The Wheel of the Year: Midsummer, with Dr Rebecca Beattie

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The Cornish Sacred Landscape Solstice Weekend. Union Hotel, Penzance.
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Launceston Ghost Tours. Tavistock Ghost Walk.
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Dragon Goddess Healings Tarot Readings. Bude Golf Club.
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Willow Tree Psychic Mind, Body and Spirit Fair. Agaton, Plymouth. 
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Chyan Solstice Gathering. Chyan Community Field, Penryn.
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Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:01

Oh, do not tell the priest our plight, for he would call it a sin. But we've been out in the woods all night, a conjuring summer in We bring you good news by word of mouth, good news for cattle and corn. Sure as the sun come up from the south by oak and ash and thorn. Sing oak and ash and thorn, good sirs, all on a midsummer's morn, surely we'll sing of no little thing in oak and ash and thorn. I'm your host, Freya, a witch who lives in Cornwall but who isn't a born and bred Cornish maid. I am back for season three of the podcast. I just want to say thank you so much to all of my lovely listeners and followers for being so patient with me over the last couple of months. Uh, the month of May was a little bit miserable. Felt like I was fighting for my life at certain points, but uh maybe I'm being a bit dramatic there. Um, but yeah, I am glad to be out of that uh May madness or May miserableness, and summer is here, and I am just so looking forward to this season and to sort of getting back on the podcast again, recording episodes and reconnecting with all of you guys. So thank you so much for being so patient with me. We have a really lovely episode kicking off season three. The wonderful Dr. Rebecca Beattie is returning for this special episode, and we are going to be discussing everything midsummer and summer solstice. So I won't ramble on any longer. I will just get straight into it. Hope you all enjoy. Rebecca, welcome back to the Cornish Witch podcast.

SPEAKER_00 2:46

Yay! I feel like I should be doing the you know, the animal from the Muppets, doing the waving of the arms, going, Yay! I can't get excited. I love that.

SPEAKER_01 2:56

I love that. Yeah, I send that to a lot of people. It's so lovely to have you back. Thank you for coming and coming back again. Thank you. It's lovely to be back. I think you're our last episode, which was Imolk, was very well received. Um I got a lot of lovely feedback. Um, and I've loved listening, um, listening to it and um listening to you and listening to your teachings and your knowledge and your your wisdom around it. So um, yeah, it's great to have you back on again to discuss um another Sabbath that we've got coming up. Yeah, turning again. Um keeps turning, doesn't seem it does, it keeps turning. So we have Midsummer or the summer solstice, as some people might see it. Um there is, I think, another word for it that might be used on the wheel.

SPEAKER_00 3:48

That's the it's those other words like I don't know what they are. Yes, the the the other words for some of the Sabbaths are quite um well, we'll get into that in a bit, but they are quite controversial for for reasons that I will explain.

SPEAKER_01 4:08

Yeah, yeah. I think we we touched on that a little bit in that in our last episode together as well. Um did we? Yeah, I think I think we did. Um yeah, someone just decided to well, I'll let you I'll let you I'll let you refresh my memory when we get into it. Yeah. Um Yeah. Yes. But Midsummer, as within your in your book, The Wheel of the Year, um, what I love about it is um not only do you talk about the the history and the folklore and the the pagan and Wiccan tellings and history behind Midsummer, but you also um go into the scientific side of things. So, you know, where we are rotating around the sun in our solar system, um, where we are tilting on our axis in our northern of southern hemisphere, and also that um in the southern hemisphere, their midsummer is in December compared to ours, which is in June.

SPEAKER_00 5:08

Yeah, absolutely. It's one of those, one of those things. I was once lucky enough when I was a teenager. I had a my best friend at school move to New Zealand um at the end of our GCSE year, and I was lucky enough to be able to go and visit her um a little while later, and I happened to be over there for Christmas, and it was really, really strange because Christmas Day we spent it on the beach and it was a hot day, and you know, you kind of think it's it's really it's one of those things that we often forget that the southern hemisphere is entirely different than the northern hemisphere, so we have to kind of just be aware that while we're online wishing each other happy midsummer, you know, our southern hemisphere brothers and sisters are doing midwinter at that point, which is very different.

SPEAKER_01 6:05

Yeah, very different, and it feels quite back to front as well. Like I I I haven't been to the Southern Hemisphere, um, but I uh just imagining myself being on the beach at Christmas time or or Yule and it's very, very hot, I I wouldn't know what to do with myself. I think it would mess up my equilibrium.

SPEAKER_00 6:27

Exactly. I was remember um there was a a TV series I was watching that was uh an Australian programme, I think it was MasterChef or one of those ones, and they often talk about um you know Christmas in in June because if you think about how our what we're celebrating archetypally, so thinking outside of the just the pagan box for a minute, but in the middle of winter, we all need a festival that brings us light and cheerfulness and reminds us that the world might be cold and and grey and all the rest of it, but that we can bring a bit of cheerfulness to to the table. So in Australia, one of the things that they've kind of moved towards doing is having a more of an actual midwinter festival in June rather than celebrating Christmas and and Yule and all the rest of it in December, like we do. But it's it's one of those discussions that if you hang out with um, you know, I was lucky enough to hang out with some Australian witches last um last summer, and we were talking about how the wheel for them is just completely different because not only have they got the opposite seasons, but also the seasons behave slightly differently. So, you know, they might not necessarily have spring, summer, autumn and and winter all around the world. There might be areas like near the equator where the where the seasons are just different, you know, they don't necessarily have autumn or spring in quite the same way that we do. And in fact, I think that one of the Australian folk were telling me that they almost have a second spring because they have spring, and then you know, a few months later the the process starts again. So there's something about the Wheel of the Year and the way that we celebrate it, and this is this is where sometimes you'll get debates with um the sort of hardcore um Wiccan community that that exists online mostly, thankfully. They're not um not necessarily in the British Isles, they're elsewhere. But they have this belief that because the Wheel of the Year was set up in a certain way, you should be celebrating it to the letter in the way that it was originally written, which I think is wrong because we don't have you've you've got to adapt, you've got to change and grow and celebrate what what you're seeing where you are.

