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Episode 52: Ostara
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Welcome back and happy Ostara Witches! We hope you all have an amazing day filled with all the celebrations!!! So get in losers, and lets talk about Ostara.
We would be forever thankful if you left our podcast a 5-Star review. If you really loved the show and want more Get in Loser content, check out our Supercast & Buy Me a Coffee links below. You can also find us on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram @GetinWitches, on TikTok @weredoingwitchcraft or email us at weredoingwitchcraft@gmail.com. You can support our show through our
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Music by Karl Casey @ White Bat Audio- The Witch
References
- Alden, Temperance. Year of the Witch. (2020). Weiser Books.
- Cunningham, Scott. Cunningham’s Book of Shadows. (2018). Llewellyn Publications.
- Moura, Ann. Grimoire for the Green Witch. (202o). Llewellyn Publications.
- Moon, Aurora. Ostara Magickal Correspondences. (2018). Plentiful Earth. https://plentifulearth.com/ostara-magickal-correspondences/
- Ancient Celebrations for Today: Ostara. Mabon House. https://www.mabonhouse.co/ostara#
- Bhagat, Dhruti (2019). The Origins and Practices of Holidays: Ostara, Holi and Purim.
- Wigington, Patti (2020). History of Ostara, The Spring Equinox. Learn Religions. https://www.learnreligions.com/history-of-ostara-the-spring-equinox-2562485
- Youtube:Chaotic Witch Aunt
Alwyn Oak
Scarlet Ravenswood
Recommended
Transcript
Introduction to the Podcast
00:00:00
Speaker
Do you feel drawn to learn more about witchcraft in the occult but feel lost on where to start? Then welcome to Get In Loser, We're Doing Witchcraft, a podcast all about what it means to be a witch and where to get started on your journey. Join us as we navigate through various witchy topics and share what we have learned about the craft.
Celebrating Ostara on the Sabbath
00:00:16
Speaker
So get in witches as we talk about Ostara.
00:00:46
Speaker
I'm excited about this episode. This, too, I feel like is probably the first time that we released a Sabbath episode on the actual Sabbath. Yeah, normally we do it a little, like a week early, I think, is usually when we've done them in the past.
00:01:04
Speaker
But I'll star us today. Yeah, so release day. Blessed I'll star guys. Not today when we're recording, but when you release this, if only. If only. At least we have like a month. I want to make some honey aches. I know, that sounds good. Yeah, and I saw, which I will talk about later, but I saw that like a traditional breakfast is hot cross buns and I'm like, I've never made a hot cross bun, now I want to. Yeah, I'll talk about that too.
00:01:29
Speaker
Oh, yay. Talking about hot cross buns.
Explaining the Spring Equinox
00:01:34
Speaker
So Starra, which is the spring equinox, happens today. It typically happens sometime between March 19th and the 23rd. So for the Northern Hemisphere, it's today, released today. And in the Southern Hemisphere, it's September 23rd for 2023.
00:01:52
Speaker
Yeah, so I guess you guys will be celebrating right now, like the autumnal autumnal. I feel like I can't say that word right now. That word is so hard. It is so hard, but the autumnal equinox, that's what you'll be celebrating on this day. So it's another amazing time of year. It's just a full day of celebration. It really is. No matter where you are in the world, celebrate.
00:02:17
Speaker
Yeah.
Symbolism of Ostara in the Wheel of the Year
00:02:18
Speaker
So Ostara, which is also spring, the rites of spring, Iostres day, the vernal equinox, and the spring equinox mark the first day of true spring. And according to the year of the witch, which I'm going to reference that book so much during this episode, it's a great sabbat book if you don't have it. But according to the year of the witch, this is the fourth spoke on the dark side of the modern wheel of the year.
00:02:44
Speaker
This is the time of the year where the energies of nature start to shift from the sluggishness of winter to the exciting expansion of spring. It's a time of rebirth, revival, and resurrection.
00:02:56
Speaker
Yeah, and this is one of the only two times of year where you have 12 hours of day and 12 hours of night. The night and day are balanced. So outside of what we're going to be talking about with abundance and fertility, this is all about finding balance, renewal, and possibilities and hope during this time of year.
00:03:14
Speaker
You can see signs of fertility in the form of new plant life, sprouting to life, and the birth of new baby animals of the season, or simply just through the abundance of nature. New life is beginning from the dead earth, and energy and creation are spawning.
