Flashes of Insight

WEATHERING THE STORM NAY FAY The Contiuning Saga of the Storm that Wouldn’t Leave
My four legged familiars and I have been sitting on the edge of this Fay storm for days and it has been both challenging, frightening, grounding and heartwarming. So much time to let the inner emotional storms ebb and flow between chores, stabilizing the space, meditating, doing ritual, seeing clients, and basically hunkering down.
As I often do when some big hurricane,fire,drought is afoot, I contacted special spiritual friends to help me protect Moonhaven and generally hold a peaceful safe space for all in the path of the potential disaster. As always, I ask that the storm does the least harm and the most good also using the 3 D’s.Divert,Dissapate, and Dissolve which actually works quite well. (read on…)

PLUTO IN SAGITTARIUS PASSING IT ON TO CAPRICORN
In trying to explore the last 12 years of Pluto in Sagittarius one cannot miss the fact that our government as well as others have become a theocracy, where one’s God or lack thereof becomes a major point of political power. Beliefs have become paramount with each side claiming to have the last word on what God wants.
Jupiter ruled Sagittarius is all about expanding beliefs and I believe that in spite of the bombastic over blown missives of the No-Fundamentalists of every stripe, we have also enjoyed more awareness and sharing of Cultural Diversity. (read on…)

Summer Rain Brings New Life to Moonhaven

Iam so enjoying the fragrance from the key lime blossoms that are almost coated with happy bumble bees and butterflies this morning. The constat daily thunderstorms that replaced the searing drought have brought a sorft of ecstatic aliveneness to the devas,land and plants of Moonhaven (read on…)

Tree Magic at Moonhaven
Here at Moonhaven the trees have surely been teaching me. Some 10 years ago or so while in meditation my guides or perhaps the devas of this place spoke to me of what they wanted me to do for them and they were quite specific. They wanted me to arrange stumps bowls and stones around 4 particular trees. As I began to fulfill my task, I noticed that the 4 trees chosen actually made a cross in my yard. (read on…)

SPIRIT’S STORY SPIRIT SPIR BEAR, BEAR and Tonka Too 
Date: 5/12/2008 1:01:23 AM Eastern DaylightTime

  I have been waiting for quite some time to tell the story of my beloved dog Spirit. Interesting too that at this time I am dogless for the first time since I found Luna in 1973.  Actually there was a span of 2 years after Luna passed that I was dogless but for most of my adult life, I have been graced with wonderful canine company. Tonight is also the eve of Spirit/Bear’s passing on Mother’s Day some 7 years ago.
I am now feeling ready for another dog in my life and am hoping that Spirit/Bear will feel that it is a good time to return to me on this side of the veil. (read on…)

SACRED RIVER SACRED SPRING
I have never been to a man made grotto or any of the well known ones however there is a particular spring head in the Itchetuknee River which is a crystal clear turquoise blue spring fed river and this one in particular, known as the Blue Hole, is a grotto for sure. I have had the same feeling diving into other spring heads in the many springs and rivers of this kind in Florida but the Blue Hole to me is like diving into the Yoni of Oshun. (read on…)

Sacred Water Ritual from Moonhaven and the Grandmother TreeI have made a wonderful cleansing ritual with water
and the nature spirits and plants from my yard. Like
my own watery nature the work is fluid and not fixed
in formula.
I carry a large pot as I walk around the yard at
Moonhaven, which is a cross between a park and a
jungle full of amazing plants, trees and energies. (read on…)

Questions by Ayedo

1. How do you get by spiritually when the world turns cold, icy,
dark, rainy or foggy?

2. Who are your spirit friends?

3. How do you connect with community for spiritual survival?

4. What spirit, deity or animal helps you get by during winter,
helping you find daily pleasure instead of angst as you maneuver
the dimly lit, slippery path in winter’s wake

Thanks so much for posing these provocative questions as I am very much struggling with them myself. I have been quietly acknowledging to myself that I am feeling blue and missing my core of friends all of whom died within a year of each other. I have made other friends but the deep kind don’t come easy.
Being the community Priestess and Shaman doesn’t always help either as all assume that you are fine always.
I rarely if ever get really depressed but I can feel it poking around my edges like a little frost in this cooler time.
So after contemplating these questions, I said to myself, Enough of This and lit my favorite incense in every room and proceeded to go out to feed my beautiful Appaloosa Mare.
I know that I find my deepest peace and sustenance in this Shamanic realm that I co - create under the loving arms of the Grandmother Tree in my White Room (read on…)