SPEAKER_01 9:08

Absolutely, and and it's you you've got to you've got to work with your with where you are, how how nature is how nature is in that season and in that cycle at the m at that moment in time. There is yeah, it wouldn't make sense if you were living in, like you said, near the equator and it was constantly hot and humid, and yeah, you wanted to do you know a a a Yuletide dark ritual, it it you know, it's it was not going to make any sense, and you're not gonna be able to honour nature in the environment that you're in that way either.

SPEAKER_00 9:42

Exactly. And I think when when you start um going in depth in the Wheel of the Year, when you've kind of been doing it for a few years, what starts to happen is that you know, you know, I know that we're coming up to midsummer here, and that's what we're celebrating. We're very much focused on the sun being at its zenith, and you know, the the in nature everything's reaching its absolute um height in times of greenery, and you know, traditionally at midsummer what we'd be doing is that is things like harvesting herbs because they're at their absolute peak, but there's also an echo of the opposite festival on the wheel of the year. So when you look at the diagram of the wheel, often what you'll find is this is just a faint echo of the opposite festival coming up each time. So when I'm celebrating Beltane, I'm aware that there's an echo of Sawin in there. And while I'm celebrating midsummer, there's an echo of midwinter as well.

SPEAKER_01 10:45

Yeah, yeah, that makes sense. What I find interesting about midsummer or you know, the here in the UK, the 21st of June. I think I notice that a lot of people are going, oh yes, it's the 21st, summer's here. And I'm like, it's kind of it's getting done now. It's getting a bit done. Yeah, no. I mean, I mean, summer started back along. We're mid we're past the midpoint. Exactly.

SPEAKER_00 11:13

Which and that comes down to different calendars. So we've got um, you know, we're in in some particularly in Devon and Cornwall, we're on a we're on a Celtic, you know, we're a Celtic group. We are um folk who who emerge from those sort of Celtic traditions, and the Celtic calendars, you know, if if you just look to Wales or to Scotland, you'll see the Celtic calendars actually are different to the meteorological ones. And I always have to just pause for a millisecond when I say that word, because it's a bit of a bit of a mouthful. But the you know, the meteorological calendar, i.e. what the scientists are saying, is different than what the Celtic traditional calendar was, which is that mid mid you know, midsummer means midsummer, we're halfway through. Um, because we're measuring summer having started on the on Beltane. That was when we celebrate the start of summer in the in the pagan year. So it's a really weird one, isn't it? When people are saying, but it's you know, Spring Watch on telly. What? Yeah, why are we watching Spring Watch? It's summer, yeah, you know, but the rest of the the rest of the world hasn't quite caught up with that idea yet.

SPEAKER_01 12:32

No, no. For for people who listen who are listening and um who want to sort of be become more aware of um you know the cycles and and be more sort of present within nature, what sort of things would you would you tell people to start looking out for within nature at this time of year?

SPEAKER_00 12:51

So the first thing I do is is is in a class, I always this is the first question I always ask my students is what's nature doing where you are? Because um it's really important to connect to the nature where you are. So obviously, where we are in in in you know the southwest, we have a certain group of plants that you can look out for. So, you know, the foxgloves are out, the campions are out in the um in the hedgerows, we've got elder flowers just coming into bloom, we've got ox eye daisies absolutely going bonkers this year everywhere. You've got cow parsley, it's all those hedgerow plants, yeah. And the greenery, you know, the one thing I notice at this time of year is I'm out walking with my uh Spaniel companion every morning, and the green is some in some places standing shoulder high now. We've got, you know, you're kind of having to get through waves of of greenery just to to walk on the footpaths. You can start to see green berries as well just starting. So in my garden, I've got raspberry canes and strawberries, and they're in berry, but they're very green at the moment, they still haven't come through. Um, you know, the the white thorn and the black thorn that we saw the beautiful blossom on in the spring at Beltane. Um that's now making way for these really, you know, tight green um fruits that aren't going to be ready until the autumn, but they're they're starting to grow now. Yeah. And you know, all those lambs that we were looking at at Imolk, uh thinking they were cute, you know, they're they're they're now starting to look like teenage lambs, you know, so they're they're you know still leaping about in the fields and and being um really enthusiastic about everything, but they're starting to look more like sheep. Um and on where I am, so I'm just on the edge of Dartmoor, um, we've got the foals being born as well. So that's another another thing to look out for is the little foals and the little calves that are around as well.

SPEAKER_01 15:10

I'm not far from Bodmin Moor, although look, I'm just not far from Dartmoor, but yeah, you've got the the the foals will be out on Bodmin Moor with the ponies there. There's also a herd of deer. Um oh yeah near um oh what's it called? Near Trippett Stone Circle, there's a forest, um, a pine forest, and there's a herd of red deer in there, and so I think the fawns will be you know being born as well, which is lovely. Yeah. Um and I'm just seeing so many rabbits everywhere.

SPEAKER_00 15:41

Absolutely, absolutely. I I always love that that first thing in the morning I'm always out quite early. Um, and you you get that thing, don't you? It was it's something I had when I was growing up on Dartmoor that my parents' house was right next to a field, so I used to literally come out in the mornings and be watching the baby rabbits running around, which was lovely.

SPEAKER_01 16:06

Yeah, I also also noticed the bird song changes as well. The bird song, like the dawn chorus really starts to to change uh in the summer months. There's it the the melody is different.

unknown 16:17

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 16:18

How amazing. Isn't it amazing what you start noticing when you when you pay attention?

SPEAKER_01 16:23

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 16:24

You know, all of these things that that most people who aren't attuned to nature just walk past and just think, yeah, it's just birds singing. But you know, it's it's learning those nuances, isn't it? It's learning when you when you can really immerse yourself in nature. I think it's one of those things that the more we do this stuff, the more we learn and the more we become connected to the landscape we're living on.

SPEAKER_01 16:49

Absolutely. Um what can what can people do to help them connect more to to the land and also to celebrate um uh summer summer solstice as well?

