How to work with wheel of the year? Do I really have to?

Samhain is approaching and thought I will write another class typical for Samhain, I need to explain one thing first - Samhain is the first celebration on the wheel and start of the pagan new year, so now it's a good time to explain what the wheel truly is. Wheel of the year is a pagan calendar, marking the festivals. Often it's connected with the moon cycle, seasons and weather. We need to remember, that the early pagan cultures were also agricultural. For them, change of seasons was important to plan ahead. We need food for a darker and colder time, but we also need seeds to start new growth in the spring. So everything had to be planned and the wheel helped with it. At that time it was more intuition-based, as a bone culture had an official calendar back then, and the wheel itself was described by modern paganic and Wiccan cultures, but the symbolic meaning of the wheel shouldn't be ignored, as it helps us with specific correspondences too. We already know that correspondences are important and helpful with our spells, and everything has them, including seasons and festivals. Also, something worth mentioning is that the wheel is based on Celtic tradition - many sources and researchers are claiming that ancient Celts were celebrating day and night festivals as well as the fact that life isn't stuck in place, everything is connected and after night is always a day. Every time keeps flowing and repeating itself. Here we notice the more cyclical nature of the time itself. We will talk more about it in later steps.

The story of the wheel and its symbolism

I am not sure if this story comes more from pagan or Wiccan tradition, but there is one story explaining energies of the year and also the story of the wheel. During the whole year, we are surrounded by the feminine energy of the Mother Goddess. She is with us always, nurture and help us, but also teaches us, as we are her children. The story itself is connected not only with her but also with two Gods. So we have here 3 beings that are connected to one another. In future based on this will be catholic beliefs, yet they remove the goddess and feminine energy, leaving only a masculine one. We do have Saint Mary, but she's not the creator Goddess, as pagans believe.

In numerology number 3 is a number of life and death, balance, past present and future, cycles and new beginnings. All of that is found on the wheel itself. Some also claim 3 is the perfect divine number, so I am not surprised that this number is used in the story.

The story itself is very simple. As the year starts on Samhain the Goddess resides in the underworld with the Dark God. Because she's absent on the earth so is life. The plants die, and the sun is weaker. She is resting there and sleeping. The Dark God is ruling over the land and spreads cold and dark. This is the hardest time of the year - there is no food growing, the days are shorter and shorter and the night is long, and it becomes only harder and harder. Once the day is so short, we reach Yule - Winter Solstice and the longest night in the year. Because of so much destroyed balance between day and night, the Light God decides to intervene. He reaches the Dark God and demands him to stop. They agree on the fight and the Light God wins. Because of that, since the Yule, we have had more light and the days are becoming longer too. Warmth keeps coming back to our lives, and slowly Goddess awakes too. She leaves the underworld and moves to the Light God, staying with him on Earth. We reach Imbolc, the time where the couple is trying to fertilize the earth with their own copulation, and soon it starts growing. During this time we plant seeds to soon have the first plants. As they nurture themselves and Earth, we reach spiring time - Ostara. Everything is growing and on full growth. This will keep this way until summer. After Ostara we reach Beltane - the festival of fire, slowly celebrating more warm temperatures

and the sun showing more and more. Now Goddess is spending her time on Earth, and the Light God is warming the planet, helping her to reach more potential...the warmer it gets and the more growth comes the more Dark God is annoyed. As he doesn't like life itself, he gets angrier and finally demands another fight. Light God spent most of his time helping the Goddess and he's weaker now. As the battle on Litha (summer solstice) is won by the Dark God, the days again becomes shorter. Now it's the time for reaching fruits. The first result of Dark God union with the Goddess is appearing on Lughnasadh, the first harvest and it will continue until the Mabon. After that time, there is nothing to reap and the Goddess is tired of her work, so she again moves to the underworld to rest.

The story itself I very simple, but it's full of different symbols and meanings associated with not only the wheel but also specific festivals. The festivals happen once in 1.5 Months, so they are often celebrated, especially if we add also full moons, during which we celebrate too, but that's the topic for other times. The symbolism also shows us the flow of life and nature - life and death, seasons, good and evil, light and dark.

The eternal fight of gods goes on and on. The wheel and the story help us understand most of the festival influence on our human life too. We will explore deeply the symbols dedicated to the specific festivals, as there are many things to go. But the wheel can be also associated with one of the tarot cards - the wheel of fortune.

As the Wheel of Fortune in the Tarot symbolizes life is in a state of change. Good luck and good fortune will make their return in time, the same can be seen in the wheel. For most agricultural societies, the land and the fertility of it is the most important issue - we have wealth, but not in the form of money, but goods. We have food, we have animals. When animals die, we use it. We use meat to feed ourselves. We use the skin to make clothes and shoes. We use the bones in rituals. The parts we don't need we leave so animals can feed, earth be fertilized and then new life will spring in form of fruits or vegetables. Everything has its own flow. So even if winter is harsh and nothing grows anymore, we know soon it will pass. The wheel will turn and the same will happen after being worn on-field in summer. The time of rest and being with the family will come.

How does the wheel look like?

As we explained the symbolism, we can move forward with the wheel of the year and explain how it's looking like. It's a circle with 8 celebrations in its simplest way. Every 1.5 months we have another celebration. You can see that in the image below.

We start on Samhain then we have Winter Solistice - Yule, Imbolc, Ostara, Beltane, and Summer Solistice - Litha, Lughnasadh(sometimes called Lammas) and Mabon. Then we have circle starting again on Samhain. For easier description you can look at the table below.

These are the dates connected with Northern Hemisphere. Please remember that the South one, have the festivals in the opposite order. When we have Samhain, They have Beltane. The wheel works the same way for Southern Hemisphere, but the dates are in another order, which you can see below table: Samhain - 30.04/01.05 Yule - 21.06 Imbolc - 01.08 Ostara - 21.09 Beltane - 31.10 Litha - 21.12 Lughnasadh/Lammas - 02.02 Mabon - 21.03

How do I work with the wheel of the year?

Now the most important thing for all the witches and mages - how to actually work knowing all of that? Why would you even bother with knowing all of that? The wheel shows the specific influence of Earth energy and Sun Energy. It helps also with elements of light and darkness. You can use all of that in your work. During the light time, you might connect it with specific elements, seasons and works. Samhain could be connected with death and rebirth, transformation and ancestry. The Darkness is strongest here. Yule is more connected with hope, light and celebration of returning sun. Winter is at its peak and we know soon everything will change for the better. Imbolc is about fertility and creating changes in your life, planting the seeds of changes. Ostara is about growth. Seeing them growing slowly. Beltane is about wealth, fire and positivity. Litha is about sun - positive working, money, wealth and sexual energy. Lammas brings for us the first harvest - we see the first fruits and are able to look at what we still need to fix and grow. Mabon is full harvest - we take out everything which we need. All of those symbols can be used not only on the spell working (making spells also stronger) but also about self-working. You can focus on specific aspects of yourself during that time and slowly heal them with the wheel. You can focus more on negativity since Mabon and see how things can be changed on Imbolc. There are many ways to work with the wheel. Certain spells will be stronger during specific festivals, same as specific Gods and Goddess influence. That would be all from the most important basics about the wheel of the year. I hope you enjoyed learning about it. Everything here comes from my own heritage and personal knowledge.