fbpx

Rituals

What Are New Moon Rituals?

by

Are you ready to start on a new journey?

This journey will be one of the many and Moon will guide you on your path.

It will all start with the new moon. In the darkness and the silence of the night, you will go deep inside your labyrinths.

Because you, only you can listen to your truth.

No worries, on the way, you will have the support of the Moon and the Sun, as always.

So let’s start. Shall we?

What happens on a new moon and what are new moon rituals for?

“On Earth, our view of the illuminated part of the Moon changes each night, depending on where the Moon is in its orbit, or path, around Earth.

When we have a full view of the completely illuminated side of the Moon, that phase is known as a full moon.

But following the night of each full moon, as the Moon orbits around Earth, we start to see less of the Moonlit by the Sun.

Eventually, the Moon reaches a point in its orbit when we don’t see any of the Moon illuminated.

At that point, the far side of the Moon is facing the Sun. This phase is called a new moon.

During the new moon, the side facing Earth is dark.”

The position of the Moon and the Sun during Each of the Moon’s phases and the Moon as it appears from Earth during each phase. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech, Nasa Science, Space Place

As you already know that according to my perception, what we see with our eyes is just one side of reality.

There is another reality level in the symbolic field.

Don’t you think that the moon is a great symbol of this perception as well?

So, what happens in the new moon spiritually is, we are let alone in the darkness and silence of the night, so go deeper inside, to start a new journey.

What rituals to do on the new moon? 

The new moon is a time for new beginnings, a fresh start, and a blank page.

Especially if you are following moon phases as a cycle since the waning gibbous phase of the moon you will slowly start to close the circle.

It is time for gratitude in waning gibbous, then releasing, letting go, and forgiving in the last quarter, and finally surrender rest and recuperate in waning crescent.

So, you will be fresh for a new start in new moon time.

If this is your case, that I will recommend you some new moon rituals for you below.

How to do the new moon ritual?

#1. Prepare yourself for a new start: Imagine meeting with your boyfriend in the first few days.

Be excited and get ready.

This is a new start, a new beginning.

Take a nice bath, wear nice clothes, maybe some make-up, some jewelry, and a nice smell.

Whatever you feel like but get prepared for your inner journey.

#2. Prepare your sacred space for a new start: For me creating sacred space is a must, which would hold space for me.

A safe space where I can be vulnerable and go on inner journeys.

If you do not have a sacred space, you can consider creating one.

If you already have one, you can tidy and refresh the energy of your sacred space, your altar, your meditation room, or your office.

#3. Prepare your ritual place: Get ready for a ritual by burning a sage, some candles, some fresh flowers, nice tea…

Let your intuition guide you.

#4. Open your ritual circle: Maybe you can open this circle from yourself to yourself with a nice song that you sing or that you play or read a poem or a prayer or getting a card from your deck.

New moon prayer

Tonight I enter the sacred space of my heart

I go deep within the sacred sanctuary of my soul

Close my eyes and ask for the answers that I seek

Pray for divine guidance as to my direction in life

And ask for the courage and love

To follow the path of my heart

#5. Be grounded and come here and now: You can meditate or simply focus on your breath for several minutes.

If you can do this outside in nature even better, tune in with the moon.

#6. Go deep inside yourself in the silence and darkness of the new moon: You can do a shamanic journey or journaling or meditate with a question in mind.

The question is; what are your intentions for the upcoming moon cycle, that your soul is longing for and your mind is looking for wand your body is waiting for?

Try to be free from self-doubt and fear. 

Contemplating death can support our choices of love. So you can ask an additional question to yourself as this will be the last month of your life, what you would want to do.

#7. Come back from the journey and write down your intentions: Write down simply your intentions for the upcoming month and put it to your sacred space, maybe with a crystal.

#8. Close your circle with gratitude and surrender: You can close your circle by expressing your gratitude for life and putting your intention about making your best with love for the upcoming month and besides that surrendering to what life will bring to you.

At the end of the circle to close you can read some affirmations for the new moon.

Affirmations for the new moon

I am aligned with the Universe

My life is overflowing with limitless potential

I invite abundance and prosperity into my life

I am Divinely supported

My dreams and desires effortlessly manifest into the Now

I am beginning a new and exciting path

My word has an abundance of love, trust, and compassion

Gratitude vibrates in every cell of my body

I believe that anything is possible

I trust my journey

I invite new ways of thinking in my life

I open myself to my highest good

I reclaim my power and embrace new beginnings

I shine my light with ease

I allow love to fill me

I am gentle with myself and compassionate with others

I have the power to shape my reality

If you would like to make this night even more special and looking for a nice self-reflection ritual, you can consider drawing your tree, which you can see the details of here.

What are new moon rituals for?

How to do a new moon manifestation

  • If you are a believer in manifesting your dreams and getting the help of the universe, the new moon is a great time to start that.
  • You can go through the ritual phases that I have talked above, or simply a variation of it below.
  • Release. Take a bath or shower. Let your worries wash away.
  • Set your space. Light a candle and set up any crystals, feathers, flowers, or herbs.
  • Ground. Meditate or breathe deeply for 5 or 10 minutes.
  • Connect. Call in the power of the earth and the moon to bless and protect.
  • Manifest. Write down your intentions. Fold and store in a safe place with a crystal for the entire moon cycle
  • Close the ceremony. Check back in at the end of the moon cycle.

New moon rituals for letting go

If you are not following the moon cycles and rituals for each phase, then you can adapt this ritual according to your needs.

Let’s say, on the day of the new moon if you feel like releasing and letting go, do some rituals for letting go, or if you feel surrender and forgiveness, then it is time for you to do some forgiveness ritual.

The main point here is the Moon is guiding you, but you are the Hero of this journey.

You are the Isis, that will give birth to Horus alone in a way, even though you will have the support of Sun God Aman Ra and Moon God Thoth, as you can read more about the symbolism here.

So, if you need a letting go ritual for the new moon, you can follow the steps below:

  • Take a bath and wash away all your worries.
  • Ground and connect by breathing and meditating.
  • Writing what you want to let go of.
  • Say thanks to all the lessons you learned and express that it’s time for these energies to let go and simply burn the paper.

Cleansing Prayer

I am now choosing to cleanse myself and

Release all thought forms, beings, situations, and energies.

Those are no longer of service to my highest and greatest good.

Across all planes of my existence

Across all universes and all lifetimes

I ask that all energies that are less than love be transmuted for the highest good of all.

And so, it is

What do you eat on a new moon?

In all spiritual paths, fasting has been an important ingredient.

So as a new moon is a start of a circular path, one can fast in a new moon.

There is a diet called the moon diet or lunar diet werewolf diet which consists of simple 24-hour water or juice fast during the full moon and new moon phases.

Adding a fasting practice to your moon cycle can be a nice idea as it will make you more present and prepared for the new beginning and clean the body.

You can listen to your intuition about what to eat on a new moon, maybe intermittent fasting can also be a choice.

New moon vs full moon rituals

The new moon is the start of a journey, and the full moon is the place where the hero of the journey gets the full reflection of the Sun and that the creative source just reflects via the hero.

For this to occur one needs to start a journey.

And life is full of journeys, one is finishing and the other one is starting.

If you would like to know about full moon rituals you can also check this article, here.

Conclusion

Moon, Sun, and Earth; all together are providing us a great symbolism.

They are showing that we are never alone, we have the support of the Sun and the guidance of the Moon.

But we humans living in this Terra planet, we are the Heroes, the ones who will start the journey to receive this guidance.

So, listen to your deeper truths and let the Moon guide you so that you can shine like stars.

If you like this article, the articles below could also interest you:

What Are Moon Rituals?

Draw the Tree of Your Life as a New Moon Ritual

Below is a Pinterest friendly photo…. so, you can pin it to your Rituals Board!

What Are Moon Rituals?

by

Oh, the beautiful Moon. Such an incredible inspiration for humanity with its reflection of the Sun.

The Moon symbolizes wisdom, birth and death, and a spiritual connection.

The Moon invites us to an internal journey, in the silence of the nighttime, which one can only go alone.

Are you ready to respond to this invitation of the moon with moon rituals?

First, let’s start with the basics.

What is the spiritual meaning of the moon?

Joseph Campbell says in his book called Goddess Mysteries of the Feminine Divine that;

‘While Isis is in labor in the reed marsh, her only support is the sun god Amon Ra and the guide of the dead, the moon god Thoth.

Isis is one of the main models of the Virgin Mary in the Christian tradition;

This classic motif, which we can refer to as the mother who gives birth without a father, has survived by entering later folklore and epics.’

Here we are seeing the guidance of the Moon God Thoth which is interesting.

Hermes Trismegistus is a legendary Hellenistic figure that originated as a syncretic combination of the Greek god Hermes and the Egyptian god Thoth.

So, we know that Thoth has been related with the Hermetic wisdom in ancient wisdom work.

If you have read from Drunvalo Melchizedek’s The Ancient Secret of the Flower of Life, there he gives a lot of reference to Thoth as well. 

Moreover, when I see Moon-Sun and Isis, it makes me think about the holy trinity.

What are the 3 parts of the holy trinity?

  • Isis-Osiris and Horus
  • God-Holy spirit and Jesus
  • God-Mohammad and Ali

According to Islamic mythology, God said, I was a hidden treasure, and I wished to be known. Sun symbolizes Allah.

The moon symbolizes Prophet Muhammad, who is the mirror of God, he is reflecting God.

Still for God to be known, in the trinity, there is another person Ali, who was cousin, son-in-law, and companion of the Islamic prophet Muhammad.

By full trust of Ali to Prophet Muhammad, the reflection of God, Allah could be known in the heart of Ali.

He could only reach to God, by knowing himself- with an internal journey and by full trust and surrender. 

This is the same story of Isis’s giving birth to Horus alone, without any father, the virgin symbol we see again and again. 

Hero’s journey can only be taken alone and you can find what you are looking for inside you, not outside.

As Joseph Campbell says one can do this journey by dying and being reborn again and again. 

This is the secret that has been transferred hand by hand by people since Hermes Trismegistus for 16000 years and still living.

This is the secret that Moon God Thoth is whispering to us gently, in the silence of the night, in our journeys to the deep inside ourselves.

What are moon rituals?

Moon rituals are the rituals that are made by taking into account the Moon phases.

Moon has been used as a guidance and hope for humanity since we exist.

It is a great reminder of Unity.

It is the same for us all.

I had a distant relationship, with my husband when we were a young couple. He was in Spain, and I was in Turkey.

Seeing the same moon at night was kind of relaxing me.

This same relaxing effect is coming when I remember that everything is One and the duality that my eyes see is simply a distortion of my vision.

