*Disclaimer... this is me sharing my personal belief structu..

*Disclaimer... this is me sharing my personal belief structure, this is nothing meant to offend Christians as I do discuss the faith. I’ve spent 15 yrs studying it and it is just my opinions and why I chose what I celebrate. I love everyone who has a respectful and inclusive passion for their faith* For those of you who don’t know me well, I practice Buddhism which I find is the best way to be in communion with the life energy that flows in all living things. What I love about it is that you can practice Buddhism but still hold unique personal beliefs about life. The Buddha sold me when I read he taught not to follow his teachings exclusively if some of what he said didnt hold truth to you, but to use it as a guideline to search for your own truth. With that said I believe in magic and a spiritual life that we all can communicate with. I also believe an acceptance that what is beyond this life cannot be fully understood until it happens to you. Trying to explain your religious beliefs to others as facts is narrow minded and only invites conflict. In truth none of us know so how can anyone say there’s only one way. I’ve spent my life talking to my mother who passed when I was two and I didn’t realize until I was 21 that she was talking back to me. I’d tell my dad the information that would come to me and they were things only he would know. I’ve connected to the pagan holidays because they are what most modern holidays and traditions have stemmed from. Yule= Christmas, Ostara= Easter, Samhain=Halloween, etc... they were a way to celebrate nature and the unknown veil of this life and what is to come. But Christian holidays replaced them so the church could more easily “convince” pagans to convert. (Keep in mind I’m mostly talking about modern day UK & Western Europe). So today we celebrate Beltane, the celebration of fertility of the land. It’s the day that the goddess (ie Mother Nature) and the Green Man (ie the god of rebirth) unite in a celebration of the season... there’s the balance of feminine and masculine. I love celebrating the seasons instead of Christian holidays founded in centuries of rulers more concerned in using religion to govern and oppress. Rather than to celebrate a love/connection to life and whatever this loving energy is that sustains us. So today I woke up to 10 beautiful butterflies that were born, they’re my first of spring. I will probably have about 150+ butterflies this year and they are so therapeutic. I love knowing in a small way I am helping a creature that is doing so much better work for the Earth than I ever will. They pollinate and help keep our ecosystem thriving. It’s not much but it reminds me how small we are and how beautiful this world is. Humans can be so powerful, we could do incredibly great things for this world... but instead we have turned into creating an unsustainable life. This holiday reminds me that there is hope for a sustainable future if we learn to commune with nature. And now our only hope is for technology to advance in a way that we use it only for survival and to preserve and heal the earth. I hope I get to see that in my life time 💜 Happy Beltane 💋