Dark Yule Magic

Last week, I saw a ghost.

Not the rattling-chain variety, but the subtler kind. The kind that arrives at the winter solstice, when the year pauses and the light is at its weakest. I see them in the reflection of a dark windowpane. In a shadowed alleyway. In the whispered memory of things past. Each of them offers an invitation to peer into what Sheridan Le Fanu refers to as “a glass darkly” (a phrase borrowed from Corinthians).

It’s no accident that Christmas developed a tradition of reading ghost stories across many cultures. These late-night tales are meant to be told when the nights are long, and shadows hover just outside the firelight. Traditionally, the dark heart of winter has been a time for seeing what usually stays hidden. In the spirit of Dark Yule, I found myself thinking about A Christmas Carol this season, as I was visited by three ghosts of my own.

Take the ghost I saw last week. She was one of many I’ve seen this season. The first was in early December. I met the ghost of who I used to be: ambitious, overworked, and easily lost. I saw her for who she was, and who she needed to be to survive. Then I hugged her and set her free. I saw the ghost of Christmas present, too, in quieter endings—certain places and ways of thinking simply sealing themselves off, not with drama, but with a soft, unmistakable knowing. In her place is overwhelming gratitude for this beautiful life and the love I find I have in it—so much more than I thought I had in the dark days of the pandemic.

And I caught a glimpse of the ghost of what may yet be. Last week, she called to me unexpectedly at a local market. It was as if nobody saw her but me, and for a moment, time stood still. We spoke only briefly, and the content of that conversation is for me and her alone. But long after we parted, I knew I had experienced a memory from my future—what Patrick Harpur calls a daimonic moment—when time bends, and we connect with archetypal energies far beyond our everyday human experience.

On the shortest day of the year and the longest night, we peer into the darkness in search of light.

Peering into a Glass, Darkly

In Mexica tradition, priests used black obsidian mirrors to gaze at the sun. They would angle them toward the sun so that the light could pierce the dark stone. It appears like a pinprick of light, as if the sun has literally seared a hole into the dark mirror, even though it is only a reflection. The darkness, you see, was the only way the priests could safely gaze at the light. Darkness was not the enemy—it was the condition that made vision possible. I learned about this magical history from a lecture at a local brewery given by Kurly Tlapoyawa, an archaeologist, ethnohistorian, and host of the podcast Tales from Aztlantis.

The story behind the Mexica calendar and the winter solstice was powerful to me, as a Mestiza who is still learning about my roots. The use of obsidian as a mirror to see the sun feels deeply gothic and filled with gloomth. It echoes Sheridan Le Fanu’s In a Glass Darkly, where the daimonic never appears head-on, but only obliquely—through the uncanny, synchronicity, and the unexplainable. To see “in a glass darkly” is to accept that we can never gaze at the numinous directly. We see it out of the corner of our eye, in a strange sense of knowing, or by peering into the darkness—our psyches, our imaginal worlds, the stories that speak to us.

That is what storytelling does. It is the dark mirror that allows us to peer at things that would otherwise be invisible, whether in a holiday ghost story or in another kind of text altogether.

The daimonic always comes in sideways, as Harpur explains in many of his books. In order to experience the numinous, we must peer into the darkness: the monster under the bed, the skeletons in the closet, the ghosts on a moonlit road we’d rather avoid. The winter solstice—the longest night welcoming the return of the light—becomes an apt metaphor not just for shadow work, but for acknowledging that the world is much vaster than we can always perceive. Sooner or later, if a person wants to heal, they must dare to peer into a glass darkly and see what emerges.

Winter Solstice Liminality

This is Dark Yule Magic.

It is when you embrace the fallow period—the quietude and the slow return to longer days. It is a liminal time in which the shadows slowly recede, and with them, the heaviness of old selves and old stories, which we gladly commit to the Yule bonfire.

These are the moments when the dark mirror speaks, not of doom, but of hope. You never approach the numinous directly. You look through the obsidian mirror. And if you’re willing to stay with the darkness long enough—long enough to let the ghosts speak—you begin to see the light.

Wishing you a luminous Winter Solstice season, filled with the right kind of darkness—and light.

Atl text: Four lit pillar candles in orange and pink hues surrounded by holly leaves and red berries with the text "Dark Yule Magic" above.

Enchantment Learning & Living is an inspirational collection of musings touching on life’s simple pleasures, everyday fantasy, and absolutely delectable recipes that will guarantee to stir the kitchen witch in you.  If you enjoyed what you just read and believe that true magic is the everyday, subscribe here.

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Winter Solstice Story Magic

This post originally appeared in my November/December 2024 newsletter.

