Book review

https://www.patheos.com/blogs/agora/2022/03/phoenix-rising-baba-yaga-slavic-earth-goddess-book-review/

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Baba Yaga review

Full review HERE

The time for insights

Autumnal air is potent with insights. They hang heavy in the morning mist ready to emerge and burn bright in pronounced and sharp autumn sunsets. Can you feel it?

There is a reason I call this season the most magical. During this time palpable transformations happen. Things that had laid dormant for some time come forward. They now ask to be resolved, the soil is ready. It is time for the sharpest clarity to come into our awareness. It is an exciting season, and I am yet to meet another woman, who does not adore autumn.

Nature, writing, giving, family, love, gratitude – insights have been very clear and vital to my moving forward with my own personal evolution and various projects. It feels like I have waited for this time for the whole year and finally I can exhale, throw the weight of uncertainty off my shoulders, and relax into myself fully. I am truly reaping the rewards for what has been patience, vulnerability, allowing the hard times to be a learning experience and embracing all.

It is the Earth element time, which is dominant in me. There is no surprise I feel at home in this season.

Imagine Autumn as a human, a lady; be it an imaginary vision or a real person that comes to mind. Her charm and maturity are attractive. Her wisdom is deeply grounding, comforting, and reassuring to whoever seeks it. I see a mature lady, but not too old. She comes to my awareness as autumn begins to transform the landscape slowly into wetness here and bareness there. As it sprinkles hues of pale yellow and deeper brown amidst the trees, I see a lady that rejoices in the season of understanding what had been, what is and what is yet to come. She is aware of all seasons and interconnectedness of all living matter and spirit. She is not afraid of anything, as fearing darkness is like moving further away from the roots of the mother, from the warmth of the womb – the exact place of nurturing and transformation we need to be in. It is non-sensical, unwise to fear or reject what is the catalyst for all life. Autumn invites to welcome darkness into every aspect of our lives and let it cradle us into a state of sleep and inner reflection. If allowed and befriended the darkness can be incredibly soothing to go deeper into our own season of winter. What a gift and an opportunity this season brings.

This time of year, I relish shrouded silence in the woods. Energy is more potent. Sounds are pronounced one minute and muted the next. Signs and glimpses of all things ‘last’. The last burst of a bird song, the last splash of colour, the last ray of sunshine and warmth on the skin. My intuition rises like an internal fire that’s been resting and preparing. Freshness in the air is scented with remade matter, moist and moving with organisms, rotten with nutrients for the earth, in preparation for winter.

August 2020

Soul land

It is a period of wrapping things up in a wider sense of the beginning of the harvest season. To me it makes absolutely sense and after all is said and done what is left is a simple life, gratitude, people that we love, fulfilling work and creativity in every day with self-awareness, but not analysis. We are now done with analysis, I feel, and shifted towards moment-by-moment daily values and really breathing life in as it comes. This year has brought so many improvements to the ways things run, which is applicable to individual lives and the collective, and it is good to be able to look back and be grateful for having arrived at this point in the year and see how things were and how they are now through our own personal creation, tweaking, restructuring and letting things fall away as needed. The difference is huge. I am excited to start reaping the fruits/rewards of the seeds that I planted back in March. I remember that period of confusion, trepidation and nervous excitement of the unknown. Planting season always keeps me sane and grounded. Here we are with my land bursting with fresh organic produce that ends up on my plate and in my body. Very satisfying, indeed.

This summer for the first time in many years I am not depressed. I get seasonal summer depression (SAD in reverse) every year with no fail, but not this time. Instead I have been happy and noticed how I enjoy everything, however small, and gratitude has gone up a level also transforming to this shining light that doesn’t go out, but just accompanies me in everything that I do. I am able to be more and for longer and find it a lot more natural, up another level. I have learnt to stay in one place and be okay with it. I am slower and more intentional and what has been the most useful change is simplifying everything even more. For years I have had up to three jobs and multiple projects on the go all at the same time. I slowly reduced and culled in that area and this year it is the final alteration, I hope, to the whole work dynamic. I actually want to have just one job from here onwards – this is alien as you can imagine, but necessary. As always my way of living and being has been 100% intuitive and I attribute satisfactory results to my intuition, which I have never distrusted. I don’t know any other way to live at this point and it has truly changed my life many years ago when I stepped into understanding that my inner voice is the one I need to follow. My intuition is my magic.

My trip to Scotland this year has been utterly different too. I did wonder in the last year if things were going to change following a lot of work done on it last year and struggles and turmoil last summer. It did change in a very natural and gentle way. My predictions were correct and my work paid off. As I drove on empty roads in Argyll on the way to the islands I was surrounded by pine forests and wild flowers everywhere. I saw a cloak of grief not being there anymore. The lump in my throat was no longer there. I felt free, almost flying. I could finally exhale with ease. Sadness, overwhelm and confusion cleared up, evaporated and all I felt was the land just being there, unchanged, unshaken and blooming as usual. Immense comfort entered me and it remained unchanged for the duration of the trip. I felt happy every single day. I reached some sort of completion on my journey of seven years. The number, I realised, was significant, as every grief that comes my way is always intense and lasts for seven years exactly. This was no different.

Today I can say that the feeling of contentment and calm is here within me and very welcome it is too. Being back home is like slotting into a place that holds me. It is comfortable, snug and functional. It might not be my soul home, but it is a secure base, something I created and share with people that I love. There is beauty in that for sure. I look forward to autumn and winter immensely and getting back to writing and creating.

Ostara 2020

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Why this Ostara is particularly important…

Blessings on 2020 Ostara, everyone and what a vital time this is to honour, celebrate and appreciate what we have and love. The season of transition is at its peak, which goes hand in hand with what is happening around the globe right now. We are entering into a space of uncertainty and ask ourselves ‘will be seeds sprout? Will I be sustained over the hard times ahead? Will the harvest be bountiful to keep us in nourishment?”

What we plant right now is important for what we will reap later on. It is time to take care of ourselves and our consciousness in a way we might not have done before. The seeds of growth and change have never been more important on every level – how we think, how we honour our feelings and how we act as a result of self-awareness and self-reflection.

When most of us will be practicing indoors this weekend, stand by the light and plant your seeds on windowsills. Everyone and everything needs the light, warmth and sun to grow and even if it is often invisible to us these days, know it is there, in existence and support of our conscious efforts. Know that the birds, mountains and animals out there will continue as normal with their daily life, cycles will continue and nature wheel will turn no matter what. They have seen it all before and adapted using vital survival mechanisms and abilities to embrace change and adjust. We can learn a lot from the natural world, but what we can do as humans right now is continue nurturing our seeds in all their manifestations: family, friends; loved ones; our own bodies, psyches and souls. All is interconnected and important to care take.

Wishing everyone a successful sprouting season. Continue digging the earth and immerse yourself in nature’s wisdom. If you can go outside allow for the elements to tell you a story of what needs to happen. Elements are tuned into us, as we all carry elemental qualities within us. Listen to what needs to consolidate in order to get through this delicate, uncertain transition.

Keep well and sending you all Ostara blessings!