This is what Ibn Arabi calls dying before dying, to see the reality on another level, where everything’s source is the same.

Moon is also a great reminder of life’s cycles and phases.

Moon helps me to set my expectations correctly about life so that I will not frustrate that much.

Life is full of ups and downs, and it is an adventure.

The moon reminds me not to attach but just enjoy with an open heart and a child’s curiosity.

Many traditions in the world are still connected with the Moon cycles and Moon calendar.

For example, Ramadan for Muslim people happens in the 9th month of the Moon Calendar.

Easter is observed on the Sunday following the Paschal Full Moon, which is the first Full Moon that occurs on or after the March equinox.

Once we are attuned to the Moon and her cycles, Moon can guide us in our inner journey and remind us with the compassion of the basic spiritual principles along the way.

When to do moon rituals? 

The Moon displays these eight phases one after the other as it moves through its cycle each month and we have a slightly different view of the Moon each night.

This is symbolizing perfectly not to attach to anything but just being in the moment mindfully.

#1. New Moon: New beginnings, a fresh start, and a blank page

We cannot see the Moon when it is a new moon.

We are alone on our own as Moon can not reflect the light of the Sun to us.

It is perfect though as in the darkness of the night, in silence we can go deep inside to hear the real calling of our Soul and define our intentions.

#2. Waxing Crescent: Adjust, refine, and edit.

In the Northern Hemisphere, we see the waxing crescent phase as a thin crescent of light on the right.

Moon is gently letting us know about its guidance and the reflection of the Sun.

It reminds us that we do not have to attach to anything, everything is changing so our intentions and goals also can.

It is time for adjusting, refining, and editing.

#3. First-quarter: Challenges, decision, and action

We see the first quarter phase as a half-moon.

Once we are grounding on our intention and aligning with the world about them, the world is starting to give us what we need.

We can face challenges.

It is time for grounding us even more, coming to our center and making decisions from this place, and taking action from this grounded place.

#4. Waxing Gibbous: Refine and reflect

The waxing gibbous phase is between a half-moon and full moon. Waxing means it is getting bigger.

We are remarkably close to the full moon, getting closer to halfway.

We are continuing our journey, taking responsibility for our lives, refining, reflecting, and continuing to take action while we are in our center.

#5. Full moon: Celebrate and harvest

We can see the Moon completely illuminated during full moons.

Moon is reminding us that if we can let go and be pure inside then the creative source will shine from us.

In the new moon we have deeply listened and fearlessly set our intentions, then during the journey till here we acted from our center meaning that we did our best and did whatever we did with love.

Now, creative force is shining on us.

This is the time of the peak energy, blessings and joy, and gratitude and celebration.

#6. Waning gibbous: Gratitude

The waning gibbous phase is between a half-moon and full moon. Waning means it is getting smaller.

Moon is letting us know that a journey has a starting, getting what you have asked for and coming back.

This is the theme that Joseph Campbell was explaining in his book called Hero’s Journey.

A journey does not finalize once a hero gets what he asks for. It’s time to come back.

A circle needs to be closed.

In the full moon, with our peek energy, we shined and now we are on the coming back slowly and in the phase of gratitude.

#7. Last quarter: Release, let go and forgive

We see the third-quarter moon as a half-moon, too. It is the opposite half as illuminated in the first quarter moon.

It is time for releasing, letting go, and forgiving.

#8. Waning Crescent: Surrender, rest, and recuperate.

In the Northern Hemisphere, we see the waning crescent phase as a thin crescent of light on the left.

Moon is letting us know that soon will be a new moon again and a new journey will start.

Before that, it is time to rest and recuperate.

To be able to do so, one needs to surrender and accept that whatever happens is happening for a reason.

How to do moon rituals?

You can be aware of the moon phase and check-in to see how you feel, and what are your needs.

According to your needs, you can do different rituals.

You can check these articles to get inspiration about how to do moon rituals: 

Rituals for Letting Go

Forgiveness Ritual

Draw the Tree of Your Life as a New Moon Ritual

Conclusion

To start a new journey with the new moon, be in your temple, purify yourself.

Be centered, listen to your deepest truth.

Pass from the doors of self-doubt and let it go.

Reflect the Sun as the moon does.

Do not attach to anything.

Do not forget, life is a continuing journey.

Start with a fresh new beginning, refine, decide, act, reflect, celebrate, feel gratitude, let it go, and forgive, surrender, rest, and recuperate.

Because soon it will be a new fresh start.

Enjoy the journey with the guidance of the Moon.

You are never alone my dear, never.

Below is a Pinterest friendly photo…. so, you can pin it to your Rituals Board!

Rituals for Letting Go

by

We human beings have the urge to control everything. This belief of ours that we can control everything is nothing more than an illusion. An illusion that creates suffering and grief for us.

I believe in the power of visioning and active imagination and still, I believe in the power of the ability to surrender and let it go.

The balance where I find is paying incredible attention to be present and whatever I am doing, doing my best and doing it with love.

How one can do that? It is not an easy job. The first thing we need to do is being attentive and present. Being in your temple and checking yourself in continuously, to see if you are centered, or another way to say it is to check if you are in your Axis Mundi.

I guess this is the only thing we can control. Our own situation of being in the center or not. If we are centered, perfect. If not, taking the necessary step to come to our center.

Once we are centered and grounded, it is easier to let go. Once we are letting go, then we are just clearing the way for the creative force to pass through.

Letting go or releasing can be for strong feelings of grief, or simply for any little blocks or thought patterns that you are becoming aware of during the day.

The rule is simple, be aware, take control of your temple and clean your space, let the creative force flow from you.

Preparation for rituals for letting go: how can I be aware?

By simply slowing down. Checking in during the day, as many times as you need. This means simply asking you the question of: How do I feel right now? How are my thoughts right now, my body feeling right now? How are my emotions right now?

Preparation for rituals for letting go: how can I take control of my own temple?

By taking care of your thoughts- your speech and your actions

When you realize you are in a vicious cycle of controlling thoughts and as a result negative speech, remind yourself that you have 3 options: accept, change, and let go. Take responsibility and look at each option carefully. Decide what you want to or can do and just do it.

Preparation for rituals for letting go: how can I let go?

With a ritual and a prayer and an intention.

When we talk about rituals and prayers, people often think that it is a magical thing or a religious or spiritual thing. For me, they are the keys to a harmonious life.

Look at it this way. We are human meaning that we have some limits and cannot control everything. We are not God. When we begin to feel that we have full control over things, we simply suffer. And it does not make any sense at all.

As we do not have any manual for human beings reminding us that we are limited and we cannot control everything, even we do everything perfectly, the results cannot be all the time, the way we want, we are forgetting.

Another characteristic of being human. We forget very easily man. And this is what it is. We are human. This ability to forget is in our survival, and it is in the game of creation. That is why, we forget again and again, that we cannot control everything, we are not Gods or Goddesses.

That is why, we need to remind ourselves what being human is, so inviting compassion and creative source to our daily life with rituals and prayers.

How do you release and let go?

You can create your ritual for releasing and letting go. Or you can use any of those I will give you below as an example.

The methodology is simple. Set the space – Starting a ritual with a symbolic act – Pray/say your intention – Close the circle with a symbolic act.

First, you will set the space, where you will be feeling safe and trusted, and you can be focused and in silence. This is what I call, creating and being in your sacred space.

Again, sacred does not mean that you have to be in a mosque, in a church, in a temple, whatever. Your body is your temple already. What makes a space sacred is where you can feel present and safe.

Starting a ritual with a symbolic act, I will give you an example from my singing ritual. Every week, I listen to a spiritual song and contemplate on it and at the end of the week, I sing this song and record it. Before recording, I start a ritual with a symbolic act. I fire a candle and some incense, then I meditate. This is how I start my ritual.

Once I started a ritual, rituals bring me to the present, helps me to hold a space, so that I can connect with the unseen, with myself, and with the universe. After my meditation, I simply say my prayer or intention, however, you would like to call it. I say that I intend to be able to get out of the way, so the creative source can come through me for the healing sound.

By being present and with this intention in my heart and mind, I sing by being in the moment. This ritual helps me to be in the moment and while singing a song, I am there fully. This is what makes the song a medicine song. When I am present, I am letting go and then only the creative source can flow from me.

Once I finish, I say thank you and I close the ritual by closing the fire of the candle.

Rituals are symbolic. The unseen world speaks with symbols. Letting go is something you do in the world of meaning; it is not something in the material world. So then if you want to let go, as you are doing it in an unseen world – does not mean that it is not real, it is as real as the unseen world- then you need to speak the language of this world: the symbols!

When you use symbols, you simply welcome yourself to a ritual. You can create your own ritual, which could be simply preparing and drinking a coffee. Or you can also get inspiration from these rituals below:

Burning ritual to let go

If you are facing a negative thought pattern in yourself, burning rituals to let go can be a great help for you.

How do you burn intentions?

You can write down this negative thought pattern and rephrase it as an intention and then burn the paper as a symbolic act to let go.

For example, if you are seeing that you are envying somebody and you are in continuous comparison with people around you. You can simply write down; I am aware of my thought patterns of envying and have compassion for myself and I thank this negative feeling for showing me how I do not want to feel, and I know that I do not need this anymore. I welcome to my life my own uniqueness and my shine.

What does writing a letter and burning it do?

Once you write down your intention, burn it as a symbolic act. Feel it while burning and repeat inside your intention. The more you feel, the better its impact will be.

Rituals are as dreams or as guidance in shamanic journeys. They are using symbols from the image library for your soul. By burning the letter to let go, you are communicating with your soul, talking by its language: symbols.

Water release ritual to let go

Similar to using fire elements, you can also use water elements to release. With your intention in your mind and heart, you can have a shower, bath, immerse fully in a river or sea. Or even you can say your intention of letting go speaking to the water and then pour that water to a place symbolic for you to let go.

You can be creative around rituals. Follow your intuitions as they will tell you the best way to speak the language of the symbols.

Closure rituals

Once you finish the ritual, it is important to close it with a symbolic act.

You can tell your gratitude and if there is a candle close it and simply bringing your sacred space in its previous situation can be a closing ritual.

