Now, don’t get me wrong, I am definitely a nature religion kind of gal, but I don’t exactly go as far as embracing the biting bug part of nature. Hitchhikers must die. Sorry, that’s way this witch rolls. Anyway …

After doing the icky dance from the finding a tick and trying to figure out ways to keep my two spider bites from hurting any longer, I go to bed thinking the icky is behind me while I move forward to embrace other forest type dreaming.

Later, I wake up in the middle of the night around 3:00 a.m. feeling something crawling on my leg. I sit up and look and can’t find anything and go back to sleep. As I’m going back to sleep I feel something crawling on my thigh and I sit up and find a bug crawling on my leg. I grab it and smack my husband awake yelling, “Bed Bugs! I have Bed Bugs! Get me a plastic bag for the bug man tomorrow!”

My husband (who loves me dearly and indulges me) leaps out of bed like a hero and asks to see the bug. I look at him with disdain and advise him in a manner that wives do that I’ll show him AFTER I put it in the plastic bag or it will get lost and I need it for the bug man. Ever faithfully living up to his motto of “happy wife happy life” he does a hero leap and head downstairs retrieving a sandwich bag to contain the wretched beast.

While he is gone, I’m doing two things: (1) I’m doing the icky dance and thinking about how much extra it will cost to call in the bug man on a Sunday before I have a full house infestation of bed bugs that I brought home from vacation. (2) I’m ripping off my clothes and, therefore, doing the icky dance naked while my service dog is staring at me like I have lost my mind and she hasn’t had the necessary training on how to deal with me losing my mind. Anyway …

My husband returns with the appropriate containment device for said bug and said bug is quickly dispatched into the plastic sandwich bag containment device appropriate for all possibly dangerous or biting types of bugs one wishes to identify or show the bug man that you paid a bazillion dollars to come out on a Sunday to deal with.

Next we take this offending beast to the computer and look up bed bugs trying to compare the two and it begins to appear after several minutes of coaxing from my husband that this may not actually be the ground zero bed bug of an impending bed bug infestation consuming our entire house.

As we look onward to further identify this potentially dangerous beast, we come across several pictures and realize that this bug is a grape beetle from California. We begin discussing about whether we misidentified this bug and whether a California grape bug could have established a migration pattern to Florida.

As we settle into this discussion, I get a little of the midnight munchie feeling and reach over for the bowl of grapes we keep next to the bed and then we stop to stare at each other and then back at the bowl and then back at each other. Anyway …

Without saying anything further, my husband kisses me on the forehead, says he loves me, and lays back down pulling the covers over his head.

Moral of the Story? Sometimes a bed bug infestation is just a California Grape Bug. Yup. That’s the only moral that comes to mind.

Happy Camping everyone! Muwah!

It is one thing growing older with someone and quite another when one of the two develops long term (often forever) chronic pain or health issues along the way and the other doesn’t. It doesn’t just change the dynamics of the person suffering from pain issues, it also changes how that person interacts in their marriage, and, consequently, affects the other spouse as well.

In our case, my chronic pain developed over years ~ slowly increasing as life and time took its toll and my spinal degeneration progressed. Bit by bit, some things became a little more difficult until eventually I had to eliminate certain activities all together. It’s really been in the past two years that it has reached what I consider to be a disabling status.

First, it was just making adjustments such as having cement benches installed in the circle and having the kids or my husband carry in the groceries. Then I began stepping out of bonfire dancing and taking various over the counter medications on a daily basis to try to keep going in my work profession. Eventually, I was spending more time just trying to focus on my work and spending a good percentage my off time from work in bed resting until it reached a point where it felt that I was either working or I was in bed.

As the person with the issue, I didn’t want to admit to myself or anyone else that it was catching up with me. I didn’t want to be viewed or labeled as disabled especially by my loved ones. I often did things I shouldn’t have done like moving dressers, resodding the lawn, carrying camping equipment, etc. although my husband would insist that I let him do it. I just didn’t want to admit that I was losing my superwoman status.

