Soda, Champagne, or Chablis? Let’s Toast to 2023!

Out with the old and in with the new!
There’s magic on New Year’s in all that you do!
Beth

Rejoice, my dears! We stand at the crossroads of a new year!

I suggest that you spend some time today in sacred space, setting your intention for the shining promise of this new beginning.

Supported by Mercury, Mars, and Uranus in retrograde, this is an ideal time to REview, REflect, RElax, and make sure that in days of auld lang syne, old acquaintance not be forgot.

New Year’s is a gateway of very old magic, and all forms of manifesting, spells, and rituals are amplified at this turning.

You can prepare for this moment of initiation by knowing that everything you do on New Year’s Eve and New Year’s Day is loaded with magical significance.

Rituals and Preparations

For example, make a ritual of writing down a list of all you do not want to carry forward into the new year. A toss into the fire or a smoldering, cleansing-herb filled cauldron will release those energies and is a time-honored tradition.

This is an ideal time to make a vision board for what you’d like to manifest in the coming year.

Or pick a word that will be your inspiration and guidepost for the days ahead. Write it down or make it into art. Just be sure to put it somewhere that you will be reminded of it every day. My friend, Lunaea Weatherstone, has written an inspiring article about how she goes about this.

In many parts of the world, the New Year is greeted with a lot of noise, sometimes made by church bells. Originally this was to frighten away evil spirits that might try to sneak into the New Year and try to spoil it. People in the Northern Hemisphere sometimes lit bonfires for the same reason.

Some of our neighbors out here in the woods of Durham County, North Carolina like to shoot off guns and bottle rockets.

But shooting guns up into the air is colossally stupid, as the bullets must come down somewhere. Serious property damage, injuries, and even death can result, not to mention terrorizing the local wildlife. So the local animals and I prefer the ringing of bells and songs offered to the Guardians.

Before midnight tonight, sweep and clean your house and take out all the trash. You don’t want to sweep tomorrow or take anything out of the house, or else you will sweep away the new beginning that tomorrow brings.

And doing laundry is extremely bad luck on New Year’s Day. Just so you know. (More tomorrow!)

Also, be sure you finish any projects you still have to complete, for they say that a task carried over will never prosper. If there’s something BIG going on that can’t be finished, at least complete a component of it, done and dusted.

Manifesting Prosperity

Using that same sympathetic magic, you might follow the custom of leaving some money just outside your door, so that you can bring it in first thing tomorrow, setting a prosperity spell for the entire year! This has worked beautifully for us for a number of years.

The American custom of spending the night with the one you love and kissing them at midnight insures that the relationship will thrive in the coming year.

In Vienna, the pig (sacred to the Goddess Freya, whose time this is) is the symbol of good luck. Pigs are let loose in restaurants and everyone tries to touch it for luck, as it runs by. In private homes, a marzipan pig, with a gold piece in its mouth, is suspended from a ribbon and touched instead.

Hogmanay

Since ancient times in Scotland, this night has been celebrated as Hogmanay. Outshining even Christmas celebrations (which were banned for over 400 years in Scotland), this is a time for rich feasting, drinking, dancing, tale-telling, and music.

The first person to cross your threshold after midnight brings luck into the house. Since medieval times, then, the best possible first-footer would be a tall, dark-haired, handsome man, who brought gifts of whisky, bread, a piece of coal or firewood and a silver coin.

He enters in silence and no one speaks to him until he puts the coal on the fire, pours a glass for the head of the house and wishes everyone a Happy New Year.

Then, of course, the revelries explode and continue into the wee hours, even for several more days in some cases!

I highly recommend adapting this practice at your parties tonight. It is a magical moment you will never forget, and rich rewards may be yours in the coming year!

Divination and Magic

Naturally, this a wonderful night for divination, and it’s perfect for those of you who read the cards.

Otherwise, since I am no longer offering personal readings, an alternative way to determine your future in the new year is to prick a newly-laid egg at the smaller end with a pin. Let three drops of the egg white fall into a bowl of water.

Then use your powers of scrying to interpret the designs it makes. This will give you a glimpse of what the new year holds in store for you.

Another tradition for the young people is one that comes to us by way of Russia. Put a thread through a golden ring. Pour some water into a glass and then lower the thread with the ring into it.

Wait quietly until it begins to swing and knock against the borders. Count the number of strikes – they denote the age when you’ll get married.

Ancestors and Modern Times Entwined

And you know those resolutions we make year in and year out (or else resolve not to make anymore)? We are not alone!

There are records from 4,000 years ago in Babylon of New Year’s resolutions. Often they were announced publicly. The most common were to make good any outstanding debts and return anything borrowed.

Nowadays, the most common resolutions are to lose weight and give up smoking, closely followed by .. guess what! .. making good any outstanding debts and returning borrowed goods!

And speaking of our long-ago ancestors, the ancient Egyptians, Greeks and Romans all had the tradition of showing off the first babies born in the year. In the 14th century the custom of showing a baby entwined with a banner of the New Year began, in Germany.

The Divine Ones

New Year’s Eve is sacred to Yemaya, the Mother of the Sea. In Brazil, people dress in white, go down to the ocean, light candles in the sand and throw white flowers into the waves for Her.

In the ancient Egyptian traditions, today is the sacred day of Sekhmet, the lion-headed Goddess whose worship center was Memphis, Egypt. Nursing mothers would pray to Her to let down their milk and to protect their wee babes.

And this day is also set aside for honoring Vesta – the Roman Goddess of the hearth. Known by the Greeks as Hestia, She was credited with the art of building houses (since every home was built around the sacred central fire). A good energetic cleansing and blessing of your hearth would be a most rewarding activity today.

Perhaps echoing that custom, this is the day that many put away their Solstice decorations, for some say it is bad luck for them to still be up in the New Year.

At least be sure to give thanks on this night for the benevolence of Hestia, for the roof above your head, and the plenty in your life. Many in our challenging economic times have discovered that home is a precious, sometimes precarious gift.

And we especially send our prayers on behalf of the estimated 103 million souls who have been forcibly displaced from their homes, including those fleeing the war in Ukraine.

Blessed be to your holy home, as it gives you the nurturing and comfort that enables you to go out into the world.

Gracious Blessings in the Name of Hecate

And as you know, the last day of every month is sacred to our dear Hecate. Hecate is the Goddess of Witches and the psychopomp, who shows the way to those crossing to the lands of the dead. As such, She is the Guardian of the Crossroads, including all mundane road crossings as well as the crossroads between life and death.

We especially welcome Her as She presides at this crossroads of the Year.

She is the Triple Goddess in Her most ancient form, the trinity of Artemis the Maiden, Selene, the Mother, and by Her own name, Hecate, the Crone.

On this night, leave food at a crossroads in Her name. If you are especially wise, you will pick a crossroads where She can see to it that the hungry may eat it, whether they know it is in Her name or not.

Hecate also rules over prophecy, healing, visions and magic. This amplifies even more the magic of New Year’s Eve as an outstanding night for divination, meditation and spellwork.

So raise a glass with me, and bid farewell to 2022, a year of shocks and challenges, if ever there was one. For better or worse, it is about to be a closed chapter.
Hail the new, ye lads and lasses.

2023 is knocking on our door.

This is an updated collection of tidbits from my posts in years past, with heartfelt thanks to the late, beloved Waverly FitzGerald, from whom I learned so much. Blessings to you, Waverly, for your legacy as a Priestess of Time and Teacher of the Wisdom of the Ancient Ways. What is remembered lives.