If the ritual was deep for you, you can combine it with a grounding to close the ritual. The grounding exercise below can help:

  • Sit with your feet flat on the floor, eyes closed, body straight and comfortable. Keep your hands comfortably open on your lap. Slowly relax your muscles.
  • Breathe in and out at a deep and slow pace, and your breathing will keep a certain rhythm.
  • Imagine that your breath carries light in your favorite color, and each time you feel calm with this light, and every time you breathe out, you take the boredom out of you.
  • Imagine the light first filling your heart and radiating from your heart to your whole body and your every cell shining brightly.
  • Let the thoughts that come to your mind flow. If there are feelings such as anger, sadness, disappointment, let them come out.
  • Imagine a cord emerging from the coccyx. Feel this grounding cord as it passes down, to the foundation of the building, from there to the earth, through the rock, magma, and gaseous layers beneath it, connecting to the center of the earth.
  • Send all the negative emotions, the people you are angry with, the uncomfortable emotions from your cord to the center of the world. Mother Earth turns these feelings into positive.
  • Enjoy the balance that occurs while manipulating the negative and focus on the positive.
  • Open your eyes and thank the earth and yourself.

Rituals for letting go of grief

You can do letting go rituals for grief as well. All our emotions or signals, so when you feel grief, simply hold space for yourself for some rituals of letting go.

This releasing ritual can help you to let go of grief:

  • You can lie down or sit by having your feet on the ground. It is important to have your spine direct, as it is where the energy flows.
  • You can close your eyes and cover them with a scarf.
  • The relaxation exercise is an amazingly simple exercise that first stretches and then loosens all the muscles of the body and is applied sequentially.
  • This stretching and relaxation are done sequentially from the feet to the head for four seconds.
  • It is done rhythmically in coordination with breathing.
  • The first example is as follows: as you push the abdomen out, take a deep breath, one to four. Take two three four. 
  • While holding your breath, contract your foot muscles: hold two three four.
  • Again counting 4 exhales: give out two three four.
  • Then give a break for 4 seconds: stop two three four. Meanwhile, gladly feel your feet relax.
  • Quadruple again take the breath, hold the breath, tighten your calves while holding the breath and loosen your calves as you exhale.
  • Notice and enjoy the relaxed calves in four seconds.
  • Repeat this process on the hips, abdomen, chest, arms, hands, shoulders, neck, face, and skin of the head, respectively.
  • When it is over, imagine yourself relaxing as if you were lying in a bathtub of warm water. Stretch out your arms and legs as far as you can and take a few deep breaths.

What is a release or letting go ceremony?

In all cultures, we have the ceremonies of letting go. For example, funerals are great ceremonies for letting go.

When my father died, I understood the importance of funerals. In Turkey, people come to visit your house for 40 days. Especially for 7 days, people come with meals. You do not cook anything; people bring food for you and that food is served and eaten with everybody. At the end of the 40 days, you have a special ceremony, where you cook a special dessert for people and special prayers are sang.

Before my father passed away, I did not understand the importance of it. When he died, thousands of people visited our home for at least 40 days. During the day and night. Each person was explaining another story about my father. We were talking about my father, laughing, crying. The emotions were a roller coaster, and I was living the life of my father again via all these stories told by different people.

I realized that I was gently let go with the help of people supporting us, stories, prayers, songs, shared food. Thanks to this ceremony, I could face my emotional roller coaster and I was passing through it with the community instead of being alone. That ceremony made me stronger to meet my grief for the upcoming months.

Ritual for moving forward

As I have explained before letting go rituals are great to clean the space so that you can move forward. Life is as it is, you cannot stop and stay in the same place. Whatever happens, you need to move forward. As the expression says, you cannot take a bath in the same river twice.

Moon is a great symbol for it. With its ever-changing phases, it is reminding us of the cycles of life and the need to move forward.

Moon is gently reminding us that there is nothing to control.

Letting go ritual full moon

All those letting go rituals that we have talked about above can be done during the full moon. The full moon is a great time in the moon cycle to let go. So simply as a full moon ritual, you can do a ritual of letting go.

New moon rituals for letting go

Letting go is not only for big emotions or blockage that you may have, but it is a continuous awareness state. Every day I do letting go rituals. Before starting working, while starting a bright new day, before writing this blog post, before singing, all these are great ways to let go.

When you start a new moon cycle, to clear your space so that the creative force can flow freely, do your letting go ritual.

Conclusion

We; humans need more self-compassion. It is not easy at all to be a human. We are living in a world of duality and we forget. We are many times unaware of our limits and source, as fishes are unaware of the water or as we are unaware of the air.

So, we need to remind ourselves again and again. So that we can gently remember that we are here supported and loved by the One, the only thing we can do is trying to come to the center, our Axis Mundi, doing our best and doing with Love.

Make letting go ritual, your daily ritual. Let go of the illusion that you can control everything and remember that you are enough as the way you are, and you do not need to anything to be loved.

If you enjoy this article, the articles below could also interest you:

Ritual Meaning and Examples of a Ritual

All You Want to Know About Morning Rituals

Live Life As a Ritual. Convert Your Routines to Rituals

Below is a Pinterest friendly photo…. so, you can pin it to your Rituals Board!

What Is Shamanic Journey Drumming and How Does Shamanic Drumming Work?

by

Shamanic journey drumming is a magical tool that opens the doors of different realities for us. We are not alone, and we are part of a larger web of life. The idea of Michale Harner about spiritual ecology, fundamental knowing that everything is alive that everything deserves respect and, everything is on some level sacred and it deserves to be treated that way.

He even mapped out the unordinary reality (the realm of spirits) thanks to the shamanic journeys of his and many other people’s experiences. All those shamanic journeys started with one sound: the beat of the shamanic drumming.

What is shamanic drumming?

Shamanic drumming simply means to change consciousness at will by a drum.

The shamanic world view is talking about different realities, which are as real as this reality of ours. In these other realities, in the upper and lower world, there are other compassionate beings called spirits. Spirits as human form and animal form in the upper world and lower world.

When we talk about shamanism, we are talking about the discovery that there is a whole other reality. Maybe the most important accomplishment of Michael Harner to the academic world was saying simply that: spirits exist. We are not alone in this creation.

The journey of exploration to outside of space and time, where you learn to access these other dimensions of reality through rhythmic sound typically drumming oftentimes rattling.

Scientific research shows that in nine minutes of steady drumming most people can access this altered state. For some people, it takes longer, for some less time.

So, the drumbeat is the vehicle that carries you to the sources of wisdom, to the spirit.

You ask the spirit to come but it is up to the spirit to decide to come or not, then once the spirit comes, you create a relationship with this specific spirit.

How does shamanic drumming work?

During his hard work in exploring experimental shamanism, Michael Harner discovered and developed a drum-playing technique suitable for almost everyone. In the book The Way of Shaman, he describes the drum beat rhythm that he finds most suitable in shamanic studies and the effects of this rhythm on the state of consciousness. To summarize, he suggests a continuous and monotonous rhythm between 205 and 220 beats per minute. It recommends not changing the scale of the rhythm and the intensity of the beat. He explains that it should not be perceived as a piece of music, but as a means of differentiating and directing, almost hypnotizing, to differentiate the state of consciousness. The drum rhythm is unlikely to put a person in a deep coma-like trance.

Ayşe Nülgün Arıt explains the shamanic trance in her book ‘Cosmic World of Shaman’ as such: ‘It may be useful to mention once again the definition of trance. Generally, with a false perception, the shamanic trance is thought to be a state in which the daily reality completely darkens and leaves the spiritual body in inertia and passivity.

Trance defined in this way, that is, a partial state of despair in the environment of uncontrollable visions and voices is not shamanic trance. Just as does not represent the shamanic consciousness, the shamanic journey cannot be initiated in such a state.

In the shamanic journey, a certain percentage of consciousness is constantly in the body’s physical environment, aware of what is happening there. It is possible to hear a sudden noise in the room. This awareness is what it should be, it does not prevent you from traveling a shamanic journey at the same time. By ignoring the distraction, the experience in the altering realm is continued.’

Drumming beat for the shamanic journey

Harner explained the drum playing way that will determine the end of the journey and the need to return to the physical world as follows:

The drum player pauses for a second, interrupting the continuous monotonous rhythm. Then a set of seven strong beats is played four times. Then he plays for thirty seconds to forty-five seconds as fast as possible. A set of seven beats is played again four times. This time the tempo is low, and the beats are softer than normal.

This four-stage play program signals that the journey has come to an end and the return will begin. During this time, as described in detail in this blog post, you ask your guide to bring you back to the tunnel. Thank your spirit guide, and travel back to the ordinary world by traversing the first entryway.

How to do shamanic drumming?

In the documentary, The Way of the Shaman: The Work of Michael and Sandra Harner, a shaman explains this as below:

“Spirits tell you to drum the drum. They tell beat hard, beat fast, beat a long beat, they also tell me when to stop.”

In my sound therapy sessions, when I use shamanic drumming, which occurs intuitively, I experience exactly what he is telling. I am taking the drum because I am told to do so. I am drumming but I am not the one, who is drumming at that time. Sometimes my sound also becomes part of the sound therapy with the drum. Which again, is all happening at the moment, with the facilitation of something different than mine.

If you are leading a shamanic journey or starting to experiment on shamanic drumming while drumming you will need to invite your spirits.

Guided shamanic journey drumming music

When I do a shamanic journey at home, I use guided shamanic drummings recorded by different people, mostly use the ones of Michael Harner.

Shamanic drumming at Youtube

Youtube is a great resource to reach shamanic drumming very easily. Below, I am providing you the links to different shamanic drumming recorded by Michael Harner, Sandra Ingerman, Michael Drake, and Frauke Rotwein respectively.

Shamanic journey drumming: Michael Harner

As mentioned in Wikipedia, Michael James Harner was an anthropologist, educator, and author. He founded the Foundation for Shamanic Studies and the New Age practice of “Core Shamanism.” His 1980 book, The Way of the Shaman: a Guide to Power and Healing, has been foundational in the development and popularization of “core shamanism” as a path of personal development for new age adherents of neo-shamanism.

Here you can see a documentary about the works of him:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JNloOTQoRzA

Shamanic journey 15 minutes with callback

Shamanic drumming 30 minutes with callback

Shamanic drumming: Sandra Ingerman

Author of twelve books, including Soul Retrieval: Mending the Fragmented Self, Medicine for the Earth, Walking in Light, and The Book of Ceremony: Shamanic Wisdom for Invoking the Sacred in Everyday Life and Shamanic Journeying: A Beginner’s Guide.

Shamanic drumming 30 minutes with callback

Shamanic drumming: Michael Drake

He is the author of The Shamanic Drum: A Guide to Sacred Drumming, Shamanic Drumming: Calling the Spirits, I Ching: The Tao of Drumming and Shamanic Drumming Circles Guide.

Shamanic drumming 30 minutes with callback

Shamanic drumming 15 minutes with callback

Shamanic journey drumming: Frauke Rotwein

Frauke Rotwein has explored shamanism and healing extensively since 1993, and has trained in many different cultural approaches such as Dr. Michael Harner, Tibetan Shamanism, Celtic, Peruvian, and North American shamanism and integrates all these practices into heart-centered core shamanism.

