I really love the idea of making your own "holiday." That really sang to me. We have mesquite trees and they refuse to "pop" or release their leaves to bloom, until winter is completely over. It may be in the high 80F/26c's and those trees somehow know and will not become green until winter is truly over. I am going to begin a celebration on the day this happens! So wonderful. Thank you!
I can relate, in Lithuania we kinda have our own wheel of the year and the dates are a bit different from the wiccan one so I always felt a little confused, having to celebrate the same thing twice or choosing one over the other. After a while I think I just got overwhelmed and stopped celebrating, now I'm figuring things out and looking at my heritage for inspiration. It's still nice knowing when those wiccan celebrations are, it feels like a more special day, but I think it's more important to keep my local celebrations from extinction.
You scared me lol. You scare me every time you upload videos like this 😂. I always wonder "why?! What happened?! Are they evil?!" Lol, but can see now that this is specific to your very specific practice and life. Although, the "create your own holidays" goal makes a lot of sense...because you're absolutely right in that the wheel of the year holidays are specific to specific people in a specific region. Here I am, a person of mainly African and some European decent, and celebrating something that really has little to nothing do with the majority of my ancestry 😅. You're such a leader! I can see many people following your visions in the near and distant future. You're such an amazing example of what it means to be Pagan.
6:03 I completely understand, I’m a Hellenic polytheist and we have our own holidays and just that wheel of year is not for everyone. Even then you don’t have to celebrate the holidays as well if you don’t want to.
Yeah most of people who come into neo paganism/witchcraft fear not doing well those celebrations when they are.... Not that important. Ahahha i mean they have the importance you see into them. I was talking to french people who practiced magick way before wicca became a thing and they are so confused with that concept ahhaa.
I am doing something similar. I live in Australia, have Scottish, German and English heritage, and am Norse in my belief system. There is a lot of work to be done.
Interesting. At 18 I moved from a heavy visual of season changes to a heavy forest- not much temperature change… I love honoring the waxing and waning energy of the sunlight combined with the plant growing cycle.
I am 47 now. Astrology and being immigrant of Norse grandparents heritage wise on my mothers and fathers side… I love honoring the plant cycle- I was raised as a farmer… selling food to support our survival.
I tried celebrating them and just couldn’t. It felt almost painfully inauthentic for me. New Age/ reconstructionism has never really been my vibe. Love the solar festivals, but I don’t have ties to the rest of them. Still trying to find my thing
So great to see how you develop and create your own way on your path. As always..following the Intuition is the fun part isn't it? It is really a big benefit for the community to hear content creators talking openly about the changes of their practices. It is truly a journey and it takes time. Thank you for the video. ❤
100% - if we are to evolve to symbiosis with Nature then we need to become humble and simply observe. Then try to understand. Here in South Africa, the amaXhosa people have always relied on plants and animals (birds in particular) to let them know when it's time to plant, time to harvest etc. That to me is far more reliable and logical than a stone calendar such as Stonehenge based on solar or lunar cycles, far removed from local climate and climate change. For me in the Southern Hemisphere, my year generally starts on 21-September, because I've found that is generally when our spring rains start. So the earth becomes pregnant (Imbolc = "in the belly") around 1-Aug (with the first rite of Spring) and then gives birth to new life on 21-Sep with the Spring Equinox rains. Soil bacteria changes in late winter (21-Jun to 1-Aug) to start decomposing more mineral content, since most organic content is decomposed in the early winter. The Wheel of the Year is a great guide but works even better with local observations and traditions.
Let's be honest, the wheel of the year exist since the 1950's (and 1970's to the mainstream audience) There's something i learnt after many years of following it : sometimes there's something to celebrate, sometimes not so much... It only depends on you tradition and/or your connection to the otherworld. I spent many great Mabon followed by disappointing Sahmain. So now i adapted to what feels right to me, based on my experience with the land and my surronding.
Thank you for being honest about needing to wait for the motivation to research certain things. As an ADHD person this was so validating to me lol! Like there are things I really want to learn but it’s all about the timing, sometimes I feel really guilty and imposter syndrome-y about not being able to research the things at any time. It’s a nice reminder to see I’m not the only one and I can just slow down. 🌿
Tbh I don’t know if I’m neurospicy (but I’m suspecting it) and I’m just learning how to live with it. I’ve always been that way - if I’m interested in something k want to know all about it but if the motivation doesn’t kick in I can’t bring myself to research it. So I’m just trying to ride the wave, at some point it’ll bring me there 😅
I love this. I see this happening all over the "pagan" community. People are starting to reclaim their relationships to nature in a more natural way. I live in America, in the region of the pacific northwest. We have a totally different climate than the rest of the country so I am also working on my own calendar system.
Precious little kitty stretching her paws behind you 🥰!!! Thank you so much for this video! It was very interesting to hear your reasoning for what holidays to celebrate, it makes a lot of sense ✨ I hope you get to make your own holidays as soon as you'll feel it's right for you I usually celebrate a bit of whatever, since for me a celebration will be spending time with friends and family, so I can adapt to that. I'm not rigorously following the calendar on that front Cheers!