00:03:31
Speaker
Like Sam said, the hours of the day and night are equal, and the god and the goddess are considered equals in love on Ostara while light is overtaking darkness. It is a time of beginnings, action, planting spells for future gains, and tending to ritual gardens.
Ostara's Origins and Easter Connections
00:03:50
Speaker
And during this time, you know, we have talked about this before on our Wheel of the Year episode more in depth, but you can use the journey of the God and goddess throughout the Wheel of the Year and especially the God's transition from birth, death, and rebirth to really, I guess, understand the Sabbath more or just to get a heading of like,
00:04:16
Speaker
metaphorically what it's being tied to. So during this time of year with Ostara that God would be coming into youth and maturity during Ostara.
00:04:27
Speaker
And you can like, I think what you're saying, correct me if I'm wrong, is like you can relate that to the seasons essentially. So like he's coming into his youth at this point in time. This is when we're starting to see like plant life and animal life like coming back. Right? That's what you're saying. Okay. Yes, but in a really shitty way of saying it. So thank you for helping me with that because I was having a very hard time.
00:04:55
Speaker
Something that I hadn't heard this before, so I wanted to include it in my notes, was that Ostara was thought to be Roman in origin created by Caesar to mark the beginning of the tropical year. Oh, I don't think I've ever heard that either. Right? I came across that in two different sources and I was like, that's interesting. I've never, like, never come across that. Yeah, I've never come across that either.
00:05:20
Speaker
Huh. That's interesting. I would love to read up a bit more about that because that's... Yeah. I know. I found it in the Temperance Alden book. What the hell is it called? Year of the Witch. I read it in the Year of the Witch first and then I was like, I've never seen that. So I looked it up and I found it online as well, like on another source. And I was like,
00:05:41
Speaker
Interesting, but I didn't have time to go back and research anymore to flush that out. But I wanted to include it just because I thought I really did think it was interesting. It's not something I've come across, but who knows? Yeah, who knows? Maybe. So historically, there were a lot of festivals
00:05:58
Speaker
happening around this time or during this time of the spring equinox and it marked the beginning of the agricultural cycle and this is when farmers would start planting and this is something that we've talked about a lot like we talked about it on the last episode we were discussing like the importance of like the sun and the moon and then all on a lot of our sabbat episodes wheel of the year episodes we discussed the importance the agriculture played in
00:06:26
Speaker
a lot of these Sabbaths historically. So while we don't know much about how our pagan ancestors celebrated Ostara, not a ton has been like super documented, but what we do know is that the celebrations they would do, what they would do to honor this time of year absolutely predates the Christian holiday of Easter. And even if they weren't celebrating or revering any specific deity, they were
00:06:52
Speaker
like being very cognizant of the changing seasons and understanding the impact that the sun and the seasons were playing on this time of year.
00:07:04
Speaker
I feel like I'm sounding like a brokered record here, but again, according to Temperance Alden in The Year of the Witch, contrary to popular belief, while Easter does share a lot of similarities with Ostara, they're not the same thing. Easter falls on the first Sunday after the first full moon following the spring equinox, which is why Easter is celebrated
00:07:24
Speaker
in late March to early April. And while the secular holiday includes things like eggs, rabbits, and sweets similar to Ostara, the Christian holiday does not include those in its beliefs. Easter is based too, like when you're talking about the equinox date, it's based on a lunar or a pagan calendar, which I think is hilarious because
00:07:47
Speaker
If you were to tell a Christian that they would probably lose their fucking shit, they lose their shit. And they'd be like, absolutely not. This is when Jesus rose from the dead. Like, but that date changes every year. What? Yeah, what? So what day? Yeah, we're talking about that the other day. We think it's really funny that they're like, Oh, Jesus rose from the dead. And we're like, so he's a zombie.
00:08:07
Speaker
Right. Happy zombie day. Happy zombie day.
Symbols and Celebrations of Ostara
00:08:12
Speaker
But also another thing, and we're going to talk more about eggs throughout this episode, but I thought that was interesting to put this here. So when we're talking about Easter and Ostara and the similarities and the symbols associated between them, both of them include eggs.
00:08:31
Speaker
And I wanted to know why eggs. So during the winter months, chickens will stop laying eggs during the really cold winter months. Or if they do keep laying eggs, it's not as frequent as before. But they start to lay them again in the spring.