When it reached the point that I couldn’t work anymore, I should have just admitted it, accepted it, started pain management, and made a plan with my husband for me to retire, but I just kept at it and kept at it. I will admit now (because I couldn’t then) that if I had not been so stubborn and went to pain management earlier, I might have had a few more working years on the end side of my career.

I was forthcoming with my husband about my previous injuries from the beginning of our relationship, but I think even when you are aware of a future possibility when you are with someone day after day, you tend to become less aware of it. I didn’t suddenly become disabled, it crept up on us both very slowly until one day it just seemed like we both woke up and realized BAM I can’t do things anymore.

When this happened, everything began to change in what I deem the Make It or Break It period of time. Where I used to handle the bills and organizational parts of our marriage including family events and date nights, I became unable to do so because of the pain and the medications Where I used to make dinners most nights, I couldn’t guarantee being able to stand up every night for the amount of time needed. Sometimes dinner was ready. Sometimes dinner wasn’t. Where I made appointments for the family and ran around doing errands at lunch, I didn’t have the steam to focus on those activities and my increasing pain levels, so sometimes it would get done and sometimes it wouldn’t. The worst part is I didn’t want to accept or admit that I couldn’t, so I would say I would take care of things and then they just wouldn’t get done.

In my eyes, I was doing the best that I could and my best wasn’t being appreciated. In my husband’s eyes, I was becoming unreliable and he began feeling as if he was becoming solely responsible for everything involved in running a family household rather than having a partnership in the responsibility end of our marriage. Because of this we both went through periods of time where we would shut down from each other.

The best way I can describe our “worst times” is that we would stand with our backs to each other, but we never took one step away from each other and eventually we always turned back around to face each other. I guess that’s how our marriage made it through all the changes: by surrendering past expectations of each other, dismissing previous spousal role definitions, and allowing each other to grow and adapt into the person we each individually needed to become.

When we first got married, we made a promise to each other that if either of us ever felt like walking away, we would recommit to coming back together. We have kept that promise to each other. At this point, we worked on accepting and adapting to the changing environment of our marriage and our expectations of marriage.

I wish there was a secret I could share with everyone about how to hold a marriage together when you go through something like this or any other dramatic change in a relationship or the relationship environment, but I think it really comes down to the two individual people involved. We have seen marriages fall apart or we have seen them become stronger than they were. There is no special technique or secret to making it work, but I know this much . . .

If both people are committed to making the marriage stronger, there is a good chance it will be come stronger. If either person is not committed, there is a stronger chance a marriage won’t survive.

Brightest of Blessings ~ Mead

The summer sun makes me lazy and sleepy and I spend the majority of it closed up in some sort of air conditioned place in an instinctual survival method like a bear that hibernates in the winter. Silly old bear. Everyone knows the best time to be out and about and get things done is in the crisp winter air. Okay, well, maybe not everyone.

One of those not everyone is my husband. He adores the summertime and runs about gleefully in the sun working up a sweat in a manner that I find to qualify him to be certifiably insane. Why anyone intentionally would want to raise their body temperature in the heat of the summer is absolutely beyond my comprehension, but there he is in the noonday sun throwing a football about or doing lawn work.

As a good wife, though, I support his efforts entirely through the window of my air conditioned house. Sometimes, I scamper out only long enough to hand him a drink and try not to look so amazed that anyone would be out in that humid heat in the first place much less the fact that he actually likes being out there.

The usual summer martial battles have never really about our relationship or any issues per se, but the fact that (1) he wants to be outside in all the summer glories and (2) he wants his wife out there with him. After ten years of marriage, he has come to terms that he is more than welcome to pursue (1), but that (2) simply ain’t happening unless the sun has gone down and there is a continuous breeze.

