Under the Dancing Tree®
Dance class Mold Flintshire, Dance class flintshire, meditation, mold, meditation flintshire, dance north wales, meditation north wales
School of Sacred Dance and Healing
Prompt 1
Journal
Read the information shared about Lammas below
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What does Harvest mean to you? e.g What do you think of? How do you feel about this time of year? What are your past or present experiences around Harvest?
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What are your hopes and wishes with this harvest celebration?
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Why are you here? What drew you to this event? What are you asking yourself for? What can you offer yourself at this time?
Deepen
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What are you noticing in nature? - On a walk this week, in silence or song, notice Mother Earth around you and the beginnings of change. What does Harvest look like, sound like, smell like.
Considering your crop of this year past.
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What are you most proud of achieving/doing or being?
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What do you wish to continue?
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Is there anything you feel didn't work so well or did not serve you that you desire to let go of?
Activity
Create a seasonal altar.
Seasonal altars are a great way to connect into the wheel of the year. They celebrate where we have been, where we are and where we are going while bringing you fully into the present and magic of where nature is currently transitioning.
They remind us of our connection to the land around us and give us a centre of focus, a daily reminder of our gifts and an expression of gratitude
Suggestions of things you could add to a Lammas Altar.
~ Corn/Wheat, grains or bread - a linking with agriculture and the literal harvest
~ Flowers such as sunflowers, poppies, meadowsweet, daisies
~ Candles
~ Incense or Essential Oils
~ Crystals
~ An intention or prayer
~ The colours of Lammas are yellow and gold and we are working with the element of Earth.
For our journey together you may also want to add things as we go through our week.
You can add words, affirmations, poetry, your journal pages, an apple/branch/leaves, anything associated with Mother energy or Goddess. It can change and grow.
Make this a sacred space that you can see and interact with. It doesn't have to be big, it can small of only 1 or 2 objects. Whatever is right for you.
You are invited to not only keep this altar up during our time but until you feel ready to change or until you prepare your altar for the next festival of Autumn Equinox in September.
You may also at this time of year create an altar outside with the same objects - creating the altar space out in nature and making a commitment to visit or be there at some point every day is a really beautiful offering to you and the earth. Do not worry if food gets eaten that you have left out, your offering has been received by the earth and is thankful - you can always replace! (NB. please cook any grains first - do not put raw rice out especially as it can be dangerous to birds.)
If you have children encourage them to contribute or to create their own - They can collect things from around the garden and really put thought into what they are thankful for and what has been provided for them.
Here is an example of a Lammas Altar inside
Festival of Lammas
What is Lammas and why celebrate?
Our Goddess of the Harvest online retreat runs over the weekend of Lammas, Loaf Mass in Anglo-Sazon, Lughnasadh in Ireland, which marks the beginning of the harvest season.
Is the first of the two Harvest festivals; Lammas and Autumn Equinox and therefore is an opening of a month-long portal. Following Autumn Equinox the next festival is the Samhain, the Celtic New Year, so we at the beginning of the end. Our European ancestors would celebrate festivals throughout the year the mark the transition of time, to come together to feast, hold moots and celebrate and to honour various the happenings of nature through observation and interaction.
It is very likely that grandparents of ours were still taking part in many folkloric and traditional activities such as bringing in the grain followed by a country dance. The traditions vary by country and even county, so I invite you to research the traditions of the land you are on and remember it's song and rhythm - Honouring YOUR land is important - Harvest may have begun or is yet to come. The festivals follow the solar wheel and most have fixed dates but as in nature, time is fluid and every land context is different - Here in the U.K this is the grain harvest. Perhaps your harvest is blueberries rather than wheat, rice rather than apple. Celebrate difference and your unique path.
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In wales the Goddess of the Harvest is called Mon, Modron, Mam Cymru and we call this Harvest time Gwyl Awst, or August Festival. What is she called in your country? What does your heritage name this festival?
In ancient Britian Ker and Epona were also celebrated at the time as well as Breejsh, an ancestor of Brigantia. In Ireland Lud was celebrated as the solar king and in the source of the word Lughnasadh, as was the Irish Goddess Danu. For this celebration we will journey with the Ancient Greek Goddess Demeter, but mother is the same whether called Mam, mum, mother, mummy, Mom.
The energy of this part of the year may be associated with parenting, and mothering in particular, as we think of the land and all it provides.
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Lammas is the time of celebrating abundance. We celebrate all that is ready to be harvested within ourselves and in the outside world.
It is the beginning of the closing of summer, as the days grow shorter and the earth radiates all that she is ready to bare and birth.
Beginning and end, manifestation, life is given, let go of what has been, celebrate it and then take forward those first seeds, what you need or desire to continue.
We offer the first fruits as we gather together. It is an important time to gather as a community, to be seen, heard, to be held and to hold, to witness, celebrate and to be witnessed and celebrate all we have achieved, manifested, and all the ways we have grown in ourselves and contributed to growth in the world.
We give thanks for the earth is supporting us in all of this, all that she has given and we declare our willingness to receive her and a co-creative relationship with gratitude and reverence.
For our celebration we will come together to celebrate both the sun and the moon, solar and lunar Lammas to bring in balance and celebrate the beauty, the offering, the harvest, the nourishing aspects of both the light and the dark, masculine and the feminine, god, goddess, seed and fruit, within and without.