00:08:50
Speaker
And that's when you see this more abundance in eggs. So back to that fertility and abundance, our pagan ancestors who may not have as celebrated a star, they absolutely marked these agricultural trends during this time. And this was one of the big ones because this was whenever they were starting to get fresh protein again. And it wasn't just like dried meats and shit. Like they were able to collect more eggs to sustain their lives. And that's why we see eggs as a big, big symbol of fertility during this time of year.
00:09:20
Speaker
And it's used in so much of the food for Ostara and in the celebrations, which we're going to talk about here in a little bit. But this is also the time to celebrate the ability to create, to manifest love, and gain a deeper understanding of life. And Ostara is also the perfect time to take action on any ideas and goals that you made for the year and to start new projects.
00:09:47
Speaker
Yeah. And there are a lot of ways to celebrate Ostarra. So we're going to be talking about some like free ways that you can celebrate that anybody can do, ways that you can celebrate in the broom closet. I mean, there's so many different ways that you can celebrate this time of year. One is to like really do anything that allows spring to come back into your home. Going for a nature walk, standing outside with your shoes off and grounding and just spending time cleansing your body and
00:10:17
Speaker
your soul in the sun is an awesome way to celebrate this time of year. One of my favorites is gardening, which I've already started my little plant babies and they're already starting to sprout. We cannot wait to get them in the ground, but basically just plant seeds for your summer crop.
00:10:35
Speaker
that is probably one of the most broom closet things outside of like spring cleaning that you could really do because who's going to question somebody like planting a garden in the spring. What you plant during Ostara will like grow and be ready to be harvested during your coming summer months and on the sabbats of Beltane
00:10:56
Speaker
Leitha and Lunasab. You could also participate in spring cleaning. And this doesn't have to be limited to just your home, like take time to declutter and clean up areas where you spend a lot of time, like maybe your car or if you sit out on your front porch a lot, spend some time like sweeping and mopping it and like wiping everything down. Or you could even clean your workspace at your office.
00:11:17
Speaker
And with that cleaning, I mean, Ostarra and Embulk are the perfect times of the year to do this and setting those intentions. And one of the things that you could use during your cleaning is fresh lemons. I mean, you can, whether this be, like I said, I mean, it doesn't necessarily have to be fresh lemons. So if you're living someplace like where I'm at right now, essentially, fruits and veggies are very expensive. And you wouldn't think that because we're on a subtropical island, but it is, and it's a whole thing and it sucks. But if you're somewhere where, you know,
00:11:46
Speaker
the fruit and veg selection is not great or it's very expensive. You can even just use essential oils. So using lemons in whatever form, add a little bit of lemon juice or like the peels or like some drops of essential oils is a great way to cleanse out old energy, replace it with abundant energy and filling it with that intention. And it's something that for the most part, like it's easy to access and no one's going to be like, why do you have lemons in your house?
00:12:15
Speaker
Like if you're in the broom closet, I mean you could just have lemons to have lemons because everybody has lemons. Unless you're living in Japan and it's super expensive to get lemons.
00:12:24
Speaker
Kind of to piggyback on this, if you live somewhere where it is hard to get fresh fruits and vegetables, I don't remember if I saw this on TikTok or YouTube. I know it was a video, like some form of video, not like a written blog or newsletter or anything, but it was a witchy account. I wish I remember who the creator was, but they said they used Pinesol because it's one of the most
00:12:49
Speaker
broom closet friendly things that they could use because it's got lemon and pine both in it. So they use pine salt in their practice because they live with other people. So nobody questions it. Yeah. And you don't have to speak these intentions out loud, just saying them over and over and mopping in a particular fashion like we said before.
00:13:12
Speaker
I absolutely use pine's all when I clean because I love the way it smells. Me too. Especially the lavender one, which I can't find here. Oh no. I'm so mad about it. Like what the hell? Anyway, it's fine. I'm going to stop complaining. Oh my gosh. But anyway, I, again,
00:13:31
Speaker
was reading the Year of the Witch. I'm gonna keep pushing this book because it's great. But she includes a spring cleaning and decluttering ritual in her Ostarra chapter. And so I was going to include it here because I read it and I was like, this is something that's so simple that again, if you're in the broom closet, you can also like, do this and nobody could
00:13:56
Speaker
question it because you're literally just spring cleaning. But what you'll need is a white seven day jar candle or she also said you could use like tea lights, like seven tea lights, one for each day kind of thing, a large garbage bag, a broom, a mop, Florida water, which she also includes a recipe in the book.