I gave it a good shot when we first were married, but he began to notice and eventually to accept that I have a tendency to get a severe sunburn in about 5 seconds which quickly proceeds into heat stroke ~~ both conditions which tend to prohibit women from wanting to any contact with another human being for days, especially romantic contact. As the wonderful husband that he is, early on in our marriage, he decided and announced that I was no longer allowed out in the summer sun stating that it was his manly mission to be out there protecting me from not wanting to be touched later on.

As the first cool breezes of autumn start blowing in, you can see a change in his face. He starts becoming wistful about his love affair with the summer sun and begins sighing a lot. There is only one thing that can distract him from the coming loss of his ability to sweat in the hot, humid summer ~ football season. In his mind, this is the only acceptable reason for the seasons to change. The, ironically, just to insure his acceptance of the wintertime cold, there is basketball season.

So while he is marinating on the couch with sports, I start revving up and heading outside for the winter ~ my glorious winter. Sometimes during half-time, I can see him peeking out the window of the heated house amazed that I would even consider being out in the cold winter breezes that rejuvenate and inspire me in ways the summer never does.

To every witch, there is a season and mine is winter.

Brightest of Blessings ~ Mead Muse

In the business of regular living, there is an ebb and flow to issues and challenges and for most people, there are periods of lull and rest where you can recuperate from the energy and emotions expended on resolving issues. As years pass, you get very accustomed to the cycle and during stressful periods even give yourself some relief by reminding yourself that these things will pass as do all other things.

Chronic pain deeply alters those cycles. As physical issues proceed and/or conditions deteriorate, the whole cycle intensifies and shortens until there are fewer and fewer and then no rest cycle to which we have become accustomed to rejuvenate ourselves. Sometimes, I think this is the hardest part of dealing with chronic pain ~ the moments of being pain free (to the degree that you don’t think about being in pain) drifts further and further apart like an elusive phantom being chased by a modern day ghost hunter.

Yet this phantom of living pain free can become our obsession. We spend so much time and money chasing it that we often increase our own pain with this effort until it becomes a Catch 22 or “damned if you do, damned if you don’t” situation.  What if that one thing (no matter how crazy) was the one thing that would have worked?

Well meaning and loving people will give you a million suggestions for pain relief. They don’t want to see you in pain. They want your attention and focus back on living. They don’t want to be reminded that they might one day be in a situation where nothing really helps them deal with pain or some other situation. People with chronic pain issues want this, too.

When you are involved in the Wiccan and Pagan Community, those helpful suggestions and intentions are three-fold in volume with the expansive alternative and holistic approaches.

So our initial impulse is to chase remedies and suggestions.

We light the candles.
We burn the incense and smell the aromas.
We rub oils and ointments.
We reiki ourselves until we know the techniques better than some masters.
We ask for healing energies although we feel embarrassed to do so.
We drink the teas and then change the teas and drink them more.
We take the vitamins, minerals, and supplements.
We go to pain management and take the medicine and cope with side effects.
We get the painful shots in our spines and joints.
We pray to the Gods and speak with our spirits.

We often get temporary relief from this, but it rarely “fixes” chronic pain issues. If most of them were fixable, then we wouldn’t have chronic pain issues.

In my personal case, my spine is degenerating from a car accident I was in over 30 years ago. The process has been slow and is a result of wear and tear from daily living on damaged vertebrae. My spine is deteriorating and unless there is a remedy to entirely rebuild and/or replace my spine, I will be facing chronic pain issues for the rest of my life.

In addition, I went through the windshield during the accident and over time, again from wear and tear of daily living on my neuro system, I am having degenerative issues. Unless my nervous system can be replaced, I will be facing chronic pain issues for the rest of my life.

I am not angry and I am not depressed. I am blessed. After the accident, I was told that if I bore a child, my back would be so injured from the process that I would be in a wheelchair for the rest of my life. I have given birth to three children (along with two stepchildren) and I continued to walk and carry them on my hip as infants and youngsters. I have never allowed the potential of my injury to hinder me from living my life.

