According to Norse legend, the longest time of Darkness in the year is called "Night of the Mother", as the Goddess labors to birth Light back into the world.
At Winter solstice, the sun dies. Time stops. Then as Freya spins the wheel of fate once again, "Jul" in Norse, the sun is reborn. Her hand holds the spindle, a symbol of women's wisdom and skill. From her basket, she plucks a handful of wool, freshly combed but still unformed. Placing it on her wheel, she makes the ancient sure-handed gestures of the spinners, pulling the wool, winding it about the distaff, working it to a smooth and useful shape. So doing, she reminds us of her presence in the cycle of death and rebirth.
For me this season, this specific Yule, rang with the sound of Freya voice calling out to me. This was the year I discovered and took on spinning. Just as Freya does I have done the wool gentle moving between my fingers each passing moment spun within the strands. I have watched the spinning of my spindle seeing within its movement the cycle of my life. The spindle I use does not spin forever I consently have to put my personal energy into it to keep it spinning and to form the thread that is my goal. Reflected upon my greater life is this simple fact, to make something useful of yourself you must put all of your focus and energy into your life.
Freya was a Goddess of the Winter and her sacred goose brings to mind both protection and soft, snowy white down. When snowflakes fell, she was "shaking out her bedding". As I look out upon the deep deep blanket of bedding that surrounds my home I do see the layers of sleep and life that are hidden from view. I know that below the snow is a world that is very alive, from the small tunnels the mice make as they quest for fallen bird see to the surface where those very birds dance and spare with the squirrels for both the bounty of my oaks and for the bounty which we share with them. Freya knows this life is there she understands the cycle and lays it out for all of us to see in every element of the world around us. Her sacred cats gifted by Thor (my patron), dance in the eyes of my own cats as the long to leap out into the snow and hunt and play.
Freya is the sister-lover-mother to the God Frey, god of Yule. She has been worshiped as the multi-faceted goddess of birth, death, sex, the underworld, the earth, the stars; a goddess of magic, the Great Sow wed to the Boar, the Mistress of Cats, the leader of the Valkyries. To me as I come to understand and have dialog with her she is all that is strong in women, she is the friend of man, she is our source. Many of the women I talk with mention how hard it is to get along with their own sex, for me this shows that we all need to work strong in support of developing strength without male malice, compasion without pity, intellegent motherhood and companionship that brings out the best aspects of being a woman. To look at Freya and to understand her is to walk away from the focus of our popular culture and into a time where all her gifts can be expressed freely and without disrespect.
Freya wears a cloak of bird feathers (allowing her to transform herself into a falcon), and her chariot is drawn by two blue cats. Another of her favorite animals was the pigs or boars thus she was sometimes called Sr (sow), an epithet. She was also known to have wandered the countryside at night, in the form of a she-goat. Take all these aspects into yourself in the coming year, know the joy of flight (intellectual, spiritual, physical). Embrace the speed and grace of running, leaping, or just relaxing in the sun as my own cats do. Be a seeker, snuffle the ground for the treasures that are secreted there, look to the future and to your own personal power and that most sacred of energies you share with a loved one or friends. Turn this power into strength, turn it into good fortune, walk the quiet green ways of the forest and feel it breath. Dedicate this year to Freya and to living well.
At Winter solstice, the sun dies. Time stops. Then as Freya spins the wheel of fate once again, "Jul" in Norse, the sun is reborn. Her hand holds the spindle, a symbol of women's wisdom and skill. From her basket, she plucks a handful of wool, freshly combed but still unformed. Placing it on her wheel, she makes the ancient sure-handed gestures of the spinners, pulling the wool, winding it about the distaff, working it to a smooth and useful shape. So doing, she reminds us of her presence in the cycle of death and rebirth.
For me this season, this specific Yule, rang with the sound of Freya voice calling out to me. This was the year I discovered and took on spinning. Just as Freya does I have done the wool gentle moving between my fingers each passing moment spun within the strands. I have watched the spinning of my spindle seeing within its movement the cycle of my life. The spindle I use does not spin forever I consently have to put my personal energy into it to keep it spinning and to form the thread that is my goal. Reflected upon my greater life is this simple fact, to make something useful of yourself you must put all of your focus and energy into your life.
Freya was a Goddess of the Winter and her sacred goose brings to mind both protection and soft, snowy white down. When snowflakes fell, she was "shaking out her bedding". As I look out upon the deep deep blanket of bedding that surrounds my home I do see the layers of sleep and life that are hidden from view. I know that below the snow is a world that is very alive, from the small tunnels the mice make as they quest for fallen bird see to the surface where those very birds dance and spare with the squirrels for both the bounty of my oaks and for the bounty which we share with them. Freya knows this life is there she understands the cycle and lays it out for all of us to see in every element of the world around us. Her sacred cats gifted by Thor (my patron), dance in the eyes of my own cats as the long to leap out into the snow and hunt and play.
Freya is the sister-lover-mother to the God Frey, god of Yule. She has been worshiped as the multi-faceted goddess of birth, death, sex, the underworld, the earth, the stars; a goddess of magic, the Great Sow wed to the Boar, the Mistress of Cats, the leader of the Valkyries. To me as I come to understand and have dialog with her she is all that is strong in women, she is the friend of man, she is our source. Many of the women I talk with mention how hard it is to get along with their own sex, for me this shows that we all need to work strong in support of developing strength without male malice, compasion without pity, intellegent motherhood and companionship that brings out the best aspects of being a woman. To look at Freya and to understand her is to walk away from the focus of our popular culture and into a time where all her gifts can be expressed freely and without disrespect.
Freya wears a cloak of bird feathers (allowing her to transform herself into a falcon), and her chariot is drawn by two blue cats. Another of her favorite animals was the pigs or boars thus she was sometimes called Sr (sow), an epithet. She was also known to have wandered the countryside at night, in the form of a she-goat. Take all these aspects into yourself in the coming year, know the joy of flight (intellectual, spiritual, physical). Embrace the speed and grace of running, leaping, or just relaxing in the sun as my own cats do. Be a seeker, snuffle the ground for the treasures that are secreted there, look to the future and to your own personal power and that most sacred of energies you share with a loved one or friends. Turn this power into strength, turn it into good fortune, walk the quiet green ways of the forest and feel it breath. Dedicate this year to Freya and to living well.