SPEAKER_00 17:04

I think there's a number of things that I would always say is if you can get out in nature, do so you know, get out of the town and get out onto the the sort of moorland and the headlands, and you know, we we're so lucky where we are to have access to these amazingly stunning places. So one of my favourite things, if I can, and it does require getting up painfully early on uh on midsummer, but I do like going out really early to watch the sunrise. Yeah, that's something my partner and I have been doing for the last few years, is actually going up onto the moors and and finding a good stone circle or a stone row and watching the sunrise from there because you get a real sense of historically what were our magical ancestors doing when they placed these stones in the places they put them. You start to see, you know, there was a um we went out l uh last year, and a few years we've gone out and it's been so sort of misty and overcast you can't actually see the sunrise. But there was one year that we did go out and it was perfectly calm weather, and you could see standing um from where we were sitting, which was in the middle of a stone circle, you could actually see the sun rising between two hills. Wow. And it made me realise that the way that the stone circle had been placed, it indicated there was some kind of alignment there, that there was some ceremonial, you know, um, tradition that they were celebrating just by how they've placed the stones in relation to the natural world and the sun coming up. So we know, you know, there are lots of places around the around the world where they're either aligned to either mid-winter or midsummer sunrise or sunset, one of those, depending on what their preoccupation was. So, for example, if you you know, if you go to Stonehenge or North or Mays Howe, there are various monuments where the cardinal points of the sun were significant because you can tell by where the either the sun is rising or the sun setting, that there's some kind of alignment there with the building. Um, and I kind of think that really gives us a sense of the deep layers of historical, magical, you know, amazingness that we have underneath our feet that we're not always aware of consciously. Um, and we have no idea what our magical ancestors were celebrating because they didn't write stuff down. It was all it was all an oral tradition. So whatever was in these lands prior to the coming of the you know, the Roman army who brought Christianity into the British Isles um and kind of which overtook the the pre-Christian pagan faiths that existed here already. Um, and we have no idea what those faiths were saying because they didn't write it down. You know, they they shared it by word of mouth, which is um amazing in some ways to be part of a a mystery tradition that's not written down is quite amazing because that's what modern pagan wicca is. Um but it's it's also that sense of it would have been lovely to have known what it was they were celebrating. Um but we don't always know these things. And it's it's also something about I think as as modern humans we have a kind of expectation that we know everything and that we should have access to all of this knowledge, but I actually quite like there being mysteries in the world. I think it's uh you know very reassuring that we don't know as much as we think we do.

SPEAKER_01 21:14

Yeah. Yeah. What do you what do you think they were celebrating?

SPEAKER_00 21:20

I think they were celebrating I actually imagine that what they were doing was celebrating the seasons in in you know very similar way to the way we do now as modern pagans, that there's something about celebrating the passing of of time. Yeah um there's the celebration of you know at midwinter it's very easy to work out what they were celebrating because you've had that moment where the sun is is you know getting lower and lower in on the skyline, and the days are getting shorter and shorter, and the nights are getting longer, and so we know that there must Must have been a sense of relief when they turned the corner and the day started getting longer again.

SPEAKER_01 22:06

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 22:06

Um, but that also gives us this point with midsummer, which I think you've already kind of touched on. Um that we're celebrating the sun reaching its zenith, we're celebrating, and I suspect that's what they were celebrating too, that they were reaching this point of the year where the days are just lovely and long, and you get these evenings where you can do stuff, and um, you know, it makes our relationship with life and the land very different. Um, but there's also this real kind of very faint edge of sort of feeling like okay, the solstice means the sun's reached its height, it's gonna start shrinking again now. Our daylight hours are gonna start shrinking again. Um, so you've got that tinge of sort of sadness amongst the celebration as well.

SPEAKER_01 23:04

Yeah, it feels a bit bittersweet in a way.

SPEAKER_00 23:07

Yeah, it is bittersweet. I think I think all of nature is bittersweet because it's I think that what we're we're used to doing when we've grown up in monotheistic faiths, one of the things that we're used to is this idea of binary opposites. We're used to things being good or bad, you know, you've got God or the devil, you've got male and female, you've got um, you know, the this idea that we live at one end of a spectrum or the other. And actually what we're learning as we go further and further down this path of modern paganism and being closer to nature is that those binary oppositions are a false reality. Yeah. Um, you know, we don't just have masculine and feminine, we've got a whole range of things in between, and everyone is made up of those kind of non-binary opposites, aren't we? We all have a bit of male, we all have a bit of female, and we all have a bit of midsummer and we all have a bit of midwinter. Um, and I think that it's good to understand where we are in the cycle of time, in the cycle of nature, but also understanding that we don't know everything. There's a lot we don't know.

SPEAKER_01 24:32

Yeah, it's it's very, very grounding, and and and and I love that you've gone and you know, talked about how it's it is a spectrum and you know, we're not all you know, it's not always the opposite ends of the binary. Um I think especially with the conversations that we're having these days, you know, around around the bind around the binary and and gender. Um there are some days that I'm just not really into my gender, and I just don't want to be like, I just don't want to be female or womanly, and I just want to, you know, um perhaps embrace a bit more of my divine masculine side. Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. I'll be honest. But there are, you know, some times where I'm just like, I'm not in the mood. I'm not in the mood. We've got a bit more testosterone like rising today wherever I'm in my cycle, and I'm a bit more mad and a bit more angry. I don't know.

SPEAKER_00 25:25

But yeah, well, it's very few. I think we've got a we've got a right to feel quite angry sometimes, haven't we? Oh yeah, yeah, definitely. You know, well, the world is not a fair place, it's not necessarily a uh a comfortable place either, and I think you know, you've got to go with where you're at, haven't you? Where wherever that is, um you've got to you've got to start where you are. Um, you know, so we're we're coming up to this point of midsummer. The other theme that's really important is standing in your own light and you know, having an expression of your own sovereignty. And sometimes that means acknowledging that there are days when you want to rage at the world and it's okay, you know. So it's it is that it is that thing. I think mid midsummer is quite a masculine feeling festival. If you look at the the planetary associations with with Midsummer, we're obviously in a solar festival, yeah. Um the solar gods tend to be masculine, although I'm just thinking about Sekhmet, who is uh one of the lovely exceptions to the rule, the Egyptian goddess Sekhmet, who is also a solar goddess, and she is raging. She's the you know, she's the goddess who wears the lioness head, yeah, who had to be um doped up on beer because she was ripping people's heads off too much, got too carried away with what she was doing. You know, the the sun god Ra had asked her to go and sort out the human problem, and she got carried away, and the only way that they could stop her was to trick her into drinking beer that was dyed red so she'd think it was blood, um, and that calmed her down, you know. So some of the some of the deities that we can be working with at this time of year are you know are ones that have a whole range of different emotional responses to the world, really.

