From Hollie Wildethorn (Bakerbolijkovac)

This is a review of my friend Glenys Livingstone‘s latest book. Note, I don’t get anything special or any kickbacks for writing this review and sharing the book with you. I simply believe Glenys’ work is great and is worth looking at if you’re interested in creating ceremony and meaning in your life.  

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Glenys Livingstone is a deep thinker, a prolific writer, and an Earth Woman who I’ve had the pleasure of knowing for at least 15 years. Over the years she has continued to inspire me through the sharing of her contemplations of how creativity proceeds.  

Glenys’ latest book, A Poiesis of the Creative Cosmos: Celebrating Her within PaGaian Sacred Ceremony is a treatise of earth based spirituality that provides a way to work with The Rhythm of Life in deep realationship. It will appeal to anyone who likes a bit of structure and form with all the mystery and magick of deep sacred ceremony, and without the woo of WitchTok.

Poiesis, a Greek word meaning “the activity in which a person brings something into being that did not exist before” is perhaps the most elegant word to describe the act of creating ceremony for understanding and connection. This book encourages authenticity in creating meaning-full seasonal ceremony in real-ationship to land and kinship, in this time and space, right here and now. 

This is an academic work, with references and footnotes and such. But don’t let that put you off! Glenys’ work is a collision of ideas from Land-based thinking, Eco Philosophy, Cosmological History and Feminist Spirituality, and in merging these unique concepts, she presents a story of the seasons that’s accessible to anyone who’s willing to be your own research subject. Glenys models the commitment and deep appreciation that comes with creating meaningful personal ceremony with land, water and sky. 

Her practise; many times round the year; connecting and committing to realationship with the seasons gives Glenys a credibility that can only come from lived experience. She’s not just telling you how it ‘should’ be done. Glenys is showing us how she came to do it. She didn’t get a book offer just because she has 10,000 followers on Instagram, and a podcast (she doesn’t have either of those). Rather, Glenys is writing this book to share the synthesis of a decades-long practise of active meditation on the cycles of our Universe. She says “The Cosmos is a ceremony, a ritual. Dawn and dusk, seasons, supernovas – it is an ongoing Event of coming into being and passing away.” 

Amidst the ongoing barrage of how-to books and self-help fads, Glenys’ work is an active invitation to Self Crafted empowerment. She looks at knowledge from both past and present, to make meaning for now. Through sharing how she has come to her own cyclical celebrations, Glenys shows how the seasonal story can be made your own … in this time and space, and your particular life and community. 

PaGaian Ceremonial practise leans into the deep roots of where we’ve all come from (the Land) and enables a pathway to bring the innateness of this wisdom into the present moment, in ways that honour your way of being in the world, wherever you are. Unlike many of the books that show up on the topic of Seasonal Ceremony and Pagan(esque) Ritual, there’s just no bull shit here. Glenys looks at out of date concepts and reshapes them to the sacred for now. By blending historical, present ideology and thought-full Ceremony, we are given the tools to encounter our “own new cosmological understandings.” 

This is a book of real-ationships… with the seasons and cycles as they manifest and are manifesting… 
Glenys takes the woo out of Ceremony by describing it as “a space and time given to expression, contemplation and nurturance of depth.” She says, “Ceremony may be both an expression of deep inner truths – perceived relationship to self, Earth and Cosmos, as well as being a mode of teaching and drawing forth deeper participation.” 

In my own experience teaching from Ceremony and Ritual, engaging in ways to understand and express our connections to the natural world, enables people to create meaning in even the most mundane aspects of life. As we consciously mark special days through the year, whether they be anniversaries, seasonal shifts or life’s transitions, and link those days to stories that are bigger than our own experience, we open more to find deeper understanding and expression. For me, Glenys’ work is a supportive reminder that indeed, Creating Ceremony is a key piece in the journey of Self. 

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If you’re interested, get a copy from the publisher Girl God Books or a signed copy from the author .