Faerie Beltane Ritual, 2020

I want some fun. Do you?

Please join me for a bardic circle to celebrate May Day, on Thursday April 30, from noon to 1:00 EST.

Bardic circles are a long running tradition in the Third Road (the tradition I teach). But we haven’t had one since forever.

Here’s how we’ll do it:

* Bring a short song you’d like to sing or lead us in. It needn’t be “sacred.” All music is holy.
* Or tell us a story. A brief fairytale, anecdote from your personal life, or any other tale is perfect.
* Play your harmonica for us.
* Tell a dumb joke.
* Share some thoughts that’ve been running through your mind.
* Or bring any other offering. It’s all wonderful.

If you can’t think of something to share, come anyway. Your simple presence is a beautiful contribution.

Fun is healing. Fun is empowering.

Fun is pure magic. Fun aligns the spirit.

Our fun blesses the Old Gods, the earth, and our lives.

Even the attempt to enjoy ourselves opens us and our lives to new possibilities.

In situations that near broke my spirit, I learned to find whatever fun and humor I could possibly manage. It helped significantly in returning me to wholeness—e.g., spiritual resilience, physical well-being, and power.

Mayday is a Pagan celebration of joy, life, and all its potential. That makes it a perfect time for fun.

No experience needed.

This free ritual is a group phone call. (Your carrier might charge you for the phone call into the ceremony.)

Instructions for how to dial in to participate are in my next newsletter. Click the banner below to subscribe for free and receive other exclusive offers available only to my wonderful subscribers.

Thank you so much.

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Inherent Magic & Fundie Paganism

Magic is a flow within the fabric of reality. Magic is also a state of being inherent in all living things. Magic is also living in myth, actually living it. And magic is love. Fundamentalist religion, including fundamentalist Wicca, squelches one’s magical being, squelches one’s love, and separates one from the larger flow of loving magic. If you judge others’ magic, your own may weaken.

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Beloved Fellow Seeker, Thank you for your spiritual journey, because I can’t grow spiritually alone.

I wrote a book, out of gratitude for you and love for you: “Sprinkling Faerie Dust on Breakfast: A Daily Reader for Busy Parents and Their Children . . . and for Any Way-Busy Person.”

Spiritual reading that fits into your day and supports travelers of any spiritual path.

Only available from the author. Buy it here: http://etsy.me/W5GJs4 Thank you again!

The Ecstatic Path, Serving Community, & False Ego

The Ecstatic Path, Community Service, and Arrogance

A few thoughts, May Day, 2012
Updated May, 2022

Detail from Root Woman, painting by Francesca De Grandis

Detail, Root Woman, Digital Art, Francesca De Grandis .

The occult shop I worked in during the 80s had lockers out back, behind the building. Our customers would buy candles, which we would dress (for example, anoint with magical oils), bless, and then burn in the lockers. Some customers requested candles for prosperity blessings. Some asked for healing candles. The variety of magical candles covered every imaginable situation from justice to romance.

By some standards, it was such an odd priesthood, if not utterly dismissed and invalidated. The bunch of grungy lockers with wax dripping all over them was part of something many would consider hokey, outright ridiculous. But it was the real deal—powerful magic that was of service to community.

Priesthood (ministry, service, call it what you will) takes many sincere forms. Some have more prestige than others. But whether one receives a lot of acclaim or none at all, the Gods know when the heart is filled with juicy desire to serve. This desire fuels our joy constantly. And the Gods bless such a heart with peace and happiness.

The ecstatic path I walk includes a commitment to serve.

The Gods also know when the heart is heavily burdened, made sad by a self-deceiving ego-drive to be at the top of the heap. And the Gods bless this heart, too. This compassion is sorely needed for individuals who don’t understand that service fueled by the desire for prestige and ego-feed will only get them snared by false ego, which twists their magic in knots so it works against them. Goddess help them. They can end up on a hard road! I know this because I had to learn it through personal experience.

Decades back, I went into media to serve my Gods. I’m a shy and reclusive person who did not want to be in media, I just wanted to remain in oral tradition, but my Gods insisted I also enter the media. And sometimes, working in the media, my thoughts dwelt on fame or ego. When they did, it hurt me, what a mess! Luckily, my overall reason for being in media was service, so I was able to spot my arrogance and move past it. … Well, I still am arrogant to some degree, but I imagine all humans are. As long as I remain aware of when my false ego is leading the way, and I make ongoing attempts to stop that, I think I am OK.

I am amazed at the amount of serenity to which I have become accustomed. I have noted that, when my arrogance comes alive, my serenity does not remain at the level that’s become typical of me. When serving my Gods in sincerity, Their peace flows through me to empower my work. I can have a reasonable degree of serenity and, therefore, my health is good, my abundance continues, and from my peace emerges ecstasy. So mote it be.

As to the aforementioned ego drive to be at the top of the heap, ha! There is no heap. There is only the joyous dance of life and the chance to serve within it. May all we humans learn at deeper and deeper levels to dive into life fully, not mistaking titles and pomp for ecstasy and caring. And may we always know that ecstasy and caring go hand in hand, like lovers.

Root Woman, painting by Francesca De Grandis

Root Woman, painting by Francesca De Grandis. If you’d like a limited first edition-print of this art, email me at outlawbunny at outlawbunny.com

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With its relaunch in 2012, this site was split between three servers. (I know there are other options, it’s a long and grassroots story.)

http://www.stardrenched.com is mostly for the site’s blog, events announcements, and new additions to the site’s Grimoire.

The site’s original domain remains https://people.well.com/user/zthirdrd/. Among other things, it has online Grimoire entries prior to 2012.

Way back, there wasn’t space for everything I wanted on the well.com site (my site there is ancient, started back when they were very few women on the web, and site storage space was minuscule), so some side pages got put on feri.com.

This old blog explains it a bit more.

I continue to blog at my other site, www.outlawbunny.com. Two separate blogs.