~re-treading the path~

finding a path is never easy, keeping to a path is never easy and its easy to become distracted.

like anything in this world finding and remaining on a sacred path is one that constantly needs work, these things take time, take dedication and do not come easy.

anything can interfere with your path, even the smallest of thing, problems with family, a busy life, work, illness...anything.

but here's the thing...your path will never entirely desert you.

you might drift from the path but your path will never desert you.

it will sit snug deep within you like a fox cosy in it its den while your life gently meanders on its way, sitting there all cosy just waiting for you to remember it and to slowly find your way back.

this has been my life for a year now, the gentle meandering from my path. this has happened before but never for this long and never in such a complete way. a lot of this has been to do with my depression, the black dog drags you away from everything that is special in your life, isolates you from it, makes you think that nothing is important anymore. and that's how it was for months, I felt nothing, I had lost all connection, I felt nothing...absolutely nothing. the times of sacred celebrations passed me by without any sense of recognition or feeling. my altar space just sat there gathering dust and my shaman drum hung on it place above my altar un-touched.

as I wrote in my last post the magic of the moongazy gathering helped me find my way back onto my path and since then I have bene making those tentative first steps in re-treading my spiritual path, finding myself back on my soul journey.

the most important part was celebrating the summer solstice in my little wild, sacred garden, for once I was not too unwell or too pulled down by the 'don't care' vibe of depression to go and light a fire in my little cauldron...

I burned some of my star child 'moon' incense to celebrate the joining of the full moon on the summer solstice...

and drummed...

until the full moon slowly rose over the edge of the hollow we live in...

and I started to read my cards again. yesterday I did a four card reading of my shaman oracle cards...

 I feel better, the black dog and the anxiety is still there, but being back on my path and having a sense of connection makes me feel better, I feel almost whole once again.

~yule~

well how was your yule?

i admit that this year i have really struggled, really, really struggled.

for weeks now i have had problems with insomnia, i fall asleep easily but find myself waking around 3-4am and more often than not i get up instead of staying in bed and trying to get back to sleep.

boxing day found me up at 1am, wide awake, knowing my family were going to arrive later that morning and i had to cook dinner for the five of us.

luckily i made it but i am feeling so run down and exhausted. as i am off on holiday with my sister next week i really need to get on top of this.

the weather here has been grey and damp for weeks now with only a day or two of sunshine, a few days ago i was able to get washing on the line and magpie and merlin had fun playing in the garden

i was given some new books for yule which i have started already...

my neighbour Calv sent round some lovely ginger biscuits

and this morning i had a nice chai latte

choosing incense

and finally meet 'Gibson' our 1999 VW T4...

we finally sold 'Pretty Pagan' for something considerably smalller, something more of a pocket rocket. 

because we have lilith our crazy little french folding caravan we no longer needed a big camper with all the bells and whistles

 unfortunately a week or two after bringing him home some low life broke in and stole every one of swampys tools and so the spare money we had to turn him into a day van went on replacing all the tools, then he broke down and more money had to go on his repairs.

because it involved taking a lot of the engine apart swampy decided to replace a lot of the parts with nice new ones. we finally had him repaired and with his MOT the friday before yule.

once i am back from my holiday we will be slowly working on the interior~nothing fussy, just a seat than turns into a bed and a unit for the 'kitchen'.

this morning swampy put a hook up my my alter to hang my shaman drum from...although i just realised that in the new year we will be moving things around in our living room and it will have to come down again anyway!