At the start of the year, I pulled The Fool in the tarot. The message was clear: time for a new adventure. I wasn’t sure if that meant a new job, a move, or what. But I’d forgotten what a trickster the deck can be! Often, the message is more poetic than the brick-and-mortar answers that we want to ascribe to this divination tool. At any rate, this has very much been a year of trying to relearn myself and all the joys life has to offer.

Somewhere around March, I discovered what The Fool had been trying to get me to see all along. I didn’t need a location change. I didn’t need a new job or even a new haircut. What I needed was a change in perspective. I need a deeper appreciation of my life and all I’d done to make it an abundant one—and the knowledge that I could keep growing and bringing light into the spaces of my life that needed more nourishment.

The stress of the pandemic—personally and professionally—had narrowed my vision and made me tight and tense, always looking for the next battle or foe. Worse, the stories I told myself about my life got rigid and hard, like some highly-touted but thoroughly depressing piece of literary fiction…in other words, it was brittle and boring! It was time for a reset.

Enter The Fool who asked me to open my heart—and my eyes—to the wonder all around me. It was time, in other words, to rethink my story and get rid of the plot threads that weren’t doing a darn thing but bogging down my narrative flow.

There are precisely two ways to effect positive, lasting change in your life. Trust me. I’ve learned from experience. The first is through hope. I know it sounds trite, and perhaps what not many people want to hear with all the traumatic world events right now. But ACTIVE HOPE—where you firmly believe that there is a better way of being in the world and work towards that—is a powerful thing.

The second is through storytelling.

Stories give us hope. Stories give us glimpses into different lives and worlds and ways of thinking. They offer us medicine and wisdom. We find ourselves in stories—what we read, what we watch, even the stories we tell about ourselves. It should come as no surprise, then, that hope and storytelling go hand in hand.

I often ask myself, when I get stuck and my thinking gets rigid, “Is this interesting narratively?” Or, if it seems like there’s no solution to my problems, I ask, “What’s a good, generative plot twist here?”

This helps me get perspective and space from the doom and gloom that’s easy to sink into when old ghosts and negativity come knocking on my door. I wonder…is it interesting to be consumed by that darkness and end up like a long-suffering protagonist in a dry-as-dust but supposedly “brilliant” literary treatise on human suffering? No, not really.

I’m no stranger to the lure of darkness, but I’d much rather be a gothic heroine!

So here is another, more interesting narrative path: Take a beeswax candle. They are the best for warding off negativity and purifying the air, after all. Set it in an old brass candle holder. Light it. And use it to find your way down that darkened corridor beyond your door. Ideally, you should be wearing a long, flowing white gown, though you need not necessarily run through this haunted house.

Brave the darkness, certainly. Face those ghosts. But do not let them consume you. And for goodness sake, keep your heart open to brooding strangers with a mysterious past and a future that is as bright and loving as the one you wish to conjure for yourself. What is a story without romance? A boring one, and as my familiars will tell you, we simply don’t have time for boring.

Sound foolish? Perhaps. But The Fool says there’s nothing wrong with that. In fact, we both think getting a little foolish now and then is a marvelous idea!

That’s why I’m indulging now in one of my favorite holiday pastimes: immersing myself in the world of storytelling. When the world seems dark and the way forward unclear, I sink into the realm of the imagination, a place where archetypal energies and mystic forces are always at work, showing us a more profound way of working magic in the world. Stories take us beyond the dust and build-up of everyday living and remind us that there is wonder all around us, endless possibilities, if we stay open and curious, like The Fool.

So this holiday season, whatever you celebrate and however you celebrate, may you leave room for stories that terrify and shock, that heal and cleanse, that revitalize and inspire. Indulge in the Christmas tradition of reading ghost stories. Find yourself in terrifying folklore and mistletoe-strewn romances. Revisit old friends (a Lord of the Rings trilogy marathon or a rewatch of The Holiday, anyone?) and find new ones (do yourself a favor and go see Wicked—I promise it is the magic we all need right now!). May you leave room for hope and light on these darkest nights, as well as good stories. Above all, tend your own story—what wild and vibrant plot twists would you wish for yourself in the coming months? Invoke that Main Character Energy! It’s all The Fool asks of us.

I will see you in the new year for more magic-making, tarot know-how, and bookish enchantments. Until then, remember, true magic is in the everyday…and a good story!

Image of a cozy reading nook with festive winter decor framed by a window that overlooks a snowy landscape. A book is open across a warm blanket.

Enchantment Learning & Living is an inspirational collection of musings touching on life’s simple pleasures, everyday fantasy, and absolutely delectable recipes that will guarantee to stir the kitchen witch in you.  If you enjoyed what you just read and believe that true magic is the everyday, subscribe here.