Shamanic drumming 30 minutes with callback

Shamanic journey 15 minutes with callback

Conclusion

Shamanic journeys, shamanic drumming, and all this cosmic view of shamanism is a great way to see the Unity in life.

It is so symbolic that the entrance gate of this cosmic view is via a sound and that sound is made of the connection of 2 different skins: the skin of the hand and the skin of the drum.

As in Bible, it is said, first there was sound.

Enjoy your shamanic journeys and the beat of the shamanic drum to start these journeys, which are always toward you. Because everything that you are looking for is inside you, never outside.

If you enjoy this article, the articles below could also interest you:

My Shamanic Journeys Experience

Learn How to Find Your Spirit Animal

What Is the Meaning of a Spirit Animal?

How to Connect with Your Spirit Guides?

Below is a Pinterest friendly photo…. so, you can pin it to your Shamanic Journey Board!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bo653sm9Ybs&t=65s

How to Shamanic Journey?

by

If you are called to take shamanic journeys, I strongly recommend you listen to your senses and intuition. It is a vehicle for incredible guidance which is available to all of us.

I have prepared you a guide below hoping that it will serve to answer the questions about the shamanic journey for beginners.

Let’s start.

What is a shamanic journey?

Shamanic journey meaning and definition

The shamanic journey is a heritage from our ancestors to be in connection with the universe and with ourselves, to receive any kind of guidance that we need.

As Mircea Eliade, in his book called Shamanism: Archaic Techniques of Ecstasy mentions that Shamanism is practiced in Central and North Asia, the Americas, Southeastern Asia and Oceania and also Tibet, China, and the Far East. Eliade argues that all of these shamanisms must have had a common source as the original religion of humanity in the Palaeolithic.

After Eliade’s academic attempts around the topic, Shamanism becomes an academic topic and affects the Neoshamanic movement which developed in the western world in the 1960s and 1970s.

The shamanic journey is a great way, to connect with your deeper truth and it is one of the tools available for us such as our dreams.

What happens in a shamanic journey?

The journey starts with shamanic drumming. Shamanic drumming helps your brainwaves enter from Beta to Alpha rhythm and it does this automatically, without any control or any preparation. Shamanic drumming is immensely powerful to connect as you will experience and as science already declares. It is not a coincidence at all that drumming has been used all around the world as a healing tool.

During the journey, you relax, set yourself free, and follow the beat for a journey to go internal.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bt_85u2LHQc&t=295s

What is a shamanic journey like? Shamanic journey steps

As its name also mentions is a journey, with its start, continuation, and end. During this journey, you are the hero, and all the journey is about you. You are taking this journey to respond to your questions.

The shamanic journey has its process which helps you to flow with the drumbeat and lead you to this hero’s journey.

  • It starts with drumming.
  • Once you hear the drum, you enter from your tunnel. You would imagine beforehand its entrance, it could be a door, a window, a secret place, a well, any place that you would like to imagine as an entrance to a tunnel.
  • Once you enter from the entrance to your tunnel, in the beginning, you shape the images in your tunnel with your mind until you lose all the control, and you are just experiencing a journey.
  • Drumming continues and letting you travel. During this journey, you receive guidance from your power animal or your spiritual guides.
  • Then suddenly you hear some change in the drumming for some seconds signaling preparation to come back.
  • Next, the rhythm of the drumming increase significantly to let you know that it the journey of the way back. You are passing through all the places you have been to come back.
  • As the last step, the rhythm becomes very slow which leads you to your exit.
  • After you finalize your shamanic journey, in silence, before doing anything you write down your experience in a journal.

Shamanic journey what to expect?

Even though your entrance to your tunnel may not change, nor your power animal which will guide you, still each journey is unique and will be different from each other completely.

You can expect especially in the beginning a lot of self-doubts where your mind will say you this reality is not true, whereas it is another reality, as true as the one that you got used to. This is why writing down is extremely important. Once you write down and realize the powerful symbols and guidance you received, those doubts will go away, and you will feel more confident.

When you are starting shamanic journeying or if your mind is not calm, it can be hard to connect. If this is the case, doing previous breathwork can facilitate the smoothness of the process. 

Shamanic journey experiences

Every shamanic journey is unique. It is such an adventure. You cannot imagine at all, what you will experience.

I appreciate all my journeys, where I have met with other realities and come with many guidance full of treasures.

You can read here more about my shamanic journey experience.

Moreover, it is said that the famous book of Jung called Red Book, which is published in 2012, is composed of Jung’s shamanic journeys to other reality.

How to take a shamanic journey?

There are different journeys you can do which we can look at more in detail. First of all, in your first shamanic journeys, you will be searching for your power animal – nagual – spirit guide.

It can take some time, especially to pass your doubts and believe full-heartedly.

I am saying that because it took several months for me to meet my power animal. Till that time, I have made many journeys. Once I found out about my power animal, I was totally surprised because it was the same one that I met just in the first shamanic journey I made with a friend, in a very casual environment, just to try.

Shamanic journey examples or shamanic journey ideas

Shamanic journey to find power animal

As I have already mentioned, your first journeys consist of finding your power animal. You will start your journey with an intention to find your power animal, again and again, till you find it.

Once you find your spirit guide, then you can have 1 or 2 shamanic journeys just to meet with your spirit guide and know it better and create a connection.

Sometimes I miss my spirit animal, and I take a shamanic journey just to meet with it and share an experience together.

Shamanic journey to the lower world

Once you find your spirit animal, you can do these journeys to 3 shamanic words: lower world, middle world, and the upper world.

Shamanic journey to the lower world is the most common one and most of the guidance to your questions is there. This is also the starting point.

Middle world isthe world we live in. It is mostly being done by shamans to give healing or to find lost objects.

They are symbolic meanings; the lower world does not mean under the Earth or less important than the upper world.

Shamanic journey to the upper world

The upper world in Shamanic cosmic vision is where the Gods and spirits that unified with God live. When you visualize your entrance and your tunnel to start the shamanic journey, in the journey to the lower world, you imagine that your tunnel goes down, whereas you imagine your tunnel goes up in the upper world. Both in your shamanic journeys to upper or lower worlds, your spirit animal guide you.

Shamanic journey to meet spirit guide

During journeys, you can meet with your spirit animal of all your life or a new one for some time being. You can also meet with your spirit guides, some specific ones, or can appear to you in some cases in a shamanic journey as well.

Shamanic journey intentions

Intentions are what are guiding the shamanic journey. For each journey, you need an intention, and you must be very clear and focused about it.

Your shamanic journey experience depends mostly on the quality of your intention.

How to start the shamanic journey?

Before starting, you can practice the visualization of your entry point. You can choose an entrance point from a place that you already know. You can close your eyes, take 3 deep breaths, and visualize all the details. These imagination exercises will help you in your first experiences.

The best advice to start is to relax and to surrender. You can lie down and close your eyes and even cover them. Take deep breaths and relax.

With the sound of the drumming, imagine your entrance point and go inside from this place. Once you enter, you can get the help of visualization to create your tunnel until you will feel that you are not the one creating the visualization anymore.

If this is for finding your spirit animal, tell your intention as my intention for this shamanic journey is finding my spirit animal.

If you already found out about your spirit animal, call for your spirit animal and ask for your intention.

Go to the journey with your spirit guide until you hear the change in the rhythm. Once the rhythm change, you will know that it is time to come back. Come back from your exact way, pass your tunnel, and go out from your entrance slowly and gently.

Spend some time here and once done journal your experience still in silence.

How often should you shamanic journey?

My guide that I learned the shamanic journey from, told me that doing at most 2 per week is enough as it is about the balance of giving and receiving.

I do not do that often, but I do it every 15 days, or sometimes once a month. It is important to do it often, as at the end of the day it is a connection you create with your spirit guide, so showing up there and having a relationship with your spirit guide is extremely important instead of looking at it as just a process that you receive.

Conclusion

I welcome you to this new world of new realities where you will receive incredible guidance on your path which would light your way.


These articles below can also serve you;

My Shamanic Journeys Experience

Learn How to Find Your Spirit Animal

What Is the Meaning of a Spirit Animal?

How to Connect with Your Spirit Guides?

Below is a Pinterest friendly photo…. so, you can pin it to your Shamanic Journey Board!

 

How Do I Talk to the Universe?

by

Symbols are the language of the universe and you use your senses, intuition, and your mind to understand this language. Talking to the universe is the best game ever. It is seeing the signs and reading them.

The more you practice talking to the universe, the deeper your connection will become, and you will pass the fields of doubt as I call it. You can read more about it here; How to connect with the universe spiritually?

We all would have our own ways to talk to the universe. In this article, I will share with you the ways I started to do so.

It is as in all relationships. Care and love are the magical ingredients of it.

Let’s start. Shall we?

How to feel the universe?

The more I become connected with the universe, the more I become aware that the universe is inside me. We do not learn anything new but always remember because our essence is God.

Still, I need some tools for this remembrance, even though tools are just tools, not the main path.

Then there are times that I do not need any tool or any practice at all. At those times I just know and when I know, there is no need for questions or answers or signs or connection, because there is just One.

Again, I forget, and I begin to use my tools to talk to the universe, by being aware that they are just the tools.

How do I get in touch with the universe?

#1. Dreams

Dreams are guidance from the universe, full of symbols just for you. Your dreams are your connection to the subconscious.

When you become aware of your dreams, you will realize your patterns, you will find out the meanings of the symbols and you will be aware that there is a communication behind them.

If you have never worked with your dreams, the first place to start is to begin to write them down. Get a dream notebook and in the morning when you wake up, write your dream down directly.

#2. Daily meditations

Daily meditations are a great way to bring silence to your life. To talk to the universe and to realize the signs of the universe you need to slow down and come to the moment. Daily meditations are great to help with that.

Moreover, sometimes during your meditations, you will live some deeper transcendent experiences, where you will know that you are in touch with the universe, you are in connection.

#3. Singing ritual at sunrise

One of the best ways for me to feel the continuous connection with the universe is being awake and witnessing the sunrise.

I am living seaside, so my morning ritual is to go running before the sun awakes. In the middle of my way, I am witnessing the sunrise with a big smile.

Many days I find myself the urge to sing with inspiration and awe. I just let myself sing and get the healing of my voice with these frequencies of the blessing (or Hamd better to say as praise to God), coming from the heart.

While all this is happening, I know that I am one with the universe. It seems like singing at sunrise and sunset by the woman was an old ritual that existed in the universe. It is powerful. I invite you to give it a try and let me know how the experience was for you.

