The Baby and the Bathwater
I was talking to a good friend last month who lives out of state, and of course our conversation wound around to our love/hate relationship with Reclaiming. We both came up through the ranks of Reclaiming as teachers and priestesses, and we both benefitted greatly from the skills in collaborative ritual, facilitation, group journeying, and ecstatic, extemporaneous invocation that you just can’t learn anywhere else.
Both of us have been involved with Reclaiming for around 20 years, and have seen a lot. We’ve seen good people come and go over the years, and have noticed that mostly the good people go after they realize that Reclaiming is a victim of its own idealism and there’s nowhere to “advance” once you have experience and skills. I said that I have been struggling to clarify my present-day involvement with Reclaiming, particularly trying to discern what is baby and what is bathwater and not throwing away that which is of lasting value.
My friend responded instantly: “But there is no baby in the bathwater, and there never has been.” I was stunned at that, and have been thinking about it ever since. Can it be true that what started as a grand experiment in creating a spirituality that was Goddess-centered, egalitarian, politically and socially radical would have absolutely nothing to show for itself 25 years after the fact? Could it be that a community and religious movement which has been at the center of my identity for over two decades consisted all along of nothing but our intense willingness to believe our own promotional language?
I think that’s a pretty harsh assessment, and I’m not sure I fully agree with it. To me, Reclaiming has always been about the web of friendships that I have gained from my involvement in the community. Through Reclaiming I have come into contact, trained, and been in circle with some of the most incredibly talented magical practitioners I ever hope to meet. Even though most of us don’t teach Reclaiming classes or witchcamps anymore, or attend Reclaiming rituals, we are still friends and co-conspirators. These friendships continue to inspire and support us in all the different places we find ourselves both spiritually and socially.
As a sustainable spiritual community venture, I think Reclaiming will not survive because in the end the forces of entropy will be greater than any force binding its parts together. It simply does not have the structural cohesion to survive in the long term. As far as producing a discrete body of knowledge that defines Reclaiming and its practitioners, whatever started out being uniquely Reclaiming has long since been absorbed into the greater eclectic Pagan milieu, so while I think we can claim to have influenced a large number of people, it is more in terms of style than substance.
This post falls far short of a careful analysis of flaws in the structure or ideology of Reclaiming, and perhaps I’ll go into greater detail in a subsequent entry. I would certainly not tell people to avoid Reclaiming; I think there is value in some or most of the core classes, and large group rituals still have the power to encourage major transformation in those for whom that is a necessary next step. But the language, the belief system and ideals that surround most of what gets taught under the aegis of Reclaiming really deserves a fresh, critical eye. Having long since given up trying to raise the bar overall on our teacher training and feedback systems, I genuinely shudder at some of what gets taught now in the name of Reclaiming magic. So while I don’t tell people to avoid Reclaiming, I do caution them to choose their teachers wisely.
At this point, I think the only thing I have to contribute to Reclaiming is a clear-eyed inventory of what many still think is a bathtub full of babies. I am not ready to join my friend in pulling the plug but I do think that, Reclaiming’s future aside, it will be helpful for everyone who has trained or taught Reclaiming-style magic to apply the same clear thinking to their own assumptions and experience, figure out what their own baby is, and get it out of that stinky bathwater.
August 7th, 2006 at 1:55 am
This could generate tomes, my friend. I agree completely about the lack of standards. I’ve often experienced this as leading to sloppy rituals and sloppy magic. That’s the main reason I’ve avoided public rituals for the most part for many, many years.
I continued to attend the Spiral Dance because of community, because it was a place where I could see ‘my people’ once a year, but not for the magic. Even so, there’s no one who gets the energy up like we do in our SDs!
In any case, even my beloved SD Samhain rituals got so bad I quit going altogether. I’ve returned when I’ve been invited to contribute something special, like the invocation of the Mighty Dead of the Craft at the 25th anniversary. I was honored to do so, I took it as a big, important challenge, and an opportunity to foster a group identity. And I think I did a good job, regardless of how well or how poorly other parts of the ritual were performed.
I thought about that a lot before I accepted the challenge, during the time I was trying to meet it, and since. I’ve discussed it with other Pagans and scholars, and have come to realize, thanks to the insightful intelligence of Christopher Chase, that what I did in naming those six Mighty Dead I chose was to in effect canonize them. Very interesting.