00:14:15
Speaker
salt, and a few free hours. And she does include using cleansing herbs if you don't have the means to make Florida water or just don't want to. So you would start by lighting the candle and placing it on your altar or a working space. Ask your deity guides or whoever you see guidance from to lend you peace as you begin the task.
00:14:37
Speaker
Leave the candle burning as much as you possibly can, preferably burning it straight through, but as we always say, please practice fire safety. Center yourself in a few moments of meditation and reflect on what brings you the most stress. Once you feel grounded, grab some trash bags and just start working on that area.
00:14:56
Speaker
Take everything that is unnecessary from that space and place it in those trash bags or in a box or whatever you have. Obviously like not your furniture but the thing that's like what items are cluttering that area. And then you're going to place that bag or box in a closet or an enclosed space for the time being. You're going to return to those later.
00:15:17
Speaker
Then you'll get your broom and you'll sweep in a clockwise motion, moving dirt out of the room and then out the front door. Then you prepare your mop by placing a pinch of salt and a generous amount of either cleansing herbs or Florida water into your bucket with cold water and mop the floor in a counterclockwise method. Allow your floors to dry completely before using them again.
00:15:39
Speaker
And then don't return to the bags of stuff until the seven-day candle has burned all the way down, because this allows you clarity and space to declutter and then start fresh. Once your candles have burned out, then you go through those items in the bags, either getting rid of the extra clutter that you no longer need, or you no longer feel attached to, and then putting the rest of the items away in appropriate spaces, which I really liked
Ostara Rituals and ADHD Discussion
00:16:05
Speaker
that. Yeah.
00:16:06
Speaker
have seen this method used outside of witchcraft for people with ADD and ADHD. And Anthony and I have joked about doing this because we both are ADHD people and we're very much pile people. Here's all the mail that's in a pile. Here's all these things. We put them in a pile for right now because it gets this clean. Everything's in a pile. So if we did this, I feel like if we took a box and put all these piles in the box, went through cleaning the rest of the house and then
00:16:36
Speaker
took the time to go through those after we've cleaned and we have decluttered and cleaned space and really had a moment to detach from those things. I feel like we'd be so much better off getting rid of stuff. Oh, yeah. Absolutely. Mike is like that. I never even thought of it being an ADHD trait or anything, which is interesting because he is a pile person and it irritates the shit out of me because I'm one of those people where I'm just like,
00:17:04
Speaker
Because if it's all paper, he'll stack it together. And I'm like, wait, let's just, as we're cleaning, pull out the paper that needs to be thrown away. And he's just like, we're just going to put it in a pile pack first. That's how our brain works.
00:17:16
Speaker
He'll put like, he'll get bags and he was just like, okay, this stuff doesn't belong in here. I'm just going to put this on a bag. And I'm like, when we were doing the floors and there was stuff everywhere, like when we were like ripping out carpet and laying the floors down, when Anthony would go to work, like I cannot function in the mess. Like it needs to be in a contained pile or I'm like anxious and like.
00:17:39
Speaker
stressed out. So I would just get boxes and all the tools would go into a box. And then Anthony would be like, where did you put it? And I'm like, everything's in this box. And then we'd like go through and like, work on the house again. And then he'd go back to work on Monday. And then there would be more stuff. So I would need two boxes. And then it became like, he has like four boxes of all of these like house tools for like reviewing floors and painting. And he's like, I don't know what box things are in. And I'm like, just go through it. Yeah, box. This is not my box.
00:18:07
Speaker
This is your box I made for you. It's like it'll be bags be random bags. And then I'll just find this random bag. Like I found one last weekend when I was cleaning our room and I thought it was trash. At first I was like, what is this trash bag? No, it was a bag full of shit that he was like,
00:18:26
Speaker
all grouped together and was like, we'll deal with this later. And I'm like, I don't know why but it's like it's a collective ADD ADHD thing. Like that's just how our brains work. Like if we put it in a pile and deal with it later, we can clean now. But if we don't do that,
00:18:42
Speaker
We can't clean. That needs to go to its thing. It needs to go to a box, a bag, a pile, whatever. Basically, I go downstairs after we're done recording and tell my husband he has ADHD because there is no other excuse for this. He has it. Anthony and I laugh all the time because we both definitely have
00:19:01
Speaker
either ADD or ADHD, I don't know, I've never been tested, but like, we have like all the signs for it, you know, and then like, we'll be on tik tok scrolling and you know, like neuro, neurodivergent tik tok and ADD tik tok, like everything on those were like, oh,
00:19:17
Speaker
hit me in the feels. I really felt that one.