I think the wheel of the year is more of a template and I absolutely love seeing people customize it to their tradition, regional location or even what works for them as a person to celebrate what holidays that click with them. Love this video!!
Waiting for motivation is actually a really good research method xD This solved my issue with the wheel of the year being from the northern hemisphere and the difference in lack of seasons
Great video! And I completely agree with you. I've been thinking the same for a long time. When I started to educate myself more in these topics and exploring my spirituality, most of the practices and beliefs were foreign to me, literally. I am Latin-American, and even what I can say is my culture is not something that I can lightly call mine and practice as if nothing. I don't resonate with a lot of things, foreign or from my own culture. I still have a lot of conflicts in my practice, but I recognize that some things have just naturally merged, and I have to play with that and the idea that at the end, this is deeply personal and interconnected. It is really refreshing to see you being so hands-on on your practice.
I cannot express how inspirational this video has been for me. I discovered witchcraft first and fell into inclusive Norse Heathenry slightly later. I really like the idea of the Wheel of the Year as different times to reflect on different aspects of our lives as part of a cycle. I think that the further back we go, the more in tune with the cycle of the seasons and of life, of nature and the environment our ancestors were. However, I live in SE Texas which is a semi tropical environment and the alignment of the wheel of the year doesn’t really apply. I recently had a birthday and am committed to a year of learning myself, of listening to myself, and experimenting with what feels right and being ok with what doesn’t. This video had given me lots to think about how I can connect with my ancestors even though they lived in environments very different than my own. Thank you so much for sharing your practice and how it has evolved over time. It really helps guide me in my journey and to accept that change in my practice is healthy and ok as I change and grow.
Moin Bente, einmal auf deutsch, weil es mir einfacher fällt es zu erklären. Erstmal finde ich das Thema sehr spannend, weil ich mich in einer ähnlichen Situation befinde, aber generell mit weniger "religiösem" Hintergrund als einem animistisch Ansatz und erleben der Natur. Dabei hilft es mir persönlich sehr mich nach meinen Bienen zu richten. Sprich nach den Bienenjahr, welchen sich nach den Pflanzen richtet, die regional und saisonal anders sein können und sich vor allem jedes Jahr wieder neu am Wetter orientieren. Dankeschön 🌼🌞🐝
It's funny you did this video, becauae I was going to do one on my journalling with what days do I want to cekebrate in and out of the wheel of the year. Your cat Skadi is so soooo cute!
I'm pretty much on the same page as you in re holidays. Personally, I tend to skip holidays in general, not because they don't resonate with me but because I have no sense of the calendar and I always forget that a holiday is coming up. I forget my own birthday, too. I'm more into "festival periods" - please give me a whole month at least to acknowledge a regular life passage, thanks. I also never really resonated with the Wheel of the Year. It's very Celtic-esque and rural, and I'm a multicultural American and 100% urban from an even more multicultural major city. I resonate much more with astronomical cycles, personally, so I celebrate the solstices and equinoxes and the solar cycles, which tend to cover several months each. And I observe the life cycles and movements of wildlife, trees, and wild plants rather than the cycles of agriculture. There's so much overlap among the holidays of different beliefs, I kind of feel like it shouldn't make that much difference, to be honest. For instance, my personal winter festival period is basically the whole winter, starting with the Winter Solstice and encompassing the Astronomical New Year, Solar New Year, and Lunar New Year. All the other religions' winter holidays fall within that period, too - Yule, Christmas, Hanukkah, Eid, Diwali, Kwanzaa, etc. - so I figure I'm up to accept any invitation I may receive. 😉
I’m kind of in the beginning of this process myself for my practice. I haven’t identified as Wiccan since 2019 but continued to observe the wheel of the year and a few other things such as altar tool correspondence. Been feeling like it no longer fits my practice but it’s literally the o my thing that has helped me to feel like I have community when the sabbats come around, but I feel like it’s time to decolonize my practice. Great video ❤
I'm a baby witch from the southern hemisphere (Brazil), and the reversed wheel just doesn't seem to click for me. Idk. It feels weird to celebrate Celtic/British holidays in a completely different date than the original places they originate from. Part of my ancestry is Iberian Celtic, so I feel compelled to celebrate Celtic holidays. But it feels wrong to celebrate them in reverse.
I was searching for a spiritual practice now as an adult, I tried Christianity but Iam more of an old testament kind of woman. 😉However I realized that even Christianity follows the wheel of the year. Its one of those things they couldn't get rid of. So that was a turning point for me, I started to define myself as a witch instead. But I am a bit stuck on which ones I want to celebrate for the same reasons as you. I cant get rid of Christmas, its too many childhood memories there. I need Valborg and Halloween too. But other than that I dont know...
I have very little to no connection with my ancestors or agricultural holidays. I only celebrate the solstices/equinoxes, but I do celebrate them on the exact date, because for me it is all about the astronomical alignment and not what the weather or the plants are doing in real time (the seasons are all out of wack anyway)
I've been using the wheel of the year as a reference for me and using it as a tool to frame what offerings or rituals. Because of my area it matches up to the wheel so I know 4 out of the 8 (I think its 8) are for the 4 seasons and the other 4 make them fit my practice or make them completely different to match if thar makes sense.
