At Year's End

Winter Work for Exhausted Magicians

It’s getting to be that time of year again. The frigid winds have arrived, the leaves bleed out, their hues of red and yellow gracing the ground, and the wild hunt is just on the horizon’s edge.

I always struggle with this slice of the cycle. The gloomy days seem to sweep that divine spark away from my being, while a lethargic spirit has moved in, making its home in my body. My ability to spring up out of bed the moment my alarm goes off has hit the road, and suddenly, I find myself craving candy. My ability to ward off the impulse to shove it in my face is severely reduced… I’m losing a war to an army of delicious Reese’s sticks. And just to make things a little more difficult, with the coming of the holidays comes that lovely holiday rush with a boss who thinks that you can work the hours of many mortals. With all these little Jotnar tap - dancing their hearts out, I’m barely able to conjure anything to blurb about.

It’s a part of the cycle, the time of the year where the world slows down, the wind becomes ever more aggressive, and the wife has unbury candles for when the winter storms decide to rob us of electricity - which actually happened while I was crafting this.

The Work of Winter: Sitting With What We’ve Woven

During these cold months it’s our sacred duty to sit with the year’s events. What choices did we make? Did our decisions increase the luck of our family and clan? With complete honesty we must examine the wyrd we’ve weaved and determine if its leading us to a path that we wish to walk down

But what does it actually mean to examine wyrd? This isn’t a simple ledger of wins and losses, successes and failures, though this can certainly be a part of the process… you’re not doing a quarterly review! While hitting goals is important, we must take a step back and recognize the pattern we’ve been weaving, and often that pattern is created by small choices and habits flying beneath the radar of conscious awareness. The question isn’t “Did I succeed?” but rather “What kind of life am I creating?

When you look back at the year, you’re not hunting for mistakes to flagellate yourself over. You’re tracing the shape of your days. Did you spend your evenings building something or numbing something? For instance, I likely spent too much time drinking and watching the Youtubes, and I definitely did not spend enough time in meditation.

Wyrd doesn’t care about your intentions. It cares about your actions; we are our deeds. You can intend to be present with your family while scrolling through your phone at dinner. You can intend to take care of your health while eating Reese’s sticks. Wyrd is built from what you actually do, not what you meant to do or wished you’d done.

Looking Forward

with the time taken to examine this year’s wyrd, must also look to the coming year. Where are we headed? What are our goals for the year? If you’re a crafty little magician, and if you’re reading this you’re at least Woo curious, then set aside some time to craft yourself some sigils.

Let’s be clear about what kind of work this actually is. This Sigil-crafting isn’t some new age manifesting nonsense. You’re not getting a new sports car. The boy who left you isn’t coming back. This work is about clarifying your intention and embedding it in your daily awareness. When you create a sigil for the coming year, you’re asking: What do I want to grow? What pattern do I want to weave into being? What do you actually want your life to feel like when you’re living it?

This may seem more difficult than it should. We’ve been conditioned to focus on external metrics and material goods. Sure, these can be fine in their own right, but often they’re merely placeholders for the things we genuinely desire. Maybe you want to spend less time in conversations that drain you. Maybe you want a career advancement because deep down you are desperate to win your fathers love. The sigil work forces you to get specific. You need a concrete thread to weave.

The sigil becomes a fancy little glyph that bypasses your overthinking mind and speaks directly to the part of you that actually makes choices. You can place the sigil on your wall, on your phone background, or even tattoo it on your wrist. And if you’re married try working on the sigils with your partner. And remember, the magic isn’t always in the symbol. The magic is in the choosing, and choosing again, until the new pattern becomes your wyrd.

At Springs End

Old man Winter doesn’t negotiate. The world slows whether you’re ready or not. The Wild Hunt rides, the storms knock out the power, and you’re left sitting in the dark with a candle and the uncomfortable truth of what you’ve been weaving all year. You can ignore it, sure. Plenty of people do. They barrel through winter at summer’s pace and wonder why they’re burned out by February.

The road is long and dark. The exhaustion will win some nights. This is the rhythm that predates your boss’s expectations, your holiday obligations, your war with Reese’s sticks. It’s older than all of that. And it’ll be here long after. Our ancestors didn’t wait for ideal conditions either. They sat by fire and examined their year because it was time to do so, not because it was convenient.

So light your candles when the storms come. Sit with your wyrd when you can steal the moments. This is the season for it, and the season doesn’t wait, but it also doesn’t judge. It simply is, and it invites you to do the work within its boundaries. And remember, imperfect work is better than work not done.