However, unlike you and some others, in the last year and a half I’ve experienced a lot of healing between myself and the community at large. I feel more valued, appreciated, respected. Perhaps that’s because I’ve had so many more years of being distanced and uninvolved, except with some individuals.
I, too, shudder at what gets taught in the name of Reclaiming. I’ve been shuddering for years.
And I agree that there’s no structure, and I see this lack of structure, this ‘do whatever feels good’ attitude, as running counter to any notion of long-term stability.
I’d sum up Reclaiming in three phrases: sloppy rituals, lack of standards and accountability of teachers, and juicy magic. Great for ravers and other energy junkies.
I guess I see the situation more as an elephant in the living room or the emperor having no clothes than as babyless icky bathwater. Maybe the baby’s drowning, or getting sick from the dirty water.
Let’s talk more. I’m unwilling to give up entirely on something I’ve put so many years of my adult life into. OTOH, maybe I’m just a slow learner.
August 7th, 2006 at 8:00 pm
thank the goddess! Thank you Anne! Thank you Macha! This is a discussion that NEEDS to be had! I’m thinking on this, and my experience at SpiralHeart camp. Rook and I found out in our path that there’s absolutely no general consensus on what the baby is EXCEPT for we are all our own spiritual authority. Is that a baby?
August 8th, 2006 at 4:42 pm
Maybe. Personally, I’m into She Who Changes, She Who Is All.
August 8th, 2006 at 5:41 pm
Don’t give up yet!! You’re still needed, just maybe not where you are at. We have need for skills and discussions like this one where what works and what doesn’t is out in the open. Don’t drown the baby just yet, please? Some of us are just getting started!
August 8th, 2006 at 7:49 pm
Wow. The Emperor has no clothes, but by behaving as if he did all those years, as co-conspirators co-creating the dream, we bound ourselves to each other in a very deep and lasting way.
I’ve thought a lot about all the people who have left Reclaiming, including myself of course. I still marvel at the potency of the moment when I realized how much of the theology of Reclaiming is a shimmering veil, nothing more. What’s of more value? The fantasy of Reclaiming, or that moment of awakening from its dream of non-hierarchy? Maybe the whole point of getting on the moving walkway of Reclaiming is the point when it’s finally possible to let go of the hubris behind what we call “big magic” and the other conceits of the tradition.
So fleeting is the impact of open source spirituality, eh?
August 9th, 2006 at 11:14 am
Two things that I value so much from Reclaiming - despite barely doing anything within that structure anymore, and having serious issues with some of it - are:
1/in classes, there is room for people to speak, to listen, to hear, which you do not always find elsewhere and
2/ecstatic ritual.
I’m telling you, ecstatic ritual is rare in my experience. Yes, a lot of Reclaiming ritual has gotten bogged down in recent years and needs to be waaayyyy simplified again IMO, but there are people who know how to work to raise energy and hopefully facilitate communion. I find people all over who are really hungry for that.
August 9th, 2006 at 3:58 pm
Worked well for me, to leave, and then come back YEARS later. In a whole nother piece of the country. I think there’s a baby in the bathwater, but I don’t think it’s necessarily the baby we thought was there. Or even necessarily recognizeable as a baby.
Reclaiming’s much bigger, and more fluid, and more unrecognizeable, and more widely spread, than I, at least, expected, 25 years ago. And some of it goes so far up my nose you can’t get it out with a crowbar. But pieces of it I like very much.
What I liked best was the idea that things could change and weren’t going to stay the same, and we could make stuff up. And I still find that. The part about how the humans misuse structures, and want to run things, and are often really misbehaved — well, I have to say that I didn’t believe that ANY structure would fix that.
My version of a belief in Original Sin.
But on the other hand, the humans ARE capable of learning things and changing.
So that’s nice.
Much love, sweetie.
August 11th, 2006 at 1:48 pm
Thorn is absolutely right — nobody, but nobody, gets the juices flowing and consistently raises the level of energy that Reclaiming folks do. I say that from years and years of participation in all kinds of other Pagan and Craft rituals.
