Lughnasadh

This is part six in the series of celebrating The Wheel Of The Year.

All the "Cross Quarter Days" of which it is the third in the year, are celebrated about halfish way between the Soltices and Equinoxes. They are generally on the Eve's or day of of the first of the month- so Beltane is celebrated May 1, Samhain (now Halloween) is the night before All Soul's night. Lughnasadh (also spelled Lughnasa) is typically celebrated August 1 and is also called "Lammas."

Some references say this was one of the fire festivals, others say it wasn't. Traditionally, it's the first of three harvest festivals. First harvests of grains were celebrated with breads of all sorts. Harvest fairs dotted the country side, people danced in celebration of the bounty of the crops. This was a time of handfasting for either temporary considerations or commitments to longer marriages.

In my world interpreting and celebrating this festival, I see this time in the corresponding Wheel of Life as full on adulthood..not quite to "middle age" but no longer a young adult. It's an extension of the energies celebrated at Litha, celebrating our maturation in life. In my geographic location, the harvest has been in full swing for some time now. Most of the berries have come and gone. We've had peaches, pears, apricots, plums and nectarines for a long time, now. All sorts of veggies have been around for weeks and weeks. Some of our crops are done, not just beginning. So I saw this time as celebrating the life journey of the 30-40 year old...beginning to master things in their field, make a difference. Many are married with families, kids well on their way to growing up. There's a comfort level with the self that wasn't there in the 20's...knowing the self more and celebrating life's achievements, finding one's place and also letting go of youth.

My favorite way to celebrate this holiday was to continue to acknowledge and honor what we had created in the year so far- to really hoan in on the ways in which we were harvesting our intents made at Imbolc, both overt and subtles ways on all levels of our beings. As it's also a time of "stepping out," so to speak we usually did a ritual of acceptance of our bodies.

We would meet at a river, make a fire. At the end of the ceremony of ackowledging ourselves, we would do a meditation then take berries and eat some, while smearing them all over our naked bodies- giving thanks for this vessel that carries us..our ultimate expression. Initially we would smear the places we had "issue" with...blessing them and envisionsing these place in new ways. Eventually we changed it to smearing the places we didn't like AND the places we especially liked to make them one in the same. I really liked that. After drumming and dancing around the fire for awhile, creating all sorts of mayhem and happy whoopings, we would dive into the river and wash ourselves off. It was a BLAST!!! Highly recommended especially for CEO's, teachers, doctors, police officers and stay at home moms (well....yes...especially for everyone).

Tantrically, this is the time when we would have built our trust of each other in the group to being doing really deep work, delving into who we are and healing past woundings to make way for a more joyous "second half" stage juicy conscious living. In my group, this involved doing healing massage on each other.

Questions to ask the self at this time of year when we have opportunity to assess where we've come to and make new conscious choices about how we want to move forward:

Am I living my full juicy self? If not...what's holding me back? Self-limiting beliefs? Am I willing to revisit those beliefs and see them in a new more enlivening way that is more of my choosing than something outside me?

What have I accomplished in my life? Are they still my goals? What are my goals for life? What do I want to do before I die that I haven't done yet but still want to?

How has my immediate world supported me in creating the visions I've had? How can I begin to "give back" to Life, thanking it for its abundant cradling of my soul?

How do I celebrate myself? Do I do it enough? What are some little ways I can show myself I love me?

I encourage everyone to go find at least a berry to smear on their face. It really is quite liberating, fun and keeps all this serious stuff in perspective. Juicy Blackberries work best. Plus, they're real pretty.

Blessings!!

Images:

Dancing at Lughnasa from here

Blackberry by Scott Bauer

Woman at Burning Man 2003 by Brad Templeton