Lammas & the Turn of the Wheel
The Wheel of the Year turns as we move through the eight Earth holidays that include the Solstices (Winter and Summer), the Equinoxes - Fall and Spring, and the cross quarter holidays of Imbolc, Beltane, Samhain and Lammas.
Lammas is the time of celebrating the first harvest, it is a fire festival and connected with the baking of bread and the abundance of fruits that ripen at this time. Some of the fruits are ripe and being harvested, and yet, much remains to mature before being gathered in.
Abundance may come,
and yet, it is not assured.
Will there be sustenance
through the winter?
I always perceive Lammas as the time when we are at the threshold between hope and fear.
Hope and fear create a yin/yang duality.
We hope/we fear, we hope/we fear, we hope/we fear.
In the garden, we are harvesting summer's abundance and getting ready to plant fall crops.
In the spiritual garden, we can ask questions
concerning what we are harvesting and what we are planting
for the coming days, weeks, months, years.
What do you hope for?
Hope to release, or to receive,
Or perhaps to feel, or understand?
What do you fear?
Fear you might lose, or never have?
Or perhaps you fear you might not be seen?
Or that you will be seen but it's not safe?
What abundance do you want to harvest?
These and other questions personal and pertinent to you can be journaled or sketched about to explore, mull over, meditate about, while asking for and being open to receive guidance from your inner wisdom and guides.
Lammas harvest, edible mushrooms!
I suggest a simple ritual, such as this:
Lammas Ritual
Make a threshold of dried herbs creating a line on the ground, or use a ribbon or yarn, or a stick, or plant stalk, or find a natural archway in the woods. Or draw a line in the sand, literally!
Stand on one side of it, and contemplate which hope/fear twin you are addressing and cross the threshold to choose Trust. Trust encircles the duality, connects them, and is also the way through that maps the way that will bring us home to ourselves in the present.
And the present moment is the point of empowerment, the space where our creativity can breathe and come to life.