I’m someone who will take allll the holidays whether mine or not because having a day that’s special and different for any reason breaks up the monotony and sameness of the boring daily grind 😂. I’ll take it, any win at all over that. I love decorating and having something be special rather than the alternative of nothingness. Whatever the occasion, I’ll gladly take it. It doesn’t have to mean anything beyond “fun”. People get excited around holidays and enjoy the pageantry. I get that, I’m very much that way myself. We do the typical American holidays big here-like REALLY big 😂. Why not, it’s something cool and different to do that day rather than have nothing special going on at all. But this is definitely a “to each their own thing” thing. Everyone must do what makes them happiest in their own life. It can’t be forced off on people who don’t want it.
Norse Magic and Beliefs has already made an exact calendar you are speaking about. Everything from the historical sources. You should check that out for your research
This video is on point very inspirational, if you will, since I started my practice I've had a hard time figuring out who I am, so now I'm studying the Celtic pagan tradition, because a lot of my ancestors are Celtic British in German and I'm in the south so there is folk magic in that it's kind of scattered for me your video has helped me, thank you for sharing
I stopped following the wheel of the year and a lot of holidays because as a chronically ill person, I can never know if I'm going to have the energy to do anything for these holidays 😂
To be honest,the seasons are so messed up in the UK especially, I celebrate when it really " feels" like the change in season, also there are one's I just don't bother with because they don't resonate...Beltain, Midsummer being two I totally skip, really I am a dark half girl so ,anything before fall and after yule, I am like nah lol😂
I am very interested in your process for coming up with a celebratory calendar. Living in the US makes it even more of a mess, not that physical origins matter, but having grown up in or adjacent to cultures would have to help.
After I realised Christianity definitely wasn’t for me, I started researching the beliefs, culture, folklore & mythologies of my ancestors. I have only ever used Wicca as a reference for ideas. My father is from Denmark & my mother is from Northern England so I have a broad range of holidays to choose from. However I currently live in the Southern Hemisphere & would prefer to work with the seasonal changes relevant to where I am. I’m also of the opinion that Heathens/ Pagans/ Witches should go with what works best for them personally & love the idea of making up my own. For me currently it’s all about the Equinoxes, Solstices & phases of the moon. I’m sure I’ll figure out more as I do more research, I do have a reconstructed list of holidays for Norse pre-Christian holidays, but I’m still figuring out which works best for me & how I’m going to incorporate it into my own life.
i used to be wiccan many years ago but im norse pagan now, i was never really a big celebrator of the wheel of the year and i dont do anything now except prayer and offering and the odd sigil making, but it would be nice to have something to celebrate and do. it's kinda sad to celebrate holidays alone tho
The wheel of the year is not Wiccan. The wheel of the year was developed by Ross Nichols, who did work with Gerald Gardner, but would go onto create contemporary druidry. Both religious movements catalyzed the pagan revival, which would inspire later secular and “reconstructionist” movements. That’s why it carried over into more modern pagan practices. The sabbats are not holidays, though they can be observed as such. The wheel of the year is a magical tool based on the ceremonial practices the creators were inspired from. It is in essence a magical system and tool and is better compared to something like planetary magick and astrology. The purpose of the religion of witchcraft (Wicca) and Druidry was to create magical systems that were completely separate from Christian and Jewish idolatry that was still present in ceremonial magick at the time. It’s hard to understand any sort of accuracy and timeline considering the plethora of voices on the matter and a general lack of academic respect for occult practices, so I hope this helps. I’m not criticizing I promise. But one thing to consider when looking at these early 20th century movements is their proximity to mystery cults and hermetics, rather than an attempt at historical accuracy that became more popular in the 21 century.
One thing that I think would help you on your journey to developing your own sun system is to look at other traditional religion’s calendars. High church, especially traditional orthodoxy is VERY specific on their timelines and is based on prechristian planetary calculations. That should give you a good amount of frame work to work from.
I never celebrated it in the first place, my practice is based on Hungarian reformed practices, syncretized with Chatolic, as both can be found in my ancestrial background, I've grown up with them, and I cannot toss them away just lie that. I do not really call myself a witch or anylthing like that, in Hungarian lores it is called "bűbájos", from an ancient tale: Mother Moon had two sons, one is Bű, one is Báj, they were the personification of "bad" and "good, darkness and light. They almost eliminated the life on Earth by fighting each other until Mother Moon had enough of it and regulated her children to be in balance with each other. Hence the name bűbájos, or in not so exact translation "Enchantress". I try to avoid appropriatingJewish culture within my practice, so I always do look up if there might be some aspects I need to drop. So my practice is quite limited.White people have no culture at all of their own origin. Let's face the fact, we're thefts since our skintone was born with the first mutations. :/ I am so sad about that. I do not think of myself as a human at all. We're one of the most dangerous viruses roaming on Earth.
You're a saint as always 😭 I've been looking for these exact same things. Searching both for traditional Heathen holidays, but also important German holidays, which is hard to find as an American. I'm so excited to see what you find and make, as always. Would you differentiate the German holidays based on their regional significance (a holiday more important to Bavaria than to Brandenburg, for example) or would you make them all German with a capital G/D?
