Imbolc Blessings, Rituals & Recipes
Wishing you all a magical Imbolc...whatever you conceived at Winter Solstice now quickens inside the dark womb of the Goddess within you, She lives inside each of us (regardless of our gender identities). Imbolc can be translated as: “In the belly...”
As the light grows longer each day... so does our creative urge to grow and create Beauty!
Inside the Center of the Sacred Circle of Air, Fire, Water and Earth, is the Void of All that is Becoming. That Center is quickening at this time, pulsing with life within each of us. Awakening the life force within, but not quite ready to be born into the outer world. This is the very beginning of spring’s rising energy and birth can wait until the Spring equinox in March.
The shift of the light as the days lengthen is obvious now. I love this time of year, and this holiday, though I don’t have Celtic ancestry, at least not in this lifetime – well, not unless we count my Irish step-grandfather Jack.
My mom’s mom Florence, daughter of my herbalist grandmother Esther, married him after divorcing my grandfather Irving, which was not done by a Jewish woman in those days! Nor was my grandmother Florence immune to other arenas of gossip. She inspired it with her free-spirited, independent, ahead-of-her time ways. She was a gambler who dyed her hair platinum blonde, married a man who wasn’t accepted by her family (to say the least) and was one of the first women in her neighborhood to drive a car! We are talking about the very early 1900’s. Jack owned a bar in Brooklyn, upon which my mother (born in 1929) used to dance as a little girl!
Apparently, free-spirited, witchy women run in my family line! I wish I knew more about them…
^ Click on the image above to view ^
me performing my poem,
and meet my circle of apprentices!
Back to Imbolc, the goddess Brighid’s holiday. Brighid is so powerful the churchmen couldn’t get rid of her, so they turned the Goddess into a saint. Just like my foremothers, a saint she ain’t.
She is a Creatrix, revered for inspiring poetry, and for her smithcrafting. She is connected with both Fire and Water. Passion and Healing. She brings together complementary elemental forces: The fire that forges the blade. The water that cools it. The pen of poetry is another form of magical “blade” that helps the wielder/writer/poet cut through the vastness of all the possibilities that perception and imagination reveal, to distill what is beyond words into the medium of language, of story-telling.
Brighid is beloved as the Goddess of healing wells, of the sacred waters that flow there.
When I was on sabbatical in 2018, staying for a time in East Clare in Ireland, I learned I was just up the road from the home of the legendary, infamous herbalist, Biddie Early — also called the Wise Woman of Clare.
Amongst quite a few other reasons, including stories of her magic blue bottle, she was infamous because she’d outlived at least three husbands. A local herbalist took me to Biddie’s home, and I was thrilled when I spotted a hole in the Earth, Biddy’s magic well, which my friend confirmed for me!
The land, the well, and the ruins of her home were a living, vibrating portal... I sensed the beech trees on the land were her particular guardians, helping to hold the sacred space. I sensed, too, that they were connected to and were aided by a stand of beech trees I’d often been drawn to visit that were up the mountain from there, near where I was staying. Maybe those trees are the early lookouts, since they have the perspective granted by distance. The story goes that the land has been impossible to sell. Every deal falls through.
Biddy died in the 1800’s.
Speaking of trees, this magnificent being is said to be one of the three oldest trees in Ireland.
Called the Brian Boru oak, after a high king of Ireland, the tree reportedly dates from his time (941-1014). People come from all over the world to ask for blessings from this ancient Tree. So as you look at this picture, would you kindly send your blessings of love and gratitude to this ancient oak from wherever you are? Thank you.
An Oak Bark Tea Recipe For Spiritual Strength
Drink oak for strength and endurance, as well as its astringency, which helps tone and tighten tissue, including mucus membranes.
Ingredients:
Elder flowers - 1 1/2 tablespoons
White oak bark - 1 tablespoon
Stinging Nettles - 1 tablespoon
Put the herbs in a mug, pour boiling water over them and steep covered for about 15 minutes. This tea will also promote immune health, including in the mouth.
As to Imbolc:
Enjoy the Quickening.
Reflect on what you conceived in your meditations at Winter Solstice.
Light a Candle to your creativity, to whatever form it takes.
Explore it.
Journal. Draw. Paint. Dance.
Walk in the woods.
Wake up slowly.
No Rushing.
Trust the Present Magical Moment.
Blessed Be.
Two Imbolc Ritual Bath Recipes… to awaken & inspire the creative goddess within!
Light a candle as you soak and dream in the bath. This combines fire and water in that simplest of rituals — a ritual herbal bath.
Milk and Honey Bath
Add ½ gallon of fresh, local sheep, cow, or goat’s milk (raw if available) into your bath tub full of hot water. This is magical and softening to your skin as well as a wonderful combination of earthy and almost otherworldly, like soaking in the cosmic milky way. You can add to the magic of this ritual milk bath by stirring in a ¼ to a ½ cup of rose honey. It is a sensual, beautifying ritual.
Make sure to put your hair into the milk bath, too, and no, I don’t recommend rinsing it after, though you can if you like. Just moisturize your skin with your favorite oil or lotion.
If a milk bath is not your cup of tea (mixing up the modalities here, oops), try this:
Rose-Chamomile Bath
Dried roses - 1 cup
Dried chamomile - 1 cup
Put the herbs into a ½ gallon jar or pot. Cover completely with boiled water. Cap the bottle, or put the lid on the pot. Let steep for one hour, then pour those herbs through a fine sieve into your bathtub full of hot water. Relaxing, sensual, pain relieving, skin beautifying, and inspiring,
This bath is also Earthly and Divine.
Imbolc Blessings!
~*~ Robin Rose ~*~
