Mabon 2021

Mabon Newsletter 22 September 2021

Welcome to Mabon where I am writing this after my visit to Orkney! My trip over the UK’s most dangerous strip of water, the Pentland Firth, was painless and the weather on Orkney, sublime until the final day…and time to go back home, via a stop off at Aviemore. More on that later…

The nights are now pulling in, closing the curtains not long after tea, and when we begin to wake up and it is now longer daylight but barely dawn, it can only mean we must be at the Autumnal Equinox, when the darkness begins to overcome the light as the wheel of the year turns once more. Where did summer go? We have been so busy at the shop this year due to ‘staycations’ and greeting our returning regulars once more, a treat, but the shop is needing restocked now schools are back to get it looking fab again…it has been a mess and restocking a nightmare but hopefully, we will now get time to have a good clear up and tidy and all will be well again.

The Equinox is a great time to check out and update your wish box, especially now life is as normal as we shall get for a while. How will your life/career/relationship move forward? What needs adjusting, what needs releasing and what parts are ok? How would you like your life to come out of the winter looking? What would you like to learn? The winter was a time of study, creativity and making, so think about how you can spend the winter productively and what you would like to create in your life! Not got one? Find on my ‘Calm your life’ sheet…

Also, how are you going to look after your mental, physical and spiritual well-being over the winter? Although most restrictions here have been lifted, facial coverings are still mandatory in shops to keep infections down. With colds and flu having been in hiding since the Covid pandemic began, we will see them now run alongside, so it is imperative that you keep your body fit and well over the winter and your immune system boosted. Take Vitamins C & D, plus Echinacea or Thyme tincture, and add tea tree to your baths (Niaouli for kids), all to help boost your system to fight the onslaught of infection expected. Remember, it is also important to take time out for yourself. This is something I have now learned to do, and am no longer willing to work 60+ hours a week …a lesson from the pandemic is there needs to be much more balance in our work, rest and play. This balance is maybe something you can also address over winter. Use the winter to give your body a chance to relax. Maybe we all need a little family hibernation time over winter, even though we have had 18 months lockdown! Have a family ‘game night’ once a week or do a family jigsaw on the floor. Mum taught me to knit and to sew over winter nights as a child, so why not teach the kids a life skill. In the days of ‘power cuts’ we played a lot of cards as a family. There are lots of ways you can spend winter nights productively so don’t just fester in front of the tv… get crafty with the family!!

However, I think one of the main things we should all do this equinox is congratulate ourselves for surviving 18 long months of Hell. Well done!! Pour yourself a glass of your favourite tipple to go with your favourite food and give yourselves a big pat on the back because, as Barry says, “We’ve made it through the rain…”

New Feature: the Celtic magick of The Woodland

I need to mark these new times with a new feature to go with the new normal in our lives now, so decided on the magick of trees for support and structure. The Celts and Druids loved and honoured them, and used them as law, language and guidance, so is just what we need at this time to help us rebuild. If you think about it, some British trees have stood for hundreds of years, overseeing financial disasters, plagues, wars, and so much more and yet are still standing, strong and proud, so let’s turn to the magick of our woodlands for help, support and strength.  In season at the moment is the humble bramble, or blackberry if you want its proper name! No matter what I do, they insist on living both in my back garden and behind the shop! Their vines twist and bend and scramble and climb and survive any weather Scotland can throw at them!! Leave a patch of land barren and the bramble will take it over, planting many small babies from just one stem. We have all picked brambles as kids and remember those thorns scratching us, as we try to get hold of its delicious, sweet Vitamin C enriched fruit! It is said that if you serve a bramble and apple pie to your partner, it will inspire lusting impulses and pouring bramble sauce or jam on porridge will bring good health and abundance!! However, the fruit should not be picked after Samhain as they then belong to the birds and the Fairy folk!! The lesson from our humble bramble is to collect knowledge from many directions and explore many paths, but don’t get caught in the thorns of greed before tasting the sweet fruit of wisdom!

Bramble charm against poverty

On Mabon, find a bramble bush and cut a wee piece stem (thanking it for its help). Carefully strip it of its bark and thorns, tie a piece of gold thread or ribbon to it and hang by your entrance door. As each member leaves for their day, get them to touch it for luck and to protect all the household against financial hardship and struggle.

Quantum Quattro wants to play…

Every time I went to shift this big bag of stones, it came undone and chucked itself all over the floor. Sellotape it up, put big bands round it, whatever I did, the stones kept leaking out, so I gave in and decided this stone must need to ‘go out into the world’ so we’re popping a piece in every bag of shopping…but what does it do?

