Remembering our Truth with Zinnia
Let it Go? Let it Be? Being with Truth.
HAIL ZINNIA, Zinnia elegans, bright and friendly bloom that jump starts the memory, activates child-like wonder, and opens the way towards the ever present opportunity for transformation. Like the friend and ally Butterfly, that comes to this state of being after an alchemical journey, I call upon you Zinnia to expand into change and endure all obstacles. I look to you, shining bright in rain, or heat, blooming again and again and again until the snow falls as a model for beautiful, joyful resilience. HAIL AND WELCOME!
Remembrance Ritual with Etain, “The Shining One”
Etain (Ay-deen) is an Irish goddess who went through a myriad transformations. She remembered again and again who she was after a lifetime of trials. She Spent time as a goddess, a fairy, a mortal, a butterfly, and a drop of water. Zinnia is also a flower of remembrance. Together they amplify spells for inner truth and finding the way home.
This ritual is best performed in the morning on a day with bright sunshine. Find a place in nature where you will be undisturbed and can move freely. Materials: Zinnia or flowers as offering.
At the Full Moon I meet with a coven of SiStars in ritual. This Moon we presenced a movement to bring us back into our truth. It was similar to the ritual in the Zinnia issue of 52 Petals (available for subscribers below). My movement came from forehead and brought me into an aspect of the Serpent. I was struck by what I remembered through the moving.
At New Year’s in 2020 I held the aspect of the Violet Snake in ceremony, channeling the mythic story of the Snake shedding ancestral trauma for everyone present. In the ritual this last Full Moon it dawned on me that this journey is still unfolding for me, that it might take the whole decade to complete the shedding process. As a metaphor for Letting Go, the Snake shedding the skin that it has grown out of has been a fitting image to meditate on.
In 2020 I wrote: “I stood as sentinel for all the Ancestors Stories, held in the skin of the snake, and the other Animal Avatars energetically pulled the secrets away, running their hands across my skin and dress. It was incredibly powerful, and I think I am still integrating. Once this aspect of the Procession was complete we returned each mask with gratitude to it’s Altar were it remained for the rest of the evening. It was deeply powerful to hold space for such an intense transmutation.”
I find it interesting that Zinnia is also associated with a powerful symbol of transmutation, The Butterfly. Unlike the Snake, which retains its identity after the shedding process, the Butterfly emerges after the Caterpillar completely dissolves and reorganizes its matter into a new form.
I keep receiving the message to Let it Go… Let it Go… Let it Be… Release! But What?
Am I letting go of the shape my life held before becoming a mama? Letting go of hustle culture and the scroll? Letting go of past traumas? I’ve been muddling and musing over this frequent message since the New Moon, and as the moon enters it’s final phase before beginning again I think I’ve found some answers to my queries through ritual, journaling, and listening to the serendipity of the universe, such as my ritual where the Snake returned to me in the ritual mentioned above.
Cross Pollination- a sharing of current inspiration inspired by Letting Go and Finding Truth:
Many years ago I read a little blurb on facebook about the dangers of releasing vs letting go, and how when we release something we are telling ourselves we are re-leasing. Language is powerful and its made me curious ever since. So when Sebene Selassie released her New Moon musings on Let it go vs Let it be it had me thinking again. It’s been spinning around in me all moon cycle.
Since the New Moon i’ve been playing with the Moon-spirations ebook by Tara Kimes. I came across it after reading her substack on The Devotee (now behind a paywall), and found my interest piqued. I love playing with archetypes in this way! I made a few changes to the order of the archetypes, doing a switch-a-roo with Mother, Goddess, and Oracle to better fit my lived experience.
So far I’ve played with the aspects of Goddess, Muse, Mother, Mystic, Sensual and now Queen. While working with the Mystic I found myself humming the Dances of Universal Peace, Letting Go Into the Mystery. Since, i’ve been contemplating the nuances between let go and letting go. If you would be interested in reading a full newsletter on these explorations let me know in the comments.
I’ve finished the Magpie issue of 52 Feathers for August’s Summer of Birds Zine over on Patreon and I rebuilt my altar after months and months. I used to rebuild my altar every new moon and full moon, the opposite of Let it be. It felt good to refresh the space and release 😉 the previous energies.
I’m reading Against Purity in my bookclub and there is lots of discussion around memory and forgetting as tools for or against liberation. How forgetting histories support oppression. How taking responsibility for memory and the future opens up possibilities. It has me pondering my own relationship to memory, for myself and for my culture, and for the collective, and how I find myself coming back into truth through remembering is an almost daily activity.
The full issue of 52 Petals: ZINNIA is included in this post for subscribers. Thank you for supporting the Khaleidoscope Zine Archive.
In this issue:
Remembering Ritual with Etain, “The Shining One”
Invocation for Zinnia
The Major Arcana- The Wheel of Fortune
Pollinator Allies - Butterfly