Creating Ostara Altars and Food Suggestions
00:19:22
Speaker
That aside though, something else you can do is decorate an Ostarra altar. Yeah. And with this, you can do anything that symbolizes fertility, eggs,
00:19:33
Speaker
rabbits would be great ones too if you wanted to. You can use eggs and like eggshells in your spells. So like sigil magic, draw a sigil on it and you can even use. So they have like an egg collecting or egg dyeing kits. They have these like wax crayon things that are like not colored. So it's basically like a clear crayon essentially. And you can draw like your sigil on them and then dye it however you want to.
00:20:01
Speaker
and your sigil will be on this egg. And I think that is amazing. But instead of because, you know, usually with sigils, one of the best ways to activate it is through fire. Obviously, I wouldn't want you to set your beautiful egg that you just created on fire because this is like a sustenance thing. This is protein, guys. So maybe like visualize your fire. Visualize your fire. Visualize it.
00:20:21
Speaker
Yeah, eat it. Like peel it, burn the shells, and eat your egg. There you go. You activated it. Or you could grind those shells up into a powder and use them in your garden. Absolutely. Yeah. And so there's a form of divination that you can use with eggs called ovumancy. And
00:20:41
Speaker
For this, I'm not super familiar with this form of divination, but essentially what you would do is separate the egg whites from the egg yolk. And then I've seen some people crack an egg into a glass and read the whites that way. But another way you can do it is just
00:20:58
Speaker
putting the egg whites into some boiling water and then look at the shapes or patterns that the egg whites make and you can you know interpret or divine what that means for you in your life but obviously like a lot of this stuff is like old folklore so you're not going to find like a book of like
00:21:15
Speaker
Okay, this is what all these egg white patterns mean, like you're gonna have to focus heavily on your intuition, and like really setting a good intention whenever you go to do this about like what you're wanting to glean from this, what this what this would mean if you see this or that, and then going into the Overmancy to kind of figure out what the egg whites are telling you.
00:21:39
Speaker
And then rabbits, like going back to including rabbits in your altar and stuff and just in symbolism as well, rabbits, I've said rabbits now like 14 times, more specifically March hares, they're usually nocturnal, but around this time of year in March, it's their mating season. And so they're seen all throughout the day during their mating season and that is one of
00:22:07
Speaker
the reasons why rabbits and hares are so linked to Ostara in this time of year.
00:22:14
Speaker
Yeah, they are already out out here and I had one scare the shit out of me the other night. He was like in our yard under we have a Rose of Sharon in the center of our like front yard and we were going I think we were just like running to the store or something and it was like already dark outside and I opened the door and I guess he saw us and just froze and I was like, oh, I'm going to check the mail. So when I walked across the yard, he like jumped and bolted and scared the shit out of me because I didn't see him there.
00:22:44
Speaker
Yeah, but we're already seeing them out here so much. Yeah. Which I love. We get little baby rabbits. We have a space in our yard that the rabbits use every year for a den.
00:22:55
Speaker
That's really cute. I love little babies. Something else you can do is make egg-based foods. Some examples that I just came across in researching Ostarra would be custards, frittatas, egg salad, and deviled eggs. My favorite thing. I was going to say, I love all of those things. I'd be fine with any of them. Yes, especially the deviled eggs though.
00:23:18
Speaker
Yeah. And then when you decorate eggs, you can even create natural dyes from herbs and flowers to color them, which I thought was really cute. And I actually came across a whole thing of like what flowers and herbs and like fruits and vegetables to use to dye fabrics the other day. And I was like, Oh man,
00:23:39
Speaker
I don't need another hobby. We could do this for eggs. Calendulas are like a top one for like yellows and oranges. And I was like, I grow those every year. So perfect. Yeah. Obviously you can do egg hunts, which are pretty like standard for Easter for like secular Easter. So you could also do that for Ostarra.
00:24:05
Speaker
And then after coloring, hiding, and then finding the hard-boiled eggs that you've decorated, you can use them to make your deviled eggs, and then use those crushed eggshells in your garden, like I said earlier.
