Inner Growth and the Ritual Observance of Equinoxes, Solstices, Cross Quarter Days and Moon Cycles

“Inner Growth and the Ritual Observance of Equinoxes, Solstices, Cross Quarter Days and Moon Cycles”

The change of seasons, as marked by solstices, equinoxes and cross-quarter days (such as Imbolc, Feb. 2, Samhain around Halloween, etc.), as well as the phases of the moon, are useful as living markers by which to observe significant passages of our inner spiritual and psychological evolution. Each season describes a cyclical change in the outer relationship of the earth, sun, and moon which has a corresponding occurrence within an individual’s body, mind and spirit. n Just as the different exte
al seasons evoke the need for certain physical adaptations (the need for heat in the winter, watering the garden in the summer), the inner plane experience of seasons and change remind us that we are in a continuous, evolutionary cycle of birth, death, and re-birth.

When we observed the Spring Equinox in March, for example, we attuned ourselves to the awakening of plant life just beneath the surface of the earth and tethered that awareness to an inner, personal experience of parts of the self emerging from the wintry cold and darkness of the unconscious realms of psyche, or the initiatory “underworld”, and sending tender, probing shoots of growth up toward the warmth and light of the increasing warmth and daylight of the sun and the conscious self.

This summer solstice, we again have the opportunity to marry our relationship to both outer and inner-plane experiences of light and shadow. Through ritual and ceremony (and shamanic jou
eying is a powerful vehicle in this regard), we can activate a magical transformation of repressed, shadow material, bringing that material into the light of day, the light of consciousness.nn--Luisa Kolke
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