Secondly, Reya, it seems that you view Reclaiming as some kind of single, unified, monumental entity, which it isn’t, and never has been. I say that because I do not appreciate being considered, by implication, as a co-conspirator in co-creating the dream. While it’s true that I’ve done plenty to contribute to the manifestation of this dream, whatever it is, at the same time I have distanced myself from Reclaiming for many, many years. I have lots of Big Issues with the whole WitchCamp notion. There has never been a forum to discuss such thingsm and few people would want to hear them anyway, so enamored they are of WCs. And who am I to say what profound changes any individual may have undergone as a result of WC experience(s)?
That said, it’s *my* trad, these are *my* people, *my* community. so to disconnect entirely — which I have not been able to do even when I’ve tried because, like Lady Macbeth, I cannot wash the blood from my hands — would be like cutting out my heart. The entire phenomenon has had a deep and profound impact on my life and growth.
The way I look at is is if ‘we’ leave, then whose dream is it? I will have wasted 30 years of my life. I’m not willing to consider that as the case.
August 12th, 2006 at 6:38 am
Macha I don’t consider my years with Reclaiming a waste, even though I’m completely out of its energy field now. Many apologies for insulting you, that was never my intention. I have a lot of affection and respect for you, and for all my ex co-conspirators. Had to laugh when I saw you compare yourself to Lady Macbeth, unable to wash the blood from your hands? How conspiratorial is that comparison? (I write this with a smile.)
August 12th, 2006 at 11:31 am
Well, it’s not like I haven’t tried over the years. :-) I finally had to realize it wasn’t possible.
Maybe that’s because those of us who actually do things, who are responsive to public inquiries and such, who get a reputation for being knowledgable and reliable sources of info, get permanently associated in the public mind with the whole group. Would you believe that I *still* get phone calls around Samhain giving me names of the BD, asking me if there’s childcare at the SD, asking me if there’s parking and how to get there from Sacramento and what buses to take??? That just blows my mind. It used to bug me when I *was* actively involved — well, not the BD part — because it seems to me that people are perfectly capable of looking at a bloody map or calling the Muni instead of bothering an overworked, un[financially]-remunerated volunteer.
This has all been frustrating, too, because every peak experience as well as every dreadful trauma that anyone has had in a WC setting gets laid at my feet when I travel and it becomes known that I’m somehow ‘in Reclaiming,’ whatever that means. I’m expected to answer for them, and I cannot. I have been precluded from doing that by having been rejected as a teacher. I don’t even know the people they praise or complain about.
Anne, look what you’ve unleashed! Perhaps I should be taking this talk somewhere else. Maybe I’ll move it to my own blog (www.besom.blogspot.com) so you needn’t be clogged with it.
Seems like overripe fruit is dropping from the tree.
August 12th, 2006 at 12:46 pm
I’m relatively new to Reclaiming. So I can’t comment on the way it has changed or if the magic is more sloppy now than before. And I can’t comment on what value the tradition holds to any one. But to speak from my own experience, I have found that Reclaiming magic is far tighter than almost any tradition that I’ve found in my area. I also have learned (and continue to learn) many tools that have deepen my relationship with the Goddess and the elements. For me, Reclaiming (with its warts and all) still has several babies in the bath water.
August 12th, 2006 at 12:58 pm
Sorry to be using this blog like this, but I know of no other way to contact Jason.
Jason, where do you live? I am truly amazed that you experience Reclaiming as being ‘tight’ rather than sloppy. I’m assuming that by ‘tight,’ you may be meaning that is has flow, relativity (as opposed to randomness), some theological cohesion, etc. Could you please say more about the particulars of your experience? You can reach me at herself@machanightmare.com rather that cluttering up Anne’s blog.
August 12th, 2006 at 9:17 pm
I think you’ve got lots of babies, you just don’t use the theological vocabulary that would help you to name them. (In detail much of this will be inaccurate- please read for concept.)
This discussion has come shortly after I read Chas Clifton’s important new book, Her Hidden Children, in which he (rightly, I think) says that the significant alteration by the American version of Craft is to place it as a nature or earth religion, (and, I would add, panentheistic and more immanent than transcendant.) British Traditional Craft seems to have little to do with ecology beyond the seasons and agricultural fertility. More on HHC later.
