"Autumn is a second spring when every leaf is a flower."” Albert Camus
Mabon, also known as the Autumn Equinox, is a pagan holiday celebrated when day and night are of equal length. This balance between light and dark serves as the foundation for Mabon’s themes of harmony and thanksgiving. This year Mabon falls on 22nd September in the Northern Hemisphere. It is considered the second of three harvest festivals on the Wheel of the Year, coming after Lughnasadh and before Samhain. Since Mabon is a harvest festival, it involves the preparation and sharing of a meal that includes the season’s produce—apples, pomegranates, roots like potatoes and carrots, squashes, and grains.
This feast is often shared with family or within the community as a way of giving thanks for the bounty of the harvest. Participants often decorate altars with symbols of the season, such as acorns, pinecones, autumn leaves, vines such as ivy, and horns of plenty. Candles in autumnal colours like deep yellows, oranges, and browns are also common. Apples are also a prominent symbol of Mabon, representing life and immortality. Activities might include apple picking, making cider or apple pies, and using apples in rituals. Similarly, the making and drinking of wine is traditional in honour of the grape harvest.
The equinox is a time of balance, and this is a central theme in Mabon. It is a time to reflect on the balance within your own life (work vs. rest, giving vs. receiving) and the external balance in nature. Some people practice the act of balancing stones at Mabon as a meditation on balance and thanks, reflecting the balanced day and night. It offers a moment to stop and relax, enjoy the fruits of personal endeavours, and prepare for the slower, reflective winter season ahead.
Mabon coincides with the Sun passing through Human Design Gate 46, the Gate of Serendipity, or Self-Determination. “Growth and good fortune come through application, truthfulness and sincerity, or, simply being in the right place at the right time with the right attitude. Small gains eventually lead to great accomplishments. Love of your body is love of your temple, or love of the vehicle that conveys you through your precious life.” (Chetan Parkyn).
I love this sentence from Hua-Ching Ni’s translation of the I-Ching about Gate 46 where Gates correlate with hexagrams: “This hexagram counsels one to emulate a young sprout by maintaining calmness and balance and allowing growth to evolve naturally.” And it inspired my choice of the Albert Camus quote above. If you’ve read my previous newsletters, you will know that each Gate has 6 different expressions, or Lines: –
- Promoting growth
- Expanding naturally
- Progressing easily
- Fulfilling commitments to grow
- Proceeding regardless of visible progress
- Reviewing – it may no longer be the time for growth but for service
I think the “suchness of life” is much like “thrownness” and indeed “serendipity”. We may have great good fortune, or we may not. When my dad died, my mum gave me a card which had been given to her by a school friend at the time of her father’s passing in 1935. It read: “When the one great scorer comes to write against your name, he writes not that you won, or lost, but how you played the game.” I sense that this is what this time of year is all about. We are invited to give thanks for our blessings, whether achieved by hard work or by good fortune, and consider how we want to play the next part of the game of life.
With love and all good wishes,