I was also told that I would require intensive spinal surgery before I turned thirty. I am now 50 and am now being told that the odds are far more against me that I will be able to walk again or have feeling below the waist if I have this fancy surgery. Again, I make my choice to walk and to feel rather than choosing to a pain free life.

I’ve had far more time living an active life than I was ever told I would enjoy. I’ve had children and a wonderful husband. I’ve danced in the moonlight around bonfires. I’ve managed to stay on my feet until my youngest child has reached an age where he is turning to his father and budding manhood. I feel like I have missed nothing in my life and have enjoyed every aspect in my 50 years to this point that I would have wanted out of an entire lifetime.

I have been and I am blessed. I’m just in pain now and it’s going to get worse as I get older although I’m not willing to accept the full negative future predicted by doctors. I didn’t accept it before and I have no intention of accepting it again. I intend to do as I have done before, living my life to the fullest that I can without accepting their perceived limitations of how I should be living my life.

The Goddess isn’t punishing me for anything. I am not suffering any special karma or karmic result of my actions towards anyone. No one has cast a spell that was effective enough to make this happen. No magickal working has backfired on me to cause this situation.

I am not being punished, I am being blessed by the Goddess. Imagine the life I would have had if it had not been for Her blessings and the strength She has given to me. I never would have had children. I would have had unnecessary surgeries and quite possible be a complete invalid at this point if I was still living. She has allowed me to travel beyond my years and my physical abilities to support and love my family, my friends, and the Community these many, many years.

I am blessed, BUT now that my medical conditions and chronic pain issues have come to the point of where it is too difficult to continue with things I have done all my life, I now am a little lost as what to do and where to go now.

I can let go of the past. I don’t have a psychological need to be who I was and do the same things I used to do. I have had a blessed life and have done all the things I wanted to do. There is nothing I regret having not done yet. I have no issue redefining my life and actually, I’m rather good at redefining my life and being open to new directions. I just don’t know where to go or what to do now.

So, for now, I continue to walk on the foggy road knowing I am blessed.

In order to gain a deeper understanding of the relationship that chronic pain issues has with the spiritual and magickal self, we first have to take a quick look into our basic construction.

We are spirits manifested into the physical plane. Yup. That’s what we are.

In our belief system, we choose to reincarnate life after life in order to learn lessons and gain wisdoms. Before we are born, we are in a more pure spiritual state unattached to the concerns, worries, scattered mental thinking, etc. that constitute what we call our manifested personality in each life. This manifested personality is developed through parenting, experiences, and life lessons in conjunction with our spiritual nature. It is a mutual intimate bond between the two worlds of existence (physical and spiritual) which we by nature attempt to maintain in some type of balance.

If the spiritual is removed from the physical self, then the physical self remains in a coma like essence. If the physical is removed from the spiritual self, then the spirit is released back to the Summerland to rest and prepare for reentry into this great training ground we call life. In other words, it’s important to keep in mind that in order to remain on this physical plane, we have to maintain this connection between these two worlds if we wish to remain here.

In between the two extremes described above lies the intimate relationship we maintain (or in some cases, try to maintain) between the spiritual and physical selves. One could spend lifetimes just analyzing and learning about the nuances of this relationship we have with ourselves, but we are at the moment looking at how pain on the physical level affects this relationship.

Let’s take a look at a pure pain state. Most people have stubbed their toe really hard or banged their shin or funny bone at some time or the other. In that moment of overwhelming pain, we are pretty close to being in a zen state or totally in the moment. We feel the pain and all we do is feel the pain. We don’t think about the bills, the broken lawnmower, what to make for dinner, what candles to light, the fight we are having, or how we feel about something someone else said. We feel the pain for a few moments and we don’t mentally chatter about other things either. We just feel the pain.

In that moment of intense pain, we are physically, mentally, and spiritually focused together on the pain. We don’t always have all these so intensely focused together on one thing very often. It is almost an enlightenment moment if you really understand it.