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Winter is for Sacred Simple Pleasures

It’s a cold and cloudy day, a perfectly cozy winter’s day, promising much-needed snow and quiet time. I’m sipping cinnamon and anis-laced coffee this morning, gazing out the window above my writing desk, and relishing the cozy warmth of my home. It’s strewn with twinkle lights and smells of beeswax and more cinnamon. It’s filled with books, herbs, and all the things I love, including my two familiars gazing out the window beside me. It’s a comforting and warm antidote to the brewing storm outside.

Truly, it is the perfect day to indulge in self-care. There’s something about this heavy weather that invites us to slow down and take care of ourselves. Maybe indulge a little.

Honestly? I’ve always said magic is a hard, gritty thing. It takes work. You can’t just light candles, say positive affirmations and then expect the universe to drop miracles into your lap. You’ve got to work for it. Stay grounded but hopeful—and always, always be proactive in cultivating a magical life. Self-care is like that. I mean, you can light candles (again), say positive affirmations (again), and…expect to feel reborn. Sure, light your candles. I love my beeswax candles because they cleanse the air, smell like honey, and are just plain pretty. Affirmations can be powerful spells that help you grow. Candle magic is a thing. You see, magic and self-care have a lot in common—I mean, we think of candles and affirmations for both, right? 

In fact, seasoned witches know that radical self-care is the backbone of magical living.

It means slowing down and feeling hard feelings. It means talking with those you love to find a way forward. It means pinpointing a place in your life where the energy is stagnant and then working through things so the energy can be free-flowing. Sometimes, it means you need to reimagine your life. Things that were once generative and inspiring for a time can become sour and toxic if we hold on too long. Energies change, and it’s time to move on—it’s life’s way of making sure you keep growing. It’s also about being able to acknowledge and celebrate the moments when your life is flourishing and where energy flows. And yes, self-care is also about exercising, eating right, sleeping well… basically treating yourself like a small child who needs a lot of TLC.

But here’s the thing I’ve discovered: that work can be exhausting.

It takes a lot to face hard things, to sit with those feelings, and to map a way forward. It can be hard, too, when you experience joy because sometimes you realize you haven’t allowed yourself to experience enough of it. Who hasn’t been stingy with their joy from time to time? All this to say that sometimes, as we stay steady, conjuring change through our routines as rituals, we need a breather. 

And that’s where the fun—and ever so important—part of self-care comes in. 

I admit it: I like my candles and positive affirmations. I’ve spent the afternoon making cinnamon, orange, and peppermint bath bombs so I can indulge in festive bubble baths and share them with loved ones. I’ve also become obsessed with “fussy” skincare routines of oil cleansing, honey face masks, and painting my nails. I’ve added touches of glitter to, well, everything. These silly things—so often the things we think of when we think of self-care—are just as important as all the other hard stuff you have to do to really take care of yourself. There’s nothing like brewing a pot of mint chocolate tea, curling up on the couch in a pile of blankets (and cats), and going down a Pinterest rabbit hole to learn about the best tips for face care or what the heck latte makeup is (what I normally wear, as it turns out). 

Or there’s the pure gothic delight of listening to ghost stories while knitting by twinkle light, or, yes, watching a cheesy holiday movie for a popcorn and pizza movie night. Sometimes, it’s taking a day to go to the salon and indulge in holiday shopping. Or cozy up by the fireplace and do nothing but daydream and snooze. See what I mean? It’s frivolous and fun…and so absolutely necessary.

Choosing joy is when we let the magic in.

It’s when we allow all we’ve worked for and conjured to settle and take root and manifest in the way that is healthiest for us. It’s the fallow time when we reset and rest and let nature do its work. We can’t always be go-go-going. In fact, it’s a good way to clog up your energy and inadvertently sabotage your conjurings! All good magic is a hard, gritty thing, true. But it’s also a soft thing, a thing that needs energetic flow and divine receptivity to balance out the dirty business of cleaning up our lives.

The holidays are the perfect time to slow down and indulge in sacred simple pleasures; the sillier and more joyful, the better. All the better, in fact, to conjure magical living this year and in the next…

Enchantment Learning & Living is an inspirational collection of musings touching on life’s simple pleasures, everyday fantasy, and absolutely delectable recipes that will guarantee to stir the kitchen witch in you.  If you enjoyed what you just read and believe that true magic is the everyday, subscribe here.

Want even more inspiration to make your dream life a reality?  Follow me on Facebook, Pinterest, and  Instagram.  Thanks for following!