#4. Doing more of what makes my soul happy with a discipline

When we do the things that we love to do our soul smiles, the creative energy inside us flourishes. When we start to do this with a discipline, by prioritizing our joy, creation, and expression then we begin to realize that something else is speaking via us- a creative source.

This is what Lewis Hyde is talking about as the concept “gift” in his book called the Gift as well.

In the second part of the book, Lewis Hyde looks deeper into the work and lives of 2 artists: Walt Whitman and Ezra Pound. When you read, you feel that both artists do not own their art. They call it a gift from the creative source where they just become an instrument for this divine energy to be visible.

#5. Visioning and visualization

All those rituals around visioning and visualization include faith and the intention to connect with the universe. Creating a vision board and hang it on a place for you to see is a reminder of your connection with the One. 

Once done, every day sparing your time to daydream-visualize with joy is another expression of your intention and is a process of joyful manifestation which boosts your energy and will make the conversation with the universe more vivid.

#6. Sound journey

Sound is important to connect with the universe. Remember those concerts that you have been that you were feeling tuned in and alive. Or think about when you were singing in the bathroom, being totally in the moment.

In many rituals around the world, music has been used for connection with the universe. Many of the Gods and Goddesses have their own musical instruments as an important connection point with non-seen.

Having said all this, I will talk to you about sound journeys. Have you ever been to a one? In a sound journey, a person plays music by being in the moment, by improvising being connected to the source and you just close your eyes and let yourself be. It is called a sound journey with inspiration from shamanic journeys.

Sound converts to a vehicle to carry you in the subconscious fields, and you receive messages from the universe. If you have never tried it, I strongly recommend it.

How do you ask the universe for a sign?

#7. Directly asking for a sign

We are in continuous conversation with the universe. So, we can ask for signs and get our answers. For anything we want. This ritual of asking a sign is from Gabrielle Bernstein. I was already doing this on my own and hearing from her again in her manifestation challenge this year, reaffirm it for me. Here is how:

Follow these three steps:

Step 1: Choose your sign

Pick the first thing that comes to your mind. Don’t get too hung up on this or question the sign that comes to mind.

Don’t overthink it. If nothing has popped into your head yet, close your eyes, sit in stillness for a few moments, and pay attention to the first image or idea that comes to mind.

Step 2: Turn over your desire

you ask for your sign, turn over your desire to the Universe with a prayer. Say a prayer such as this one:

Thank you, Universe, for showing me my sign of whether I’m moving in the right direction.

Step 3: Be patient

Don’t try to force your sign to show up. Remember that the Universe doesn’t respond to controlling, demanding energy. Let the Universe show up for you naturally.

Once you will have your sign, it will be crystal clear for you. You will know it. If it is not, try to tune in again and do all processes from the start.

Remember it is remarkably simple, you will get it. Trust me.

How do you speak to the universe?

#8. Connection with your spirit guides

Those people who reached Unity in their lifetime have the frequency of love. Connecting with them will automatically elevate your energy. The more you will remember them, you will see the support and signs of the universe around you.

You can read more about it here: how to connect with your spirit guides?

#9. Talk to God or Pray in your own way

That morning when I was in deep meditation before sunrise, suddenly these words came to me:

Ey gönlümün sultanı

Ey can, canan

Güvenimi tam eyle

Gücümü an’dan eyle

Yolumu sana eyle

Gönlümü aşktan eyle

Aşık Gül Ayşe

Which means;

Oh the sultan of my heart

Oh feminine and masculine divine source (One)

Make my trust whole

Make my power from the moment

Make my way to You

Make my heart from Love

Just after this morning meditation, I went to witness the Sunrise. The feeling I had was almost like puking, a melody wanted to born so I did, I gave birth to it.

Since then this prayer is a medicine for me. I am praying it while singing. You can listen to it here.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bWG9DrqAquM

 

Try it, write your own prayer and sing it with a melody coming to you and convert it to your medicine.

How can I get an answer from the universe?

#10. Shamanic journey

Shamanic journeys are great ways to meet with your spirit animal and get guidance from them. The images that you see, and the experience is so vivid, that once you write them down after your journey, it is hard to have any more doubt of the signals of the universe. Check here to read my shamanic journey experience.

#11. Self-Inquiry/Contemplation

At the end of the day, even if you are aware of it or not, you are having a deep conversation with the universe. In the conversation of your mind, inside, you are having questions and putting these questions to the center of the universe.

Be aware of it. When you see a sign and living a moment of “what a coincidence!” think about it. Realize your continuing conversation with the universe. Once you become aware of this power of yours, then take the control of your ability for contemplation and self-inquiry. Whatever you need an answer, gently ask for it to the universe.

We know everything, we just forget and we need to remember again and that remembrance will come from the source.

“…The most important aspect of meditative self-inquiry is knowing how to ask the question, knowing how to introduce the question into the silent mind, into the core of your being. So, when we look and we observe and we ask a question, we are not looking for an instantaneous answer from the mind, but the question itself is actually focusing awareness, it’s drawing awareness’s attention in a certain direction. It’s very important to understand this lest the mind starts searching in its past experience for an answer. An inquiry is meant to open the mind, to provide a gap within the mind through which we can enter a deeper experience…”

#12. Driftwood

The more you become aware of the continuous conversation of the Universe with you, the more you begin to see the details of the conversation. 

The signs and symbols are all around. Coming via a person, sometimes via a song, sometimes a bird or a cat on your door. The abundance and joyfulness of the universe are incredible.

There is another concept called driftwood by Abraham Hicks. They are little treats that come along in your journey. Many people see them and just consider that they are simply a coincidence. Coincidences do not exist my dear, but the signs and symbols of the universe do.

Do not forget that the universe operates from the Unity principle. Our mind’s right or wrong does not exist in the holistic perspective. There is just unity, there is just One. Moreover, universe energy is quite funny, and love playing. So, open your eyes and enjoy the game.

When you feel admiration or envy for another’s person’s success, be careful with it as it is another kind of driftwood. Simply celebrate them and trust that you are close to achieving what you are manifesting in your life.

Writing the driftwoods down, once they are appearing is a very good idea as it will prevent you to forget. The more you will see the driftwoods, your faith will be stronger which will make you see more driftwoods on the way.

Can you ask the universe for anything?

Yes. It is up to you to receive the symbol and interpret it.

Universe wants the best for you, so even a sign that the universe gave to you does not sound to you the best, do not forget our mind perception around what is good and bad for us is narrow-minded compared to the perception of the universe.

What signs does the universe give?

The sign that the universe gives could be anything. On the other hand, you can also ask for a specific thing as in #7. Directly asking for a sign. Do not forget, when you will get the sign after asking, you will be crystal clear about it.

Conclusion

I feel like I need to stop here. I wanted to write more and more. For example, I wanted to tell you my stories of connecting with trees, talking to plants, bringing stones, pines, and plant from journeys, and doing shamanic journeys with them. And many more. 

We all have these magical stories in our lives. Think about yours, what are they?

Below is a Pinterest friendly photo…. so you can pin it to your Connect with the Universe Board!

How to Connect with the Universe Spiritually?

by

I was always aware of my connection with the universe, from early childhood. Not sure when I began to have some doubts about it.

Most of the conflicts with my couple were around me reading the signals of the universe and getting frustrated when seeing that he was not believing.

One day I passed the fields of the doubt, realizing that it was not him that I was frustrated when he was not believing in the signals that the universe was showing continuously but I was frustrated with my side that was having doubts.

Anyway, let’s go one by one. I am getting excited as this is one of my favorite topics. Let’s start from the beginning of the story. Shall we?

How can I open my mind to the universe?

The mind is not the core gate to connect to the universe, but the heart is. The intuition, your senses, and your mind, altogether will guide you in this journey.

How do you know if you are connected to the universe?

We are always connected to the universe, even we are aware or not.

If you have any doubts about it my story of creating my altar and sacred space can help you. It is about how seeing and reading the signs in my altar and in my sacred space shown me that I was in continuous connection with the universe. This experience helped me to pass the fields of doubt.

It was after the birth of my second child that I started to create a place for me just to be. I was missing daily meetings with myself so much during those first years of having a newborn baby, that without even not realizing it, my hands and my body reacted and created a space for me to go there and have some alone time, even 10 minutes per day.

In that space, I made an intention to create an altar. I started simply. I cleaned the stuff that was on a cabinet, just put some incense and a candle and that was it. Beside the altar, to the wall, I also hanged a paper for me to serve as a mind map. 

During those times I was giving a lot of daycare to my babies and realizing thought patterns in my mind. So, I simply wanted to write them down on paper. As I did not have a lot of time, I thought a mind map, instead of journaling could serve me to self-reflect.

During those months, I visited my sacred space daily, so my altar. Whenever I was realizing a thought pattern – could be an idea, a question, a belief, I was writing it down to that mind map. Moreover, I was bringing those objects that were symbolically meaning something to me on my altar.

After several weeks, something incredible had happened. All those objects and mind map was showing me a conversation with the universe. The universe was answering my questions via the things I lived, the people I met, a word I read, a song I listened to. Many ways. Whatever was happening in my life was incredibly connected as well as all the creation.

All those abstract ideas about the universe supporting me and talking to me were tangible and concrete with the objects on my altar and with the words on my mind map.

That night, when I was explaining this to my partner and when he was again questioning and making the joy of my reading the symbols of life as they were appearing, I began to cry. 

But this time the reason for my crying was the feeling of relief. I was free and passed the fields of doubts. I was not believing anymore; the universe is talking to me via signals, but I was knowing it. You can learn more about creating a sacred space, here.

How do you build a relationship with the universe?

  • By being aware of your thoughts and inviting beautiful thoughts.
  • Being aware of your words, your speech, and being the source of beautiful speech.
  • By being aware of your acts. Whatever you are doing, doing it from this awareness and doing your best and with love.

In a summary, by being aware of yourself. Because connection can not be made via the exterior world. It can only be made inside. The universe, God, the cosmos are inside you, so that is why you will realize this connection via being aware of yourself.

We have said that the connection with the universe is via the heart. The language of the heart is love. Love is the key to connection. Love your friends, love your family, love your work, love your creation.

To love, one needs to know first. So, give your time, your care to all those things in your life, make the feeling of love, your compass. When you lack the feeling of love in your life, slow down and come to the moment. 

Feeling of guilt and shame can come to visit you. Gently be aware of them and choose not to empower them. You are more powerful than your emotions. Instead of being drawn into these feelings, bring your focus to yourself. Ask what you need as being your best friend.

If you do not feel love towards your family, your neighbor, be aware and then self-reflect. Ask what is going on? What leads to separation instead of unity?

