38. Celebrate the Seasons

One of the most profound ways I have found to connect with the natural world, the passing of time and the seasons, and my own stages of life has been to celebrate and engage with the wheel of the year and traditional pagan holidays. In neopaganism, the year is divided into eight spokes. Each year begins with Yule in December, then continues to Imbolc, Ostara, Beltane, Litha, Lughnasadh, Mabon, and ending at Samhain in October. Each celebration incorporates history, aspects of the season that it belongs to, and also the passage of life, with Yule representing the birth of a new year or the beginning of life, and Samhain representing the end and the remembrance of life at its passing. So I will be recording my celebrations of each of the seasons here.

Imbolc February 1st - While not technically the first holiday of the pagan calendar, Imbolc (Irish: IM-bolg) is the first in the traditional calendar year, falling on February 1st in the northern hemisphere (pagan holidays are dependent upon the seasons, so the holidays fall at different times in the southern hemisphere). Imbolc is also known in Christianity as St. Brigid's Day or Candlemas. The pagan and Christian holidays have similar/same roots and both involve lots of candles and mark a point halfway through the winter.