate professor emeritus of criminal justice at Indiana University-Bloomington. Steve was an activist in Austin in the sixties and seventies, and wrote for Austin’s underground paper, The Rag. Steve, who belongs to the Cherokee Nation of Oklahoma, is also a columnist for Indian Country Today. He can be reached at swrussel@indiana.edu. Read more articles by Steve Russell on The Rag Blog.]

The Rag Blog

[+/-] Read More...

[+/-] Summary only...

Danny Goldberg : Don't Diss the Drum Circles

Drummer at Occupy Wall Street in Philadelphia. Image from PhillyNow.
Don't diss the drum circles:
Why hippie culture is still
important to our protests

By Danny Goldberg / AlterNet / November 2, 2011

Progressives and mainstream Democratic pundits disagree with each other about many issues at the heart of the Occupy Wall Street protests, but with few exceptions they are joined in their contempt for drum circles, free hugs, and other behavior in Zuccotti Park that smacks of hippie culture.

In a post for the Daily Beast Michelle Goldberg lamented, “Drum circles and clusters of earnest incense-burning meditators ensure that stereotypes about the hippie left remain alive.”

At Esquire, Charles Pierce worried that few could “see past all the dreadlocks and hear... over the drum circles.” Michael Smerconish asked on the MSNBC show Hardball if middle Americans “in their Barcalounger” could relate to drum circles. The New Republic’s Alex Klein chimed in, “In the course of my Friday afternoon occupation, I saw two drum circles, four dogs, two saxophones, three babies... Wall Street survived.”

And the host of MSNBC’s Up, Chris Hayes (editor at large of The Nation), recently reassured his guests Naomi Klein and Van Jones that although he supported the political agenda of the protest he wasn’t going to “beat the drum” or “give you a free hug,” to knowing laughter.

Yet it is precisely the mystical utopian energy that most professional progressives so smugly dismiss that has aroused a salient, mass political consciousness on economic issues -- something that had eluded even the most lucid progressives in the Obama era.

Since the mythology of the 1960s hangs over so much of the analysis of the Wall Street protests, it’s worth reviewing what actually happened then. Media legend lumps Sixties radicals and hippies together, but from the very beginning most leaders on the left looked at the hippie culture as, at best, a distraction and, at worst, a saboteur of pragmatic progressive politics.

Hippies saw most radicals as delusional and often dangerously angry control freaks. Bad vibes.

Not that there is anything magic about the word “hippie.” Over the years it has been distorted by parody, propaganda, self-hatred, and, from its earliest stirrings, commercialism. In some contemporary contexts it is used merely to refer to people living in the past and/or those who are very stoned.

The hippie idea, as used here, does not refer to colloquialisms like “far out” or products sold by dope dealers. At their core, the counterculture types who briefly called themselves hippies were a spiritual movement. In part they offered an alternative to organized religions that too often seemed preoccupied with rules and conformity, especially on sexual matters. (One reason Eastern religious traditions such as Buddhism and Hinduism resonated with hippies was because they carried no American or family baggage.)

But most powerfully, the hippie idea was an uprising against the secular religion of America in the 1950s, morbid “Mad Men” materialism, and Ayn Rand’s social Darwinism.

The hippies were heirs to a long line of bohemians that includes William Blake, Walt Whitman, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Henry David Thoreau, Herman Hesse, Arthur Rimbaud, Oscar Wilde, Aldous Huxley, utopian movements like the Rosicrucians and the Theosophists, and most directly the Beatniks.

Hippies emerged from a society that had produced birth-control pills, a counterproductive war in Vietnam, the liberation and idealism of the civil rights movement, feminism, gay rights, FM radio, mass-produced LSD, a strong economy, and a huge quantity of baby-boom teenagers. These elements allowed the hippies to have a mainstream impact that dwarfed that of the Beats and earlier avant-garde cultures.

In the mid-Sixties rock and roll’s mass appeal fused with certain elements of hip culture, especially in San Francisco bands like the Jefferson Airplane, the Grateful Dead, and Big Brother and the Holding Company (as well as Seattle’s Jimi Hendrix). That mood was absorbed and expanded by much of the popular music world, including the already popular Bob Dylan, the Rolling Stones, and the Beatles.

John Lennon’s songs “Instant Karma,” “Give Peace A Chance,” “Across The Universe,” “Revolution” (“But when you talk about destruction / Don’t you know that you can count me out”), and “Imagine” are probably as close to a hippie manifesto as existed, and the Woodstock festival as close to a mass manifestation of the idea as would survive the hype.