If you have the burden of resentment, practice forgiveness.

If you do not love your work, then take responsibility. Do not over-complicate and poison yourself with negative thoughts and words. Be aware, there are just 3 options of yours: or you change, or you accept, or you leave. Grow up, activate your intuition, your senses, and your mind and decide for yourself and take action for this decision.

Do more of what makes your soul happy. Give your time to those things that give you joy. Paint, sing, dance, write. Create. Express. Make it as worship, as an everyday ritual. Have some discipline for creation. Show up every day. Let the divine creative energy goes out from you.

Feel the gratitude. Practice the gratitude until you will come with Hamd- which is praising God. When Love is there and when you pass the field of doubt and being aware of the communication of the universe with you, the direct effect is the feeling of awe and “Hamd”. Until then, you can start this practice with gratitude.

Learn and get information. Even though the connection with the universe is not via the mind, still getting information about the spiritual world will help you.

In Islamic Sufi perception there are 3 levels of information:

  • Ilme’l-yakīn – the information you receive by the mind,
  • Ayne’l-yakīn – the information you receive by proof,
  • Hakka’l-yakīn – the information you receive by interior seeing and experiences with intuition and knowing.

In the path to Hakka’l-yakīn, one starts with Ilme’l-yakīn meaning the information you receive by reading the books, listening to podcasts, or watching videos or movies so to say.

How to connect with divine energy?

We all know that everything is energy and to connect with divine energy, we need to increase our energy levels, frequencies. All those different things we were talking about to create a connection with the universe are increasing our frequency at the end of the day.

For the sake of summarizing those we talked above from another perspective, to connect with divine energy, one needs 2 things:

#1. Purification first so that you can be in the moment and you can be aware. As we have already talked about purification, you need to take care of what you think, what you say, and how you act. You need to be aware of yourself and to be aware of yourself, you need to slow down first.

#2. Tuning in so that you can tune with divine energy. Prioritize yourself. Be your best friend. Discover who you are and create a new you with your potential inside you.

We human beings have been created with the seed of the creator, so we all have the potential to reach to Insan-I Kamil, those human beings who reached unity with God while they were in their human experience.

We are all walking our own paths. This blessed life of ours is a sacred gift and we are the ones responsible for our unique life. The frequency of divine energy is joy and love. So, make your life a journey of love. Prioritize your joy, your feeling good, do what you love, and do it often, until you realize that it is not you who express but the divine energy does, and you are just an instrument of it. 

Conclusion

I see the connection with the universe as a game. It is my favorite game actually. This game makes me remember my source and my potential as well as that I am being supported and loved all the time.

The more I play, the more I remember.

I hope this post would inspire you to also play this game of “connection with the universe.”

Below is a Pinterest friendly photo…. so you can pin it to your Connection with Universe Board!

How to Connect with Your Spirit Guides

by

I attended a webinar by Tara Wild about the ancient feminine. It was about goddess Brigid and there she had a guided meditation to connect with the goddess which inspired the guided meditation below to connect with your spirit guides. 

During the mentioned meditation, Rabi’a al – Adawiyya came to my meditation instead of Brigid. You can read more about her here. One of the things she asked me to do was doing an offering, similar to that one I participated in, for those who would fast during Ramadan to get guidance from her. That is why I have prepared a live event just before Ramadan, called Blessing Ramadan Guidance with Rabi’a Al-Adawiyya. You can watch the whole online ritual here.

Moreover, she guided me to prepare a journey of love during Ramadan as an offering, which you can also see here. 

Just after giving these offerings, I decided it is time to write about spirits that guide us and how to connect with your spirit guides, which is one of my favorite topics. 

Spirits that guide us

When I was a kid, we were having our summer vacations in my grandfather’s mountain house in the south of Turkey. There I had my best childhood memories.

I remember during those summer nights, sometimes as a game, we were calling the spirits to help us with my brother and other friends who were bigger than me. We were writing letters to paper one by one from A to Z and creating a circle with them. Then we were turning down the cup and putting our fingers on the cup and one person was asking the question for guidance and then the cup was moving and going to the letters, writing words to interact with us. I always doubted if somebody moved that cup or not 🙂

It is funny that this story wanted to come here while I am writing this blog post. Because it was even not in my memory at all. Maybe all these experiences with spirit guides that I can live during my adulthood is thanks to this childhood experience which was opening a window for another kind of reality, beyond the eye can see. 

3 years ago, I began to be conscious about the guidance I can receive from the spirits that guide us. I was already doing shamanic journeys and getting guidance from power animals-naguals, but what I am talking about, here is different. 

What do I mean with spirits that guide us? 

What I mean with spirits that guide us here are those human beings, who lived in the world before us and who could reach the union with God, so symbolically become immortal. There is even a belief that the world is continuing to exist and has been continuing thanks to those humans-souls who could reach illumination-unity with God during their lifetime. 

The book called ‘Living with the Saints and the Divine’ written by Can Kağan Osman Aydoğmuş, explains spirits that guide us as below:

“They are friends of God and are miraculous beings who have helped all humanity throughout their lives and passed beyond death while living.

They are divines who have reached God and have the consciousness of Truth while living. The love of saints for existence and humanity is excessively big and vast. These teachers, who always enlighten humanity, help, protect and teach are the carriers of light.

They have known and lived through all the limits of humanity: they have overcome their weaknesses, have accomplished the most difficult things to accomplish, have passed all the exams, and have reached the status of the divine. Earned the appreciation of God and become an example and guide to humanity.

That is why it’s easier for them to help people. Because they know people very well, they know how to be human. They are indeed the best teachers, as they have gone through all stages of humanity and have come through that experience and ascended to their positions and passed beyond death while living.”

How did I begin to interact with spirits that guide us?

Some years ago, I gave a conscious decision of making my spiritual life a priority. I have already participated in different retreats, I was also facilitating retreats and doing practices, however, I decided to have daily spiritual practices: daily meditation for an hour and several different practices such as inner child work, shamanic journeys, dream writing, singing classes in a meditative mode, etc. 

Continuously hold space for myself in my sacred space and also paying special attention to signals via my altar let me passing the fields of doubt. Maybe I can talk about it in another blog post.

My story with Yunus Emre

At that time, I began to watch a series about the life of Yunus Emre, a Turkish poet and mystical Sufi who lived in Turkey in the 13th century. 

I always liked his poems and always felt special attention to him. Besides all these, watching the series created a very magical effect on me. During my daily life, I was living with him. He became a character in my life, a friend for me. 

Daily I was having an inner conversation with him and each time I was connecting him with more love. He became very dear to me which is continuing. I feel a connection to him with Love. 

My story of Rabi’a al-Adawiyya

During those days I was also reading a book called Sufi woman. I was reading this book as a gift of a dear friend, as he was aware of a question that was coming to my mind for many years again and again, “who are the woman saints of my land”. I was not sure why this question was coming but I was conscious about it, each time more. 

While reading this book, I was amazed by the stories of Rabi’a al-Adawiyya, and I felt special attraction to her.  

Those days, I went to breathing therapy. And the therapist in the middle of the session told me that she did not know why, but she received a message that she needed to tell me this name: Hz. Rabia. 

I was amazed because she did not know anything. 

Then I began to call Rabia to my meditations daily. The same thing happened as in the case of Yunus Emre. I began to create a relationship with her, and I felt a connection to her with Love. 

While all these were happening, at the house of a friend, as a pure coincidence (a coincidence is never a coincidence) I found a book called ‘Living with the Saints and the Divine’. 

I read it in 2 days, better to say I drank it. I was surprised that somebody wrote a book about connection with saints and showing ways for it. He was talking about many things that I was experiencing on my own. 

Just several days after I found this book, I faced one of the darkest times of my life. I was very afraid, did not have any idea of what to do or what to say. I prayed to God asking for help and for God to take my place and guide my way. Then I asked for Yunus Emre and Rabi’a to be with me and guide my way. 

There they were with me; I was feeling their presence incredibly. I was feeling their power as well. It was like, even though I was passing through an extremely hard time, I was God-conscious totally and I was ok with that, I was consent and blessed, feeling loved and supported all the time. 

Since then, Yunus Emre and Rabi’a have been incredible friends for me. I am so grateful to them and I love them so, so, so much. 

Now I am having a relationship with many spirit guides which I adore deeply, and I contemplate continuously to be able to understand their true wisdom. Spiritual songs of my land help incredibly to me in this sense. 

How to connect with your spirit guides and receive messages and guidance

  • Before all, you can read the signs. If there has been a saint that you felt interested in or attached, you can start from here. 
  • You can read about him/her, watch movies, read their books, listen to their songs. Listen to your gut feelings for this. Let your heart and intuition guide you. 
  • Love is the key to connecting with your spirit guides. For love, you need to remember them, create a relationship with them. 
  • The more you will have them in your life, the more you will be able to receive their guidance. It is as in a friendship. If you look at your friendships, you will realize that it is a reciprocal relationship, the more you care and give your attention, the more you receive. 
  • The best is that this relationship happens and flows naturally. Because of that listening to your intuition is key here. Maybe there is a saint of your own land, of your ancestors. Or maybe a book that took your attention for a long time, maybe some stories, some poems, some paintings, or some songs. 
  • Once you are guided with your gut feeling to a saint, one of the steps to create a relationship can be inviting them to your daily meditations. Below I am giving you a guided meditation to connect with your spirit guides and receive messages and guidance.

Meditation to connect with your spirit guides

Part of the script is taken from Tara Wild’s online ceremony about the ancient feminine. There, she guided this meditation to connect with the goddess Brigid. The below version here is to connect with Rabi’a. You can make the meditation and connect with that saint or goddess that you feel connected to or just let the flow guide you. 

