Archive for October, 2009

See you Tonight

While many mortals will approach this hallowed evening with tongues firmly planted in their cheeks, I invite you to seize the opportunity that this night holds to connect with your dreams and inner desires.

The veil of consciousness which separates the physical realm from the spirit world will be at its thinnest tonight, presenting the perfect occasion to commune with Higher Self and other familiars who can help facilitate the expansion of our dreams.  It’s as simple as returning to the knowing place that exists within our beings, where we believe that anything is possible.

As the sun sets this hallowed evening, the Bean family will be lighting our bale fire to usher in a new year of possibilities and to celebrate the eternal cycle of our spirits.  Tonight we reaffirm who we are and revel in the magic of our own inner knowledge and guidance.  As we all continue to expand our dreams and write our life stories, I will be thinking of you.

Margaritas at five o’clock.

Hello, Stranger

I find that some days it is much easier for me to extend a kind word toward some guy I don’t know behind me in line at 7-Eleven than it is to the guy that I married.

Due to social upbringing it is customary for me to be courteous and polite to others.  I also like people in general, so friendliness is just my nature.  I could be experiencing a most unpleasant day and still nod politely and exchange pleasantries to a stranger that I encounter in public.  On the other hand, let Durwood walk in the door at home and I’m prone to snap his head off.

It helps to determine the source of my irritation.  A troublesome morning at work, an afternoon with a screaming nephew who is cutting teeth, or a teenager who just remembered to inform me that his college application fee was due last week are certainly not the fault of Mr. Bean.  He is simply blameworthy once he entered our home and became a target.  Had it been his own behavior that generated my bitchiness, then that would be an entirely different subject.

It is in the private realm of my relationship with my spouse and other loved ones that I allow terse remarks and contentious behavior to exist.  Even if I’m just plain tired, I wouldn’t talk to the guy who helps me carry my grocery bags out to the car like I’ve talked to my husband on these occasional bad days.  Why do I think it’s okay to talk to Durwood in this tone?  Surely it’s because I haven’t listened to the grocery guy’s snoring for the last 24 years, laundered his underwear, heard his fishing stories and bore his three children.

Fortunately, Mr. Bean is a good husband.  He can recognize the wrath of a woman scorned by his own hand, and is adept in determining otherwise.  Though this is understood, I’d like to stop using his proficiency as an excuse for my occasional malicious streak.  I don’t care for the domino effect it creates in our household.

An’ ye harm none, do as thee will.  Perhaps the next time that Mr. Bean comes home after I’ve had a rough day, I’ll treat him as I would any stranger. Maybe even a tall, dark, and handsome one at that.

“You Just Wait…”

If you are a parent of a young child don’t let a parent of a teenager scare you.

When the Bean children were much younger I received a fair share of unsolicited advice.  I recall many instances when I would hear a more experienced parent describe the unpleasant nature of having to deal with one of their teenager’s recent escapades.  Being the fresh parent that I was, I remember feeling as if I were listening to some sort of horror story.  I must have looked like it too, since it always seemed that my shocked expression would be acknowledged with a warning which included the words “you just wait.”  There was such certainty that this would be my future, I was often cautioned to prepare myself for this inevitable curse by “enjoying my kids now while they’re still young.”

Surely I would be wise to heed the advice of a seasoned parent, though I often wondered at the time how it would be possible to ‘enjoy my kids while they are young’ when I’m so damn tired from the lack of sleep required to take care of them.  All I knew was that I did not relish the apparent fact that my three little Beans would one day become scary monsters.  The prospect of having to deal with big and ghastly teenage strangers was frightening.

As it turns out, all the forewarning that I had once feared and the line of reasoning I had felt compelled to adhere to were crap.  After the Ann Landers incident (see About page) I realized that this well-intentioned counsel was simply the reality of another.  It was their story and didn’t necessarily have to be mine.

If you can’t imagine that some day your little one will be sneaking out of the house at night, stealing the family car for a joy ride, drinking alcohol under the stadium bleachers or being sexually active at age 14, then don’t.  I’m not suggesting that you pretend these things don’t happen.  I do encourage you to imagine contrasting scenarios that are in line with YOUR dreams, while discarding the unpleasant predictions that are offered to you by others.