00:24:18
Speaker
You can go full circle and use the eggs, you know, from start to finish, like boiling them and then coloring them and then hiding them and finding them and then using the actual like egg in your food and the shells in your garden. So I love that full circle portion.
00:24:36
Speaker
me too. I love and that's something that I mean, I've never used the eggshells in my garden, but I'm going to start doing that now. Oh, I do that all the time. I've just never really had a garden and then like trying to be more intentional with things like that. But yeah, so but I definitely
00:24:55
Speaker
take those bad boys inside. I'm like, okay, kids, hunt your eggs and then bring them to me. The eggshells are really good if you grow tomatoes. Tomato plants tend to be calcium deficient and won't produce as much fruit if you don't give them some form of calcium. And I prefer to give them eggshells than fertilizer. And then you can also use this is
00:25:18
Speaker
off topic, but we're talking about gardening, so kind of not. Your banana peels soak them in water overnight and then use that water to water the plants in your garden, but especially tomatoes will take the nutrients from that and be more productive.
00:25:33
Speaker
good to know because I want to grow my own tomatoes here because I'm not like a super I'm really picky about tomatoes and I've not been super like impressed with the tomatoes that are here. So we are actually growing we have like just regular beefsteak tomatoes and then we have brandy wise planted arctic roses which are pink tomatoes and
00:25:58
Speaker
I forget the name of these other ones, but they're an Italian tomato that have flavoring that you would use if you want to make your own tomato paste. They're flavored for that, so I am so excited. Oh man, I can't wait to come to your house and eat all the tomatoes and tomato products.
00:26:16
Speaker
Yes. So now that we're incredibly hungry, let's talk about something else that's super delicious that you can do for Ostara. And this is making hot cross buns or Ostara buns. So traditionally, these are made to symbolize the change of seasons and to honor Eostra. And so this is something to like, whenever I was living in England, this was
00:26:41
Speaker
huge around this time of year. And of course, this is something that Christians have taken and kind of made it their own, but it's not just a Christian thing. There is actual evidence and ties back to pagan traditions and stuff, but it's essentially
00:26:57
Speaker
because it is meant to symbolize a change of seasons, you're using the leftover spices like mixed spice and candied peels and dried fruits, the things that were leftover from the winter, colder months to create these buns. And so once you make these buns, you will pipe a cross on the top and this crosses to symbolize the four quarters of the seasons.
00:27:22
Speaker
And of course, like I said, it overlaps under the Christian holiday of Easter. But with these buns, I mean, there is a lot of pagan origins. So the next time you're out and you have hot cross buns, and someone's like, this is a Christian thing. There's a cross on here for Jesus. Be like, no, actually. Absolutely not. It's not. Well, actually. Yeah, well, actually. Yeah.
00:27:47
Speaker
So another thing that you can do, and this is something that, you know, this kind of goes in line with what you were talking about earlier about working in your garden, but even just cleaning out your garden space
00:27:59
Speaker
is a perfect time to like celebrate a star. Even if you're not planting anything, just like cleaning up your outside space and making it look nice is a perfect way to celebrate. And then also planting a feast. This could be something that you do with just your family, with friends, but using vegetables that are in season during this time. And then for the Northern hemisphere, those vegetables would be carrots,
00:28:23
Speaker
asparagus, cucumbers, and radishes. These would all be great in like roasted or on a salad or something like that and these would be great veggies to use during this time of year. I know that I said this earlier but this is also a great time of year to start new projects so you could do that.
00:28:40
Speaker
You could also take time to meditate. And if your mind is full of like racing thoughts, you can journal as a way to spring clean your mind.
Correspondences and Decor for Ostara
00:28:49
Speaker
Like take this time to think about your intentions for the next few weeks, set your goals and intentions for that time and just clear your mind space out as well. Ooh, I love that. Right. It's something anyone can do. Literally. You can do it in the broom closet. You could do it with like having no supplies, no nothing. Everyone can do it. Super attainable.
00:29:08
Speaker
So let's talk about some of the correspondences of Ostara. There is so many. As I mentioned already, the cross, which has been traditionally taken by Christianity to mean something completely different, but there was cross symbolism in like
00:29:28
Speaker
the pagan communities, especially as it ties to Ostara, because it's used to celebrate the four quarters of the year. So your colors for Ostara are gonna be green, pink, blue, peach, lavender, yellow, pretty much any pastel and white. Your food are gonna be eggs, honey, sprouted greens, baked goods, asparagus, seeds, sweet wine or other beverages that you add honey to, a roasted ham,
00:29:57
Speaker
which is one of my favorites when I do eat meat. Pineapple rings, hard-boiled eggs, which I already said eggs, so you get double eggs on this one. Yellow cake, poppy seeds, banana nut bread, cheese, chocolate, cream, dandelion greens, which for those of you that don't know, the dandelion is edible from flower to root.