I’m Canadian of British roots and in the 80’s was trying to find Craft. The British books seemed classic to me and some of the content was great, but many parts failed to resonate or actually turned me off. From the American side I was reading Spiral Dance and Selena Fox. Much of this writing spoke a language I could understand and love.
Here are some examples:
The quarters: To me the British ‘Guardians of the Watchtowers’ has never worked. Association with the Element itself as part of nature is powerful and perfect.
Here was a working religion that suited my Protestant ethic- practitioners actually worked at protecting nature, not just prayed for it. Maybe taking it too far sometimes, but better that than doing nothing.
After leaving Christianity as an atheist for many years, dealing with Gods as Gods was a problem. And with some of the structure. In Reclaiming-flavoured eco-feminist craft, I had no trouble relating to the aspects of deity described. Also, welcoming ecstasy, vision and immanence into every participant was and still is more appealing to me than channelling it into designated practitioners.
Craft theology is mostly expressed in its music- the gifts of our bards are our psalms and books of prayer. Again, Reclaiming has contributed major work.
I could go on, but believe me, you guys have meat to your theology and praxis. Maybe it is swamped under the powerful magic at times, or lacks the visibility that a more hierarchical group structure would give: eg power is seen in individuals, not in titles such as Priestess. But you got it. Lots of it. It’s just more numinous and mystical than in some traditions. A shimmering veil indeed.
I have to re-read Chas’ book. It’s a great book but if I recall rightly, he says a lot about Wicca becoming nature religion but doesn’t connect this to sources in feminist craft, eco-feminism, or Reclaiming. This may be because he ends his analysis early, perhaps before Reclaiming fully emerged. But if Wicca now positions itself as a significant nature religion, that place was earned more by activist West Coast Witches than by more traditional Wiccan coven work. As an outsider, I think you guys did change the world here.
Kate Songdog.
August 12th, 2006 at 10:34 pm
Wow, what a great discussion. I feel as though I’m having a party at my house with a lot of interesting people. Thanks everyone for the feedback and food for thought. I have been thinking about the responses to this, to recent threads on Reclaiming’s “spider” email list, and to my earlier post about open-source vs. wiki-spirituality. I hope to get on to my next post in the series, after this weekend filled with out of town visitors.
Blessed be,
Anne
August 13th, 2006 at 7:11 pm
“Can it be true that what started as a grand experiment in creating a spirituality that was Goddess-centered, egalitarian, politically and socially radical would have absolutely nothing to show for it 25 years after the fact?”
Maybe it’s more obvious these days to some people… it only took these past five years for me to figure it out. I seem to be running into a lot of trouble in getting across my view that “unity” among people who are not clones requires surrendering some of one’s spiritual authority, to make a greater spiritual result in freely co-created unity. People keep turning ideas for a discussion on what principles mean, and what unity means - in Reclaiming - into personal attacks.
Has Reclaiming made changes to the world? Certainly. For one thing, it’s done a great job of freeing Witchcraft from the idea that a human-mediated initiation is necessary to be a Witch. Its WitchCamps are carefully planned and set up to be schools of practical aspects in magic without leaving out the ecstasy.
But as a political force, I believe that it has had little effect - possibly even a negative effect. Twenty-five years ago, Reagan had just taken office; but I don’t really see GWB as any sort of improvement.
August 14th, 2006 at 6:45 pm
But as a political force, I believe that it has had little effect - possibly even a negative effect. Twenty-five years ago, Reagan had just taken office; but I don’t really see GWB as any sort of improvement.
OK, but I’m hardly going to blame Reclaiming for the slide from Reagan to W!
This is a really interesting discussion - thanks for hosting, Anne! Most of what I know about Reclaiming has come from reading Macha, Anne, Starhawk…and it’s been incredibly important in forming my own spiritual practice and values. I’m enormously grateful to you all. I don’t have firsthand experience of much of what you’re talking about here - the sloppiness, and so on - so I appreciate the insight. (Reya, in particular, has taught me a lot by discussing her own spiritual journey from Witchcraft on her blog.) The Reclaiming Witches where I live (the northeastern U.S.) are very interested in Feri. I think they all want to be Thorn Coyle; they’re interested in the dark, sexy, powerful, “edge-walking,” etc. I think the line about Feri’s killing you or driving you mad or making you a poet is pretentious bullshit, but that seems to be where they’re at. Not my thing, though I recognize the allure.
