The Pagan Wheel of the Year begins at Samhain (31st October). It is a time of looking back at the past year, tying up (and letting go of) loose ends, and preparing for the year ahead. The harvest is over, the leaves are falling from the trees and the winter months are coming. It is a great time for reflection.
I'm not going to go into the connection between Samhain, the Christian festival of All Saints and the modern Halloween. Right now that isn't an issue I feel the need to address. Because although Samhain is a time of honouring the ancestors and remembering the continuous cycle of life and death, this is not our personal focus this year.
TJ and I have been through a hell of a lot in the past few years. Our faith has faltered, and our lives have been turned upside down and inside out more than once. We have harboured a lot of anger, fear and guilt. And we have found it extremely hard to focus on the spiritual side of our lives, perhaps when we needed it the most!
And so, this Samhain we are reflecting on where we have been, how far we have come, and letting go of the downtrodden way of looking at things. We are making a promise to ourselves to embrace our faith, explore it and find out just where we want to go. We have spent the past few years on a solitary path, never quite committing to the values we wanted to uphold. So this year, we are making a fresh start.
Starting today, we will spend a turn of the wheel (one year) exploring our faith in new ways. We want to feel confident and secure in our relationship to life, nature and the Divine, not only for ourselves but also for Little Man.
And a part of this includes stepping away from the blog. I have been feeling disillusioned with blogging for a few months now. It feels very "false" to me, like I am trying to fit into a world that I don't quite belong to. And a change needs to occur. I have known this for a while, and this promise we have made at the Celtic New Year is the opportunity I need to make that change once and for all.
I will not be getting rid of the Patch. I have put a lot of energy into it, and do not wish to lose the journal that saw me through our relocation, wedding, pregnancy and first year of Little Man's life. It has been hard, but the blessings have been immense. So instead of saying goodbye completely, I am making a change...
The Patch is to become more focussed, where I can leave the aspects which I feel are important, and continue to document areas of our journey that I wish to remember in this way. However, by making the blog a small part of a larger whole, I am hopeful that I shall lose that nagging feeling that I should be posting more often. It's to become an "as and when" job that reflects who we are as a family, not what is currently trending in the blogosphere.
And this reflection of us means that the Patch will have a much stronger Pagan slant than it ever has. I have kept my faith away from my blog for far too long, yet it is the thing that has helped me survive the things I have and inspired me to turn those things into a way to help others (eg writing about HG).
The changes to the Patch will happen soon, but for now I am off to enjoy a celebratory meal in honour of this special day.
Blessings x
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