It is easy to cherry-pick a few idiotic phrases from stoners in the 1970 documentary Woodstock, but what made the event and its legacy meaningful to its fans -- aside from the music -- was the example of people in the hip community taking care of each other, as shown in the Wavy Gravy documentary Saint Misbehavin’.

No two hippies had the same notion of what the movement was all about, but there were some values they all shared. As Time put it in 1967, “Hippies preach altruism and mysticism, honesty, joy and nonviolence.”

Like any spiritual movement (or religion) hippies attracted pretenders, ranging from undercover cops to predators such as Charles Manson, who used their external trappings for very different agendas.

By October of 1967, following the so-called “Summer of Love” (during which more than a hundred thousand long-haired teenagers overloaded and permanently changed the Haight-Ashbury neighborhood of San Francisco), exploitation of the word “hippie” had become sufficiently prevalent that a group of counterculture pioneers in the Bay Area held a “Death of the Hippie” mock funeral. A flier announcing the ceremony warned young seekers against the existential perils of hype.

Media created the hippie with your hungry consent. Careers are to be had for the enterprising hippie. The media casts nets, create bags for the identity-hungry to climb in. Your face on TV. Your style immortalized without soul in the captions of the [San Francisco] Chronicle. NBC says you exist, ergo I am. Narcissism, plebian vanity.

The pure of heart were exhorted to “Exorcize Haight-Ashbury. Do not be bought by a picture or phrase. Do not be captured in words. You are free, we are free. Believe only in your own incarnate spirit.” Woodstock shows that by 1969 even the long-haired masses had taken to calling themselves “freaks.”

Poet Allen Ginsberg at the Human Be-In, San Francisco, 1967.

A year ago, shortly before the 2010 mid-year election, a left-wing blogger on a conference call with President Obama’s adviser David Axelrod, complained that dismissive comments by the administration about its left-wing base amounted to “hippie punching.”

The phrase was used to emphasize the contempt that the administration had shown for the progressive base, but it was also a reminder of the disdain that most of the Left has for the word “hippie,” as if to complain, “You think that we are as irrelevant as hippies!” Like those who ostentatiously distanced themselves from the Wall Street drum circles, the bloggers wanted to distinguish the modern Left from actual hippies (or who they thought hippies were).

The anti-hippie ethos on the left runs deep. Many 1960s radicals claimed that the hippies had squandered a chance to mainstream left-wing political ideas. In Black Panther leader Bobby Seale’s book Seize the Time he quotes white radical Jerry Rubin as saying that he and others had formed the “Yippies” because hippies had not “necessarily become political yet. They mostly prefer to be stoned.” In the real world, the Yippies never got a mass following, but the Grateful Dead did.

Early in 1967 writers for the Haight-Asbury psychedelic paper the Oracle, along with local poets, musicians, and mystics, organized the first Human Be-In in Golden Gate Park. They were chastised by a group of Berkeley radicals, including Rubin, for rejecting their proposal that the gathering should have “demands,” a suggestion that the amused hippie conveners saw as a contradiction of the whole idea.

(There are echoes of this argument in criticisms of the Occupy Wall Street protesters as insufficiently specific in their demands -- as if the interests of 99 percent are not a clear enough litmus test for any proposed laws or regulations.)

Bill Zimmerman, an antiwar activist of the Vietnam era, summarized the radical attitude toward hippies in his excellent memoir Troublemaker:

Not believing they could alter the juggernaut of American capitalism through politics, the hippies tried culture instead -- starting with [Timothy] Leary’s slogan, “Turn on, tune in, drop out”... While we [“the political people in the antiwar movement”] all accepted a subsistence lifestyle without expensive clothes, cars or other luxuries, they were about enjoyment, friendship, shared experiences, and whatever transcendence could be achieved through mind-altering drugs, music, and sex.

This both exaggerates the political viability of the non-hippie radicals of the day and underestimates the social conscience and commitment of many of those who chose to develop communes and new age spiritual communities.

One example is the SEVA Foundation, founded by Wavy Gravy and Ram Dass in the early 1970s. Over the course of 30 years, the nonprofit organization has raised enough money from rock benefits to pay for over three million eye operations in Third-World countries to rescue people from blindness. And of course the modern environmental movement owes as much to a mystical belief in the sanctity of the earth as it does to science.