SPEAKER_01 27:38

I'm I'm just thinking with the goddess Carly, yes, Carly, would she could she be celebrated as time of year because she is the goddess of fire and you know flame and absolutely, absolutely.

SPEAKER_00 27:52

I mean, interestingly, a lot of the solar deities are the ones that wear a solar disc around the head. So Sekhmet is is wears a solar disc because she's um affiliated to the sun. And the other the other one, which is quite weird, that if you want to look at the boy lineup for solar gods, they're all the ones that are wearing either a solar disc or a halo that that suggests their enlightened state. So Jesus is a solar deity, which uh I'm sure a lot of Christians won't thank me for saying. Um but he's a he's a solar deity, he's he's representative of an archetype that we have of the sacrificial god that you know there are tales in the landscape of um of us having these sacrificial gods that die for the sake of humanity and then um you know recreate themselves. So we've got Jesus wasn't the first to to die and then rise again. We had Dionysus, who was um you know, was one of those gods. We have Osiris was another, Ra was another. You know, there are some Mithras, is a really significant one who had a mystery cult that was built around him in Roman times. So uh if you if you ever can bring yourself to go up to London, because I know it's a bit of a culture shock sometimes when I go there, I just have to steal myself for going back there. Um, but they they've unearthed Mithraim, that you know, there's a Mithraum in um in the city of London, which is an old temple to Mithras, who had his own mystery cult, who had, you know, it was all secret um worship, just as as modern witchcraft practices are. Um, you know, there there are all sorts of things in in the world that we've forgotten about uh that that existed where these solar gods were being being celebrated, you know. So there are all sorts of things, and yes, Carly, Carly is, you know, she's she's the volcanic um goddess, isn't she? Because she's got the the fire the creativity of fire that comes that creates new new everything. And just as we're talking, I'm sitting here surrounded by a swath of smoke because I've lit a charcoal and I'm burning some incense, and I just happen to have chosen the Mars incense. Oh this one so nice and fiery.

SPEAKER_01 30:37

Um what other deities within like the Wiccan and pagan um side of things can people um learn about that as that is uh associated associated with the solstice? Um so I'm just thinking of like um the horned god or like Pan.

SPEAKER_00 30:59

Um yeah, absolutely. Yeah, I mean Pan is Pan is a lovely one. I I did a taught a workshop on Pan last week because we were looking at um and this is where sometimes the mythology is quite fluid because um Pan we associate Pan with um those green areas in nature. He you know he was a a Greek deity that was born. One of the stories is that he was born in uh Arcadia, which is the kind of perfect green garden of, you know, the Greek garden of Eden, if you like, um, this perfect bit of nature. And Pan is I've he's one of my favourite deities because he does cross over into paganism. So the lovely thing about modern paganism is that if you if you practice Wicca like me, if you're initiated into the craft, one of the things that we have is we have a pair of deities. So we have male and female, we've got the goddess of the moon, um, the god of of death and resurrection. They have names that are secret that you you only learn once you get initiated into a coven. Um, but they are somewhat akin to gods like Pan, like Kernanos, you know, the the horned god is a bit similar to Kernanos and Pan. Um, the goddess is similar to Diana and the sort of lunar deities that we have as well. Um, and those the worship of those gods goes through the whole wheel of the year, it takes us right through the cycle. Um, but there are links that have been drawn between ancient deities like Pan, who was you know part of of ancient Greek mythology and the modern um god as well. Um, and it's that lovely sense that you have with Pan. I mean, one of the things that we were talking about in my um class on this last week was I was reading to the the folk in the class a chapter from the Wind in the Willows that often gets forgotten about. There's a chapter called The Piper at the Gates of Dawn, and um Kenneth Graham was one of one of a group of writers in the early 20th century who emerged before modern paganism, so it's before the repeal of the Witchcraft Act in 1951, but they're so proto-pagan, it's quite it's unbelievable. You could think you're reading this stuff and thinking, yeah, this is pagan, this is really pagan. Um, and there's this beautiful chapter in The Wind in the Willows, which often gets edited out called The Piper at the Gates of Dawn, where the mole and the rat go in a boat looking for the baby otter who's gone missing, uh, and they encounter Pan in a in a forest clearing, and there's this beautiful description of how they encounter this very lovely god who um you know they're awestruck when they see him. Um, and there are all sorts of things about pan that we take associations like the word panic comes from pan because um that it was thought in ancient Greece if you stumbled upon Pan, you would have this sense of panic that rose up in you. Um, but he also has that gentle side to him where he can be really soothing as well with the the music and the you know the dancing, but he's got this mischievous side to him, which I think goes really nicely with Midsummer that we're all out in the the hedgerows and in the in the fields and on the moors and on the you know and on the coastlines dancing under the moon for midsummer um and it feels like there's a there's a mischievousness to it which I think is good. It's a good thing we should be celebrating.

SPEAKER_01 35:09

Yeah, it's it's it's jovial and fun and and cheeky.

SPEAKER_00 35:14

Um if we're looking at those other deities that are known as solar gods, you know, the Dionysian rites, my god. Um if you ever attend a Dionysian rite, which is um you know our modern equivalent, a probably a pale imitation of what was going on in ancient times, but it's it is really ecstatic. There's dancing and wine and you know, singing and drumming, and it's sort of, you know, people getting into this Dionysian frenzy. Um which we don't get the chance to do that very often, sort of let our hair down and really, you know, have a good time.

SPEAKER_01 35:57

I remember studying a little bit about Dionysus at university and that he was a god of wine and the arts and yeah and and and theatre and it just sounded like pure hedonism, really.

