Reflecting on my harvests

I don’t grow fruit or veg in our garden, most of it is grass although we do have a small flower bed area.  I do have a couple of lavender bushes and some of that gets harvested for assorted uses but that’s not really my harvest.  My harvests tend to be more in the achievement of goals and targets that I set myself.

Back in February I wrote about some decisions I had made about changes I was trying to make.  I had put these into three areas of Mind, Body and Spirit and at sporadic intervals I’ve posted a few bits and pieces of updates. At this stage I have decided to do a full reflection on what I have done so far.

Mind
I wrote in February of my intention to continue learning Scottish Gaelic (Gàidhlig).  I completed the second beginners course at work but since then there haven’t been any further courses freely available at work.  I had planned to try and keep my hand in with the BBC course Beag air Bheag but I haven’t managed to do this.  So while I can now manage a couple of basic conversational exchanges on the whole I do not feel that I have achieved what I had hoped in this area.  I haven’t totally given up though.

Body
My plans in this area were to continue to loose weight and to get fitter as well.  In this area I feel I have been very successful.  Since February I have lost about 15 kg in weight, I didn’t record my weight at that point so I’m not certain what stage I was at.  What I can say is that since I started loosing weight I have lost 22kg (that’s 48.4 lbs or just about 3 and a half stone). I’ve also lost 6.5 inches round my waist, 4.5 inches round my hips, and 4.5 inches round my bust since late January.

I completed the classes in Body Balance and Belly dancing and when they stopped I kept exercising.  Up until two weeks ago I was doing one class and also going swimming every week.  In the last two weeks I’ve added a new class and I’m thinking of switching the swimming for another cardiovascular activity for the winter months.

I’ve still not reached my final weight target but it’s looking as if I will manage to by the Winter Solstice and possibly before that.  I haven’t been this light or healthy since my early twenties so I feel pretty good about this and have discovered that I do have a touch of vanity lurking within me after all.  There’s a big mirror on one of the landings of the building I work in and I keep stopping in front of it and admiring myself!

Spirit
Under this section I didn’t really talk about targets as such but about things I was just beginning to do.  I have continued to carry out lunar devotions at full moon to the Goddesses Brigantia, Rigantona and the Cailleach and at dark moon to my ancestors.  For three moons after Calan Mai I felt that honouring the Cailleach didn’t fit but I think that was a height of summer thing as last moon it felt right to honour her again.

In addition to my lunar observances, a few weeks ago I started with a weekly observance for Maponos.  I’ve had some odd experiences connected with this that I will write about later.  I have become convinced that what I am trying to do each week is going down well with either Maponos, a local spirit or a combination of both.

I’ve also come to some conclusions about past experiences in meditative journeys and shamanic style practices.  I may well write more about this later although I’m not sure if I will at the moment.  Some of it is hard to put into words.

Since February I’ve also been able to resolve a few things that were troubling me thanks to the support of members of Brython.

Conclusions
All in all I think my harvests have been pretty good.  I’ve not had success with everything but that’s life.  I am particularly pleased with my physical improvements as I expect you can tell 🙂