Mabon – what does balance even mean in 2023?

An autumn conundrum ⚖️

And just like that, it was autumn. I hope you had a beautiful Mabon celebration on Saturday. I was lucky enough to rise with the sun and get my fill of crisp autumn air before anyone on the street was awake 🌄 The stillness of autumn mist is something to be dreamed about. And to be photographed.

Before we get going, I wanted to say that next week I’ll be answering all your witchy, writerly and nature questions in my monthly Q&A blog. Got a question you’re burning to get out? 😃 Ask me anything by replying to this email or leaving a comment below!

But for now, I want to talk about Mabon and the meaning that many of us, as modern Pagans, associate with this equinox festival:

Balance.

What does ‘balance’ even mean in a world that never wants us to stop working? Is it possible to achieve?

Let’s get into it.

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Dark and light: a fine balancing act

Mabon marks the beginning of that much-quoted “season of mists and mellow fruitfulness.” Fruitfulness and abundance have long been the main focus of the autumn equinox, as this is the second harvest festival of the year – with Lammas being the first at the start of August, and Samhain being the third and final one at the end of October.

Across the centuries this would have been the main focus of the celebrations and work taking place in mid-September. Danu Forest in The Magical Year tells us that another name for the autumn equinox is ‘The Feast of Avalon’ due to the bushels of apples tumbling about the place 🍎 The Celtic peoples would make a ‘kern baby’ from the final harvested sheaf of wheat to make sure the fertile goddess came back for it the next year.

But as we have moved away from farms, apple trees… nature, the main focus of the festival has shifted to a secondary meaning: the idea of balance.