SPEAKER_00 36:09

Oh absolutely, absolutely, pure hedonism, and it's it is that kind of you know, his followers were seen as being the wild, uh, particularly the women, it was the the wild women that followed him, um that you know that they were known for these kind of the the religious ecstasy and the and the kind of sense of revelry that you don't get in quite the same way in mod in in monotheisms that they're kind of very state by comparison. Um but it's that you know there is a sense of we don't we don't kind of connect to that wild side very often, and I think I think if you never connect to it, it's you know it's it's there are safe places that you can do this. So, you know, Dionysian rites were seen as places that you would connect to that kind of sense of world, um, you know, the pleasure and the festivity and the madness of it. Um but it's it can be unpredictable and it's unbridled, and you know, where else in the world do we get access to connecting to that unbridled sense of ourselves? And that's one of the things that I think the the Wiccan god, uh, or Kernanos, if you work with Kernanos as a a kind of alternative, he is seen as being that kind of connecting to your wild side.

SPEAKER_01 37:43

Yeah. And I think perhaps you know, when we're children, there is a sense that we connect to that wild side. We we do we do, you know, we have imagined we we have our imaginations, we run around, we you know, we we're very playful, we're very free, and we're very innocent. Um, and then that gets lost as we grow up, which is yeah, a shame.

SPEAKER_00 38:08

Yeah, we lose that we lose that enchantment as well, don't we? I think that's the the bit that I appreciate the most about living a a modern pagan life, is that it enables us to reconnect to that sense of enchantment that we lost when we left childhood behind and went into adulthood. Everything got very serious and earnest, and I kind of think whenever I encounter something that's very earnest, it always makes me want to reconnect to that childlike side that that sort of laughs at it and and sort of thinks, Oh yeah, that's ridiculous. Um we need you know, I do think we need to reconnect to that enchantment. That's what makes life livable, I think. Um, you know, life is hard enough without making it more so by uh you know, having these rules about you you have to sit there and be polite and you know, and and your worship needs to be really sedate and dull. And you know, I kind of for me I think one of the things about modern paganism is being able to really kind of open up the possibilities of what does spiritual fulfilment look like to you? Um and you know, for some people it's it's sort of more in in the mind, for for others of us it's more in the body.

SPEAKER_01 39:41

Yeah. In your book you talk about sovereignty as a theme of um Midsummer. Um how would you how do you explain sovereignty um for people who aren't sure what it means or what it is? For me, I kind of see it as I think I because I think I still struggle with it. I kind of I I see it as sovereignty as like sort of almost being at one with yourself, like and with your higher self as well. Like you're completely sovereign and grounded. Um but I also still find it a little bit confusing at the same time.

SPEAKER_00 40:13

Yeah, absolutely. I mean it's I think there's there's a few things we're not trained to, you know, particularly if you're female, you're trained to sort of conform and be quiet and um you know put your needs second to everybody else's. And so, in my head, sovereignty gives us a number of things. It enables us to first of all recognise, stop for a minute and just recognise what you're doing that's amazing, you know. So think about what have you achieved in the last six weeks since your last um festival, or what have you achieved in the last turn of the Wheel of the Year if you want to widen it out? What have you done in the last year? Um, what do you what are you really proud of? So there's that sense of what are you proud of, what are you good at? And also the this idea of sovereignty is also about celebrating the little things. So it doesn't have to be, you know, we don't have to stick to the Protestant work ethic where okay, what work projects have I completed? No, it's not about that. It's like where have I been a good friend? Where have I been a good sister? Or where have I, you know, really made somebody's life experience different as a result of being involved with them? What have I done that's different that wouldn't have happened if I wasn't there? Um, so I think you know, you don't always have to think about sovereignty as being a project that you've done. You can think of it as being softer than that, that it's about the human condition and and how we support each other. But I think also if you're anything like me, and I think a lot of us are, um, when you finish an achievement, the next thing you do is think, what next? What next? What am I doing next? So, you know, I've just just finished a book which is going to press, and I'm already thinking, what next? What's the next one I'm writing? Um, and I think sometimes we just have to pause and allow ourselves to celebrate that thing that we've just completed before we move on. Um, so it's about, you know, what have you done that you're really proud of this year? And there's something about in a celebration, one of my favourite ways to celebrate midsummer is to have a ritual where you are working with the divine. So you choose your God that you want to work with, whoever that is. Um, and one of the the ceremonies I've written into the book is having this fourfold process when you're worshipping a God that you you know, if you've got an altar space, go to that altar space, and this the four-step process is to greet the God in as many names as you can. So, whatever names you can think of, you might want to write them down first, or you might just want to speak from the heart. Remind them all of the things that you've done for him or her in the last year. So mention all the things that you've achieved, the things that you didn't always take time to celebrate, however small they were, you know, mention them. And at that point, you can also request a favour for them for the coming 12 months and then thank them for you know being there and supporting you. Uh, you might offer a formal act of devotion that you'll do in their name, um, over the next turn of the wheel. And um Something that you're going to dedicate to that particular deity that you're working with. And then I'll often also bring in poetry. You know, there are lovely poems that you can find. Um the gods love poetry. So if you read them a poem, they're often very happy as a result. So it doesn't always have to be like bells and whistles and all the rest of it. It can be a small thing as well.

SPEAKER_01 44:28

For those who who don't work with deities, um and they want to still celebrate midsummer, um what what other rituals can they do um that wouldn't involve sort of um working with the deity if they don't feel ready for that yet?

SPEAKER_00 44:46

Yeah. I mean, I I kind of think you can choose to work with the spirit of nature.

SPEAKER_01 44:51

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 44:51

Uh you can choose to work with your higher self as well. So uh depending on how you see your relationship with the universe, because you know, I realise not everybody has an active uh relationship with deity, but you might have a sense of wanting to celebrate nature instead. So you can kind of address your um, you can address your what we've just talked about either to nature or address it to your higher self. So just remind your unconscious self because when we're working magically or when we're working in this kind of um mystical energy spaces, what you are doing is working with your unconscious mind, and sometimes we need to remind ourselves actually, oh yeah, I did that, didn't I? So, you know, make a pact with your unconscious mind that it's gonna help you create a more magical future or a more magical cycle going forward.

