Samhain Ritual

Needed:

  • Sea salt
  • Orange candle
  • Gold candle
  • Yellow candle
  • Light blue candle
  • Decorations suitable to fall (see below)
  • Patchouli incense
  • Homemade bread and juice, wine or spring water
  • Mortar and pestle
  • Square of muslin or cotton
  • Needle and thread
  • Pen
  • 4 tiny slips of paper

Ahead of time, select a quiet corner of your home for your ceremony, or better yet, decide upon a place in nature which makes you feel close to your higher power.

Also, gather and dry a few blooms from honeysuckle, sage and marigold plants.

  • Honeysuckle enhances your psychic abilities and helps attract prosperity.
  • Marigold encourages prophetic dreams to help you access your subconscious knowledge.
  • Sage is for wisdom and clarity.

During your ceremony, any or all of these herbs can be sewn into a tiny charm bag made from muslin or cotton, and then dedicated to a single purpose of your choosing. Your charm bag can be worn or carried throughout the season.

You might also want to prepare a special harvest celebration bread.

Prepare yourself by drawing a bath and adding sea salt, then light an orange candle. As you slip into the water, imagine the golden glow of the sun in your bath and around your aura. Bathe in the solar energy, clearing away anything you no longer need to hold on to.

After bathing, take the orange candle and go to your pre-selected place of celebration and decorate a table with pine cones, grains, dried ears of corn, grapes, nuts, colorful fall leaves, and autumn flowers. A cornucopia is especially significant as it symbolizes the wealth of the harvest and our gratitude for the abundance in our lives.

Light your incense and set your four candles in non-flammable holders (or a container filled with sand) then concentrate on the symbolism of each candle's color as you write your intentions on separate pieces of paper.

Place the appropriate paper under each candle and light it:

  1. Orange: Warmth, energy, creativity. What do I need to acquire to bring more joy into my life?
  2. Yellow: Communication. How can I best communicate and translate my desires using creative energy?
  3. Light Blue: Idealism, spirituality. How can I increase my spiritual awareness and keep my desires congruent with my life's purpose?
  4. Gold: Abundance. What am I most grateful for today, and how can these gifts help me during the next three months?

While your candles are burning (with the slips of paper tucked beneath them), grind your herbs individually with a mortar and pestle and concentrate on their particular energies as described above. Stitch up a small charm bag, add the herbs, and offer a silent prayer of gratitude for the abundance in your life and for the desires of your heart which will soon come to fruition.

Spend some time meditating and truly appreciating the beauty of the world around you. Then eat, drink and be merry!

When your celebration is complete, you can remove your intention papers from below each candle, place them in your charm bag and stitch it closed. You might instead want to burn each paper in the flame of its candle, allowing your intentions to be sent out powerfully into the ethers.) In the same order you lit them, snuff out your candles. (You don't want to scatter the energies by blowing them out.)