CURRENT MOON

Friday, November 21, 2008

Grounding



You know those great science fiction stories where a culture in the future has founded an entire way of life around some random quote left over from present times? Where "eorge ashington" is all they know about leadership or "Have a Coke and a Smile" leads to intense theological debate concerning what the ancients meant by "Have a Coke"? Where a garbled version of the Pledge of Allegiance is a sacred text?

I sometimes wonder which words, if I had to choose, as a witch, I'd leave for some oddly witch-deprived world of the future to discover. I generally wind up unable to choose between "All acts of love and pleasure are rituals of the Goddess," and "The Goddess is alive. Magic is afoot!" Both seem, to me, to encapsulate so much of what's good and right about Wicca. I do know, though, (yes, I spend a lot of time on such silly thoughts) what one skill I'd teach if I were the last witch left and not left for long, at that. I'd teach Grounding.

IMHO, if you can ground, you're a witch and you'll probably eventually get all the rest on your own, anyway. (OK, and -- "don't light a lot of candles when wearing flowing robes," "spend some time every day outside," "when you forget your well-written incantation, just make it up, it will probably be better anyway," "you don't REALLY need an athame," "witch wars are not worth it," "handle wolfsbane and thorn apple with gloves, really," and "when you meet Great Lady Artemis Raven Moonflower along the path, kill the Great Lady" -- those are good, too.)

Grounding is the basis, for me, of all magical practice and if all that you have time to do is to ground, I still think that you can say you've engaged in daily practice. Similarly, I'm v hard pressed to think of any situation in which grounding isn't the first thing you should do, the most effective magical spell that you can cast, the best and most effective way to be a witch in whatever situation you face.

More here, here, and here.

Beyond that, there's the Ha Prayer or some form of breath work, and there's building a personal place of power where you can go to work magic, find answers, gather strength. But, trust me, only ground and the rest will come. Even if you never have a small, ancient jar full of ground-up High John the Conqueror's root tucked in the hidden compartment of an ash broom carved w interesting runes. Not that there's anything wrong with that.

4 comments:

Celestite said...

That was good.
and here I have been worried about not having any of that root.

Dj Connell said...

Oh, well said!

I've often thought that we could revise the basic courses into some wisdom that's actually useful (grin). This post would go on my list.

Sia

Singing Sparrow said...

Thank you so much for the post. Recently-the past two years- I have come to understand that I can't return to christianity as it is known to us even with my beloved Mother Mary. I have walked alone, praying knowing that I would now need something that is literally rooted here now in the earth. I have been reading you off and on during this period. this post gave me the reminder that I needed-grounding that I used to practice faithfully but which I lost contact with due to pressures that I did not expect. Well here I am bubbling away-I am so excited to feel my first "connection" on my new path toward wholeness.

Anonymous said...

I've only been accepting of my Paganism and Witchcraft for a couple of years now. So I have much to learn. However, I did first learn about grounding while briefly studying Aikido about 20 years ago. The power that resulted amazed me and still does. Thank you for the wonderful links.