SPEAKER_01 45:56

I I love that because I find the unconscious mind incredibly fascinating. Um I was listening to a podcast, I can't remember if it was if it was the this year or last year, where someone who was a professional in in like consciousness and unconsciousness, um they said that 90% of the mind is the unconscious. Yes, absolutely. And then we only only a small part of our consciousness is we use our consciousness as like 10%. Yeah, so it's like our unconscious mind is is I still have to get my head around it, but it's incredible like that we use it.

SPEAKER_00 46:35

It's flipping miraculous when you when you put it that way. I mean, often um uh psychologists will often use, you know. I mean, this is something um a lot of the the big names in psychology used, was the you know, the metaphor of the iceberg that you've got this tiny little 10% po poking up above the surface, uh, which is your conscious brain, and that's the bit that does language and it does logic, and it can it can cope with about um you know plus or minus about seven things before it starts going into overwhelm. So you know, we all know that that feeling of panic that comes when you're trying to multitask and you're thinking, you know, God, they said women were good at multitasking, well, I can't do it. Um, you know, you have that moment of panic where you're thinking, shit, what am I gonna do? I've got to do this. Um, and you you have that moment of panic, and then if you can just let go of that, the unconscious mind by comparison deals with millions of bits of information every second, and it just filters them out and it it sorts out what you need to know, it tells you what you need to pay attention to, you know, it's the part of your mind that does learning, it does dreaming. So if you're somebody that keeps a dream journal, it's your unconscious mind that's doing that. The complication with the unconscious is that it doesn't do language in the same way, so it doesn't do words, it does sensory information. So when we're spellcrafting, the reason we have these spell ingredients, like all of those herbs and the coloured candles and um, you know, the altar cloths and the incense smells and all of that kind of thing, the whole reason we use those is because we're communicating with our unconscious mind. And it's our unconscious mind that does the magic.

SPEAKER_01 48:39

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 48:40

It's the unconscious mind that does the creativity, that you know, writes the books, that comes up with the ideas, that paints the pictures, that when you go into a state of flow, it's because your unconscious mind is taking over, and your conscious mind at that point is taking a back seat, which is what we want it to do, to allow you to sort of do the creative stuff. So I think that what we forget when we're talking about sovereignty, the thing to really remember and hold on to is that what I mean when I say sovereignty is your own self and how magical you are, because we don't celebrate how magical we are. Um, you know, unless unless you're somebody that's got a deeply significant personality disorder, most of us keep that side of our ourselves hidden. Um and midsummer is one of the one of the the points in time where you're actually invited to say, actually, these are the things I'm really proud of. This is what I'm good at. Um this is the the magic that I've achieved in the last six months or year or whatever it is that you want to do.

SPEAKER_01 49:55

Yeah. Well that's really nice because that's not always easy as human beings for us to do.

SPEAKER_00 50:03

So Exactly, particularly particularly for women as well, particularly for women and you know, non-binary folk, we are we do tend to be shoved in a corner, don't we?

SPEAKER_01 50:15

Yeah, yeah. So I really like that you can use midsummer to completely dedicate it to yourself, which is lovely.

SPEAKER_00 50:23

Yes, yeah, yeah, and it's an act of self-care and it's an act of you know, you can uh the the act of dedicating yourself, you can, you know, if we if you want to get really archetypal about things, how the thing that I love the most about modern paganism is nobody tells you what to believe. So you're not told that there is a God, and you know, there's God the Father, the the Son and the Holy Spirit, and all of that stuff. We don't have a book that tells us this is our belief system, this is what you have to follow. With modern paganism, the other aspect of sovereignty is you don't need a priest because you are your own priestess or priest, you don't need somebody as an intercessor, you're the one that drives the the boat really in terms of your own spiritual life, yeah. And that act of just taking a moment and saying, Okay, I commit to supporting myself going forward. I'm gonna be my best um supporter, I'm gonna look after myself, I'm gonna cheer myself on and allow myself to flourish in a way that um I haven't always done in the past.

SPEAKER_01 51:40

Yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 51:42

You know, just allow yourself to step forward.

SPEAKER_01 51:46

Absolutely. You've got some lovely sort of um sovereignty self-care rituals um in your book as well for midsummer, such as you know, outdoor swimming, um making sure you're safe when you're doing your outdoor swimming as well.

SPEAKER_00 52:00

Yes, yes. I don't think I've I've done that not safely and uh ended up having a terrible time being very unwell for swimming somewhere that wasn't clean.

SPEAKER_01 52:13

I know it's yeah yeah pick your spot, pick your spot. Do your research, yeah, make sure you're yeah, you're safe. But yeah, things like cooking a s cooking a solar-inspired meal, using all of like you know, the Mediterranean flavours, food for different temperate climates, or just having a barbecue to honour the longest day, like something nice and simple, which is great, like that. You've got a really nice recipe for dandelion orangeade, which I definitely want to try. Um dandelions are so good for you as well. They are like they're very rated.

SPEAKER_00 52:45

Yeah, absolutely, absolutely. And and that's something you can do on your own or in a group as well. I once did the dandelion orange aid cup with um my little group of of witchlets uh when I used to do in-person classes in London before COVID. Uh, we had a group of um sort of seekers, young seekers that were kind of curious about witchcraft, and we used to meet every month uh in a basement of a bookshop in London, and you know, we'd learn about an aspect of witchcraft and then we'd have a ritual and we'd celebrate each other and you know, really kind of it was part self-help group, part witchy group, part class. Um and one of one of the occasions we made the dandelion orange aid cup together.

SPEAKER_01 53:36

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 53:37

So, you know, we we all sat round in a circle and we made the made the drink and then added the dandelions, and everybody in that circle stirred in their intention to that to that jug of orange aid, you know, whatever it was they wanted to manifest or bring about, or you know, what they wanted to celebrate in terms of their sovereignty.

SPEAKER_01 53:59

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 54:00

Um and then we we all drank it as a celebration as part of the end of the ritual.

SPEAKER_01 54:05

That's so lovely.

SPEAKER_00 54:08

So it was nice, yeah. It's good. It's good having things that you can do together or alone, you know. It's it's useful having the quiet rituals that you can do at home and in the pri privacy of your own spaces. Uh, but sometimes it's good to be in a group as well.