00:30:18
Speaker
and it does a lot of really good things for your body. Other edible flowers, fish, honey cakes, hot cross buns, ice cream, maple syrup, nettle tea, olives, pine nuts, salad, sunflower seeds, and seasonal and local fruits and vegetables. And a traditional meal could be hot cross buns and eggs for breakfast and then ham for dinner.
00:30:42
Speaker
right? I'm like perfect. Your crystals are going to be aquamarine, amethyst, rose quartz, jasper, and moonstone. Your incense, there were a couple that I came across in this one that I couldn't find like more on, but jasmine, light scented florals, secret garden was one of them. I don't know if that's just like an incense that other people know. I've never heard of like secret garden incense, so I don't really know what it's made up of.
00:31:11
Speaker
But it was on two different lists. So I don't know. I guess maybe somebody out there knows. If you know, let us know. Rain was another one that I was like, I've never heard of just rain and sense. I've heard of that one. Okay, it's not. I haven't seen it super like the only place I've ever seen it was nature's treasures in Oklahoma. Like I've never seen anywhere else.
00:31:29
Speaker
Okay. African violet, rose, and sage. Oils would be ginger, lavender, lotus, and rose. Your symbols are going to be rabbits, eggs, spring flowers, lambs, clovers, baskets, butterflies, chicks, dragons, mermaid, or mermen, robins, pegasus, serpents, and unicorns.
00:31:53
Speaker
Plants and flowers are gonna be clover, crocus, daffodils, tulips, ash, alder, birch, sink foil, dogwood, four leaf clovers, honeysuckles, iris, narcissus, peony, primrose, and violets. There's a lot, and I'm sure too with this list, it's like even because it is so extensive, and this is probably not even
00:32:19
Speaker
all of them. You can find any of these things. No matter where you're at, you can find clover. You're going to be able to find honeysuckle. You're going to be able to find a lot of these things just growing out in nature wherever you live. Yeah. Not last summer, but the summer before or spring. We had tulips randomly pop up in our yard around our trees and they've never been there before. It was like, oh,
00:32:48
Speaker
I love it. Nature does weird things. It really does. But kind of switching gears to talk about some of the deities, because there's a lot of deities associated with Ostarra. And there's a few that I wanted to give a more in-depth kind of
00:33:03
Speaker
I guess not really discussion about but just a little bit more information on. So of course we've already mentioned Eosra and she is essentially a northern European Germanic goddess of fertility and she's also known as a goddess of dawn and the rising sun.
00:33:20
Speaker
So, the goddess's feast day was typically held on the full moon following the equinox, and really there's not a whole lot that we know about her that's been documented. But what has been documented, a lot of it really came from an 8th century monk who wrote about her being celebrated in North Umbria, so like England, Anglo-Saxon times, and
00:33:42
Speaker
he dictated that she was celebrated. So obviously, it was something was happening, something was going on. So she at least goes back to the eighth century. But there's a legend that she found a bird wounded on the ground in the winter. And to save its life, she transformed it into a hare. But the transformation didn't quite take, so it looked like a hare.
00:34:04
Speaker
but could still lay eggs like a bird. And that's where we get the Easter bunny from. Yeah, I don't know if you ever read American Gods or watched the show, but Eostres, I know. And I can't remember if it was in the book or not because it's been so long since I've read it, but they included that in the show with the, I think I want to say Wednesday, who is Odin, tells that story to Shadow, the main character.
00:34:29
Speaker
And then this bunny comes along and it's just pooping out eggs as it goes through the whole cart. I'll have to watch that or read the book or something. I've never even heard of that. The book is phenomenal. The show, they were trash. The first season's really good. And then there was a lot of drama that happened. Oh, man. Well, I'll try to read the book then. Yeah, so this they say to that, you know, the Easter bunny, this first bird that was turned into a bunny that
00:34:58
Speaker
was saved by Aostra is they lay eggs.