Macha, you’ve been rejected as a teacher of Reclaiming? Now I’m just totally bewildered.
August 15th, 2006 at 1:47 am
WitchCamps only, a few years ago. You’re no more bewildered than I’ve been. I think I’ve got it figured out now, though, and it’s not a pretty picture.
Macha
August 15th, 2006 at 6:03 am
Macha you’re bewildered? You of all people must certainly understand the secret hierarchy of Reclaiming, the hidden list of Who’s Who and Who’s Not Who, yes?? You know what I’m talking about, right? I’m not placing blame here on any individual; it’s part of the feng shui of Reclaiming. In an effort to make itself non-hierarchical, the tradition placed the ongoing human instinct of hierarchy way into the shadow. There have always been secret cabals, covens of power as well as those who are placed outside the boundaries of the inner circle. I could name names, but it’s not about the individuals - they come and go as we’ve mentioned on your blog. It’s like going to a Passover seder; no matter who attends, no matter what their relationship to each other, there will always be a “dad”, always a bunch of “kids” who act up, and always a long suffering “mom” who does all the cooking and work. People take on roles, then put them down. In Reclaiming there is a strain of the glamorous priestesses who are invited to teach at every witch camp - for awhile - and then there’s the second string, left to sit on the bench no matter what their talents may be.
August 15th, 2006 at 2:49 pm
The note from Reya sums up what I have been thinking about and observing in Reclaiming for the last 10+ years.
The following is an excerpt from a private email I sent to Anne, Jason & Chas today:
“I would add - as an outsider who heard the grumbles for many years and went to various events to see for myself - that the group was never comfortable using power and authority in responsible and open ways…. I don’t say this lightly. I’ve run my own non-profit Pagan groups and worked with many others in the larger community. I’ve been both a mundane teacher and a manager in business, as well, so I know how hard that kind of work can be, and I’ve made my own share of mistakes in growing our groups. Reclaiming, though, has made it ever harder on themselves. Their idea of “consensus” meant that they bought into endless arguments and discussions. Those who wanted to get anything done gathered together a few hard working souls and did it quietly, behind the scenes. That is no way to grow a larger movement.
Let us also not forget that they had to deal with their shadow sides as well. Most of us come from dysfunctional family systems. Unless those issues are honestly acknowledged, they can’t be healed or used for the greater good. To that end, I wrote these articles:
The Shadow Knows:
http://www.witchvox.com/va/dt_va.html?a=&c=fritz&id=6619
The Bard and the Poser:
http://www.witchvox.com/va/dt_va.html?a=usor&c=fritz&id=6620
among others,
and started Spiral Steps: http://www.spiralsteps.org
Those who avoid doing the difficult inner work their life offers will find that their work in the world suffers accordingly. I can speak to this issue because, like I always say, you get a great view from a glass house.
By the way, I’ve seen several generations, starting with the ones from the 1960’s, who have a lot of trouble with authority figures. And then it comes time for them to *be* authority figures…..boy, does that bite hard…..”
Sia Vogel
August 15th, 2006 at 5:16 pm
Reclaiming is like all other human-created structures: good parts, not so good parts. The part that seems to have been working best is the process itself, the maddening patience-trying struggle for consensus. Beats top-down management any day.
And yes, there are parts and places where I share Macha and Anne’s frustration.
Thank you for this most enlightening discussion. Maybe the best part of all was the (unintentional) networking and re-networking, year after year.
Mevlannen etc. etc.
from very far away and (daytimes at least) three miles under the mountain.
August 16th, 2006 at 6:03 am
Kate wrote that “the significant alteration by the American version of Craft is to place it as a nature or earth religion, (and, I would add, pantheistic and more immanent than transcendant.) British Traditional Craft seems to have little to do with ecology beyond the seasons and agricultural fertility”.
