The Power of Interior Investigation
Today my fiancé asked me how humans could ever get organized enough to fix the many colossal problems in the world. She said that even if substantially sized groups banded together to work on worthy humanitarian causes, she probably wouldn’t trust them. I feel that.
Groups of humans can so quickly become cultish, power-hungry, vapid, and out of touch. An astounding number of the most seemingly heart-centered nonprofits are run by corrupt CEOs who have the same defunct moral compasses as their corporate counterparts. Numerous spiritual collectives swiftly transform into vampiric MLMs, demoralizing pyramid schemes, or divisive churches and cults. Even well-intended creative organizations will cave to the seductive call of late-stage capitalism and sell out their original target mission for a fat check or fast cash.
She followed up her observation with, “So how will we ever get out of this mess we’re in?”
After some marination, a thought emerged:
I don’t think we’re going to get out of this mess and through these discordant evolutionary growing pains via groups, gurus, or mass organizations. At least not at first.
That’s not to say I don’t believe in the power of protests, activist movements, and covens. They are badass and necessary. But I think the central work of this astrological moment is overwhelmingly and surprisingly, solo. For eons, we have traversed the cycles of corruption, wars, and revolution. My intuition (and the ancestors I work with) tell me this time is different.
It feels like there’s some supremely witchy shit on the horizon.
Even within the cacophony of noise in central LA (where I currently live), I can feel it.
The Aquarian Age and the resurgence of feminine power call for surrender, wisdom, and radical interior investigation. That means, this time, the revolution must come from within.
Samhain Harm Ye None
This isn’t a new concept. During the Occupy Wall Street and Women’s March movements, a similar idea was frequently thrown around. And before them, it was popular amidst the waves of activism in the 1960s and 1970s. Both Gandhi’s and Martin Luther King’s movements were driven by the core of this ideology, radical non-violence. Non-violence is a beautiful concept and can be understood intellectually with ease. But to live non-violently in a consistent manner requires cultivated wisdom, empathy, inner compassion, and connectedness. This is far more difficult to achieve and it stems from prioritizing internal change and personal revolution over external change and global revolution.
That much-needed wisdom and reflection come only from that interior investigation. It comes from meditation, communion with nature, shamanic journeys, and/or other healing practices that can trigger the memories of our unfathomable connection to each other, the divine feminine, the sacred Earth and Star spirits, and the original breath of our earliest existence.
The Aquarian Age has valuable messages for us, perhaps the most important among them being the death of guru outside of oneself. This is the point in our collective growth when the bravest among us will let go of the rigidity and pressure of our very civilization and embark on billions of vision quests. One by one.
Only then can we truly evolve.
Connections to Samhain
So what does this have to do with Samhain (more commonly known as Halloween)? As the veil between realms gets thinner, as it does every year at this time, we can use this energetic opening to spur our own vision quests. We can celebrate this ancient Celtic festival by turning off our phones, sitting in dark, liminal spaces, and listening for answers from within. There are unseen spirits, guides, and entities all around us, waiting and willing to aid in our spiritual development. Especially during Scorpio season.
Samhain is the Witch’s new year. It marks the end of the harvest season and the beginning of the darkest part of the year, in the northern hemisphere. It is an intrinsically introverted and liminal time, which makes this solo interior work more accessible. The lessons gleaned from deep, meaningful shadow-work, although immensely uncomfortable, can be absorbed more quickly at this time. Because our spirits and ancestors have more access to us, they can powerfully aid in unraveling old and stubborn karmic knots, if we are open and allow.
My Witch’s Charge
Identifying as a Witch and practicing the Craft have different meanings for different people. For me being a witch is about three central aspects (I think of them as sides to a sacred triangle):
The first is Bravery (Maiden):
Bravery to face the inner layers of the self.
Bravery to admit both our deepest, ugliest folly and internal power that’s beyond measure.
Bravery to rise against the waves of patriarchy by invoking the Divine Feminine.
Bravery to be resilient in the face of the often excruciating contrast of this binary planet.
Bravery to stay awake enough to refocus on the Magick of love, laughter and compassion.
Bravery to remember the reality that exists beneath all realities.
The second is Power (Mother):
Power in knowing that we co-create uncountable realities, thousands of times each day.
Power in service of the receptive Feminine Spirit that binds us all.
Power in a lineage that we both revere and make manifest, simultaneously.
Power in the sacred act of original creativity (birth).
The third is Wisdom (Crone):
Wisdom of radical compassion especially projected to those who seem not to deserve it.
Wisdom of the ancestors, spirits and entities of all realms, both seen and unseen.
Wisdom of cultivated humility when bestowed with Magickal power.
Wisdom of the elements and cosmos in ritual workings.
Wisdom of Great Grandmother Spirit.
Final Thoughts
So, when October comes around each year, I am reminded of the sacred responsibility of this path. This is our time to journey within and connect with the deepest, truest versions of our sacred selves. If throughout your days you often feel disconnected from a happier, livelier version of yourself, use the power of Samhain to remember who you are.
I am reminded that for us to collectively evolve, I must be brave, powerful and wise enough to look within and listen closely. Only there, in the quiet, innermost crevices of our being, can we conjure the necessary spells to break our subconscious bonds to the outdated, destructive patriarchal beast.
Make no mistake, to be a Witch is to be a warrior.
But, unlike the traditional warriors of the past, we know the real battle is fought within.
On Samhain, when the power is high, and the veil is thin, So Mote It Be.