As practitioners of the Craft, and indeed as human beings with families and jobs and lives, we can lose track of our own spiritual progress because it’s been superseded by other, more immediate concerns. That’s certainly been the case with me. I’ve found that it takes more effort to flex my magickal muscles, that things aren’t as easy as they were when I was a newly-initiated third-degree priestess. And a lot of that has to do with life changes, health changes, prolonged stress in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic, and just plain exhaustion.
Recently, I went back and reviewed my essays on the inner temple practice because I have dedicants who are at the point in their training when this exercise is introduced. It is meant to help them find themselves and build their own personal power. When I reviewed the meditation, it inspired me to go back and do work in my own inner temple.
Oh, what a shocker that was. When I parted the mists to reveal my inner temple, I was horrified to find a disaster area in place of my walled garden, cottage, and well. It was definitely time to do some work on myself, by myself, for myself.
Like all people wandering through the wreckage of their home, I looked for something – anything – that was still intact. I found tools scattered, books strewn all over the area, stone blocks intact but haphazardly disassembled from the walls they used to be in. I realized that nothing had actually been destroyed, just thrown about. That doesn’t mean there wasn’t damage to some things, but when I picked up books with torn pages and tools with gouges in them, they came to life in my hand and returned to their original state. That gave me a lot of hope, not to mention overwhelming relief. I hadn’t lost anything. I’d just come to realize that my inner temple reflected my outer life – disorganized and jury-rigged.
I decided then and there to take some time for a more thorough working. It would take planning, just as building my inner temple for the first time had taken planning, but I was very encouraged by the fact that all of my important tools and creations were intact. It meant I could focus on rearranging and updating my inner temple without having to recharge or recreate items that I had imbued with power and information.
What Stays and What Goes
The first thing I did in my renovation working was to gather my things from the disorganized mess of my inner temple and set them out to really examine them. Some tools felt just as powerful as they’d ever been. Others needed some care and attention. Still others were drained of their spiritual essence and needed to either be reconsecrated or decommissioned. I spent a long while sitting with each tool, understanding what it needed, and acting accordingly. There were tools and creations that were respectfully returned to the mists from whence they came, and there were tools that were lovingly reinvigorated with power and purpose.
Once all this was done, I turned my attention to the inner temple itself, reflecting on why I had built it the way I had in the first place. I decided that I still needed high walls in my garden and a gate with a key. But I decided that I didn’t need half of the rooms in the temple that I had built those years ago. So I rebuilt the temple as I walked through it, starting with the outer walls and the front door, continuing through the mudroom, the hearth and worktable, the study and shrine, and the bedroom. Then I went back through the house and repainted the sigil on the front door, set up my “psychic email” guestbook, put the books back on the shelves near the hearth, and returned my tools to their place in the chest by the worktable.
Finally, I turned to the garden outside of my inner temple and renovated it to be filled with plants, animals, and stones that had great significance to my personal path. I returned the things that brought me comfort and security to their rightful places and re-empowered the different portals to once more take me to places further afield in the spirit world.
Returning to Practice
Having spent a good deal of time intricately redesigning my inner temple, the last thing I wanted was for it to fall into disarray again. After all, the inner temple is a reflection of and a repository for our spiritual wellness and magickal power. It’s a living thing because it lives in us, it’s part of us, and it will mirror our lives.
I didn’t want my spiritual wellness to suffer at the hands of compartmentalization, procrastination, mindlessness, and busyness. But I also didn’t want it to suffer at the hands of overplanning – which is absolutely a flaw of mine. Eventually, I decided to add a mindfulness meditation to my weekly Coffee With The Goddess practice. That would give me the ability to check in with my inner temple once a week and if I were inspired to do it a little bit earlier, because it felt like a good moment to do so, then all the better.
Another task I undertook was to do some magickal and mundane maintenance on my physical tools: cleaning them, refreshing the markings on them, spending time in meditation with them to reconnect with their magickal essence, and strengthening them and their connection to their counterparts in my inner temple.
Continuous Improvement
As you check in with yourself and your inner temple, I urge you to take note of the differences you become aware of from visit to visit. Take note of the sameness as well. What changes and what seems eternal? You may wish to keep a physical journal to track these things. If you’re anything like me, then you forget pretty quickly unless it’s written down! It’s also a good way to track your personal spiritual progress. And if you realize you haven’t visited in a while, find some time on your calendar and visit, even if it’s just for five minutes to recharge yourself. Your inner temple isn’t all work and no rest or play. It’s your personal oasis in the mists of magick.