You can also have the guided meditation in the video below:

  • Place your hand in your hearth, close your eyes. You can lie down. 
  • With your hands on your heart, lying down, breathing deeply.
  • I invite you to send your breath to your heart space.
  • Feeling your heart softening and opening little by little
  • I invite you to imagine there is a light shining through your heart.
  • Shining from below you deep in the Earth, passing through the sacred pathway of your beating heart
  • And moving up in the column of light into the sky, to the heart of the heavens.
  • See how much you can open to these ancient codes of love, flowing through you. In this sacred channel as it is as old as Earth, as old as stars as old as time. 
  • Bringing your whole consciousness into this light 
  • Imagine now you are traveling on the light waves of your hearth. Traveling through time and space. Your essence being pulled towards the heart of the infinite. 
  • And it is here that you are embraced by a Love that is so much greater than you. A Love that is woven into the All. 
  • As you begin to move through these light codes you begin to sense that you are being pulled towards a place. A place beyond physical reality, a place in the other world that is calling to you, deep in your soul. 
  • Little by little the light around you gives away to a feeling. A feeling of your bare feet, connecting into an ancient landscape.
  • And Little by little, you begin to see that you are standing in an old town, a town with earthy color.
  • The sun begins to fade in the sky and you see a simple path before you. You tap onto the path, your bare feet. You walk step by step. Moment by moment. With your full presence up in the little streets of this old town. 
  • You feel safe and curious. There are little candles in the street, giving little light to space. 
  • You see the last Sunlight.
  • You are close to a square now, you realize a beautiful fountain in the square and begin to sense you are not alone. 
  • As the sun descends below the horizon, you begin to feel a presence. 
  • You see Rabia that had taken fire in one hand and water in the other talking to some other saints.
  • Rabia sees you, she gives the fire and the water to others and approaches you with a smile on her face. Rabia stands close to you shining brightly with the power of Love. 
  • Take this moment truly see her and feel her. Feel her presence. She steps towards you and she looks you in the eyes and she says I am Love. Takes another step towards you, so she is very close to you now. She places a hand over your heart, and she says you are Love. 
  • You take a deep breath and feeling the touch of her hand and the gifts of her words. 
  • Rabia then looks around and smiles and looks in your eyes and she says we are Love.
  • She says very softly and gently, are you ready for a journey of love? 
  • It is the time of getting guidance, asking questions, contemplate, and seeing the signs. 
  • Time for the veils to disappear and seeing God in everything. It is time to live as worship she says. 
  • Rabia then presents you with a gift. A gift to remind you of the Love. See the gift in your mind’s eye and take a moment to feel the blessing of this gift and offer her your heartfelt gratitude. 
  • Your time with Rabia almost ends. You ask Rabia, “do you have any guidance for me for the upcoming month of the holy Ramadan?” Rabia offers you some guidance, her final parting words. Just for you. Listen to her wisdom with your heart. 
  • Rabia looks into your eyes one final time. She smiles and turns and goes away. 
  • Then you hear an old song of Love – “Aşkın aldı benden beni, bana seni gerek seni. Ben yanarım dünü günü, bana seni gerek seni”
  • You feel it’s time now to return. With Rabia’s gift, you begin your journey back, the moon is rising on the horizon. Milky light illuminating your path. 
  • As you begin to approach the outside of the city, you see a doorway of light before you. You reach the doorway and when you are ready you step through the threshold where you are embraced by light and you travel along the light waves of your heart once more. You travel through time and space until you come back into an awareness of your physical body. Breathing deeply as you feel the column of Love flowing your hearth space once more rising on Earth into the heavens. 
  • I invite you to bring all this light, down from the Earth up from the heavens, bring it all to your heart space. 
  • Spend some time here. Felling your heart and take a deep breath. Slowly bring more awareness to your physical body. When you are ready, gently open your eyes, move your body, and maybe take a stretch. 

Journaling to connect with your spirit guides

When you are ready take your journal and write anything you to your journal. I also have some journal prompts:

  • How did Rabia appear to you? What were your impressions and feelings?
  • How was your experience from your connection to Love? What does it feel like?
  • Are you ready for a journey of love; getting guidance, asking questions, contemplate, and seeing the signs, to connect to your deeper truth? 
  • What gift did Rabia give you?
  • What was her guidance for you?

Take around 5 minutes and write down the details of your experience from the guided meditation and your connection to Rabi’a al-Adawiyya.

Conclusion

Even if you are aware or not, we are continuously being guided with our spirit guides. Being aware of it and creating a relationship with them, will guide you in your inner journey.

They are friends of God and remembering them and being in connection with them, will open up a way for you to remember God and being in connection with God. 

I hope this post somehow will help you to start this incredible journey with your spirit guides. Their friendship’s value cannot be measured. 

16 Gratitude Exercises to Invite Daily Gratitude to Your Life

by

Why is gratitude so hard?

The answer is simple. We become so used to the services of others that we forget to appreciate them. Also, it seems to us that it is our right and others’ duty to serve us. Thus, the cycle continues, and we forget to thank others.

In addition to that, whenever we are overjoyed upon getting a blessing, we often are so lost in it that we forget to thank. We forget to appreciate the source, our God, the Ultimate Provider. We become lost in our achievements and success.

How do you practice gratitude?

Gratitude seems hard and forgettable but not impossible to achieve. By following some practices daily and being mindful of that, you can incorporate gratitude in your lives. Below, you can find out how. Let’s go!

Daily gratitude

The first thing to do is “be regular.” Yes, if you want to achieve something, the key is to work for that regularly. The “daily gratitude” will let you enter the garden of gratitude.

Gratitude exercises

Just like you achieve your fitness goals by daily gym and exercises, here are some for achieving gratitude. You can practice whatever you like. So, let’s get started!

Gratitude exercises #1: Gratitude diary/gratitude journaling

Ah! Who else has the love for journaling like me? Raise your hands. Journaling is “penning down your thoughts, feelings, whether on paper or some device.” As for achieving gratitude, you can start a gratitude journal. There are many ways of writing in a gratitude journal.  As an example, consider this: write the name of a thing or a person you are grateful for. Plus, mention how that thing or person has added value to your life. Describe in two to three sentences with depth and thankfulness.

You can read more about gratitude journaling here.

Gratitude exercises #2: Gratitude list

Whenever you go for the groceries, I am sure you make a list. This gratitude list is something like that.

What is a gratitude list?

A gratitude list is a specific number of things you are grateful for, listed down daily on a notebook or your smartphone.


Now here’s the drill. At night, free from every work, take out the pen and a notebook. You can also use your smartphone. Make a list of five things for which you are grateful today. And believe me; you will have a smile on your face and a heart full of gratitude to have them. Start with five things, and sometime later, increase the count. At your weekends, go through these and enjoy.

Gratitude list ideas

You can put anything on your list. Anything that makes you feel grateful for its presence, mention it. It can be your eyes, your intelligence, and your loving nature. Your pillow, a comforting place to visit, or walking on the dewy grass with a loved one. Can be anything. I think this exercise seems to you quite interesting.

Examples of a gratitude list

  1. My loving mother
  2. My caring sister
  3. The velvety fleece with which I cover myself
  4. The cool breeze at night in summer
  5. The snacks at home for my midnight hunger

Gratitude exercises #3: Gratitude jar

A gratitude jar is a fun activity. Take a glass jar. Write on a chit of paper about one thing you are grateful for. It is up to you if you want to do this activity daily or weekly. Decide a fixed time to fill the jar. At the end of the week, take out all the chits and remind yourself of the good you have this week.

Gratitude exercises #4: Gratitude tree

Here’s another fun-filled activity for you. Bring some small branches or twigs of a tree. I hope you can easily find these. Place it in a vase or a jar and keep it on the table. Now make cutouts of leaves from the paper. At night, write a thing to be grateful for on a leaf and tie it to the branch or stick it with some tape. Include your family members in this activity also. Everyone can write their names on their pieces. It will bring a sense of thankfulness to your family and a good addition to the table as well.

Gratitude exercises #5: Gratitude box

Just like a gratitude jar, you can use a box. Any shoebox will work. The drill is the same. Write about one thing you are grateful for on a piece of paper and put it in the box daily. Also, make your family members a part of this activity. Everyone with their names can put the chits. At the end of the month, empty the box on a table and gather around. Enjoy a blissful time of recalling all your blessings.

Gratitude exercises #6: Gratitude letter

Write a letter of appreciation for the people who have helped you or serve you in some way. Describe their service and care for you in a paragraph or two. Give it to them with some chocolates, candies, or a flower bud. This way, you can add value to their lives and yours as well.

Gratitude exercises #7: Gratitude poster

Colors instantly attract attention. Take out some time from your busy life. Buy some colorful poster cards and markers. Design the gratitude posters in your free time. Encourage the kids to draw about the things they are grateful for. Write the names of things, people, places, or anything on the card and pen down thanks after it. I hope you will enjoy this activity as well.

Gratitude exercises #8: Gratitude notes

A gratitude note is simple and precise, unlike a detailed gratitude letter. Choose colorful note papers that are usually small in size. Write a sentence or two to appreciate and thank the person. Give it to them. You can also accompany it with a sweet or chocolate.

Gratitude exercises #9: Gratitude art

Since I have my kids, every painting I do with them is an opportunity for art therapy for me. Especially my daughter loves to paint and every day she asks: “mom, would you like to paint?” and almost always I answer “I would love to”. I mean it!

Then we choose the paint we want to use, the paper, put some candles, nice music and just chill. When I get in front of the paper, I invite mindfulness to my practice. What I paint depends on my mood and the necessity of that specific time. To give you some examples: I paint whatever I feel, self-reflection of a week or a month or a day, sometimes I paint what I am grateful for in my life or my day or just doodling with her into the same paper sometimes. 

This little activity changed my life. It is easy, it is fun, and it fosters connection with those around you incredibly. Give it a try!

Gratitude exercises #10: Gratitude stones

Collect some stones, the small and round ones. Clean them. Now, cut out hearts from tissue paper. Place them on the stones. Paint them and let them dry. They will stick to the stones making them attractive and colorful. Gift them to someone to pay your gratitude.

One more idea is to paint the stones with different colors. After that, you can write on it the names of things you have as a blessing. You can be as creative as you want. So, I leave it to your imagination.

Gratitude exercises #11: Gratitude games

Games are always interesting. Play a gratitude game with your family or friends. Make the chits of names of every member, fold them twice, and place them in a bowl. Every member has to pick a chit having a person’s name on it. On separate note cards, everyone has to write three things they are thankful for about that person. Finally, read aloud your cards one by one without revealing whose it is about. The rest of the members have to guess the person’s name.

Another game is a good source of teaching gratitude to children. Collect different colored pencils. Assign each color with a different question. Like, assign red for ‘Name a person you are grateful for’. For blue, it can be ‘Name a thing you are grateful for’. Make a lot of questions like that. Now fill the colored pencils in an opaque box and tell each kid to draw a pencil from it without seeing. Then tell them their questions according to the color they get and get the answers from them. This way, they will learn to pay gratitude in a fun way.

Here in this article of 2 alternative ways of giving appreciative messages, you can find cool ways to show your gratitude to others in a game style.

Gratitude exercises #12: Gratitude affirmations

Affirmations play a vital role in developing a habit of positivity in you. So, decide a specific time for it; do it when you wake up or go to sleep

Whatever time you decide, sit on your balcony or a quiet spot in the house. Take deep breaths and focus on the day God has bestowed on you. Think of all the blessings and pay gratitude to God. You will feel the freshness inside you. Some examples are: 

“I am grateful for my home, I am grateful to God for this life, I am grateful for the loving people around me, etc.”