Some on the left maintained that hippies scared off socially conservative liberals who otherwise would have been more sympathetic to the antiwar movement. In There but for Fortune, a wonderful documentary about radical singer-songwriter Phil Ochs, the artist can be heard complaining that freakish looking protesters undermined the credibility of antiwar demonstrations with middle Americans.

In a piece for The Nation in 1967, Ochs’s friend Jack Newfield complained, “Bananas, incense, and pointing love rays to the Pentagon have nothing to do with redeeming America.”

Republican leaders including Richard Nixon, Spiro Agnew, and Ronald Reagan eagerly used cartoon versions of hippies as part of their successful attempt to break up the New Deal coalition. “A hippie is someone who looks like Tarzan, walks like Jane, and smells like Cheetah,” quipped then California Governor Reagan in 1969.

Jefferson R. Cowie’s Stayin’ Alive theorizes that America’s rightward trend began when Nixon lured working-class whites into Republican arms by contrasting the hippie myth of Woodstock with country singer Merle Haggard’s anti-hippie anthem “Okie from Muskogee.”

One was southern, gritty, masculine, working class, white, and soaked in the reality of putting food on the table; the other was northern, eastern, radical, effete, leisurely, affluent, multi-cultural, and full of pipe dreams.

One was real, the other surreal; one worked, the other played; one did the labor, the other did the criticism; one drank whiskey, the other smoked dope; one built, the other destroyed; one was for survival, the other was for revolution; one died in wars, the other protested wars; and one was for Richard Nixon, the other for George McGovern.

Cowie’s book is terrific, but this is nonsense. The lion’s share of the decline in Democratic votes for president occurred between 1964 (61 percent) and 1968 (43 percent), when Hubert Humphrey was the nominee. Most of those formerly Democratic votes went to the racist Alabama Governor George Wallace, who garnered 13 percent of the vote on a third-party ticket -- an explicit reaction against civil rights legislation.

The demonstrations outside of the Democratic Convention in 1968 in which many Americans sympathized with cops more than protesters had nothing to do with hippies; they were orchestrated by radical non-hippies like Rubin. (Hippie icon Allen Ginsberg argued in vain against the Chicago protests, because he presciently feared violence).

Four years later, there were no hippies involved with the McGovern campaign’s mistakes, like the ill-advised selection of Thomas Eagleton as the vice-presidential nominee and the breakdown of the relationship between the campaign and organized labor. Those mistakes were made by well-intentioned but inept liberal political consultants, many of whom would self-righteously characterize themselves as “pragmatists” in future years.

It is possible that some non-racist, older, white Democrats switched sides because they were offended by aspects of hippie culture, but it seems likely that more of their children and grandchildren rejected conservative orthodoxy because of their attraction to that very culture. The Allman Brothers and other southern rock bands developed a following that dwarfed that of Haggard, and ended up being a source of funding for Jimmy Carter’s primary campaign in 1976.

Modern heirs to the hippie idea include millions of “New Age” believers, inspired by the likes of Baba Ram Dass, Joseph Campbell, Deepak Chopra, and in some cases Oprah Winfrey, whose non-hierarchal spirituality exists outside the confines of traditional churches and synagogues. Although very few neo-hippie groups have explicit political agendas, many in the progressive public interest world benefit from their largess.


What possible relevance does any of this have to American politics in 2011? For one thing, many of those young people who like to beat on drums and who devised some of the subtle infrastructure of Occupy Wall Street are clearly tuned into an energy that exists outside of the parameters of political science.

Spiritual movements do not adhere to “party lines,” which is one reason why conventional political activists find them so maddening. Martin Scorsese’s recent documentary on the life of George Harrison reminded us not only of the Beatles’ passionate embrace of Hinduism and the funds he raised for Bangladesh but also of his perverse anger at paying his taxes.

Nonetheless, it doesn’t take a poll or a focus group to know that people who identify with the hippie idea are unlikely to vote Republican. (Ron Paul’s people are trying. They give out fliers at Occupy Wall Street while, as of this writing, Democrats still fear to do so.)

Conservatives have effectively peddled the notion that all politics are corrupt. The resulting apathy, and opposition to government, conveniently leaves big business more in charge than ever. The price that Democrats and progressives pay for belittling or ignoring contemporary devotees of the hippie idea, who share the opinion that politics are corrupt, is to reinforce the impulse to “drop out” in a cohort that would otherwise be, for the most part, natural allies.

