You are magic.
I’ve said it before. You won the jackpot. Out of all the genetic combinations possible between your parents, it was you who was born. Your parents, your grandparents, even your great-grandparents dated other people before they got married, they may have even been engaged to someone else and then called it off. So many pieces had to fall into place for you to arrive.
As Samhain (SAH-win) approaches (Samhain is witchy talk for Halloween) , the veil between us and our ancestors thins. (Halloween, or Hallowe’en is a shortening of All Hallow Even, the evening before All Hallows Day which precedes All Souls Day)
This is the perfect time to reflect on your lineage and to give thanks for everyone who came before you. Some of them went to great lengths and endured hardships, if not atrocities, to ensure you got here.
My grandmother, my mother’s mother, was adopted. The story goes something like this.
My great-grandmother desperately wanted a child. She finally conceived and carried the baby to term, only to have a miscarriage. While at the hospital, she learned of a woman who was having what seemed like her fifteenth child. Her family couldn’t afford another mouth to feed, another body to clothe. The women met, made a deal, got the Salvation Army to handle the adoption and everyone left happy.
Especially me. I’m happy to be here, to have a chance to do what I love, to fulfill the soul contract that I made before this life to heal others. To ensure that my son and daughter and their children and their children’s children can fulfill theirs.
I’m not sure if the dead great-grandmother I used to talk to was the birth mother or adopting mother of my grandmother, but she and I had a connection when I was little.
When I clear energy, dead people still come through and send messages to their loved ones. With only one exception they have all communicated nothing but love. Just last week, I was working with a client. We were talking about her father. I said, “I’m having trouble clearing because I’m seeing fireworks shaped like a heart and all I can smell is roast beef, mashed potatoes and gravy.” My client said, “Oh! That was my dad’s favorite meal.”
We have two weeks before Samhain. Plenty of time to honor your dead and tell them how much they mean to you, whether you knew them personally or not. Here are some ideas.
- Sit in meditation, invite them to join you, and thank them
- Prepare and eat their favorite foods
- Donate money to a cause they believed in (My family donates to the Salvation Army)
- Pour a libation, that is pour a drink onto the ground for them
- Create an altar with photos or add photos to your existing altar
- Share your memories
My grandmother died when I was four but that doesn’t mean I don’t have plenty of memories of her. She had a real sense of style. She was a horrible cook. Her name was Evangeline (the Salvation Army are evangelists after all), but everyone called her Babe. She never had a full drink, just a little in a juice glass (that kept getting topped off).
But my most vivid memory of her was after I was in a car accident. It was the early 1960s. My mother was driving, and I had been in the front seat without a seatbelt. My mother stopped short, I went flying and hit the dashboard. I had a gash over my eyebrow and was bleeding like crazy. My mother drove straight to her mother’s house and plunked me on the sofa while she went to freak out. My grandmother told me to come with her into the kitchen where she would give me some Vernors. Vernors is a ginger ale everyone in Detroit drinks and believes to have magical medicinal properties. They’re fanatical about it. Upset tummy? Cough? Headache? Grouchiness? Bleeding from hitting the dashboard? No need to go to the doctor; have some Vernors.
It didn’t work. I had to get stitches. And I still can’t stand the smell or taste of Vernors.