However, as we all know remaining so intensely in that state for a prolonged amount of time is entirely unproductive for us in any other area of life if we do not overcome the intense pain moment and return to living in the manifested world. Eventually, we have to go back to paying those bills and working on our relationships with other people, along with all those other chores of living.

With the stubbed toe or funny bone pain moment, the pain begins to subside and as it does so, we return our focus to our regular programming of getting on with living. However, with chronic pain issues, we encounter a loop at this point. We know we have to separate back away from the intense pain to be able to function and survive on the manifested realm, but it is extremely difficult to do so.

If the chronic pain of the physical self continues long enough, most of us will turn to some type of pain management, which also affects our personality’s mental and psychological state as well.

Without chronic pain issues, the manifested being can learn and be trained to expand the spiritual or magickal nature to the forefront in meditative or magickal workings. In other words, while we will remain connected (out of necessity) to some degree with the physical aspect of our manifested form, we maximize the spiritual or magickal component within us. Think of it as if in our regular mundane self, we are like a partially filled balloon. When we enter into the spiritual or magickal self, we inflate the balloon with more air (our spiritual / magickal essence) and the air takes more space than the physical balloon containing it. Of course, there are limits that have to be respected so you don’t pop yourself out of your manifested being.

With chronic pain issues, however, this changes to a degree because the pain itself is keeping the physical self less pliant. It is keeping some of the focus back onto the physical in some degree. It requires more energy, more effort, more focus to suppress that aspect than was necessary when it didn’t exist.

Human beings in the manifested form are quite adaptive however and people with chronic pain can adapt as well to these conditions and how they affect the spiritual or magickal self. Take the balloon example again. For someone with chronic pain, they first have to accept that their balloon doesn’t work like it used to. The nature of the balloon has changed. BUT at this point, we don’t have to give up and assume that it’s over and we are somehow lessened by this.

The spiritual / magickal person with chronic pain issues has to accept and then adapt.

We have to accept and then we have to adapt keeping in mind that sometimes an adaptation or mutation from an original form can produce the same level as previously, less results, or exponentially stronger results depending upon how that adaptation occurs.

Brightest of Blessings ~ Mead Muse

One thing I do know is that I am not depressed but rather in a state of transition I suppose. There are many mundane factors at which I suppose anyone could point a finger because so many, many things have happened in the past seven years culminating to this point right here. I have actually written what occurred several times, but I keep deleting it because it seems like to put it in writing somehow empowers it in some odd way. I think the more important point is where I am at the moment rather than rehashing events that brought me here, but every time I try to figure out where here is I just think about how I got here.

It’s not so much that I really mind “here”, but this place seems like some sort of limbo and it’s difficult to see which way to journey or travel. It is like walking in a thick fog on a road. No matter how far you walk or which turn you take, it somehow still looks like the same patch of road you started on. This is a crappy place to be in. There are no road signs and no directions.

Sometimes, something penetrates the fog and reminds me that there are things beyond the fog, but I can’t see the towns, the fields, the mountain, or anything else beyond the edges of the road. By the same token, I also know I could be closely passing by dangers as well.

Perhaps this has to do with more than just my life events and I wonder if the changes in the planet and star alignments are a major contributing factor. So many other people have expressed similar feelings and rather odd events occurring to them as well. Perhaps, the Goddess is shielding me during this period of transition until it is time for me to emerge again.

One thing I do know about the current flux is that magick is reawaking for us all whether we want to believe in it or not. People who have had an adamant disbelief are going to be sorely tested in many, many ways. For us in the Craft, we’ve trained to become aware of energies, essences, and spirits that have always surrounded us. It’s nothing new to us, but with a permanent thinning of the veil, so to speak, it is going to become readily apparent to even those that have never had the Sight. However, I’m a firm believe that some people will continue to claim such complete ownership of a state of denial, they will form their very own paradox. Sort of reminds me of some atheists that spend so much time preaching against the existence of any deity or higher spirit that they actually don’t see that they have made their own religion of non-belief.

