Barding :D what's that then :P

So I have been thinking about people and how they practice their craft. Maybe it's funny that I should be thinking about it because......well..........I suppose it's just that there are lots of different ways to practice and in my last post I spoke about my grove family. I just love and admire the way we are celebrating our differences, giving each individual a chance to have their say and contribute something to the group. Yesterday I had a party to celebrate my completion of the bardic grade within The Order of Bards, Ovates and Druids (OBOD). It was a celebration from a combined group of very very magickal people, all of which wanted to share the day talking about and celebrating our craft. I decided to call it a Barding after the name of the grade I had just completed and the very first part of the order, the Bards.

It really fascinates me how the craft or our craft can be anything from grey Magick to demon worship hahaha, and yet we all get on and celebrate each other's strengths and personal triumphs. It's a testament to how diversity can give strength to others if understanding is made our foundation. With understanding we can appreciate the strengths that each different way of practicing can give to our own way of doing things, expanding our boundaries and increasing our knoweledge.

Anyway at this party we worked with the bardic circle casting and the prayer of our grove which is part of the bardic course and the practices that make up OBOD (it was MY party after all hahaha). I was so thankful to the people that came and I was so blessed with what they said and did for me that day, even though not all of them practice the same faith or craft as me, they do however recognise the importance of it to my life and the power it has to change, grow and empower the people performing it.

My grove family have shown me and taught me so much over the past year and a half. Lessons of tolerance, faith, love and compassion have all come from the fact that everyone in my little family has something different to contribute, and every contribution is considered with understanding, where the value of everything is accepted based on how it affects us all in different ways.

I couldn't have asked to be part of a family like this, I am so lucky that they found me and that they offer me understanding.

A new kind of family

I know I bang on a bout this stuff a lot but the thing is, you only really bang on about the stuff that really matters to you.............I am a member of something amazing and it's my grove hehehe. The grove of the white goddess :D.

Recently loosing my father and with the rest of my family either very far away or just plain not interested, I have found support from the people that others would assume don't have much to do with me. Of course it's only once a month and involves sacrificing goats to an imaginary host of spirits that want to use me and my friends to take over the world hahahahahahaha. But that's wrong, dead wrong.

Over the past 18 months I have met a lot of different people. People who come from almost every walk of life, who in their own way all love and practice Magick. In that time I have made friends, lost friends and become part of something that we have all affectionately named..........our pagan family.

Some people may feel a little out of their depth at times when they come to the grove ,and though being confronted with this massive gaggle of pagan geese may seem intimidating. Let me tell you that through my hardships I have never felt more love, compassion or support. 

From a group of seemingly random and beautiful people I have been given time to cry, laugh (like I have never laughed before), grow and learn new skills. All of us have this one thing in common.......Magick!!............ That special kind of connection that means no matter how far or how lost you may become you always get a hug from everyone when you walk in to the hall just once a month, goats and all.

I used to think that being alone with my thoughts was how I best processed them or that only blood relatives could offer me the support that I needed. But I have learned that if I don't share my life with others then I will never be able to share others lives with them and that in it's self makes for a lonely existence indeed. My Magick and my heart has grown because I have learned to accept others in to my life and my Magick. It's been a hard journey but now I am enjoying having more than just friends.......I have a family...........and I am part of a growing community ( that loves hugs..........and goats hahahahaha :D).

Time to get back on the rails.

Hey my beautiful lot of beauties haha. It's been a while Ennit :D.

Anyway, things are as they seem to be but I'm here and I'm happy so it's time to write to you all and let you all know the new stuff that is going on in my life :D. I have finally finished my bardic grade within OBOD and am now working towards the ovate grade of the course :D...........gimme another 2 years and I will be an all powerful DRUID!!!!!! MWAHAHAHAHAHAHA. Plus I have finally finished a college course in beauty so now it's job search time.........hmmmm that sound like fun (sarcasm is great). 

Cough!!

Anyway :D I have decided that with the end of my bardic grade (which was far more fun) that maybe I should do something. I'm not going to get a certificate or letter of commendation or anything like that so I have taken it upon myself to have a Barding :P.............let's be clear about this........a Barding is a party where I get celebrated as being awesome :D .......simply because my ego is just simply not big enough already hahahahahaha.

So anyway I have taken it upon myself to have this party of Clinton is awesome and invite lots of people to come and give me compliments on my awesomeness. However I am vexed..........simply.... vexed. I have never heard of a Barding before and have no idea what one would include let alone who came up with the idea (I'm betting it's me :P). Would there be ritual? Would there be prayer? Is it just going to end up being a booze up with disco music? I have no idea.

If I'm really honest with you I may just take everyone for a great big picnic with a bottle of champers to celebrate the move up to the next grade :D that sounds quite nice actually now I think about it :D.

