Ritual doesn’t mean candles and robes. It means repetition with meaning – and you’ve been doing it since you started brushing your teeth.
When I started out in spiritual work, I really struggled with this one. Ritual. What even is it. I had this picture in my head – candles, robes, a circle of people who all somehow knew what they were doing – and none of it matched anything in my actual life, so I figured ritual just wasn’t for me yet. Totally wasn’t ready for that level of commitment. I needed to learn more first, get more serious, earn my way into it somehow.
Well, it took me a long time to work out that I already knew what ritual was. I’d been doing it my whole life.
Why light one candle when you can light three? And some incense….
So What Was I Missing, Orlagh?
I grew up Catholic. Still am, in my own way – pagan Catholic, I call myself, which tells you something about the in-between space I live in. And it took me an embarrassingly long time to connect the dots that the sacraments I’d been raised on – weekly Mass, confession, baptism, communion, confirmation, marriage – are rituals. Not “ritual-adjacent.” Not “a bit like ritual if you squint.” Rituals. Full stop. Never mind the “special” Masses that show up around specific points in the year, Easter, Christmas, all of that – that’s ritual wearing a different coat, tied to the turning of the year the same way Imbolc is.
What Else Counts, Then?
So then I went further. If Mass is a ritual, what else is?
Turns out: loads. Brushing your teeth every morning. Your (semi) regular – if you’re me – hair appointment. The weekly takeaway. Your daily coffee, made the same way, at the same time, in the same cup. None of these look like ritual cos none of them come with candles or robes or anyone chanting anything. But they’re regularly repeated actions that carry meaning beyond the action itself, and that’s the actual definition. That’s it. That’s the whole bar.
Ritual doesn’t mean massive. It doesn’t mean huge, elaborate, performed for an audience, done “properly” according to some rulebook you haven’t found yet. It can be that, sure, if that’s what you want and what you can sustain. But it doesn’t have to be. The Mass you sat through as a child and the coffee you make every morning without thinking about it are doing the same basic job – marking something as significant through repetition – even though one has incense and the other has instant coffee granules.
My First Ritual
Once I understood that, my first actual, deliberate, this-is-a-ritual ritual was almost insultingly simple. I lit a candle.
Surprising no one, if you know anything about Irish people and our relationship with candles. We’ve been lighting them for intentions for generations – a candle for a safe journey, a candle for an exam, a candle for someone who’s sick, a candle just because you needed to do something with your hands while you hoped for something you couldn’t control… I was following a very long tradition without even fully realising it at the time. No need for a script. I needed a match and something I wanted to hold in my mind while it burned.
That’s genuinely where I’d tell anyone to start, if they’re standing where I was standing – convinced ritual is a locked door they haven’t found the key for yet. It isn’t locked. You’ve been doing it for years, just without the label. Light the candle. See what happens.
I know, it’s not even Samhain yet, and I’m already speaking about preparing for Imbolc.
But there’s a reason for it. Namely, I start preparing for Imbolc around the time of Samhain. In the same way I start preparing for Samhain around the time of Lúnasa. But for Imbolc, I take some of ye along with me on the journey.
Let’s be serious, ye already knew lighting candles was ging to be a part of this!
And it’s no joke to say that I start writing about this nearly every year at this time…
What takes so long, FFS?
Well yeah, ok here’s the thing. I prepare for Imbolc over three months, because I considering the time between Samhain and Imbolc to be my dreaming period. My planning period. I’ve taken stock of where I am and what I’ve achieved between Lúnasa and Samhain. So, Samhain to Imbolc is the heavy work.
I prepare for Imbolc in the physical, emotional and spiritual realms.
And I allocate about a month for each in my preparation cycle. Imbolc isn’t just an event to me, it’s a season. And as such, I use it as part of my seasonal work. I mean, I go through a cycle of physical, emotional and spiritual work in all seasons, but for Imbolc it’s extra special preparation.
And yeah, that’s cos of the links with Brigid. Definitely.
But it’s also because I consider the work done between Samhain and Imbolc as the most important in the year. It’s how I set up my year, plan my year, engage with my audience to find out what’s needed and what isn’t for the coming year.
