My Own Way

Since I have never been part of a coven, and I've never had a teacher, my only real guide is myself and whatever books I can get my hands on. This has its good and bad points. Since I have no teacher, I can just figure out whatever feels right and works for me, I don't have to follow the rituals and precise ways of someone else. The downside to it is that I have no one to teach me; there is no one to help me through my rituals and spells and no one to correct me if I'm doing something wrong.

This solitary methodology has led me to an interesting world of spiritual exploration. While I am certain there is a God and Goddess that help with whatever I may need, I can also feel different energies around me that are associated with the elements.

With this knowledge in hand, I figured out that most of the spells and energy is working with the elements, so I have adjusted the rituals to accommodate this. At first, I would light a white candle for each direction (North, East, South, West), but now that I know each is associated with a different element, I respect the differences and use a different medium for each direction (North - Earth - soil, East - Air - incense, South - Fire - candle, West - Water - holy water). I call each of the elements in turn (it is different each time, depending on how I am feeling and what I wish to accomplish) and then perform my spell or ritual.

Since making this change, I have noticed an increased success rate; not of my spells working, but working the way I wanted them to work. It is a wonderful feeling when something turns out the way it is intended.

Solo

Would have posted this sooner, but by cold has been kicking my rear end these past few days.

Wednesday evening, I performed my very first solo ritual. One of the ingredients I need for the cleansing I will be doing tomorrow is Holy Water, which is in short supply, since there are no stores in the area. Anyway, I adapted the Holy Water ritual from Silver RavenWolf's book Solitary Witch. Since it was my first solitary ritual, as well as my first ritual in nearly 5 years, I decided to have the instructions written down next to me for each step (so I wouldn't forget anything).

The feeling was absolutely amazing. I could feel the power of the Goddess and God flowing through me as I preformed the blessing. It was enough to make me cry tears of joy, and when I was finished, I was full of a confidence and energy I haven't felt in years. Truly, if you have never performed a ritual, whether alone or with others, I highly recommend it.

Handfasting

My fiance - who is not particularly religious - recently caved to my pestering and agreed to a Handfasting instead of a more "traditional" wedding ceremony. Now that the nagging has stopped, I have a more difficult task ahead of me: planning a ceremony that does not seriously offend my church-going relatives; most especially my uber-religious grandmother and her siblings. Luckily for me, one of my cousins is a Priestess and has already agreed to perform the ceremony/ritual for us.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not ashamed of my religious choices or the choices of my family, I just don't want anyone to have a heart attack or start screaming about how I'm a sinner and am going to hell on my wedding day. I've done some research online and read through a few books and most of them detail complicated rituals that likely make most of my friends and family very uncomfortable.

I was discussing this little dilemma with my cousin yesterday, and she came up with a solution I hadn't really thought of: for her, my fiance, and I to sit down and write a ceremony that works for us as a couple, but will not offend any of our non-Pagan guests.

We're going to wait until the wedding is a little closer before we have our first meeting, but at least we are headed in the right direction...ours.

Blessed Be