SPEAKER_01 54:25

Yeah, yeah, and to have that connection and community. Um which I think is something that um we we all long for, and um we can get so caught up within ourselves and just with life that we forget about that, and then our own consciousness and our body starts to yearn for that connection again and community, um, and brings it to the forefront, you know, of your mind. It's like what what what do I need right now? I need I need I need my coven or I need my sisters, or I just need you know, I just need connection.

SPEAKER_00 55:00

Absolutely, absolutely.

SPEAKER_01 55:02

Yeah. Um, flower crowns are always a really big, big hit this time of year.

SPEAKER_00 55:07

Yeah, absolutely.

SPEAKER_01 55:10

And uh you've got a lovely, a lovely method in the book on how to make some flower crowns, which I absolutely love, weaving a midsummer crown.

SPEAKER_00 55:17

They're they're lovely things to make because again, it's something you can do either in a group or on your own. Um but when I um used to celebrate Midsummer with my coven in London, what we would do is is often weave the the flower crowns as part of the preparation for the the circle, and then we would um you know take that forward and and use the flower crowns as part of the the ceremony and actually crowning ourselves in our sovereignty, that was part of the thing. Because we don't get you know, we don't get to wear crowns very often. Um so again, it's one of those things that you can bring in.

SPEAKER_01 56:00

Yeah. I do it does make me think of the film. I don't know if you've seen it, Midsummer, but it's called Midsummer. Yes. I have you seen it, yeah, yeah. It does make me think of that. But I do, I absolutely love that film, it's fantastic. Um and actually that was gonna make me uh um wanted to ask um about the about sort of Scandinavian, more European um celebrations around Midsummer as well, because they celebrate it on a different day to us.

SPEAKER_00 56:28

If they do yeah, and so the thing to remember, because it can feel like oh god, I've got the wrong date, I'm such a crap witch. I I don't do things on the right dates. Um the thing to to remember is that there are, as we said at the beginning of the session, there's there's different calendars that give you different points. So um, you know, in in the European countries, so when we look to some of our particularly northern European um brothers and sisters, what they're doing is having Midsummer on a slightly different day. I think it's is it the 24th? I always forget. 24th, which this this idea that Midsummer happens on the 24th. And again, it's just different calendars, it's just different ways that people mark things. Um, whereby one particular calendar we'll call Midsummer 24th. Some of them will say it's 21st, some of them it'll say, you know, something else entirely. The thing that I always think about when I'm thinking about have I got the right date? Am I doing this on the right date? Our magical ancestors didn't have calendars. That was something that was introduced much later. Um, and so they wouldn't have had this sense of, yes, it's definitely the 21st of June. So I always say honour around is fine. Um most uh Wiccan covens that I know will celebrate on the nearest nearest Friday or Saturday. They won't necessarily meet on the day of the thing. Um, so there's this this sense of with the the Wheel of the Year Sabbaths, I think that that energy kind of lingers for a while. It's it's not just a one-day event, um, it it's a a time that we we go through. That's the period that we're entering into that feels like this. But the the midsummer in um northern Europe is often Christian-based as well, because it's merged with the feast of St. John the Baptist. Uh you know, that's not our bag anyway. Um, but uh, you know, so it doesn't really matter, but that's that's often what's being celebrated is is in Scandinavia, is that sense of the 24th. And then in in the British Isles also you've got the traditions that emerged from church law, and um, you know, midsummer day would coincide as one of the quarter days for legal and agricultural calendars. So when we were all uneducated and working in um agricultural settings and we couldn't all necessarily read and write and count up stuff, um, you know, we had these traditional days in the calendar where you had to pay your rent to your landlord, and the quarter day was one of them uh for for midsummer, which was June the 24th. So these things kind of move and they change and they get absorbed into another calendar, and then we you know go back to an older calendar, and it's it's often something that is fluid. I don't think it's fixed.

SPEAKER_01 59:54

What are you what are your plans for midsummer this year? I know you said that you're gonna go and um watch the sunrise.

SPEAKER_00 59:59

Um yeah, absolutely, which is that's that's generally what I do is I'll I'll go on on the morning, I'll wake my partner up really early and we'll go up and and you know, go up to the moors. And um, there's a spot up there that I particularly love visiting where I'll see uh see the midsummer in. Um it most of the festivals there tends to be a kind of rolling group of celebrations. So I I'll also have um a midsummer circle with my coven as well. So we'll we'll you know gather in um indoors because that's what we tend to do uh for those because they happen at night and um we gather in one person's home, it's usually my home, um, and we'll we'll celebrate together as as a coven. Um this year that will be not happening on the 21st because I'm actually travelling on the 21st this year. Uh so I'm I'm going off to meet with a gathering of friends in um in Europe, so I shall be on the road at that point. Um so I'll just be having a nod to the midsummer and celebrating early.

SPEAKER_01 1:01:13

Mm-hmm. Yeah. Well, I think midsummer, if people are gonna go by the date, then the 21st is on a Sunday this year. Um It is, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:01:21

It is indeed.

SPEAKER_01 1:01:23

So I think I think I get for the majority of us who probably do work a nine to five, we'll be celebrating on the Friday or the Saturday.

SPEAKER_00 1:01:30

Yeah, absolutely, absolutely, yeah. Well you might you might do the the sunrise on the on the 21st, but if if you haven't been celebrating too hard the night before. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:01:43

If you haven't gone totally like sort of complete Dionysus themed. Or maybe you just completely stay up, just stay up the whole way through. Absolutely, yeah. That's the other option. I don't think I have the stamina for that anymore, like maybe 10 years ago, but not anymore.

SPEAKER_00 1:02:01

Yeah, me too. I mean, it's you know, it's one of those things. If you if you have been to the Dionysian rites, then you'll be forgiven for not seeing the sunrise. Uh, but it's there if you want it.

SPEAKER_01 1:02:12

Yeah. Rebecca, thank you so much. I've really, really enjoyed um having you back on the show and talking about another turn of the wheel. It's been yeah, I absolutely love it. And um, yeah, thank you so much for bringing all of your uh knowledge and wisdom and rituals um and sharing them on this episode. It's been absolutely amazing, and I hope my listeners are able to um, you know, take take a lot away from it and and do some sort of self-love and sovereignty, sovereignty, I can't say the word, sovereignty sovereignty work and self-care and take some time in in midsummer to yeah, be kind to themselves and celebrate themselves.