Woah, sweeping statement and not at all true from my experience of working with pagans and witches from all over Britain. Sure, it’s true of some - but to suggest that the US side of things has made the Craft a nature or earth religion is, I’m sorry, wide of the mark. You can’t inflate the significance of Reclaiming by distorting reality. Or is it because Reclaiming hasn’t set the British pagan scene aflame that you might interpret us as not being ecologically-minded? Reclaiming is not unique in having an ecological agenda; British ‘traditional’ Craft is not static; how could it be, to last as long as it has? So perhaps calling it trad is to unfairly deny its capacity for change, and bear in mind, there was a time when ecology was not the focus for anyone. I don’t think there’s a British tradition now where green issues are not considered.
If you’re only talking to what I might term surface or decorative pagans over here, you’ll get that impression, same as anywhere - they are the raver crowd; but for many people, pagan practice of all kinds has been about nature, the earth, for as long as the Craft has been known to exist. I’d say awareness of ecological issues is widespread in the UK as a whole, not just among pagans. I’d like to be able to say the same about the situation across the water, but alas that big ol’ monkey Bush shows clearly that there is much to be done to convince people of ecological need, let alone action. And in both the US and Canada much gas-guzzling and excessive food-gobbling continues to go on, in all communities! So I guess I’m saying, people in glass houses etc etc…
Last but not least, I wanted to say how much I enjoyed coming across this blog entry today and reading all the many opinions expressed in the comments. It’s good that these things are being discussed! x
August 16th, 2006 at 1:29 pm
Inanna wrote: “they all want to be Thorn Coyle”
That is a disturbing statement (not that I don’t want to be sexy and powerful!). I am trying to teach people to become more themselves: more human and more divine. And let me tell you, it takes a lot of daily effort and practice.
And it is said that *going into the Faery realms* either makes you mad or a poet. That often gets conflated with Feri Tradition and it should not. It has in Reclaiming sometimes. Feri trad helps people to release bound up life force, which is of course, life changing, which can, of course, feel dangerous to the parts of us that want the illusion of safety and sameness.
Reclaiming also helps people to release life force - but it often doesn’t provide enough ongoing structure to help with the consequences of that. It is why daily practice is the drum I beat the hardest.
I *do* love Reclaiming’s ability to touch beauty in a group of voices raised in praise and power.
August 16th, 2006 at 7:47 pm
The most important things Reclaiming has given me lie in the connections I have made with beloveds who share core values of co-creation, improvisational magick, the necessity of Queer Spirit as a vital part of life and the power of Mystery in ourselves and other beings to shape the Multiverse in which we live.
As with many others, I’ve heard of and experienced the constant power struggles in what is supposed to be a consensus-based, non-hierarchical tradition. Among a small group of friends, we talk about how we can’t imagine having to be official Reclaiming teachers. We prefer to do the work in our home communities and at camps - experimenting, playing and living it, thereby possibly passing the information along through practical means, co-creation with others and discussions in our kitchens and our sacred porch space.
I do not see Reclaiming as The Solution. I do see it as an option towards deepening our relationship with other people who live to shift the world towards an existence where all acts of love and beauty are our pleasure.
On a side note, it’s my understanding that technically speaking there are no “official” core classes of Reclaiming. The only thing it might be wise to agree with in order to be a Reclaiming Witch are the Principles of Unity.
October 3rd, 2006 at 4:36 am
Where are the babies, if not Reclaiming?
Not being facetious, just curious.
Is there some other accessible tradition you would recommend as having a higher babies-to-bathwater ratio?
From my semi-outside perspective, Reclaiming, despite it’s anarchistic, eclectic leanings, seems to be one of the biggest, most cohesive traditions around.
Most Traditions I know of, have no central body, let alone website, and have even less checks on how the tradition is taught or continued, and within a few ‘generations’ can mutate into wildly differing strands. They’re traditions in name and lineage, but in practice?
Reclaiming has many ways for people to check back into the main strands of Reclaiming, whether that be through books, websites, or witchcamps. Being in a distant country, I really appreciate that, and it’s one of the things that interests me about Reclaiming (chiming in with Jason, yeah - most Reclaiming stuff is worlds ahead of most of what we’ve got going locally - or to not even exaggerate a little, at least a couple of decades).
Most traditions don’t have that, that fluidity and yet the ability to check back in. There’s only a few that I think that can even mobilise from some central point, probably the witchschool one (Corellian), or Fellowship of Isis etc.
I can see, as a ‘n00b’ it has problems, but how does it compare to the alternatives?
