Diotima Mantineia - Touch the Earth, Kiss the Sky: Allowing the Rational Mind to Welcome Magic & Spirituality

About the Author

Diotima Mantineia (Asheville, NC) is a practicing witch and has been a professional astrologer and tarot reader for more than twenty-five years. She writes for Witches & Pagans and teaches widely. Her passion for science led her to a degree in soil and crop science as well as graduate work in the field.

Llewellyn Publications

Woodbury, Minnesota

Copyright Information

Touch the Earth, Kiss the Sky 2020 by Diotima Mantineia.

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First e-book edition 2020

E-book ISBN: 9780738761381

Book design by Samantha Penn

Cover design by Shannon McKuhen

Editing by Brian Erdrich

Interior art by the Llewellyn Art Department

Llewellyn Publications is an imprint of Llewellyn Worldwide Ltd.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data (Pending)

ISBN: 978-0-7387-6134-3

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To all my Teachers

Contents

Stations of the Sun

Science on the Bleeding Edge

Magic(k)

YuleThe Winter Solstice

Self and Cosmos

ImbolcThe Winter/Spring Midpoint

Energy, Ritual, and Practice

OstaraThe Spring Equinox

The Temple of the Soul

BeltaneThe Spring/Summer Midpoint

Animism, Gods, and Offerings

LithaSummer Solstice

Connecting with the Land

LammasThe Summer/Autumn Midpoint

Taking Psi Out for a Spin

Harvest HomeThe Autumn Equinox

Communicating with Spirits

SamhainThe Autumn/Winter Midpoint

Finding Your Path

Introduction

I f you have often found yourself torn between science and spirituality, if youve felt a holy and sacred connection to the stars, to Earth, to Natures soaring creations but not followed your heart into a deeper psychic, poetic connection because you feared you might have to sacrifice your rationality, then Ive written this book for you.

If you sense a depth and brilliance to life that is often veiled as you navigate your way through your daily routines in consensus reality and you want to explore that depth, to tear the veil away, but you dont quite know how to go about doing that, then Ive written this book for you.

If youve always been deeply curious about the workings of this world and think science is one of the coolest creations of the human race but the materialist conclusions of scientific orthodoxy depress you, then Ive written this book for you.

You may already follow a particular religion or spiritual tradition but dont feel that it really fits you. Maybe it puts religious orthodoxy over science, and that just doesnt seem right to you. Maybe you dont get any real sense of inspiration or connection from it, or perhaps its precepts dont really agree with your own ideas but it gives you a spiritual community, so you stick with it anyway.

Or perhaps you have no defined spiritual path or acknowledged religion at all, though you feel the lack of some kind of higher guidance in your life. Perhaps youre not really sure what you believe. You may have imagined going off on a retreat to think about these things and get clear on it allsomeday.

Someday, however, is usually a little white lie you tell yourself because there always seems to be something else to spend the time and/or money on. But you dont need to sit in a cave in India, go on a vision quest in the forest, find shamans in Peru, or meditate on the patio of a luxury spiritual resort to map a path ahead that leads to fulfilling your souls vision for this lifetime. Nor do you need to abandon rational, logical thought to pursue spiritual goals. You can map out your own path, your unique, creative engagement with reality and the universe itself, by simply committing some time to a considered sequence of thought and practice that fits within the demands of your daily life.

My work as an astrologerlearning about peoples dreams and visions, their challenges and sorrows, their soul-level longingshas made me very aware of how many people are conflicted and uncertain about their spiritual beliefs. This is unsurprising, since the high priests of our cultural religion, science, mostly deny that there is any spiritual reality or consciousness outside of the confines of physical reality, while the high priests of the majority religions mostly say theres only one true waytheirs, of course. But my own experiences and my conversations with others have convinced me that we all have a timeless and vibrant existence outside of physical realitya soul, in other wordsand we come into this world of time and space trailing clouds of glory, with a plan for that soul to create, grow, and expand its awareness.

Ive spent a considerable amount of time studying science, both formally, in college and grad school, and informally, through reading and classes. I think its one of the most remarkable and useful inventions of the human mindeven though we do tend to make a religion out of it in direct contravention of its own tenets. Ive also been actively pursuing my own spiritual journey for well over half a century. Ive managed to learn a few things as I stumbled along, looking for and finding a synthesis of science and spirituality that makes sense to me.

So I can say with some certainty that to explore the sacred connections you sense, to expand your awareness into the realm of spirit requires only your curiosity and a determination to follow where reason, experience, intuition, and results lead you. There are things youll need to spend some time thinking about and things youll need to actually do. (Experience is important.) This book offers some fruitful lines of intellectual investigation, some experiential and spiritual practices, and a framework for a year of spiritual study and exploration woven around the cycles of the Sun and natural seasonal changes. Hopefully, by the end of the year you will have begun to uncover an intellectually and emotionally satisfying way of approaching your daily life with a greater spiritual awareness and a greater sense of joy and fulfillment.

This is also a book about magicabout influencing and changing the physical world through subtle energies of Consciousness and connection. Well look at both the theory and practice of magic as well as how it changes us and the world around us.