Robin Rose Bennett’s White Birch Ritual for the Witches’ New Year

Guest Post by Robin Rose Bennett, author of Healing Magic and The Gift of Healing Herbs

It is the sacred time, most magical time, when the veils between the worlds are thin… amidst the partying you may do, take time to connect deeply, too, with the world of Spirit, with your loved ones who have passed, for it and they are closest to you now. Honor with your love and attention those who have passed into Spirit, especially this past year. Light candles, eat pumpkins and squash, pay attention to your dreams.

– Robin Rose Bennett

White Birch Ritual for the Witches’ New Year

Gather some white birch bark from a fallen tree or branch. Never peel the bark off all the way around a living tree trunk, because that can seriously harm or even kill the tree. Let it dry thoroughly. White birch bark peels off the tree in strips and represents shedding what is no longer needed—what you’ve outgrown yet may still be clinging to. It is often used in rituals related to death and rebirth.

When you want to initiate a change in your life, meditate and ask for guidance to see how you are holding yourself back from being your whole, true self. Ask to be shown what you could choose to release in order to live more fully and with less fear. It may be familiar theme that you are being asked to take a deeper level; or something you’ve never looked at before may reveal itself to you.

Write a phrase or word, or draw an image that symbolizes whatever it is that you want to let go. This could be any physical habit, habit of mind, or old belief that is no longer serving you. Make sure that it is something for you to do, or stop doing—not some way in which you want someone else to change. You can only be responsible for you choices, not someone else’s.

Writing what you are letting go, on this bark “paper” that represents beginnings, symbolizes how endings are always followed by new beginnings. Rebirth follows death as spring follows winter. Release whatever you have written on the birch paper into a ritual fire. When you burn the bark, say aloud what you are releasing, or say it silently to yourself. Either way, you have powerfully initiated a change, and now the day-to-day work begins. It is spiritual growth work you’ve chosen for yourself, so persevere and it will be worthwhile.

Excerpted from Healing Magic by Robin Rose Bennett. © 2014, North Atlantic Books.