I’d try to make them as regional as possible because there’s such major differences between the different areas….for example even just the north being more Protestant and the south more catholic….
For anyone practicing any form of Reconstructionist Paganism, it should be avoided. It is mainly based around the British Isles, where I live, but has no historical basis for me, as a practicing reconstructionist Anglo-Saxon heathen (Fyrnsidu), nor does it even have one really in any form of insular (British) Celtic paganism with the exception of some dates, but the “Wheel of the Year” is completely new age/Wiccan. For a lot of European traditions, if you look at the sources, you can actually gain some insight into their own “Wheel of the Year”. For Anglo-Saxon heathens, the Venerable Bede literally has described the Anglo-Saxon calendar back in the 700s, and this is also a goldmine for all Germanic heathens (Norse, Continental). If you’re a heathen, check out Bede for a reconstructionist approach!
I can understand that you as a Norse Witch can't identify with celtic-based feasts. I am not a Wiccan too, but I love to feast the wheel of the year with friends. We celebrate outside and we try to orientate ourselves to nature. I am living on former celtic country (Austria), so I am not connected to Norse lore and gods, but to celtic ones. I believe everybody should feast when and where his heart is.
Vielleicht bin ich da nicht so bewandert aber waren die Kelten nicht eher in England und Schottland? In Österreich würd ich eher Germanen verorten (und einen Haufen Römer die ihr Zeug dagelassen haben ^^°)
That makes total sense you feel like a Dane and German since you're from Schleswig-Holstein. Culture is never black and white. It's grey and mixes together, Americans seem to have an identity crisis because of this. 😂
Ive stopped celebrating everything on the very long "you should do this as a witch" list.. Not all makes sense to me! Also, Honestly I do not have time for that much celebration xD
I'm a bit confused by what you include in the Wheel of the Year. To me, as far as WotY holidays go, it consists of the equinoxes, solstices, and the cross quarter days. These dates have been celebrated all of human history because they are directly measurable events (highest and lowest sun, and when the sun rises/sets exactly E/W), and they are universally on the same days around the world. The cross quarter days less so, but they nominally fall halfway between the equinoxes and solstices, but I can see how that is variable. You said you don't celebrate the WotY, but you do celebrate the primary 4 days of it, so I'm left wondering what exactly you aren't celebrating. Is it strictly the cross quarter days you don't celebrate?
I completely agree with everything you said in the video. 👏🏻 The only thing I don't agree with is that, in my opinion, it doesn't make much sense to celebrate the Wikkan wheel of the year if you are not Wiccan: if you care so much about holidays, it is much better (as you are doing too) to create your own holidays, based on the geo-climatic characteristics of the territory or possibly on the culture of the people of that region: It's much more authentic and accurate than taking a standard year wheel already made and ready; but also because, if you don't belong to British culture, copying the wheel of the year it seems to me like "cultural appropriation". Thanks for sharing this information ♥️
That depends on what wheel of the year you are talking about. The most popular one pretty much all non traditional initates use is not wiccan nor stemmed from completely from wicca. Aiden Kelly was the one to make it into what it is now and it does not align with what actual covens practice. (I realize not everyone is in a coven, but they do practice what wicca started as and continues to be in full context.) So is it cultural appropriation? No. Not really. Especially because yes Wicca is the only religion to come from Britain, but it is not a British exclusive practice. Many Americans and people from around the world were initiated by Gerald gardner and others in his lineage.
Really? 🤔 I admit that I am still a neophyte, but (after having drawn numerous information from various sources), I understood that, although the most commonly known individual sabbats (imbolc, litha, samhain etc.) had arisen before the creation of the modern wheel of the year, today's wheel of the year had been assembled as it is by Gardner at the time Wicca was founded and had remained unchanged: that's why it seemed strange to me that a non-wiccan would choose to follow it. However, in fact you are right about the fact that following Wicca as a non-British/Anglo-Saxon is not cultural appropriation also because, by researching myself better in recent days, I have also understood that many Wiccan practices and traditions are the result of long processes of stratification and syncretism of various cultures and traditions of the past, both British and otherwise. Anyway, thanks for the clarification 🙏🏻
Just a note: Most traditional Wiccans do not celebrate the wheel of the year the way new age has made it out to be. It very much came from solitary non initiates. We celebrate the solitices, esbats, and equinoxs and we typically call them such. Thing like Mabon for example ARE NOT & never were Wiccan.
i stopped because it never aligned with where i live... now i just celebrate the equinoxes and solstices, and the actual visible changes around me ❤
Same❤
Same
I celebrate the fall equinox and the winter solstice. Where I live, "Spring" is hard to define, and midsummer also doesn't make sense so I skip those.
I really love the idea of making your own "holiday." That really sang to me. We have mesquite trees and they refuse to "pop" or release their leaves to bloom, until winter is completely over. It may be in the high 80F/26c's and those trees somehow know and will not become green until winter is truly over. I am going to begin a celebration on the day this happens! So wonderful. Thank you!
I can relate, in Lithuania we kinda have our own wheel of the year and the dates are a bit different from the wiccan one so I always felt a little confused, having to celebrate the same thing twice or choosing one over the other. After a while I think I just got overwhelmed and stopped celebrating, now I'm figuring things out and looking at my heritage for inspiration. It's still nice knowing when those wiccan celebrations are, it feels like a more special day, but I think it's more important to keep my local celebrations from extinction.
