Starhawk Quotes - Page 2

The long sleep of Mother Goddess is ended. May She awaken in each of our hearts - Merry meet, merry part, and blessed be.

The Goddess does not rule the world; She is the world.

A spiritual organization with a hierarchical structure can convey only the consciousness of estrangement, regardless of what teachings or deep inspirations are at its root.The structure itself reinforces the idea that some people are inherently more worthy than others.

Identifying as a Pagan, feminist, Witch, and anarchist is possibly a way to alarm great segments of the general public, but at least it keeps me from sinking into a boring and respectable middle age.

Despair breeds fundamentalism, fanaticism, and terrorism. A world of truly shared abundance would be a safer world.

Each being is sacred - meaning that each has inherent value that cannot be ranked in a hierarchy or compared to the value of another being.

Solidarity is based on the principle that we are willing to put ourselves at risk to protect each other.

Beware of organizations that proclaim their devotion to the light without embracing, bowing to the dark; for when they idealize half the world they must devalue the rest.

Only those who must bear the consequences of a decision have the right to make it.

Another world is possible!' ... Another world is also necessary, for this one is unjust, unsustainable, and unsafe. It's up to us to envision, fight for, and create that world, a world of freedom, real justice, balance, and shared abundance, a world woven in a new design.

Any ritual is an opportunity for transformation.

Through the Goddess, we can discover our strength, enlighten our minds, own our bodies, and celebrate our emotions.

Spirituality leaps where science cannot yet follow, because science must always test and measure, and much of reality and human experience is immeasurable.

What shames us, what we most fear to tell, does not set us apart from others; it binds us together if only we can take the risk to speak it.

On some deep cosmic level, we are all one, and within us we each contain the potential for good and for destruction, for compassion and hate, for generosity and greed.

Ritual affirms the common patterns, the values, the shared joys, risks, sorrows, and changes that bind a community together. Ritual links together our ancestors and descendants, those who went before with those will come after us.

It is not easy to be a Witch, a bender, a shaper, one of the Wise; nor is it safe, comfortable, laid back, mellow, uplifting, or a guarantee of Peace of mind. It requires openness, vulnerability, courage and work. It gives no answers, only tasks to be done and questions to consider....It functions in those deeper ways of knowing which our culture has denied and for which we hunger.

Patriarchy values the hard over the soft; the tough over the tender; punishment, vengeance, and vindictiveness over compassion, negotiation, and reconciliation. The 'hard' qualities are linked to power, success, and masculinity - and exalted. The 'soft' qualities are identified with weakness, powerlessness, and femininity - and denigrated.

Unless I have enough personal power to keep commitments in my daily life, I will be unable to wield magical power. To work magic, I need a basic belief in my ability to do things and cause things to happen. That belief is generated and sustained by my daily actions.

The terrain of the mysteries is the ordinary. To seek out mystery, we don't have to go anywhere. We must simply change our preception, our description, our consciousness of where we are.

Those who would practice magic must be scrupulously honest in their personal lives. In one sense, magic works on the principle that 'it is so because I say it is so.' For words to take on such force, you must be deeply and completely convinced that it is identified with truth as you know it. To a person who practices honesty and keeps commitments, 'As I will, so mote it be' is not just a pretty phrase; it is a statement of fact.

It happens over and over again—a group of people come together, fired up with passion to create change. They begin with huge inspiration and enthusiasm—and a year later, it’s all foundered in the mire of conflict. We could have changed the world ten times over—if we didn’t have to do it together with other people, those irritating, self-righteous, controlling, fluff-brained, clueless idiots who are our friends and allies.

Fear doesn't go away but you walk toward fear naked and the gate opens.

Sexuality is a sacrament.

Witchcraft offers the model of a religion of poetry, not theology. It presents metaphors, not doctrines, and leaves open the possibility of reconciliation of science and religion, of many ways of knowing.