Gratitude exercises #13: Meditation for gratitude

Meditation is one of the best ways to release anxiety and strengthen your body, mind, and soul. You can use it for a gratitude exercise as well. Here there is a beautiful 10-minute meditation practice for gratitude. Everything is explained step by step.

Gratitude exercises #14: Gratitude challenge

Gratitude challenges are very popular. Many people participate in 30 days of gratitude, 365 days of gratitude, and 21-day gratitude meditation challenges.

Prepare a gratitude challenge for yourself. It can be of any number of days you like. At the start, give yourself a 5-day challenge. Assign a task for each day. I am sharing an example:

  • Day-1:         Say thank you to your loved ones.
  • Day-2:         Send a message of thankfulness to your friends
  • Day-3:         Tell a loved one that you love them
  • Day-4:         Take a dear one out for coffee
  • Day-5:         Say thanks to yourself. Appreciate yourself for coming so far and all the struggles.

Gratitude exercises #15: Morning gratitude

Waking up safe and sound in your soft bed is in itself a thing to be grateful for. Starting your day with a deep and humble paying of gratitude to God will bless your day ahead.

So, I have a practice for you. After getting refreshed, sit on your balcony or a quiet spot in your house. Take deep breaths and focus on the new day God has bestowed on you. You are seeing today’s sun on a new day of your life. You have another day of opportunities. Think of all the blessings and pay gratitude to God. You will feel the freshness inside you.

Morning prayers of gratitude for Muslims

“The morning has come to me and the whole universe belongs to Allah, the Lord of the worlds, O Allah, I ask of you the good of the day, it’s success and aid and it’s nur (celestial light) and barakaat (blessings) and seek hidayah (guidance) and seek refuge from the evil in it (this day) and from the evil of that which is to come later.”

(Hisn from Abu Dawood) [A Hadith book]

Gratitude exercises #16: Prayer of gratitude

Duas for gratitude in Islam

In Muslim culture, the two raka’ahs of nafl prayer for paying gratitude to God are very often and popular. You can perform them at any time. Whenever something extremely good happens to you, you can pray two raka’ahs of nafl prayer and pay your gratitude to Allah.

“My Lord, enable me to be grateful for Your favor which You have bestowed upon me and upon my parents and to do righteousness of which You approve. And admit me by Your mercy into [the ranks of] Your righteous servants.”

(Surah An-Naml – 27:19) [The Holy Quran]

“O Allah, help me remember You, to be grateful to You, and to worship You in an excellent manner.”

[Abu Dawud] [Book 16, Hadith 1422]

Catholic prayer for gratitude

Here is a Catholic gratitude prayer as an example:

“We give you sincere thanks for the rest of the past night and for the gift of a new day, with its opportunities to pleasing you. Grant that we may so pass its hours in the perfect freedom of your service, that at evening, we may again give you thanks; through Jesus Christ our Lord.”

Conclusion

Gratitude is like freshwater coming directly from the source, the more you drink the more you would like to. It purifies you first then gives you joy. In the long term, it makes you softer by changing all your perspective through life and stopping to fight or resist. The more you show your blessings to life, the more you learn to surrender as you become to see beauty in everything.

Take your gratitude seriously. Do your daily gratitude exercises until you realize that gratitude becomes part of your life which brings joy, freshness, surrender, and love.

Below is a Pinterest friendly photo…. so you can pin it to your Gratitude Board!

The Meaning, Story, and Symbolism of Easter

by

It is Easter time of the year when many celebrations from different traditions are taking place. Whatever the path is, I see them all coming from the same source and varying according to different attributes and necessities of the people. 

You already know that I enjoy rituals, sacred spaces, and ancient stories and symbols. This quote below, explains also my point of view for all these celebrations happening around the world. 

Christmas isn’t about the decorations,

 It’s about compassion.

 Hanukkah isn’t about the sufganiyot,

 It’s about amalgamation.

 Ramadan isn’t about the feast,

 It’s about affection.

 Diwali isn’t about the lights,

 It’s about ascension.

 Our world is filled with festivals,

 But what do they really mean?

 Celebrating them with cultural exclusivity,

 Makes us not human but savage fiend.

 Every festival belongs to all of humanity,

 For happiness has no religious identity.”Abhijit Naskar, I Vicdansaadet Speaking: No Rest Till The World is Lifted

Our world is filled with festivals, but what do they really mean? asks Abhijit Naskar. In the light of this question, let’s explore the meaning of Easter, its story, and its origins. 

The meaning of Easter

Easter is a very important event in Christianity. It is celebrated every year as the day of resurrection of Jesus three days after his crucifixion and burial. This event occurred some 2000 years ago. The word derived from an ancient celebration of Goddess Eostre or Eastre at the beginning of the spring season.

How Easter is calculated?

Easter day is the ‘first Sunday’ after the ‘full moon occurring on or after the Spring Equinox’. That is why the date of Easter is always changing every year. 

The story of Easter

The story of Easter starts after the Last Supper which was the final meal Jesus had taken with his apostles. In that meal, Jesus had predicted his death. After that, the guards of the temple arrested Jesus. The reason behind this was that the elders of the temple were offended by the preaching of Jesus. They charged him with the claim of him being the king of the Jews. After the arrest, he was taken to the Roman governor, where he was tried and sentenced to be crucified. On Friday, Jesus was crucified on the cross.

What happened on Easter Sunday?

Stories of the Gospel tell that the Crucifixion of Jesus took place on the Friday before Easter, called Good Friday. He got buried inside a tomb that was protected as there was the risk of the body being stolen. After three days, on Sunday, a woman went there and found the tomb empty. It was believed that God took Jesus to heaven, termed as resurrection from death. 

Listening to this story, you could ask a question; has this really happened? My answer is we will never really know. We can even not be 100% sure that Jesus existed. You can watch this interesting video about this question: Did Jesus Exist?

The history of Easter

The old Anglo Saxon pagans celebrated the Eastre goddess at the arrival of the spring season. The Christians administered them and tried to convert those pagans to Christianity. The celebrations of the resurrection of Jesus by Christians took place on the same spring celebration days by the pagans. Thus, the resurrection of Jesus celebration got combined with that spring-time celebration. It was called Easter so that after conversion, the pagans can enjoy their tradition as well.

The history of Easter also connects with the Passover, a Jewish festival. According to Wikipedia, “Easter is linked to the Jewish Passover by much of its symbolism, as well as by its position in the calendar.”

The origin of Easter

There are different origins for the word Easter according to history:

* As per an eighth-century monk “Venerable Bede”, the word “Easter” has taken from the name of a Germanic goddess named “Eostre/Eastre”. She was the goddess of spring and fertility. Anglo Saxon pagans used to celebrate this goddess at the start of the spring season. 

Hence, the resurrection of Jesus indicates the start of a new season of prosperity and goodness. 

* In the ancient Norwegian language, the words ‘ostara’, ‘eostur’, or ‘eastur’, have the meaning of “the season of new birth”. Another meaning is “season of growing sun.”

For that reason, the word Easter fuses with the essence of the resurrection or rebirth of Jesus. 

* Also, if we look at the word “East”, it comes from the old English and old German (the word: ostar), having the meaning of “towards the sun”. In Greek and Hebrew languages, it has the meaning of “to rise, to shine.” Hence, the name Easter gives us a sense of the rise of Jesus again after the death.

* Eostre (in old English) or Ostara (in old German) is also “the goddess of dawn.” 

Therefore, Easter here can represent the “dawn of goodness and divinity” as being celebrated as the resurrection of Jesus. It symbolizes the faith in the rise of good powers over bad powers.

This simply leads to the fact that the resurrection of Jesus links with the joyous and fruitful spring. The resurrection of Jesus is the assurance of the arrival of good and the departure of evil.

Why do we celebrate Easter?

Easter is the day when good defeated evil. It portrays the true revival of hope and showcases the downfall of wickedness. Therefore, Christians celebrate this day with true devotion and respect. It marks the fulfillment of prophecies of the Bible about a messiah who would rise after death. This day reminds the struggles of Jesus, and the cruelties he faced. But in the end, he resurrected and defeated all his enemies. This is the sheer indication of good overpowering the bad.

How is Easter celebrated?

Easter is celebrated with full enthusiasm. Sunrise services, Easter eggs, Easter bunnies, flowers especially lilies, daffodils, and other white flowers are common practices.

Sunrise services are done in churches to celebrate the rise of Jesus. Easter bunnies are candies, mainly in chocolate flavor, that are very much liked by the children. The candy baskets are secretly kept for the children that they find out in the morning. Decorated Easter eggs are a part of the celebration. The Easter egg hunts are also organized for the children at their homes. Some organizations also arrange these hunts for the children. Also, lilies are used for decoration as a symbol of purity. 

The symbolism of Easter

You can read the symbolism of the Holy Week here as well. For now, let’s read about the symbolism of Easter.

  • Easter Bunny: The link of the rabbit came since the rabbit was the symbol of Eastre, goddess of spring and fertility. Hence, Easter gives us the vibes of rebirth and resurrection. Also, the hare has increased fertility. This also shows the message of vitality and new births. Hare is also an ancient symbol for the moon. This gets linked with the fact that Easter is determined by the occurrence of the full moon.
  • Easter Eggs: Eggs are a symbol of a new arrival. This symbolizes the new life.
  • Lilies: White lilies symbolize the pure soul of Jesus.
  • Spring flowers: Daffodils and other flowers indicate the season of spring.
  • The Butterfly: the different phases of a butterfly’s life resemble the life of Jesus. The caterpillar stage indicates the life of Jesus in this world. The phase of the cocoon indicates the crucifixion and burial of Jesus inside the tomb. The final stage of a flying butterfly shows the resurrection of Jesus.
  • Hot Cross Buns: The buns have a cross on them to remind the cross of Jesus.

Conclusion

Overall, Easter symbolizes the rise of good over bad, justice over cruelty, hope over despair, and life over death. It also gives us the message of spiritual resurrection that we can have from the depths of sins, despair, and hopelessness.

The resurrection of Jesus gives the message of optimism and the victory of goodness always. It instills faith in the people who are disappointed by the existence of evil, injustice, and cruelty. Reassures people of forgiveness and a new life who are disappointed due to their sins.

This is the time of the year-Spring-to celebrate the birth and the hope and the optimism. Maybe you are passing through the darkest times of your life, but do not forget, everything is passing, and we are just passengers here. 

Happy Easter everybody!

Below is a Pinterest friendly photo…. so you can pin it to your Ancient Wisdom Board!