You scared me lol. You scare me every time you upload videos like this 😂. I always wonder "why?! What happened?! Are they evil?!" Lol, but can see now that this is specific to your very specific practice and life. Although, the "create your own holidays" goal makes a lot of sense...because you're absolutely right in that the wheel of the year holidays are specific to specific people in a specific region. Here I am, a person of mainly African and some European decent, and celebrating something that really has little to nothing do with the majority of my ancestry 😅. You're such a leader! I can see many people following your visions in the near and distant future. You're such an amazing example of what it means to be Pagan.
6:03 I completely understand, I’m a Hellenic polytheist and we have our own holidays and just that wheel of year is not for everyone. Even then you don’t have to celebrate the holidays as well if you don’t want to.
Yeah most of people who come into neo paganism/witchcraft fear not doing well those celebrations when they are.... Not that important. Ahahha i mean they have the importance you see into them. I was talking to french people who practiced magick way before wicca became a thing and they are so confused with that concept ahhaa.
That's the realisation I have come to. I'm celebrating the seasons. Making my own wheel of the year. I'm glad other people are doing that, too.😊
I am doing something similar. I live in Australia, have Scottish, German and English heritage, and am Norse in my belief system. There is a lot of work to be done.
Interesting. At 18 I moved from a heavy visual of season changes to a heavy forest- not much temperature change… I love honoring the waxing and waning energy of the sunlight combined with the plant growing cycle.
I am 47 now. Astrology and being immigrant of Norse grandparents heritage wise on my mothers and fathers side… I love honoring the plant cycle- I was raised as a farmer… selling food to support our survival.
I tried celebrating them and just couldn’t. It felt almost painfully inauthentic for me. New Age/ reconstructionism has never really been my vibe. Love the solar festivals, but I don’t have ties to the rest of them. Still trying to find my thing
I'm Lakota and we have our own holidays which go by our seasons and what the stars are doing in the sky.
So great to see how you develop and create your own way on your path. As always..following the Intuition is the fun part isn't it? It is really a big benefit for the community to hear content creators talking openly about the changes of their practices. It is truly a journey and it takes time. Thank you for the video. ❤
100% - if we are to evolve to symbiosis with Nature then we need to become humble and simply observe. Then try to understand. Here in South Africa, the amaXhosa people have always relied on plants and animals (birds in particular) to let them know when it's time to plant, time to harvest etc. That to me is far more reliable and logical than a stone calendar such as Stonehenge based on solar or lunar cycles, far removed from local climate and climate change. For me in the Southern Hemisphere, my year generally starts on 21-September, because I've found that is generally when our spring rains start. So the earth becomes pregnant (Imbolc = "in the belly") around 1-Aug (with the first rite of Spring) and then gives birth to new life on 21-Sep with the Spring Equinox rains. Soil bacteria changes in late winter (21-Jun to 1-Aug) to start decomposing more mineral content, since most organic content is decomposed in the early winter. The Wheel of the Year is a great guide but works even better with local observations and traditions.
Let's be honest, the wheel of the year exist since the 1950's (and 1970's to the mainstream audience) There's something i learnt after many years of following it : sometimes there's something to celebrate, sometimes not so much... It only depends on you tradition and/or your connection to the otherworld. I spent many great Mabon followed by disappointing Sahmain. So now i adapted to what feels right to me, based on my experience with the land and my surronding.
Yes. I've been teaching this for years.
This makes perfect sense to me. I’d highly recommend the book Temperance Alden wrote “Year of the Witch”
Thank you for being honest about needing to wait for the motivation to research certain things. As an ADHD person this was so validating to me lol! Like there are things I really want to learn but it’s all about the timing, sometimes I feel really guilty and imposter syndrome-y about not being able to research the things at any time. It’s a nice reminder to see I’m not the only one and I can just slow down. 🌿
Tbh I don’t know if I’m neurospicy (but I’m suspecting it) and I’m just learning how to live with it. I’ve always been that way - if I’m interested in something k want to know all about it but if the motivation doesn’t kick in I can’t bring myself to research it. So I’m just trying to ride the wave, at some point it’ll bring me there 😅
I love this. I see this happening all over the "pagan" community. People are starting to reclaim their relationships to nature in a more natural way. I live in America, in the region of the pacific northwest. We have a totally different climate than the rest of the country so I am also working on my own calendar system.
Thank you for your explanation. We all have to figure out our journey.
Precious little kitty stretching her paws behind you 🥰!!! Thank you so much for this video! It was very interesting to hear your reasoning for what holidays to celebrate, it makes a lot of sense ✨
I hope you get to make your own holidays as soon as you'll feel it's right for you
I usually celebrate a bit of whatever, since for me a celebration will be spending time with friends and family, so I can adapt to that. I'm not rigorously following the calendar on that front
Cheers!
I love this, i too started off wiccan but very quickly moved away from it. I would love to see videos on pre Christian norse holidays
I think the wheel of the year is more of a template and I absolutely love seeing people customize it to their tradition, regional location or even what works for them as a person to celebrate what holidays that click with them. Love this video!!