Spiritual values can expand the reach of political action, especially at a time when progressives struggle to connect to mass consciousness. Their causes have been mired in phrases like “single-payer” and “cap-and-trade.” For all of their virtues, policy wonks didn’t come up with “We are the 99 percent.” People with drum circles did.

The Right understands the subtle connections between ideology and practical politics. Few Republican leaders distance themselves from right-wing Christians or demagogues like Glenn Beck. And Ayn Rand’s doctrine of selfishness, despite elements that conservative politicians would be afraid to avow, is celebrated by right-wing oligarchs and wannabes.

Alan Greenspan, the long-time head of the Federal Reserve, was a personal disciple of Rand, and Congressman Paul Ryan, who drafted the Republican budget that would’ve eliminated Medicare, cites Rand as his intellectual hero.

Any bohemian movement will attract goofballs. Drum circles may inspire and unify a crowd in one situation, but simply drown out conversation in another. It is one thing for a polite protester to offer “free hugs,” and quite another for a sweaty inebriate to impose them. The way to deal with this is to rebuke individual jerks, not to dismiss a vibrant section of mass culture.

As Martin Luther King pursued his strategy of nonviolent protest, the NAACP leader Roy Wilkins, who oversaw most of the legal strategy for the civil rights movement, mocked him by asking, “How many laws have you changed?” King replied, “I don’t know, but we’ve changed a lot of hearts.”

Obviously, the civil rights movement needed both spiritual and legal efforts to achieve its goals. So do modern progressives. As Nick Lowe asked in the song made famous by Elvis Costello, “What’s so funny about peace, love, and understanding?”

[Danny Goldberg is the author of the books How the Left Lost Teen Spirit and Bumping Into Geniuses. This article was first published at Dissent Magazine and was distributed by AlterNet.]

The Rag Blog

[+/-] Read More...

[+/-] Summary only...

Kate Braun : Beltane Fire Festival Celebrates Life

Beltane Fire Festival. Photo from Damn Amazing Pics.
Celebrate life, fertility, passion:
Beltane: Sunday, May 1, 2011

By Kate Braun / The Rag Blog / April 27, 2011

“Dark of the Moon what we envision will come to be by the full moon’s light”

Sunday is Lord Sun’s day, and Beltane is a festival celebrating life, fertility, vitality, passion, and growth. It is a fire festival, so be sure to include fire in some form as you plan your festivities.

Beltane, like Samhain, is a time when the veil between worlds is thinnest; the Spirit World can easily interact with the Mundane World on this day and especially after dark.

Lore tells us that on this night (also named Walpurgisnacht) spirit light will glow on the site of buried treasure (or so Count Dracula told Jonathan Harker), but this is Lore only; I do not recommend venturing forth with picks and shovels to follow a will-o-the-wisp.

All colors may be used in your decorations, but be sure to include white, dark green, and red. Your menu should include custards, sweets of all kinds, green salads, red or pink wine punch, breads, cereals, all red fruits, and ice cream.

Roses, representing the flowering dimension of the human soul, are insightful additions to your decorations as are mirrors, honeybees, and braided fibers.

Robin Hood and Maid Marian are frequently used as symbols of God and Goddess at this celebration. You may designate two of your guests to personify them by blessing all your guests, leading them in weaving red and white ribbons around a May Pole, and exchanging a kiss to symbolize the union of God and Goddess. Their kiss would be a signal for the blowing of horns and whistles, ringing of bells, and other signs of joy.

In addition, if you are able to celebrate outdoors and can build a fire, Marian may bless any animals present by adding fragrant herbs to the coals and then using a feather or feather fan to wave smoke from the fire over them.

In the Long Ago, two fires were built and cattle, horses, and other farm animals were guided between the fragrant smoke of both fires; now any animals included in this festival are more likely to be pets, led or carried by a family member to receive Marian’s blessing.

Don’t forget the fairies and other nature sprites. Decorating a tree or bush with bells and ribbons will not only please them but also prompt them to care for and protect your gardens and outdoor areas.

[Kate Braun's website is www.tarotbykatebraun.com. She can be reached at kate_braun2000@yahoo.com. Read more of Kate Braun's writing on The Rag Blog.]

The Rag Blog

[+/-] Read More...

[+/-] Summary only...