Spring Cleaning

Less than a week away from Spring, and we’re buried in snow. Supposedly there’s even more next week. Spring in New England is always…weird. Much of the time it doesn’t even feel like Spring until it’s close enough to be thinking of Summer and yet, despite the hesitance of nature, there’s a definite change.

The hens are laying, the roosters are louder, and the teenage boy is going out in shorts. The snow is bright with the intensity of the sun, and daylight savings makes evening karate classes a little easier to go to. It’s time to shake off the winter funk, and here’s a few ideas for how to invigorate your life for the new season ahead:

• Soak up some sun. We don’t really think about balancing masculine and feminine energies much, though many of the myths and celebrations we’ve inherited and incorporated into our practices have this as their center. We put our magical tools out to take up the moonlight, but what about us, the magician? Draw in some of that solar energy. Your vitamin D levels will love you for it.
• Pick a new, invigorating scent of essential oil and make some room mist, or make a cleaning spray and clean your counters and surfaces with it. We’re fans of geranium or grapefruit. Mrs. Meyers has a wonderful line of geranium-scented products.
• Have an “Empress day.” I’ll admit it – dusting and tidying is no fun, especially if you have way too many a lot of crystals and tarot decks and candles, and any form of pet with hair. Everyone talks about spring cleaning like it’s all or nothing, but instead, think of it as a how, not a what. Tend to your tools like nature tends to the seedlings huddled in the soil waiting to germinate. Love them up, and think of greeting them like the spring sun instead of being goal-oriented about it.
• Cleaning your house is only one aspect of spring cleaning. Think of the elements — earth, air, fire, water, and spirit. What’s even just one thing you can let go or change in these aspects of your life? Is there something about your physical body you need to work on? What about a thought, a creative block, an emotional issue, or a spiritual practice that isn’t working? Make way for the new.
• Open your spiritual windows. One of the cheapest and most effective ways to bring new life into your practice is just to let other people and ideas in.

What are some ways you like to greet the spring?

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