Hello hello, my loves.
It’s March, the light is (sort of) returning, and apparently so am I. I won’t pretend three months didn’t just evaporate on me, they did… If you have been here a while you know that I tend to show up in seasons, which is very on brand for a witch and very inconvenient for a blog.
But here’s the thing about Imbolc’s quickening, and Spring stirring: even when you don’t celebrate it intentionally, even when you’re too in it to light a candle or pull a card, the season has a way of doing its work anyway. The light comes back. The sap starts moving. Something in your body remembers that it is time to stir.
Something stirred. So here I am.
Where I Have Been
The honest answer is: everywhere and nowhere. Working full time. School full time. Running the CT Witch Crawl and the new Virtual version behind the scenes while it looks like nothing is happening (spoiler: so much is always happening). Teaching. Showing up for my people. Trying to remember to eat something that isn’t purely spite and caffeine.
The less honest, more comfortable, woo woo answer would be ‘I was resting and integrating’ which is also true but sounds a lot more intentional than it felt in the moment. In the moment it mostly felt like I was keeping my head above water.
I think a lot of us do thiss especially those of us who are healers and practitioners and space-holders for other people. We give and give and give and then one day we look up and realize we haven’t tended our own garden in months. The cobwebs are on the altar. The cup runneth dry. The blog has tumbleweeds…woops.
The cobwebs on my altar are both literal and metaphorical and I’m choosing to see them as evidence that I’m deeply committed to the witchy “aesthetic.”
What the Season is Asking
If you have been in a fallow season creatively, spiritually, professionally, emotionally then Imbolc and the weeks after it are your permission slip. The wheel is turning whether you’re ready or not. You get to decide if you’re going to move with it or be dragged.
I’m choosing to (try to) move with it. Mostly because being dragged sounds exhausting and I’m already tired.
For me this season is about returning to the things that fill me up instead of just the things that are required of me. Writing is one of those things. So is energy work and community. So is showing up here with you.
The Thing About Energy Work
Here’s something I have been sitting with lately: the periods of my life when I have been most depleted have also been the periods when I have been least consistent with my own energy practice.
Funny how that works.
I have been a Reiki practitioner for years and I will be honest with you the way I am always honest with you. I am not always good at receiving the thing I give to other people. I am excellent at holding space for someone else’s healing and absolutely feral about skipping my own. Classic healer behavior. Very annoying. Zero out of ten, do not recommend.
But one of the things this fallow season has taught me is that you cannot pour from an empty vessel. I know, I know, you have heard it a thousand times. So have I. But there is a difference between knowing something and actually feeling what it means in your body when the vessel is truly, completely empty. When you are running on reserve fuel and fumes and sheer stubbornness.
Reiki has been part of what brought me back. Remembering that energy healing isn’t just something I offer to clients, that it’s something I need too.
If you have ever been curious about learning Reiki, not just receiving it, but learning it, carrying it with you as a tool for your own life and practice then stay around because that is something I am going to be talking about more here. Because I genuinely believe that Reiki training is one of the most practical, powerful gifts you can give yourself as a witch and as a person who has a body that gets depleted by living in the world. But more on that soon…
A Small Ritual for Returning
Whether you have been away from your practice, your creative work, your community, or just your own sense of self, here is a small thing you can do right now, today, with whatever you have on hand.
You will need:
◆ A candle (any candle, the birthday one from your junk drawer is fine)
◆ A few minutes of quiet
◆ A willingness to be gentle with yourself about where you have been
Light the candle. Take three slow breaths. And say, out loud or in your heart:
“I have been away and now I am returning. I do not need to apologize for the time I spent surviving. I come back to myself now, not perfectly, not all at once, but willingly. The light is returning and so am I.”
That’s it.
Come Back With Me
I am glad to be back. I am glad you are here. Let us tend our gardens together this spring.
Be well, love you
Autumn
The Untamed Priestess