Waiting for motivation is actually a really good research method xD
This solved my issue with the wheel of the year being from the northern hemisphere and the difference in lack of seasons
Great video! And I completely agree with you. I've been thinking the same for a long time. When I started to educate myself more in these topics and exploring my spirituality, most of the practices and beliefs were foreign to me, literally. I am Latin-American, and even what I can say is my culture is not something that I can lightly call mine and practice as if nothing. I don't resonate with a lot of things, foreign or from my own culture. I still have a lot of conflicts in my practice, but I recognize that some things have just naturally merged, and I have to play with that and the idea that at the end, this is deeply personal and interconnected. It is really refreshing to see you being so hands-on on your practice.
Skadi is such a sweet cat. Loving the calming energy!
I cannot express how inspirational this video has been for me. I discovered witchcraft first and fell into inclusive Norse Heathenry slightly later. I really like the idea of the Wheel of the Year as different times to reflect on different aspects of our lives as part of a cycle. I think that the further back we go, the more in tune with the cycle of the seasons and of life, of nature and the environment our ancestors were. However, I live in SE Texas which is a semi tropical environment and the alignment of the wheel of the year doesn’t really apply. I recently had a birthday and am committed to a year of learning myself, of listening to myself, and experimenting with what feels right and being ok with what doesn’t. This video had given me lots to think about how I can connect with my ancestors even though they lived in environments very different than my own. Thank you so much for sharing your practice and how it has evolved over time. It really helps guide me in my journey and to accept that change in my practice is healthy and ok as I change and grow.
Very well-said. Your videos are always so informative and thought-provoking. Your cat is adorable BTW
Thank you for your work❤
Moin Bente, einmal auf deutsch, weil es mir einfacher fällt es zu erklären.
Erstmal finde ich das Thema sehr spannend, weil ich mich in einer ähnlichen Situation befinde, aber generell mit weniger "religiösem" Hintergrund als einem animistisch Ansatz und erleben der Natur. Dabei hilft es mir persönlich sehr mich nach meinen Bienen zu richten. Sprich nach den Bienenjahr, welchen sich nach den Pflanzen richtet, die regional und saisonal anders sein können und sich vor allem jedes Jahr wieder neu am Wetter orientieren.
Dankeschön 🌼🌞🐝
It's funny you did this video, becauae I was going to do one on my journalling with what days do I want to cekebrate in and out of the wheel of the year. Your cat Skadi is so soooo cute!
I'm pretty much on the same page as you in re holidays. Personally, I tend to skip holidays in general, not because they don't resonate with me but because I have no sense of the calendar and I always forget that a holiday is coming up. I forget my own birthday, too. I'm more into "festival periods" - please give me a whole month at least to acknowledge a regular life passage, thanks.
I also never really resonated with the Wheel of the Year. It's very Celtic-esque and rural, and I'm a multicultural American and 100% urban from an even more multicultural major city. I resonate much more with astronomical cycles, personally, so I celebrate the solstices and equinoxes and the solar cycles, which tend to cover several months each. And I observe the life cycles and movements of wildlife, trees, and wild plants rather than the cycles of agriculture.
There's so much overlap among the holidays of different beliefs, I kind of feel like it shouldn't make that much difference, to be honest. For instance, my personal winter festival period is basically the whole winter, starting with the Winter Solstice and encompassing the Astronomical New Year, Solar New Year, and Lunar New Year. All the other religions' winter holidays fall within that period, too - Yule, Christmas, Hanukkah, Eid, Diwali, Kwanzaa, etc. - so I figure I'm up to accept any invitation I may receive. 😉
Id love to see a video on what you do celebrate 🎉
I’m kind of in the beginning of this process myself for my practice. I haven’t identified as Wiccan since 2019 but continued to observe the wheel of the year and a few other things such as altar tool correspondence. Been feeling like it no longer fits my practice but it’s literally the o my thing that has helped me to feel like I have community when the sabbats come around, but I feel like it’s time to decolonize my practice. Great video ❤
I'm a baby witch from the southern hemisphere (Brazil), and the reversed wheel just doesn't seem to click for me. Idk. It feels weird to celebrate Celtic/British holidays in a completely different date than the original places they originate from. Part of my ancestry is Iberian Celtic, so I feel compelled to celebrate Celtic holidays. But it feels wrong to celebrate them in reverse.
I was searching for a spiritual practice now as an adult, I tried Christianity but Iam more of an old testament kind of woman. 😉However I realized that even Christianity follows the wheel of the year. Its one of those things they couldn't get rid of. So that was a turning point for me, I started to define myself as a witch instead. But I am a bit stuck on which ones I want to celebrate for the same reasons as you. I cant get rid of Christmas, its too many childhood memories there. I need Valborg and Halloween too. But other than that I dont know...
I have very little to no connection with my ancestors or agricultural holidays. I only celebrate the solstices/equinoxes, but I do celebrate them on the exact date, because for me it is all about the astronomical alignment and not what the weather or the plants are doing in real time (the seasons are all out of wack anyway)
It’s funny I have the EXACT same wheel in my dinning room right now.