Aphrodite and Oshun/Imbolc and Beyond
 

I like to celebrate the coming of the Sacred Love Goddesses starting on Feb 2 with Imbolc,Candlemas,Brigid’s Day and so on.
Mainstream culture likes to deify St. Valentine and give this bloodthirsty slayer of women the one day of the year that Love is supposed to Rule. How totally bizarre  and how the hell did he manage to grab that gig? I could research but let’s just chalk that up to the  badass patriarchy.
This just does not work for me at all so for years, I have celebrated  the time between Imbolc and Feb 14 or so as the Feast of Aphrodite. During this time one can delight in all manner of love rituals [as long as they are non-manipulative] and generally pump up your love groove. (read on…)

Creating Grids, a Fifth Dimensional Tool for Healing Yourself, Your Animals and the Planet.
by Flash Silvermoon

Are you willing to approach the possibility of creating a miniature temple for you and yours that cannot only offer you elevation of the body, mind and spirit but can actually facilitate healing? Are you willing to walk that Rainbow Bridge into the magical, mystical world of the Fifth Dimension, the place where the miraculous can unfold..if you believe?
To do this, we are required to entertain a “beginner’s mind,” that is, to approach these concepts as a willing, curious child open to wonder and magic!
Spirit is clearly telling me in every way that if I am to write about the Fifth Dimension, then I must also live it. As I write, I am daily given opportunities of how to live more attuned to this space and it is one of profound peace.
WHAT IS THE FIFTH DIMENSION? (read on…)

The Wise Woman’s Tarot by Flash Silvermoon

I will be offering a new feature for Pagan Ways. Grannymoon has asked me to do a 3 month reading for all the signs of the zodiac so that each of you can keep up with your shifts and changes during these ‘interesting times’.
I will be using my Wise Woman’s Tarot so I thought that it would be best to give you a little taste of the Divinatory Tool itself;
Meet The Wise Woman’s Tarot…….

The Wise Woman’s Tarot is a multicultural, matriarchal book with colorful companion deck. It celebrates the global female lineage in 78 powerful images. (read on…)

Modeling New Ways of Being-The Annual Wise Woman’s Festival Preparing for the 5thYear April 4-6!
by Flash Silvermoon

These are very exciting times and it has never been more important for us to start living into a higher consciousness.
The Annual Wise Woman’s Festival is one of those experiences of living into a such a consciousness and space that grows year after year in empowerment,safety,and deep sharing by all.
Its hard to find words to describe the intensity and subtlety of the uplifting feelings we enjoy at the WWFest.It is always a heartwarming empowering experience of soul connection for many with their sisters, lovers and friends. (read on…)

Binding Rituals

One of the best and most effective spells that I know is a binding. When the Gainesville murders held this area in a state of panic and fear in 1990, and 5 of the most grisly murders all took place in a series of a week. I organized women into the streets with our drums and chants for the national media because I did not want the whole world watching, which they were, and for my town to be a place where women hide and do not call out their abusers.
I turned the rest of the Rally over to more above ground NOW type groups that like to deal with the media .and then gathered the witches I knew who were strong and fearless. We did a very simple ritual binding. on the banks of the lake nearest the University of Florida Campus (read on…)

Around the early seventies it became apparent to me that my lesbian feminsim also needed a spiritual path that was congruent. I had been reading and studying about Witchcraft and for everything that I read this seeemd to fit my more anarchistic ways. Not a lot of rules there and they honor a Goddess hmmm sounded good to me and yet I was yet to have a real circle of women who believed as i did and I longed for that.
I remember that I first heard of Z when she was arrested in LA for reading Tarot Cards, or so they said. At the time I was also making my living on the East Coast reading Tarot Cards and starting women’s Kozmic Consciousness groups beacuse I didn’t think they would buy Coven’s just yet.

Sept 1975 NYC in the loft of artist Carol Clemments, I actually met Z and we shared Tarot readings on the floor over boxes.By this time,Z had become my Hera for standing up against the establishment to try to actually have Church status like the other religions and not have to pay taxes, she was very savvy and that was of course why they came down so hard and what led to her First US Tour to market The Feminist Book of Lights and Shadows..hence my meeting her in NYC.

(read on…)

WALKING A RAINBOW PATH
For me, there is nothing more important than my spiritual path which I am knowing and understanding more each day. I have walked this path  for many many moons calling myself or being called a Witch,Shaman,,Healer,Pagan, Goddessworshipper working with  Wicca,Yoruba,Native American,Feng Shui,Tantric paths and others.
  I finally recognize and have words for this path that I walk and it is a Rainbow Path where we honor diversity with many traditions, not to water any down but to embrace each unique part and hold Sacred that which resonates. (read on…)