I'm so exited to have a party and just piss about with my friends and family but I'm also concerned because my path in Druidry and the craft has created complications in my relationships with family. My faith is a massive part of my life and all in all they have kinda sworn off having anything to do with that part of me (which if I'm honest makes conversations difficult as it's all I want to talk about hahahaha). So what do I do about including family in my life when they seem to not want any part of it. Do I invite them anyway and just expect the declines or should I just ignore them al together and just not invite them and get a back log of complaints from those members who would have actually enjoyed the opertunity to come along. Ahhhhh........vexed again!!!!!!

I'm meeting up with my grandma tomorrow morning to have a catch up since my dad's passing and I'm gonna talk to her about it, which I'm sure will be really awkward but mehh. The thing I want the most is to know my family and be confident that they also know me.......all of me.......warts and all.

Anyway wish me luck, I miss posting on here and I need to start doing it again as you all seemed so interested in my rantings and ravings hahahahahaha. Cya laters my beauties and wish me luck.

BLESSED BE!!!!!

KAI

My religion not real.......hmmmm well poo poo to you.

I have been working through the elements now for the past 9 months of my bardic training and last night was a ritual that united all the individual blessings I had done in the previous months. 

The ritual took me a record breaking 20 minutes haha. I know there are people out there who are gonna say it should have taken an hour or more and those that will say that I obviously did it wrong and should have taken more time over it..............well poo poo to you. I realised during the meditation at the end that the ritual was only the beginning and that it didn't matter how long it took me to do the actual ritual. The real point of the exercise is to give me something to live, that it's not the 5 minute meditation that is important but infact the realisation that I need to take what I have learned during the ritual and apply it to more than just this 20 minutes but the rest of my life. To truly live with the elements in my body mind and spirit and remember the balance that comes from the unity of all things. 

That balance is what gives me faith and strength, when I feel balanced I really truly feel the Magick all around me, the connection to the fae and the spirits of the land. It is an empowering feeling that makes me wonder how far I could go. I feel like nothing could stand in my way. 

The ritual yesterday came after a bout of bad news and shitty happenings, for example having a car is just not as much fun as people lead you to believe hahahaha. But anyway, life has been a challenge and I found myself feeling cut off and disconnected from the truth of my own power. The elements of the world seemed a far cry from the balance I had spent the last 9 months trying to achieve. But then something happened and I made a conscious decision to change my circumstances and stop worrying about what I couldn't change. Instead I decided to resort to my faith, my belief in Magick and my connection to the spirits. 

To my great relief my connection had remained strong and with the quietest of calls the spirits answered, I  was reminded of my old habits of drawing symbols on things to cheer myself up. I remembered a sigil that I created when I was but a wee lamb hahaha. It wasn't 10 minutes before I had a pen and I was drawing the symbol on the back of my hand hahaha. It made me feel safe and strong again.

The symbol was one I had always loved to draw, a pentagram with 5 orbs that sat between each point to represent the elements. The pentagram represented me and the orbs represented my connection to the elementals and the protection they offered me. It is a symbol that always makes me feel invincible, like it could do anything. It isn't much really is it? Just a symbol. 

But what it means to me is more than just a star and a few blobs. It's my seal, my security blanket, my spiritual mark of power and my personal rune. It is something that holds me to the beliefs that I cherish and the memory of it keeps me from forgetting how I came to use it to protect myself in the past when things would go wrong. The elements are with me now and they have always and will always be with me. From now until forever and back again.

Spring is on the breeze.

It is Ostara and after reading lots of things online and looking through my books I have come up with nothing.......zilch........bump kiss hahaha. So I have decided to look at what I know in my heart, what I feel in my bones and what I taste on the breeze.

It is spring, the time of growth, birth and renewal. I am reminded of the gods and how they had disputes and growth during the first eons of creation. 

This in turn has me drawn to the story of Persephone and how she was taken by Hades to be his bride in the underworld. This act put her mother Demeter in to a despair and she no longer gave her gifts to the world. As she searched for her daughter the world became starved of fertility and began to wither away and sleep.

After three months and a plan from hades to make sure his bride returned to him, the beautiful Persephone was released from hades and returned to her mother. This act of reunion ends the very first winter and brings about the very first spring as Demeter's powers are returned to the world.

This is where I feel I am now. My spirit returned to my body as I was searching for something I felt I had lost. The love of a mother and her child is brought forth by this story and this reunion speaks of a fundamental love and care. As it is a goddess's love that is brought back in to life it spills out in to the world. Demeter the goddess of the harvest and fertility through the reunion of the one thing that makes her whole breathes life in to the wind, the warm breath takes the chill out of the air and summons the spirits of spring to begin their work. 

