This is my daily practice regime. I built up to it slowly. I started out with just daily offerings but then moved up to devotionals, active meditations and lately also passive ones.
Remember, this is how I do things not how YOU should do things.
Daily offerings:
I get up really early on work days so that I can have the time to go to the desert and make my daily offerings. I try to get there at the same time each work day unless the weather is not cooperating then I do what I usually do on weekends and go to a park near my apartment.
My daily offering ritual is very simple. I go to my favorite bush in the desert, and set up my altar on a rock right in front of it that serves as my “table”. I have a bowl which I put into some twigs that I have gathered from the desert so that I can burn them as a hearth fire. The pictures of my household deities, an incense burner, and an offering plate.
I start by lighting the incense and calming my mind a bit, I find that listening to the sounds around me usually does the trick. Then I say:
“The fire from the waters is here.
The fire from the lands is here.
The fire from the skies is here.
From below, from about, from above,
Fire has come to my hearth.” (1)
Then I light the twigs in the bowl and raise the offering plate with the offerings in it and say:
“I present these offerings to the great An Mórríghan and to the bright Lúgh in the name of the land, of the sky and of the sea and as a symbol of my hospitality, friendship and loyalty. I ask that you accept them and grant me guidance, wisdom and strength through my day.”(2)
I place the plate on the table and say a little prayer before I gather my things, keeping the offerings still on the table (minus the plate) and leave for work.
Daily Devotionals:
These I do through out the day, at different times depending on when I have a few quiet minutes, I also like to end my day with them.
Active Meditation:
My active meditation takes the form of my daily workout. I work out for half an hour each day and dedicate that workout to An Mórríghan. I find that a lot of times I get answers to my dilemmas or thoughts on something that I’m working on while I workout/meditate.
Passive Meditation:
This is something new that I just started two weeks ago. I bought an application on my phone called Relax Melodies which has different sounds with different wave lengths that correlate to deep meditation, pre-sleep and so on. I use the deep meditation setting for half an hour to meditate on different things, and then use the pre-sleep setting to get myself ready for bed while I do my final devotionals. I find that for the last two weeks I’ve been able to concentrate during the day a lot better than before.
This all may seem a lot to people but it works for me.
Works Cited:
- Serith, Ceisiwr. A Book of Pagan Prayers. (San Francisco: Weiser Book, 2002) p. 114.
- Adopted from my friend Miachdhain’s offerings ritual <http://delawarevalleyceltic.org/>.
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