What is the Winter Solstice all about?

I remember my brother feeling chuffed that he was born on the longest day of the year but if we consider what’s happening on our planet at this time its not the best time to look forward to being longer, darker nights. Whereas the Winter Solstice is when the ‘sun stands still’ when we can glow in the longer days , more light bringing inner healing; self-awareness of our inner light. The start of growth; buds poking their heads out of the soil to find the warmth and light they need to grow, develop and bloom. Hence the Winter Solstice being the time when new beginnings, new opportunities, goals, wishes and positive outcomes are being manifested. A time of gratitude to manifest more positive energy around us. A time when dreams are formed. and when our inner energy and light should be shared and passed on to others in a positive reaffirmation.

Yule: Winter Solstice Traditions – Dec 21st/22nd

The origin of the word Yule, has several suggested origins from the Old English word, geõla, the Old Norse word jõl, a pagan festival celebrated at the winter solstice, or the Anglo-Saxon word for the festival of the Winter Solstice, ‘Iul’ meaning ‘wheel’. In old almanacs Yule was represented by the symbol of a wheel, conveying the idea of the year turning like a wheel, The Great Wheel of the Zodiac, The Wheel of Life. The spokes of the wheel, were the old festivals of the year, the solstices and equinoxes.

The winter solstice, the rebirth of the Sun, is an important turning point, as it marks the shortest day, when the hours of daylight are at their least. It also the start of the increase in the hours of daylight, until the Summer Solstice, when darkness becomes ascendant once more.

Cycle of the Year

Yule is deeply rooted in the cycle of the year, it is the seed time of year, the longest night and the shortest day, where the Goddess once again becomes the Great Mother and gives birth to the new Sun King. In a poetic sense it is on this the longest night of the winter, ‘the dark night of our souls’, that there springs the new spark of hope, the Sacred Fire, the Light of the World, the Coel Coeth.

Fire festivals, celebrating the rebirth of the Sun, held on the Winter’s Solstice can be found throughout the ancient world. The Roman festival of Saturnalia was held on the winter solstice, boughs of evergreen trees and bushes would decorate the house, gifts where exchanged and normal business was suspended. The Persian Mithraists held December 25th as sacred to the birth of their Sun God, Mithras, and celebrated it as a victory of light over darkness. In Sweden, December 13th was sacred to the Goddess Lucina, Shining One, and was a celebration of the return of the light. On Yule itself, around the 21st, bonfires were lit to honour Odin and Thor.

The festival was already closely associated with the birth of older Pagan gods like Oedipus, Theseus, Hercules, Perseus, Jason, Dionysus, Apollo, Mithra, Horus and even Arthur with a cycle of birth, death and resurrection that is also very close to that of Jesus. It can hardly be a coincidence that the Christians, also used this time of year for the birth of Christ, mystically linking him with the Sun.

That Yule is another fire festival, should come as no surprise, however unlike the more public outdoor festival of the summer solstice, Yule lends itself to a more private and domestic celebration. Yet like its midsummer counterpart, is strongly associated with fertility and the continuation of life. Here the Goddess is in her dark aspect, as ‘She Who Cuts The Thread’ or ‘Our Lady in Darkness’, calling back the Sun God. Yet, at the same time, she is in the process of giving birth to Son-Lover who will re-fertilise her and the earth, bringing back light and warmth to the world (thewhitegoddess.co.uk)

Why is Stonehenge important?

Stonehenge, the prehistoric monument located in Wiltshire, is carefully aligned on a sight-line that points to the winter solstice sunset (opposed to New Grange, which points to the winter solstice sunrise, and the Goseck circle, which is aligned to both the sunset and sunrise).

Archaeologists believe it was constructed from 3000 BC to 2000 BC and it is thought that the winter solstice was actually more important to the people who constructed Stonehenge than the Summer solstice.

Winter Solstice Traditions: Rituals for a Simple Celebration

This year, let your winter solstice celebration be an occasion to look deeply at small things, to feel at home in the world and to be just where you belong

At day’s end on the winter solstice, the sun glows like a flame atop this stone circle.

Photo By Joe Coca

Early nightfall. Crisp mornings. The sharp silhouette of leaf-bare branches. Orion marching across the evening sky. These are some familiar signs of winter. We often speak of turning inward during these darker months, becoming quiet and introspective, staying home more often, sleeping longer. Yet there’s another side to winter that contrasts with our natural inclination to rest and contemplate—a side that insists we shop til we drop, eat and drink more than we care to, and rush around busy airports. Regardless of our spiritual or cultural heritage, there’s a good chance we find ourselves caught up, perhaps involuntarily or out of habit, in a commercial swirl known as “the holidays” that leaves us depleted in more ways than one.