Cefiro is FIT!!!!! Hehehehehehe

Cefiro spirit of the spring breeze carries the goddess's breath to all the land. He spreads the message of care and love for one another. He brings the element of romance to the people so that they may again feel at one with each other and spread that love which from the goddess brings life to everything it touches. 

Demeter gives life and Cefiro transports it, may we be blessed by the breath of the goddess and the council of its courier. The power that gives fertility, growth, birth and renewal. Take it in people with your very lungs and use it wisely.

How to B the next letter in the alphabet

So after A were gonna have B........naturally haha. I was thinking about the letters in the alphabet and what each one would be about, actually forgot to think about B. I was far too concerned with the hard ones like Q and X haha. But anyway here it is, the second letter of the A-Z pagan journey. 

B is for Blessings.

In Druidry we mention it a fair bit and the same in Wicca too. Blessings are a big part of performing Magick. During a circle casting we bless and cleanse the area we are in, we ask for the gods to bless us during our rite's and we bestowed blessings on others in the form of charms spells or kind gestures. 

Blessings, I think are really important to a magickal practice as it gives you the chance to receive and give what I think of as a magickal gift or dose of good luck hahaha. 

Probably the most common and frequent blessings used are those involved in creating sacred space, for me at least the act of creating sacred space is great fun and full of Magick. The very best bit for me being when the circle is blessed with the elements of fire and or water. This is the act of giving the space you have created the relevant reverence to be sacred on this occasion (also done when asking for the blessings of the divine to watch over that sacred space). It is such a simple gesture that has such a big effect on the space it is enacted in and really speaks to emphasise the fact that you are creating something magickal within and out of the world of the mundane. 

Besides using a blessing on space you can ask for them from sources of Magick or divinity, you hear of people being blessed all the time and we even do it without thinking (the response to a sneeze comes to mind haha). But simply asking for a blessing can be enough to turn what seems like a very uncontrollable day in to one that becomes easier to manage. When we ask the gods to bestow us with blessings we are asking for help from a source of power, Magick, divinity or whatever you like to aid us in our struggles. It never hurts to ask right??

In my magickal practice I have also given blessings to people. For example, In a handfasting you are the mediator between the couple and the divine and acting as the high priest you bestow a blessing upon the couple with the aid of the gods, in order that their union may be one that is happy and peaceful. With the addition of the gods, some gestures and some words. A simple act of well wishing is given power to remain a reminding force of good in a couples life. A force that is remembered so as to aid with fights and keep the couple true to the meaning of the event where they were blessed.

Blessings can be simple acts or they can elaborate rituals that stay with you for a lifetime but at the end of the day a blessing to me is the truest form of Magick as it needs no jewels or fancy props to be performed. It is a simple act of lasting love that stays with a person or place for as long as it is needed.

A-Z A pagan journey.

It has been a long time since my last post and I have missed writing on here. It's been a long time because, well, I have been busy haha. 

Lots going on and little time to sit and think. But today I got the chance and while I was thinking I noticed something online that caught my eye, so here it is. 

MY PAGAN A-Z. :D

So the first letter is A obviously and of course the first word that comes to mind with me concerning the craft is the word Altar.

An altar is a place set aside for worship, somewhere that you decide to make sacred while you work on prayer, worship, spells or simple meditation. It is a place of your choosing or somewhere that is selected for the reason of spiritual expression. 

I love Altars and have 3 in my room :D, one to Apollo another to Aphrodite and a third one is for Magick of any kind. They are pretty much just places to put things. Apollo's altar is on a shelf Aphrodite's is on top of a piece of furniture and my Magick altar is on top of my chest of drawers haha. Nothing special to anyone else but to me they are focus points for worship, prayer and spells. 

When I do Magick I go to an altar that I have set up in my room, but what about when I am in a hotel for the night or if I am out in the woods, then what? The best thing about altars is that they can be anywhere and made of anything. I have made an altar out of a tree stump, stone and pine cone before.

All I needed was a focus for my Magick and the altar that I made was just perfect for that. When creating an altar I have always tried to think of a couple of things. How do I feel when I place my hands on it? Do I feel connected to my self and the Magick around me and am I picking fault with how I have arranged things. In other words Do I need all this stuff? Does it serve a purpose?

At the end of the day altars are anywhere you want them to be and if you need one it can be everywhere you find yourself. Be open to the world and just look for a place that suits you and your magickal needs and above all, keep it as simple as you need it to be.

One last thing I will say about making an altar is don't be worried about shifting it all round from time to time and try something different, some of us try and use seasonal colours to match the festivals but it's all up to you. Just have fun with your little place of Magick. The more you use it the more power it will generate. 

Have fun people and blessed be :D