Of all the things that I was told I could expect when my kids were teenagers, the one that really motivated me to find my own way was the suggestion that my daughter would one day be “crying to someone else about her troubles when she goes through the stage where she hates her mother.”  Never threaten a witch with an objectionable forecast about her own life.

As grown-ups it is our job to not only provide our children with the care required to sustain their physical needs, but to teach them how to think.  We can facilitate this process by validating their innate power to make choices for themselves at any age.  When a child is two years old, it may be as simple as asking if they want to wear the boots or the sandals to walk through the woods, while stating the obvious consequences for each.  When a child is six years old it may be that you offer the difference between choosing a birthday party with their friends or getting the new bike that they’ve been wanting.  As the choices become more complex you will have developed a system in which their age-appropriate choices are clearly identified and corresponding consequences can be surmised and experienced.

Remember that if your little one is three years old now, you both have the next seven years of working together before she is ten years old and tells you that she likes a boy.  Likewise, you have ten years before she is thirteen and tells you that she wants to go to a movie with a boy. That’s ten years chock full of opportunity for both of you to have developed a solid relationship of guidance and trust.  Even if they are sixteen already, it is never too late to discuss their power to make choices.  Relax.  Enjoy the journey you’ll be making together.

The next time that you are subjected to a teenage horror story that includes the words “you just wait,” you’ll be able to smile with the confidence of knowing that you have your plan in place.  You and your child will be writing your own story, thank you very much.

Caroline Calls the Butterflies

I just adore a fresh, untainted mind.

Before we arrive on this planet, we are part of the All-Knowing crowd, eager to come here and create our life experience.  Then, because of the way that the system is designed, we have to stash that information somewhere within us for safekeeping while we rely on our grown-ups to nurture our physical selves.  After all, we have to have some time to adapt to living here.

Babies have that original mindset intact.  I can see it sometimes stashed right there behind their eyes when I look into those little peepers.

My niece, who has only been here for a little over two years, still has that unmistakable sparkle in her eyes.  Cara hasn’t been here long enough to encounter enough grown-ups to mess up her original programming.  I’m trying not to be one of the grown-ups who do.

On some mornings I take a walk with young Caroline while her younger brother is napping.   I am in complete awe that she will actually summon the nearby butterflies.  She does it so naturally that I find myself working really hard not to provide her with any ideas that she can’t.  I could try to invite the creatures to flutter around me as Cara does, but I’m afraid that I’ll screw it up with thoughts like “this is ridiculous” and “this will never work.”  Instead, I’ll just admire her work as she walks along singing, “c’mere butterfly” and watch as they start appearing all around us.  Caroline’s own brand of untainted programming works like magic.

Never too late for an old witch to learn some new tricks from a young one.

Go Walk the Dog

This may be a bit of an exaggeration, but it seems I have about 9 thousand spiral-bound notebooks, journals, tablets and dated calendars that are full of my reflective thoughts, poems, drawings, and hand-written spells.  Stuffed within their pages are many photos and a number of clippings from various publications that I’ve accumulated over the years.  Until I decided to start this blog, I’m quite sure that I have rarely, if ever, even looked through any of them after I’d written or inserted all that stuff in them.

Working in the Craft I’ve learned the true value of self-discovery.  Throughout our lives we collect many ‘aspects’ of ourselves that define and shape how we relate to the real world and other beings around us.  Understanding these aspects is necessary in order to make any desired change.  This is much like the process of identifying a problem before you can ascertain a solution.

There are various means available in getting to ‘know thy self’.  Journal writing (and apparently collecting a bunch of relevant paper items) is my preferred method of cataloging aspects of my Self.  Mr. Bean likes to turn off the radio when he’s driving alone in his truck just to sort out his Inner thoughts.  Our oldest daughter prefers to receive her Self revelations while she’s alone in the shower.