I've been using the wheel of the year as a reference for me and using it as a tool to frame what offerings or rituals. Because of my area it matches up to the wheel so I know 4 out of the 8 (I think its 8) are for the 4 seasons and the other 4 make them fit my practice or make them completely different to match if thar makes sense.
I’m someone who will take allll the holidays whether mine or not because having a day that’s special and different for any reason breaks up the monotony and sameness of the boring daily grind 😂. I’ll take it, any win at all over that. I love decorating and having something be special rather than the alternative of nothingness. Whatever the occasion, I’ll gladly take it. It doesn’t have to mean anything beyond “fun”. People get excited around holidays and enjoy the pageantry. I get that, I’m very much that way myself. We do the typical American holidays big here-like REALLY big 😂. Why not, it’s something cool and different to do that day rather than have nothing special going on at all. But this is definitely a “to each their own thing” thing. Everyone must do what makes them happiest in their own life. It can’t be forced off on people who don’t want it.
Norse Magic and Beliefs has already made an exact calendar you are speaking about. Everything from the historical sources. You should check that out for your research
This video is on point very inspirational, if you will, since I started my practice I've had a hard time figuring out who I am, so now I'm studying the Celtic pagan tradition, because a lot of my ancestors are Celtic British in German and I'm in the south so there is folk magic in that it's kind of scattered for me your video has helped me, thank you for sharing
I stopped following the wheel of the year and a lot of holidays because as a chronically ill person, I can never know if I'm going to have the energy to do anything for these holidays 😂
Could you cover Fenrir? ❤
I'm on a similar route - currently I'm mostly trying to look into local Brauchtum etc and what makes sense for me
To be honest,the seasons are so messed up in the UK especially, I celebrate when it really " feels" like the change in season, also there are one's I just don't bother with because they don't resonate...Beltain, Midsummer being two I totally skip, really I am a dark half girl so ,anything before fall and after yule, I am like nah lol😂
I am very interested in your process for coming up with a celebratory calendar. Living in the US makes it even more of a mess, not that physical origins matter, but having grown up in or adjacent to cultures would have to help.
After I realised Christianity definitely wasn’t for me, I started researching the beliefs, culture, folklore & mythologies of my ancestors. I have only ever used Wicca as a reference for ideas. My father is from Denmark & my mother is from Northern England so I have a broad range of holidays to choose from. However I currently live in the Southern Hemisphere & would prefer to work with the seasonal changes relevant to where I am. I’m also of the opinion that Heathens/ Pagans/ Witches should go with what works best for them personally & love the idea of making up my own. For me currently it’s all about the Equinoxes, Solstices & phases of the moon. I’m sure I’ll figure out more as I do more research, I do have a reconstructed list of holidays for Norse pre-Christian holidays, but I’m still figuring out which works best for me & how I’m going to incorporate it into my own life.
have you watched arith harger?
i used to be wiccan many years ago but im norse pagan now, i was never really a big celebrator of the wheel of the year and i dont do anything now except prayer and offering and the odd sigil making, but it would be nice to have something to celebrate and do. it's kinda sad to celebrate holidays alone tho
The wheel of the year is not Wiccan. The wheel of the year was developed by Ross Nichols, who did work with Gerald Gardner, but would go onto create contemporary druidry. Both religious movements catalyzed the pagan revival, which would inspire later secular and “reconstructionist” movements. That’s why it carried over into more modern pagan practices.
The sabbats are not holidays, though they can be observed as such. The wheel of the year is a magical tool based on the ceremonial practices the creators were inspired from. It is in essence a magical system and tool and is better compared to something like planetary magick and astrology.
The purpose of the religion of witchcraft (Wicca) and Druidry was to create magical systems that were completely separate from Christian and Jewish idolatry that was still present in ceremonial magick at the time.
It’s hard to understand any sort of accuracy and timeline considering the plethora of voices on the matter and a general lack of academic respect for occult practices, so I hope this helps. I’m not criticizing I promise. But one thing to consider when looking at these early 20th century movements is their proximity to mystery cults and hermetics, rather than an attempt at historical accuracy that became more popular in the 21 century.
One thing that I think would help you on your journey to developing your own sun system is to look at other traditional religion’s calendars. High church, especially traditional orthodoxy is VERY specific on their timelines and is based on prechristian planetary calculations. That should give you a good amount of frame work to work from.
Oh thank gods I'm not the only one who mentioned this.
I never celebrated it in the first place, my practice is based on Hungarian reformed practices, syncretized with Chatolic, as both can be found in my ancestrial background, I've grown up with them, and I cannot toss them away just lie that. I do not really call myself a witch or anylthing like that, in Hungarian lores it is called "bűbájos", from an ancient tale: Mother Moon had two sons, one is Bű, one is Báj, they were the personification of "bad" and "good, darkness and light. They almost eliminated the life on Earth by fighting each other until Mother Moon had enough of it and regulated her children to be in balance with each other. Hence the name bűbájos, or in not so exact translation "Enchantress". I try to avoid appropriatingJewish culture within my practice, so I always do look up if there might be some aspects I need to drop. So my practice is quite limited.White people have no culture at all of their own origin. Let's face the fact, we're thefts since our skintone was born with the first mutations. :/ I am so sad about that. I do not think of myself as a human at all. We're one of the most dangerous viruses roaming on Earth.