Anyway, although I am in this weird limbo thing right now, I’m going to try writing again if not to guide me into a direction, then at least to keep my husband from pestering me about it.

Brightest of Blessings from a foggy place ~ Mead Muse

On the surface, first responses are usually somewhere along the lines of “as much good things as I can get!” The truth is, however, that we have imposed or accepted limitations as to the levels of bad things we can handled AND the levels of good things we can accept.

Sometimes it has to do with society classes. For example, a person who has been at the point of borderline poverty their entire life may be totally overwhelmed and have difficulty accepting winning the lottery. The mental and emotional energy to acquire food and shelter is now required to immediately shift into whether to buy a Mercedes or a BMW.

That person has emotionally and psychologically accepting the borderline poverty life relying upon acquired survival skills that helped him or her to adjust, accept, and function in that restricted environment. Then suddenly, that person doesn’t need those same survival skills when they win the lottery, but those learned traits and skills don’t just disappear at that point. They have been ingrained through experience and time and become embedded into the psyche. In face, we often hear in the news of people in this situation that blow all the money rapidly and even sometimes return to the same financial situation as before.

So, take a few minutes and really focus on how comfortable you would feel winning the lottery. First blush is full of awesomeness, but then comes uncertainty as to how to manage that much money, whether people will friend you simply because of your new financial status, and whether you can actually have a comfortable life thereafter.

This is one point (after that first blush thought) where we can practice on accepting more good in our lives and practice of our faith strengthens us to do so. We have to believe and accept that c the receipts of all good things are the will of the Goddess. She has given us these things for a purpose as much as She places obstacles and challenges for growth in our life. She knows and has determined whether we deserve them or not and we need to rely upon her faith and trust in us, not question our own worthiness.

We must submit and accept in faith to Her judgments of our worthiness to receive good things, events, and situations. This only deeps our intimate relationship with the Lord and Lady, as well as the Great Spirit who is the embodiment of the union of them both. This is the sort of practice that changes our “belief” into “faith”.

Being in the manifested form is not about maintaining perfect balance or remaining in the center point of all things. At that point, there is no movement. There is no growth. There is only being. The spiritual state is the place of being. The manifested form is the place of growth, expansion, and learning. This place, this body, this life is about becoming more than what we once were.

In order to facilitate growth, there must be a dynamic and a dynamic only exists between at least two points reacting to each other. In the center where there is perfect harmony, those two points have merged into one point singularly and, thus, there is no longer any movement or energetic dynamic occurring. Perfect harmony is also perfect stagnation and preservation. This is the place where things neither grow older, younger, or learn.

In the realm of perfect balance, we can locate the akashic records, for example. It is knowledge as it is and is preserved. Once information is brought into the akashic library, it does not deteriorate with time or age as a book would in the manifested plane, but rather remains permanently preserved in state in which it was recorded or received.

This is also the realm of the Summerland where souls journey to rest and rejuvenate before rebirth. So within the center of perfect harmony, we can also find healing and rejuvenation.

However, in the center, we can resume our balanced state, but it is not a place for growth. We must journey forth and be reborn into the manifested realm (the physical world) in order to be in a dynamic environment. Just being in the manifested realm does not guarantee growth, however. It is also a place of deterioration. It is the principle of duality at work – not only in the male and female productive side of nature – but the growth and decline cycle as well. Thus, we can achieve greatness and strength or embrace our vices and weaknesses, and sometimes, cycle through both extremes in the same life. Both can provide growth and experiences that we will one day bring back to the lap of the Great Spirit when we reunite.

Within this great understanding, we sit in the here and now in this manifested place in our manifested form. Our spirits remember the center of balance and in the state of imbalance necessary for growth, we yearn for that balance even though it only offers us preservation after rejuvenation. Even there, though, after a time of maintaining preservation, we then yearn for the dynamic and rebirth. It is the nature within our creation that makes us seek beyond ourselves that spurs us through this principle of duality as well. Rejuvenation (spiritual balance) and Growth (dynamic manifestation).

