Cleansing Fires and New Beginnings: HAPPY NEW YEAR 2019!!

Cleansing Fires and New Beginnings: HAPPY NEW YEAR 2019!!

The cleansing power of fire, by a parade of torches, by bonfires or by fireworks is part of the New Year’s Eve celebration in cultures around the world. This way we symbolically purify our lives and start fresh. Although many cultures adhere to older traditions as well, most of the world will join in the party on the night of 31 December, the night designated by the Gregorian calendar; the most widely used civil calendar. We people of earth love to celebrate!

Whether we trust in fortune in one of its many guises, or our own resolution and determination, we set about to create new paths, new habits, new goals.  One of the oldest traditions is found in Scotland, called Hogmanay, where even the name is so old that we have lost its origins. Scottish fire festivals involve bonfires, torch parades, and Scotch whiskey; for that inner warmth and cleansing.

From Australia to Latin America we celebrate with both fire and fireworks.  Fire purifies, fire brings new growth, fire nurtures with the warmth of the hearth for food and light, fire protects us as a weapon and cauterizes our wounds. And it is beautiful. To expand the beauty, the power and the reach, we have fireworks; the great bursting of colors and form in the sky above.

So now the moment is fresh and we step into a time we create newly. Our goals and dreams are restated, our attention is toward the future. This is simply and beautifully stated by L. Ron Hubbard, “There is no person alive who cannot make a new beginning.”

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