00:35:02
Speaker
as like an honoring and an offering to Eostra. So another deity is Venus and Aphrodite. So bunnies and hares associated with fertility, of course, like we mentioned many times, are also the animals associated with Aphrodite. And so that is why she's oftentimes related back to Ostara. And then also the Scandinavian goddess Eodun.
00:35:29
Speaker
she was the keeper of the apples of immortality so the god norse pagan gods would come to her and eat apples to stay immortal and this ties back to the whole renewal energy that austara gives and so that's why she is
00:35:45
Speaker
also associated with Ostara. And then lastly, this one was my favorite one. And this is about the god Mithras, which I didn't know very much about this god, but he's a Roman god. And his story is very similar to Jesus and Christianity. Interesting. Yeah, interesting. Funny how that works, right? But he was born during like the winter solstice. And he was resurrected in the spring. And
00:36:15
Speaker
During his life, he would help his followers to ascend to the realm of light after death, which sounds very familiar with something else we've heard about.
00:36:25
Speaker
I can't put my finger on what it is. Weird. Weird. And the legend surrounding Mithras, he was also ordered by the sun to slay a white bull. And he reluctantly did it. He didn't want to do this. But whenever his knife went into the bull to kill it, a miracle happened where the bull turned into the moon and Mithras' cloak became the night sky.
00:36:50
Speaker
That is cute. It is cute. Yeah, so something good happened from it. But also, is Mithras Jesus? Probably. Like, let's be real here. And wait, are they both zombies? Apparently.
00:37:05
Speaker
So I didn't look up any information on these. I just gave you guys a list, but here's some other deities to include. Isis, Adonis, Athena, Eos, Gaia, Hera, Ishtar, Kor, the maiden, the Muses, Persephone, which I believe Persephone and Kor are the same, aren't they? I don't know.
00:37:25
Speaker
I feel like, and you know what, maybe this is, I read Laura Limpis, which is a graphic novel on Persephone and Hades, and her nickname is Cor and that, so I don't know. Maybe I'm just getting it from that. I don't have to look that up. Venus, Aries, Kernenos, the Green Man, Narcissus, Odin, Osiris, and Pan. Some decor could just be simply
00:37:49
Speaker
spring flowers or wildflowers, garden items, colored eggs, rabbit figurines, and your magical focus for this time would be balance, celebration of life, universal love, fertility, growth, increasing power, long-term manifestation, marriage, and union.
00:38:07
Speaker
New growth, opening up, rebirth, renewal, sexuality, and women's health. So you have a lot of options there. Yeah, you do. So you can pick and choose, you can every year rotate a different magical focus. Yeah, I love it. Yeah. So there's a lot to work with with Starrett. And, you know, just as like a
00:38:29
Speaker
to sum up with this episode, I just think it's important to kind of tell, I don't know, just be open to the fact that many cultures celebrate this time of year. Try not to let, this is something that I try to abide by. It's hard sometimes whenever you have people around you that are pushy with their religious beliefs, but try not to let anyone's
00:38:53
Speaker
religious beliefs, try and out shadow your own if you do practice paganism or witchcraft or you are a Wiccan or you're part of any earth-based religion or spirituality sect because there are going to be people out there that don't understand any of the pagan ties, the historical ties to some of these Sabbats and that's fine. But don't feel like you can't celebrate the way you want to celebrate because of what other people might say.
00:39:23
Speaker
And Happy Ostara. Yeah, Happy Ostara. And if you have celebrated today, let us know how you did it. We want to see pictures. We want to see all the yummy food. We love to see the food. Yeah, we sure do. So send it to us. And I'm sure we'll post some too.
00:39:43
Speaker
You just have to remind yourselves about it. I'm just kidding. We're really bad about that. We're like, well, things we did, and then we never shared it. We'll post pictures of how, and we never do. We never do. We're going to let that be our intention for this year. Actually share the pictures that we take, or actually remember to take the pictures, because that's another thing too. That, or we take the pictures and we send them to each other, and then we never do. Then we never do anything else. Yeah.
00:40:10
Speaker
Yeah, we'll have you a star guys. Yes.
00:40:22
Speaker
That's it for this episode of Get in Loser, We're Doing Witchcraft. You can find our source material for this episode linked in the show notes. If you love this episode, we would be forever thankful if you leave us a five-star review on wherever you listen to your podcasts. If you really love the show and want more Get in Loser content, check out our Supercast link provided in the show notes or search the Supercast website for Get in Loser, We're Doing Witchcraft.
00:40:45
Speaker
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