It’s my time for reflection, review, engagement… all of that good stuff.
And it takes time.
Preparing for Imbolc is a whole-person approach for me. And it’s different every year. There are some basics that stay the same, and I’ll talk about them down below, but the specifics change, over and over again.
Physically preparing for Imbolc
OK, a lot of this is cleaning. Seriously.
Thankfully Christmas happens between Samhain and Imbolc, otherwise, I’d never get things as clean as I want for the season. But there is a feeling or a need to clear our the house come spring. Which as we know, starts to show it’s face around Imbolc. It’s not the height of spring – I’d label that as the equinox. But still…
And particularly with Imbolc, after the winter season of closing doors and windows, there’s a great need to let the fresh air. To clear out the corners. Get the energy moving again.
(This is northern hemisphere based and four-seasons based of course. If you’re in a different season rotation – you may need to adjust!)
But preparing for Imbolc by getting things going again really feels apt for the season in Ireland and the stage of the year. And a good scrubbing of the house really helps get the energy moving again. As does a clean breeze coming through.
Now, of course, you may get complaints from certain inhabitants about the cold, etc. But I dare anyone not to enjoy the feeling of a truly clean, fresh house.
And it gives us a clean slate to start the rest of the year with. Which feeds into…
Emotionally preparing for Imbolc
Now, I’m the last to tell anyone how they might feel or how their emotions might affect them. But I know for me and mine, the dark winter months are touch, emotionally speaking. I tend to leave the house in the dark and get back to work in the dark.
In fact this started last week – admittedly, I was in work for 7am, but still. There is a definitely shortening of both morning and evening light. And this has an effect on our mood. Even the HSE, our health and safety people, recommend everyone in the country should take a vitamin D supplement.
Image taken from the HSE website
I mean, half the country is on anti-depressants, even with the gorgeous scenery. And that standing joke about God not letting it rain for 40 days and 40 nights anymore, but 40 days and 39 and a half nights is definitely within scope is accurate here.
How much does it rain?
As is our assessment of other climate’s rainy season. I remember being in Gambia years ago and being warned I was going during the rainy season. They got a mere 2 hours of rain every day and you could set your clock by it…
That was a gorgeous summer as far as I was concerned!
(Before anyone starts- I know monsoons and other dramatic rain are far worse than what we get. But for days of rain per year, we’re kinda up there. There’s a reason all the fields are green, ok?)
So, all in all, looking after our emotional health is important this time of year. It’s also why I consider the lighting of candles and fires to be an essential component of preparing for Imbolc. Not just about the connections of Brigid and fire. It’s about that deep seated emotional need we have for light at this dark time of the year.
Spiritually preparing for Imbolc
I mean, ye know this was coming, right? It’s not like I hide it.
And while the physical and emotional preparation are vitally important, the spiritual preparation for Imbolc is at the core of what the celebration means to me.
And the spiritual preparation can be deeply personal. For anyone! Of course there will be the public stuff. I am mostly likely to run a virtual retreat this year, again. There’s a good chance I’ll be sharing the public or public-friendly bits of my celebration on Instagram or in the Facebook group.
But there are always personal parts. I might share the fact that a spiritual shower or sacred cleanse is an important part of my celebration, but I don’t usually share the explicit details of it. I might share a pic of my brat Bhríde hanging from the door. It’s not so likely I’ll share the details of the prayers and blessings I add into my own private ritual.
There is always that dividing line for me between the publicly available stuff and the personal stuff. Whether that stuff is personal gnosis or just none of anyone else’s business doesn’t matter.
What does matter is that when I’m teaching, I give you the tools to develop your own practices. Because that’s where the value is. Not in copying what I do by rote.
Heads up
So this is a heads up. A heads up for both you and me.
We’ll be starting the course on 1st November. It ends up usually being about 5 classes over three months… I’m great at planning these things to be even and regular… not. So, there’s usually a gap over Christmas, but don’t worry. Sessions are recorded and usually available within a day or two.
