The Beltane Circle Project

Blue Moon Circle came over to my house today for a belated Beltane celebration and instead of doing our usual ritual, we worked on a spiritual project instead: tearing apart and rebuilding the outside circle we use for rituals during the warmer part of the year.

My friend Ellen (now a BMC member, and someone who came to rituals as a guest for years before she decided she was actually Pagan and joined officially) and I built the original circle the first summer I was in the house, 12 years ago. Blue Moon Circle has been using it since we started practicing together 10 years ago this spring. That's a long time. Not only was the circle in not-great shape (many of the rocks in the 9-foot-around circle sank into the ground and were mostly covered with grass) but a number of different people had come and gone in that time.

We decided it was time to freshen up both the circle itself and the energy in it, starting anew with both the folks who have been there since the beginning and those who were new to the group. We started out by cleaning up the post-winter mess, cutting back the brush that had overgrown the edges, and digging out the old rocks.

 This is how the circle looked when we started. (Our supplies are off in the left hand corner.)

Needless to say, we didn't wear our usual cool garb :-)

Once the debris was gone, we re-dug the fire pit, replaced the stones and found a few new ones to fill in the gaps, and planted flower and seeds around the edges to symbolize the growth and abundance of the season.

 Then we had a quick ritual to consecrate the new circle, complete with a (very small, because there were 30 MPH winds)) fire in the fire pit.

It's amazing how happy it made me to look at the end results, and to feel the great energy in our lovely revitalized sacred circle.

We "planted" our old group staff out in the circle. I'll go out later and move it to the edge of the area, and eventually it will fall apart and go back to the earth, along with all the old energy it contained. And when we're ready, we'll make a new one.

Sometimes it is good to reinvigorate old patterns, or to let go of even treasured things to make room for something new. What have you started anew lately?