You're a saint as always 😭 I've been looking for these exact same things. Searching both for traditional Heathen holidays, but also important German holidays, which is hard to find as an American. I'm so excited to see what you find and make, as always. Would you differentiate the German holidays based on their regional significance (a holiday more important to Bavaria than to Brandenburg, for example) or would you make them all German with a capital G/D?
I’d try to make them as regional as possible because there’s such major differences between the different areas….for example even just the north being more Protestant and the south more catholic….
Will you ever go back to celebrating the wheel of the year.
Nope!
For anyone practicing any form of Reconstructionist Paganism, it should be avoided. It is mainly based around the British Isles, where I live, but has no historical basis for me, as a practicing reconstructionist Anglo-Saxon heathen (Fyrnsidu), nor does it even have one really in any form of insular (British) Celtic paganism with the exception of some dates, but the “Wheel of the Year” is completely new age/Wiccan. For a lot of European traditions, if you look at the sources, you can actually gain some insight into their own “Wheel of the Year”. For Anglo-Saxon heathens, the Venerable Bede literally has described the Anglo-Saxon calendar back in the 700s, and this is also a goldmine for all Germanic heathens (Norse, Continental). If you’re a heathen, check out Bede for a reconstructionist approach!
I wouldn't give u any reason to not have a party or celebration!
I can understand that you as a Norse Witch can't identify with celtic-based feasts. I am not a Wiccan too, but I love to feast the wheel of the year with friends. We celebrate outside and we try to orientate ourselves to nature. I am living on former celtic country (Austria), so I am not connected to Norse lore and gods, but to celtic ones. I believe everybody should feast when and where his heart is.
Vielleicht bin ich da nicht so bewandert aber waren die Kelten nicht eher in England und Schottland? In Österreich würd ich eher Germanen verorten (und einen Haufen Römer die ihr Zeug dagelassen haben ^^°)
@birgittnlilli9726 Die Kelten waren tatsächlich auch im Süden Deutschlands, Österreich, Schweiz und Frankreich ☺️
That makes total sense you feel like a Dane and German since you're from Schleswig-Holstein. Culture is never black and white. It's grey and mixes together, Americans seem to have an identity crisis because of this. 😂
Ive stopped celebrating everything on the very long "you should do this as a witch" list..
Not all makes sense to me! Also, Honestly I do not have time for that much celebration xD
I'm a bit confused by what you include in the Wheel of the Year. To me, as far as WotY holidays go, it consists of the equinoxes, solstices, and the cross quarter days. These dates have been celebrated all of human history because they are directly measurable events (highest and lowest sun, and when the sun rises/sets exactly E/W), and they are universally on the same days around the world. The cross quarter days less so, but they nominally fall halfway between the equinoxes and solstices, but I can see how that is variable. You said you don't celebrate the WotY, but you do celebrate the primary 4 days of it, so I'm left wondering what exactly you aren't celebrating. Is it strictly the cross quarter days you don't celebrate?
I completely agree with everything you said in the video. 👏🏻
The only thing I don't agree with is that, in my opinion, it doesn't make much sense to celebrate the Wikkan wheel of the year if you are not Wiccan: if you care so much about holidays, it is much better (as you are doing too) to create your own holidays, based on the geo-climatic characteristics of the territory or possibly on the culture of the people of that region: It's much more authentic and accurate than taking a standard year wheel already made and ready; but also because, if you don't belong to British culture, copying the wheel of the year it seems to me like "cultural appropriation".
Thanks for sharing this information ♥️
That depends on what wheel of the year you are talking about. The most popular one pretty much all non traditional initates use is not wiccan nor stemmed from completely from wicca. Aiden Kelly was the one to make it into what it is now and it does not align with what actual covens practice. (I realize not everyone is in a coven, but they do practice what wicca started as and continues to be in full context.) So is it cultural appropriation? No. Not really. Especially because yes Wicca is the only religion to come from Britain, but it is not a British exclusive practice. Many Americans and people from around the world were initiated by Gerald gardner and others in his lineage.
Really? 🤔
I admit that I am still a neophyte, but (after having drawn numerous information from various sources), I understood that, although the most commonly known individual sabbats (imbolc, litha, samhain etc.) had arisen before the creation of the modern wheel of the year, today's wheel of the year had been assembled as it is by Gardner at the time Wicca was founded and had remained unchanged: that's why it seemed strange to me that a non-wiccan would choose to follow it.
However, in fact you are right about the fact that following Wicca as a non-British/Anglo-Saxon is not cultural appropriation also because, by researching myself better in recent days, I have also understood that many Wiccan practices and traditions are the result of long processes of stratification and syncretism of various cultures and traditions of the past, both British and otherwise.
Anyway, thanks for the clarification 🙏🏻
Just a note: Most traditional Wiccans do not celebrate the wheel of the year the way new age has made it out to be. It very much came from solitary non initiates. We celebrate the solitices, esbats, and equinoxs and we typically call them such. Thing like Mabon for example ARE NOT & never were Wiccan.
I love this, i too started off wiccan but very quickly moved away from it. I would love to see videos on pre Christian norse holidays