Take the adventurous qualities of malachite, the healing aspect of Dioptase, the serenity of chrysocolla and the spirituality of shattukite, mix it all up with earthy protective smoky quartz and you have this fabulous stone of transformation…well, look what’s in it, and the way it made its presence felt! It certainly seems to want to be out there working, not hiding amongst the masses in my stockroom!! I didn’t like this stone at first, judging by its hotch-potch look, but when I actually took time to look, play and spend time with it, I realised its potential!! It was certainly nagging at me to pay attention and get it out there!!

As soon as I held a piece and started to carry it with me, I didn’t want to be without it, yet I have never seen it in jewellery. This stone can help open things up and move life on, which is definitely the point of this autumn, yet it instantly seems to calm and comfort, which again is helpful, after the fears, upset and trauma of the pandemic. A stone of movement, I feel it can support folk into moving their lives forward. Even when you don’t know what to do next, it helps to clear the way, open things up, get rid of negative thinking and move onward. Past hurt emotions seem to disappear and I can even “go above” irrational and bad behaviour from others, and rise over it. A crystal brimming with loving vibrations, it is majorly beneficial to relationships with those close to you, and brings about a tranquility seldom felt, that I just want this stone with me at all times at the moment. As a healing stone, it can help leave bad thoughts, habits, destructive behaviour and addictions behind that no longer serve, and the stone to me feels like a tonic of well-being to the body, dissolving stress and fighting fatigue. I feel in power of my life to get it back on track as I want, yet serene in that I know everything will be ok. I hope it does it for you too!!

Turn the house into your gym…and avoid Sarcopenia!!

Before lockdown, I could sling boxes of crystals about the stockroom no problem…then the world changed. Suddenly crystals were not the call of the day and the shop became ‘magickal Amazon’ followed by the flood! When, 12-15 months later, things got back to normal within the shop, hauling boxes about now seemed much more of an issue!! Where had my strength gone? I had been reading a book by Dr Rangan Chatterjee called ‘The 4 Pillar plan’ over lockdown. Books like this usually get chucked rather quickly, but this doctor made sense to me, so kept on with my bedtime reading. It was here I discovered the reason my strength had disappeared and it’s all down to age-related Sarcopenia! Apparently, once we pass 30, we begin to lose muscle mass…who knew?? I have never been one for gyms, but always tried to keep my weight down, fitness & bone density up, and I have a busy lifestyle so thought that was enough! WRONG!! Over 30, you lose up to 5% muscle mass per decade…ok then! 50-60 and that turns to 3% a year, so over 10 years, that’s 30% muscle gone…and it doesn’t stop! No wonder I can no longer throw those boxes about like I used to a few years ago! If it gets really serious, you can be down to 50% muscle mass lost by 70, which can have a detrimental effect on longevity, health and mind. I am referring to this now, because I am laid up after a fall…once, I would have held on, but this lack of strength in my arms and core got me hurt! This is the 3^rd major accident in 5 years, so I must now try and turn the trend and get my muscle back and the situation reversed. I had already begun my strength programme before the fall, but it’ll take years rather than weeks…not only by walking daily (I average over 80,000 steps per week) but also by turning my house into a gym!

When you watch a youngster, even when they watch tv, they are always moving! Lives have become too sedentary now, and in an effort to keep myself from becoming a “barrel” following menopause, I began to move more, but lockdown did nobody any favours, so I began to follow my grandson, who never stops, and do more to push my steps and active minutes up in my day, but following the Doc’s advice, then included strength exercises alongside walking! Turns out it is quite easy to do 10 x lunges and 10 x squats whilst cleaning my teeth, side lunges and toe raises whilst drying my hair, 15 minutes step with weights whilst watching tv and so on. Once you get a routine to move more, it’s really easy to do, but this accident has proven how quickly this situation ‘comes upon you’ and these ‘accidents’ are part of this muscle loss. This week, I can do very little and this was only a small fall, but can start a downward trend that only then aggravates the situation. Over this winter, take the advice of one who now knows: with winter coming, don’t fester in front of the tv, but find ways to move more, keep that muscle mass up and reverse that unseen ageing…turns out that getting older isn’t just about the wrinkles!!

Recycle your Green Witch bottles please….

Recycling these days goes without saying, but I just wanted to remind you that any bottle purchased from my shop can be brought back in and you will be given 10p back on the clear jars and bottles and 15p back on brown or green. Also, no need to clean them… you can rinse out in water but it is easier for me to get the labels off if they are not pre-rinsed in a dishwasher…it seals on the labels and makes it harder to then get them off again! Thank you

Moon Times:

Full Moon:        Tue 21 Sep @ 00.55 hrs          New Moon:       Wed 6 Oct @ 12.06 hrs

Full Moon:        Wed 20 Oct @ 15.57 hrs         Mercury Retrograde Mon 27 Sep – Mon 18 Oct (just saying…)

Brightest blessings to you all. Keep safe &stay well…

Chris (alias the Green Witch)