Perhaps this year, with some preparation and planning, we can plant the seeds for a more intuitive, simpler, and natural holiday season. Winter solstice, which takes place in late December, can be a profound way to tune into the magic and beauty of the season. For people throughout the ages—from the ancient Egyptians and Celts to the Hopi—midwinter has been a significant time of ritual, reflection, and renewal. Creating a meaningful celebration of winter solstice, either in place of or in addition to other holiday activities, can help us cultivate a deeper connection to nature and family and all the things that matter most to us. Winter can become a time of feeding the spirit and nurturing the soul, not just emptying our bank account and fraying our nerves.

Pre-Christmas celebrations

While we don’t know how long people have been celebrating the solstice, we know that ancient cultures built huge stone structures designed to align perfectly with the sun at specific times, such as dawn or high noon. Some ancient peoples performed sacred rituals and made offerings when the sun dipped below the horizon to ensure its daily return, especially during the darkest days.

Many of the traditions now associated with Christmas are believed to have originated centuries earlier with nature-based communities and indigenous peoples. For example, the idea of Santa Claus may have come from the story of the first shamans who were said to climb high into the upper worlds and return with gifts of wisdom and prophecies, postulates Tony Van Renterghem in When Santa Was a Shaman (Llewellyn, 1995). The word “yule” may derive from an Anglo-Saxon term that means “wheel,” and in pagan Scandinavia, village people sat around bonfires of burning yule logs throughout the night while drinking mead and listening to the stories of minstrel-poets.

Richard Heinberg, author of Celebrate the Solstice: Honoring the Earth’s Seasonal Rhythms through Festival and Ceremony (Quest Books, 1993) describes the solstices as “times of danger and opportunity; times for special alertness and aliveness.” In Iran, families often kept fires burning all night to assist the battle between the light and dark forces. In ancient Rome, where it was called Dies Natalis Invicti Solis, or the Birthday of the Unconquered Sun, masters even celebrated as equals with their slaves. Throughout history, celebrating the solstice has been a way to renew our connection with each other and with the numinous through acts of goodwill, special rituals, and heightened awareness.

Make your own rituals

“Solstice” comes from two Latin words: sol meaning “sun” andsistere meaning “to stand still” because it appeared as though the sun and moon had stopped moving across the sky. This longest night of the year, followed by a renewal of the sun, demonstrates the cyclical order of the cosmos. In this way, celebrating the solstice can be a beautiful remembrance that our lives are part of a larger order, always changing, always renewing.

In Celebrate the Solstice, Heinberg writes that “wisdom consists in knowing one’s place in any given cycle, and what kinds of action (or restraint of action) are appropriate for that phase.” Attuning our senses to the subtle changes and cycles of the seasons might help us attune more lovingly to the subtle changes and cycles in ourselves. By performing simple rituals with personal meaning to celebrate the solstice, these rituals will serve as touchstones to help us cultivate an attitude of receptiveness and appreciation that will carry us through the holiday season with more ease.

A good starting point might be to make a promise this winter to spend more time listening, watching, and honouring the slower, quieter rhythm of the season. On the solstice, visit a place outdoors that’s special to you—a trail you can walk or a field you can lie down in, a hillside or mountain perch that provides the perfect view, or even the roof of your apartment building or a quiet place on the edge of your yard. Consider watching the sun rise or set from your little patch of the world. Write a poem. Make a list of loving wishes for friends, family, coworkers—even people you don’t know that well. Build a shrine of nature’s found objects. Light a candle. Reflect on your aspirations for the coming months. Throw the I Ching. Say a prayer. Sing an original song.

Sharing food, an important part of any celebration, is particularly meaningful during the solstice, as it represents faith in the return of the sun and the harvest. Maybe you’d like to prepare a simple meal from organic winter vegetables to share with friends or family, or cook a dinner to enjoy in the welcome solitude of your own company.

Silence is another beautiful way to celebrate the shortest day of midwinter. Reflect the stillness of the day by cultivating stillness in yourself. Consider honouring the threshold of solstice with an hour of intentional silence for you and your household.

New traditions

Creating a new tradition that brings more peace and heart to your holidays could also bring you closer to family and friends. Sharing a ritual founded on love of nature, on respect for the always renewing cycles of life, and on faith in the future has a way of bringing out the best in people. If you’d like to start your own, consider these suggestions found at CircleSanctuary.org. You might make a wreath with evergreens collected by loved ones on a walk through the woods. Evergreens, it’s said, symbolise the continuity of life, protection, and prosperity. Or build a circle of candlelight, one for each participant, and then blow them out and sit together in the darkness for a few moments offering gratitude before lighting one central, larger candle to symbolize your unity over the coming year. Ring a collection of bells at sunrise and sunset or offer seeds to winter birds and other outdoor creatures.