February 7th, 2007 at 4:07 pm
I’m very late to discover this thread, and maybe my post will not get read.
But what I want to say about Reclaiming–and about the consequence
of gaining various skills and experience as a Neo-Pagan practitioner–
is that it may be misleading to imagine or to aspire to a *place* to
*advance* to. Reclaiming, at least in it’s idealized form, suggests that
a magical community may exist with a lot less hierarchy and a lot more
cooperation than Americans generally expect.
Big rituals, which are a sort of Reclaiming specialty, are cumbersome.
Nonetheless, I have found that Reclaiming carries them off pretty well.
I have come to enjoy little rituals chock-a-block with improvisation.
The improv note poses a challenge to participants who prefer ritual
activities that follow a fairly well-established scripting.
March 28th, 2007 at 8:20 am
Hi Anne - I know this is several months old but after reading it I find it disturbing to see characterizations of “Reclaiming” as a whole that seem to mostly pertain to specific local communities - such as the Bay Area. Especially the Bay Area. And I find myself in agreement with Pitch.
Here in Texas, I am very proud of what we have in Tejas Web, our rituals etc. are awesome and get better and better all the time. We’ve been actively working this thread for more than 10 years now. Our biggest challenge is *not enough* new blood and people motivated to step in and take up the mantle to keep things going - we may run out of gas as our most experienced members find they want to step back to take on new projects outside of the Web - we’re getting older and finding new priorities (health issues the previous 3 years slowed me down personally a great deal). As an example we will not be continuing to hold Tejas Witch Camp if I recall aright - the same people have been doing it for some time and want a break or pursue other projects.
I am sorry to you, Macha, Oak, Thorn, etc. that the Bay Area has such terrible political and social problems - it seems to be the nature of the culture there that fosters both the dream and the frustrations. The rest of the country or the world does not necessarily experience the same weaknesses and issues.
Reclaiming as a tradition originated in the Bay Area, but it no longer belongs to the Bay Area, and I really wish that folks out there would remember that and dab their brushes in that little section of the canvas rather than make sweeping brushstrokes that paint everywhere else as well where it may not necessarily apply. I’ve heard that Spiral Heart has had some of its own issues as well on the East Coast.
Here in Texas, aka the Third Coast, we have no babies and no bathwater.. we have experienced priestesses and the refreshing cool waters Barton Springs… and we love to splash, swim, and play in the lifegiving waters of the Goddess and revel in the tremendous gift that is Reclaiming as we practice and experience it.
Right now the bluebonnets are beginning the carpet the highways everywhere the Maiden steps upon the awakening earth - the Goddess is alive here and magic is underfoot. And I am proud to say that Reclaiming magic here is probably some of the best magic there is in Texas.
blessings
mike
March 28th, 2007 at 1:22 pm
Hi Mike,
Hmmm, maybe you missed the part in my post about being in a completely different part of the country when I had that conversation about the baby and the bathwater. And maybe you missed the part in “A Peak Experience” about being in Minneapolis. And in “Whither Reclaiming” being in Chicago, England, and other places.
I am very happy to hear about what Tejas has going; I’ve heard from other Tejas witches that it is a vibrant community, as well. I hope you don’t think that my general comments about the tradition as a whole - based on a whole lot of travel and a wide network of friends and acquaintances - means that you don’t have a splendid community down there. That was not my point at all.
And Pitch, thanks for posting. I think that is exactly what my friend meant by the comment “there is no baby in the bathwater”: that there is no “place” in Reclaiming to aspire to, there’s just what each of us as individuals do with the skills we gain.
April 27th, 2007 at 12:54 am
The southern hemisphere, Australia shares a slow beating rhythm, that resonates the red earth of our planet, healing, loving & emitting strength for our planet.
Continue to manifest the great work you do as individuals, privately, in small groups, as elders……..maidens, mothers & crones experience & celebrate in unique ways.
Traditions are invariably diluted, but like a homeopathic remedy deliver the most necessary of practicalities. From the smallest part, comes the strength & memory. The contribution of tradition in a world that has all the bells & whistles is invaluable.
Wonderful published material from Reclaiming members exists. We in the southern hemisphere may not have had this chance to dance & admire this quality without Reclaiming.
Blessings, Willow Newberry (Sydney, Australia)