SPEAKER_00 1:02:56

Yeah, yeah. I think I think if anything, you know, if nothing else, that's what the wheel of the year is there for. It's just to give us that moment of pause and the ability to just take a breath, you know, because life is busy.

SPEAKER_01 1:03:11

It is, it is, absolutely, absolutely. Um, yeah, and I I hope to have you back on again um to talk about another um another Sabbath. That would be amazing. Absolutely. Yeah, that would be fab. I would love that. Thank you so much. It's been an absolutely lovely to have you back, and yeah, I hope to have you back on again very soon. Thank you. Have a wonderful midsummer. I hope you all enjoyed listening to this episode on Summer Solstice with Rebecca Beattie. It was such a pleasure having her back on the show, and I have to do more episodes with her every time that the wheel turns again to celebrate more Sabbaths. And hopefully, you've got some lovely ideas and rituals and things that you would like to do to celebrate the solstice this weekend as well. Let's move on to our witch weekly events, where I let you know what witchy or spiritual events are happening in and around South Devon and Cornwall. Starting with local covens that are seeking new members, so if you're a solitary witch looking to join a coven, this might be for you. Roz and Booker, one of Cornwall's longest established covens, hold meetings in North Cornwall and the Devon-Cornwall border. Applicants are welcome to introduce themselves via email and can visit their website for more information. The Cunning Grove is a witch and a cult shop based in Plymouth. They currently hold the Coven of the Sacred Grove. They are a diverse group of witches from different paths that come together to learn and support each other. Within their coven, they break the year down into four seasons. The physical coven meets on a Tuesday and Thursday nights fortnightly. They also have an online coven with spaces available. Everyone is in a group together, and each week they drop different techniques and teachings from PDFs, slides, and videos. Joining the covens comes with a range of benefits. You can get money off the shop and services, and you can also make use of the Coven Library, which is for local members only. To join the physical coven, it's £30 per person. And if you want to join the online coven, that's £15. If you would like to get in touch, you can message them through their Instagram page or Facebook page. I've also added their email address in the show notes. Seren from Serendipity Healing holds three women's circles. These are Tuesday in Abbot Scurswell, Wednesday in Torquay, and Thursday in Totnet, and they are all From 7 pm until 9 pm. Participants can choose the date and venue that suits them, and she covers the same information in each one. They happen every three weeks so you can celebrate the Sabbath and connect to nature's cycles. And then you will have a session between each Sabbath to look inward. She teaches a variety of modalities. These include somatic movement, guided meditations, tarot and oracle cards, witch runes, exploring crystals, herbs, journaling, creative expression through arts and crafts, reiki, sechem energy, drumming and sound, goddess work with the archetypes, meaningful ritual and ceremonies, and lots more. Local witchy and spiritual events. Continuing with the Cunning Grove, on Wednesdays they hold a witch and stitch, which is a free weekly crochet, knitting and witchcraft session. And on Saturday mornings they hold a free witch and brew session, which is a social with tea, talk, and it has a teaching focus. And you can find out more information via their website, which is linked in the show notes. Looking ahead to this weekend for solstice celebrations, starting on Friday, the 19th of June, Carn Crescent Crow is holding a solstice weekend celebrating the Cornish Sacred Landscape. This will be at the Union Hotel in Penzance. It's running over the entire weekend, and there are over 20 artists, talks, rituals, sound performances and alternative DJs. On a Friday, doors open at 5pm until 9pm. Saturday is open from 10am until 7pm. And Sunday opens 10am until 2 pm, and Sunday is also a neurodivergent friendly day. Tickets are available on a pay what you can basis starting from £2.50, and profits will go to supporting organisations working with Cornwall's ancient sites. And you can get the tickets on Carn Crescent Crow's website, which I have linked for you in the show notes. On Friday, the 19th of June, Launchedon Ghost Tours are going to be holding a ghost walk in Tavistock. This starts at 8 pm at Bedford Square in Tavistock, and the tickets are linked in the show notes. On Saturday, the 20th of June, Emma Jane Saunders, who runs Dragon Goddess Healings, will be doing tarot card readings at Bud and North Cornwall Golf Club. This is from 11am until 3 pm, and a percentage of the proceeds are donated to the children's hospice in the Southwest. Also on Saturday, and I hope I'm pronouncing this properly, and if I'm not, I am so sorry for butchering it. So Saturday, the Agerton Social Club, or is it Egerton Social Club? I'm so sorry. But yes, the Agerton or Egerton Social Club in Plymouth is um holding the it's hosting the Willow Tree Psychic Fairs, Mind, Body and Spirit Fair. This is from 10am until 4 pm, and there will be tarot card readers, psychic mediums, healing, well-being, hypnotherapy, spiritual and witchy gifts, crystals, crafts, and much more. And then on Sunday, summer solstice, from 5 pm until 9 pm. Once again, I'm really sorry about my pronunciations here, but it's either the Cheyenne or Cheyenne Community Field in Pen Rin, oh, I'm so sorry, guys, is holding a solstice gathering. Um, it is a relaxed, family-friendly evening in nature to celebrate the solstice, and I have gone and linked their website in the show notes. If you have an upcoming witchy or spiritual event and you would like me to do a shout out for your event on the show, then please contact me. My details are in the show notes, and you can find me at the Cornish Witch Podcast on Instagram and Facebook. That is everything I have for you for this episode. Thank you so much for listening to the Cornish Witch Podcast. This podcast is an independent personal project created outside of my professional life. It exists as a space for conversation with witches, spiritual practitioners, and those walking their own paths, sharing lived practice, ritual, experience, and folklore often rooted here in Cornwall and the land itself. If you value these conversations and would like to support the continuation of the podcast, there is a voluntary link in the show notes. Listening will always remain free and there is no expectation to contribute. Whether you support here, listen quietly, or carry these stories onward by sharing them with others, thank you. Your presence honours the craft and keeps these tellings alive. May these stories find you when they are meant to. And until next time, may the path rise to meet you.