Whatever the chosen method, it’s always beneficial to allow yourself some time now and then to explore what’s been accumulating in your Being.  Until you give yourself a process by which you can effectively recognize and understand what you’ve been collecting in there, you can’t make an informed decision on which aspects to keep, which to discard, or which ones you’d like to alter.

Walk the dog, pet the cat, take a shower, go for a drive, or write a letter to yourself this weekend and explore the ‘aspects’ of you.  When you discover who you are and how you think and feel, it’s easier to venture forth in creating who you would like to be, what you would prefer to experience, and how you would rather think and feel about the real world.  Once you have completed this particular session in your process, you will have moved on and never have to review it again.

…Unless of course you would like to start a blog.  Then you’ll have to go back and look at what it was you discovered just for reference:)

The Saving Grace of Suzanne Case

Not long ago there was a time when I came dangerously close to ‘death by PTA’.  There were a few deciding factors that had delivered me from this fate, but it is the friendship of Suzie Case that I recall most fondly.

I spent several years participating in volunteer opportunities that were related to our kids’ education and extra-curricular activities.  My motivation grew from a desire to enrich the experience of my own children and that of their peers.  I sought to demonstrate the absolute value of community service.

As a former member of the all-or-nothing club, I went full-scale with PTA.  By the time that the youngest of our three children had entered kindergarten, I had been on the PTA board of our elementary school for 6 years, serving as committee chair, secretary, vice president and president.

As is typical in any organization, I developed many ongoing relationships with other grown-ups.  The bulk of these relationships remained mostly superficial out of pure necessity.  The process of working efficiently in any environment that includes a sizable number of adults requires mindful leadership.  In order to complete the tasks at hand I found myself stroking egos, listening to complaints, squelching gossip, repairing trysts, and generally employing every available tactic at my disposal to keep people motivated.

We got a lot done.  We initiated several new programs and improved upon existing ones to enhance the experience of our kids’ public school education.  Teachers were happy, parents felt proud of their accomplishments, administration loved us, and the kids were enjoying their school.  I was tired.

It was a Sunday evening.  I was standing on a ladder trying to finish painting the few remaining clouds on the ceiling of the school cafeteria.  As part of an ongoing beautification project, a group of us had dedicated several nights and weekends to redecorating the interior of the dining hall to reflect a castle courtyard theme, complete with faux stone walls, a huge friendly dragon, and expansive blue sky.  There were a handful of parents and one teacher who had been there with me since early afternoon.  We were trying to complete  the project before school started Monday.  I had brought my son James along with me while Mr. Bean stayed home with the girls.  I looked down from my marathon perch atop the ladder to notice that James was standing with one foot on the bottom rung.  “Mom,” he spoke softly.  “When can we go home?”  I looked around and could see through the windows that it had already gotten dark outside.  I had been so intent on getting those clouds done that I had barely noticed how late it was.  Exhaustion blended with a fair amount of frustration swept over me ever so gently and I felt myself begin to cry.  I was overcome with a heavy-heartedness.  I have no idea how long I was weeping up there on top of that ladder with my head firmly planted in the crook of my arm until I felt Suzie Case reach up and take the paint brush out of my hand.  She had situated James and her daughter Kate at a nearby table where they were sharing some fudge bars that Suzie had obviously procured from the school’s kitchen freezer.  “Let’s go outside,” she stated plainly.

Suzie and I sat on the stoop just outside of the cafeteria door long enough for me to always remember how peaceful and comforting that moment was.  We didn’t talk much.  She displayed no reaction when I lit a cigarette that I had dug from a well-hidden location in my purse, there was no judgment in her voice when I expressed my revelations on volunteer excess, and she didn’t flinch when I started to sob more.  She just sat there with me, guarding my solitude for as long as I needed her to be there.

I still run into Suzie on occasion.  Her youngest daughter and mine remained the best of friends throughout elementary school and Suzie and I spent many of those years involved in their school related events.  As our girls gradually grew apart in middle school, it seemed that Suzie and I gradually eased out of the parent volunteer scene.  Younger and more exuberant parents have taken the helm and I am thankful.  On the rare occasions that I do see or talk with Suzie now, it is always a genuine and heartfelt encounter.  I’ll always treasure that time we had together on the stoop that one Sunday evening when Suzie Case had delivered me from PTA hell.