If you have children in your life, you might organise some special activities to share with them, such as identifying winter plants and animals with a field guide on a short walk or drawing pictures of winter scenes in your neighbourhood. Try writing an acrostic poem in which you use “solstice” as the root word and use each of its letters as the beginning of a line in the poem. Or watch together from a warm window as the sun sets and give thanks for both the darkness and the light. (Deena Wade)

3 Blessings From The Winter Solstice Deborah King Shares How To Celebrate This Time Of Renewal

You have all the right stuff: the gifts are wrapped, the lights burn bright, the cookies await, but do you have what counts most of all? Is your spirit ready to pause for a prayer of gratitude for the gift of another year of life and love? In the Northern Hemisphere, our planet approaches the winter solstice on December 22. The shortest day of the year marks a heavenly shift when the dark begins to recede and the light to expand. The solstice brings increasing light and has long been held as a sacred time of year.

As a spiritual teacher and energy healer, I invite you to celebrate this seasonal cycle by creating your own personal rituals to mark the passing of darkness and the coming again of healing, life-giving light. The winter solstice is a time of rebirth, a special window of peace and renewal. The quiet calm of a long winter’s night welcomes you to look within and nurture your connection to Spirit. Think of how much energy you pour into the external preparations for the winter holidays. Now is the perfect time to honor your own inner light with renewed attention, awareness, and gratitude. What are some gifts that you can give your spirit this December?

Here are 3 blessings of the winter solstice to refresh and replenish your spirit:

1. Your Angels Are Near. Wisdom traditions tell us that the winter solstice marks the bending near the angelic realm. With “angels bending near the earth to touch their harps of gold,” now is the moment to reach out to your angels for healing energy and guidance. Send forth your prayers and listen closely for loving assistance from these heavenly messengers who are waiting for you to beckon them into your life. 2. The World Slows Down. At the winter solstice, the longest night of the year, the sun appears to pause before the return to shorter nights begins. The word solstice means “the sun stands still.” How welcoming is this idea of the world standing still just long enough for you to breathe! If all the hustle and bustle of life stopped for a moment, what would you do? Take a nature walk, play with your cat, listen to quiet music, light a candle? Devote a journal entry to the idea of pausing and slowing down. Picture the still, peaceful beauty of planet Earth as seen by the astronauts. Let feelings of love and gratitude rise and refresh your spirit. 3. A Traditional Time of Reflection Begins. The return of the light that follows the winter solstice has long been seen as a time of awakening for higher consciousness. The growth of your inner light reflects the growing return of sunlight to a world in need of healing energy. The time is right for you to nurture your meditation practice, to diminish your personal darkness and increase your light. You can dedicate this period of reflection to examining your life’s goals and dreams, your life purpose. How will you move forward on the path of spiritual growth in the months ahead? How will you contribute to your own healing and thereby help to heal the world? Is there a way for you to honour the solstice by spreading some light to others who are in need?

Celtic New Year – The doves return.

New Year from Mother Goose

Wassail, wassail, to our town, The cup is white, the ale is brown: The cup is made of the ashen tree, And so is the ale of the good barley.

Horn Dance.

A dance enjoyed from All Souls to twelfth Night (Little Christmas on January 5th) in hopes of brining in ‘good luck’ for the New Year! This can still be seen in Abbots Bromley in Staffordshire in England.

Blessing May the longtime Sun shine on you All Love Surround you and the pure light within you Guide you on your way!

Hunting the Wren

An old tradition in Ireland dating back for centuries that involves band of musicians going door to door. In exchange for entertaining the locals, they receive food, drink or coin for their efforts. You can read about Hunting the Wren here.

Mummers March

This march is a somewhat more serious side of the usually mischievous mummers who used to put on plays, a type of folk theater, usually around the time of the solstice and winter months in country area.

To Drive the Cold Winter Away

This tune is also known as “The Praises of Christmas”

All hail to the days that merit more praise Than all the rest of the year, And welcome the nights that double delights As well for the poor as the peer! Good fortune attend each merry-man’s friend, That doth but the best that he may; Forgetting old wrongs, with carols and songs, To drive the cold winter away.

New Light

As we leave the darkest midnight behind and as each day gets longer and we move towards spring and ‘new light’ – soon may it come and long may it last!

The Dove’s Return

A wish for peace!

Auld Lang Syne by Robbie B.

Happy New Year to one and all. And many more to come! Lyrics to Auld Lang Syne and more about Hogmanay (Scottish New Year) here.

Blessings, love and light from Winter Solstice.

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