The answer? You can’t.

The response that usually comes after that is (1) but so many other people seem to do it, and/or (2) _________ person (usually Jesus) from a long ago past did it.

The answer? (1) Other people fake what’s really going on with themselves sometimes, and (2) Jesus never worked 40 plus hours a week, never was responsible for caring and feeding for five children, never had continuing lawsuits and/or extreme financial issues, and (due to his amazing healing abilities) probably never had a cold much less fibromyalgia or degenerative disc disease. Did Jesus have some issues to deal with? Yeah and he got to walk away into the desert for 40 days and nights to sort it out. If we did that, our children would starve and we couldn’t pay for our mortgage. Remember that back then sleeping on the roadside was considered “hip” and popular. Now they call it loitering and they arrest you for that stuff adding another 40 day absence in your family’s life in addition to the first 40 days of “finding yourself” not to mention the money required for bail, fines, and a lawyer.

Most people today would consider it very disturbing if they faced the prospect of telling their children that they lost their job, the house is being foreclosed, and that they were not sure if the kids were going to have some place to sleep or have anything to eat the following week and child services may have to take them away to foster care. Telling your children this and then telling them to be happy because you are maintaining a highly spiritual state is going to be met with blank faces of extremely upset and worried children. They don’t want to hear this. They want to hear how you are trying to fix this and make it right again.

Here’s the simple truth. Unless you are willing to sacrifice everything including your family and their financial, emotional, and psychological security, you can’t maintain the highly spiritual state of a saint regardless of all influences in this manifested state. If anyone says they can, then I’ll call them on their shit because it simply means that they are so spiritual that they don’t care about other people anymore and I don’t think anyone would agree that this constitutes the definition of “highly spiritual”.

What can you do? Accept that some days will be better spiritually than others and be as spiritual as possible while taking care of your business, but you have to put taking care of your own business as a priority. If there is a break in tending your own business, then turn your attention to others that are also being influenced by those events.

Instead of telling people to help everyone else all the time, I often say that if everyone put their focus first on their own business and took care of their own, then put the remaining 10 percent into helping others, the world would be a better place. Otherwise, you just end up with so many more spiritually unbalanced and drained people who have invested energy, effort, emotion, and time into other things and let their own suffer in the process. This only results in being burned out, unstable, and becoming bitter because no one else is coming to “save” you while you are spending all your time “saving” others.

Instead, if 20 people tended their own gardens, then most of the 20 people would have a surplus to help others at harvest and possibly have an excess of seeds to share the following spring. If those same 20 people kept tending the same neighbor’s garden everyday while ignoring or minimally tending their own, the one neighbor will have a lovely garden and harvest while the 20 others may or may not have enough harvest to survive the winter much less have enough seeds for themselves or anyone else the following spring. One lovely garden will not provide the same amount of produce that 20 well-tended gardens will provide the Community.

While not a Christian principle of sacrificing yourself and your children today instead of preparing for tomorrow, in the pagan ways of nature, it is a sound principle of resource economics that works. It just doesn’t provide the immediate gratification that people often seek (demand) these days, but it does provide for a healthier future for us all as a Community.

Does this mean turn your back on everyone in need? No. But it does mean to help others realistically and not at the expense of taking care of your own business or tending to those that the Goddess has given you to care for.

By the same token, it does not mean to be a miser or to hoard a Goddess given bountiful crop. BUT it means that you ensure that all that is in your charge has been cared for and THEN you see what measure of good you can do in the world with your SURPLUS without sacrificing NECESSITIES of today or the necessities to provide for another bountiful crop in the Spring so that you can continue to be generous to others in need.

Muwah! Mead Muse

P.S. This also answers where I’ve been lately. I’ve been tending my own garden and, Goddess willing, will have a bountiful spiritual and emotional harvest. As I’m writing this, I took a look at the number of comments that piled up while I’ve been tending my garden. Sigh. Oh well, as She wills. LOL & Muwah!