We did finish that damn cafeteria, too.

Can’t Live With ‘Em, Can’t Hit ‘Em Over the Head with a Shovel…

The masculine energy was so powerful in my house today that I had to go outside just to stop bumping into it.

Marriage, like any relationship, requires a constant balancing act between two distinctly individual energy fields.  Some days these fields overlap and coexist in complete harmony.  Other days, well, it can feel a bit crowded and unbalanced.  It’s days like these I will make a conscious effort to reposition myself before the opposing fronts collide in a violent manner.

It took me a long time to be familiar with my own ‘atmosphere’.  Since I was never a fan of the half-assed approach to knowing thy self, I’ve spent a good deal of time discovering the multifaceted circuitry that comprises my energy flow.  I only experience misery and discontent when I allow the circuitry of another being to negatively interfere with the flow of mine. My beloved husband, Mr. Durwood Bean, is simply wired differently than I am.  Most days we create a well-blended current.  On some days we produce an unpleasant and adverse electrical output.  When I smell smoke, I know it’s time to physically move away from him before someone gets hurt.

One of the most attractive features of the art and science of witchcraft is that unlike most mainstream practices, the feminine energy of intuition and emotion are given as much validity as the masculine energy of logic and thought.  Individual personality traits aside, I’ve found that John Gray’s book “Men are from Mars, Women are from Venus” is one of the most useful resources for understanding the distinctions between me and Mr. Bean.  I recommend it as a handy reference for anyone interested in the process of mapping out the circuitry of their own individual energy field.  Since reading it for the first time almost 15 years ago, I appreciate John Gray’s accurate descriptions of the natural feminine and masculine traits we project in relation to each other.  Although I’m quite certain that Mr. Bean has never read the book himself, I do know that he has been benefiting from its wisdom:)

Thanks to Dr. John Gray, I won’t be hitting Durwood over the head with a shovel tonight…..though he will be receiving a rather lengthy message from Venus over coffee tomorrow morning.

What Goes In Must Come Out (eventually!)

I’m 49 years old and I know every word to the Dora the Explorer theme song.  If my loaded brain is capable of absorbing and retaining this senseless tune, imagine what’s inserting itself into the filing cabinet of my 2 year old niece’s brain.

Since I’ve been spending quite a lot of time with my niece and her younger brother, I remember how convenient the television can be when you’re home with the kids.  I find myself using it for one of two reasons: I’ve exhausted my own resources for entertaining them (and I need a break) or I’ve got something else to do and need to keep them busy.

Every time I resort to the television I relinquish my control over their cognitive acquisition process.  It’s not the end of the world, but as a caretaker of young minds, it’s my responsibility to pay attention to what they are taking in.

Words and images enter their mental library constantly.  When these materials are repeated on a regular basis they become part of their reference files.  It shouldn’t be a big surprise when they access one of these files.  The first time that I heard Cara use the expression “dammit”, especially in its appropriate context, I was reminded of just how efficiently this system works.  Way to go, Aunt Jillian.

Whether she gets it from me or the television is not the point.  The point is that she is in the process of building her own personal reference library, so why not supplement it with healthy materials?

Here’s an easy one to try:  The next time your child accomplishes something, instead of saying “I am so proud of you” change the words to  “Wow, I bet YOU are so proud of YOURSELF.”  It’s just a small tweak, but one that could make the difference in a child who grows up to value self-approval before always having to seek  the approval of others first.

I used this technique with my own kids, who are now confident young adults; so you might say it works like magic.  Then again, there’s always “Dora, dora, dora the explorer….”

The Witch Is In

Welcome!  Thanks for stopping by…

The broom closet door is wide open and I have much to share.

Articles about my experience with motherhood, marriage, family and friendship are currently under construction.

For now, please check out my About page above.

Hope you come back to visit me again soon!

-Jillian