Starhawk quotes

Starhawk is an American writer, activist, and one of the most prominent voices in modern Paganism and ecofeminism. Her books, including "The Spiral Dance," have inspired generations of spiritual seekers and environmentalists. She continues to lead workshops and rituals promoting social justice and earth-based spirituality. Here are 40 of her quotes:

In the Craft, we do not believe in the Goddess - we connect with her; through the moon, the stars, the ocean, the earth, through trees, animals, through other human beings, through ourselves. She is here. She is within us all.

Starhawk

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.

Starhawk

Magic is another word that makes people uneasy, so I use it deliberately, because words they are comfortable with, the words that sound acceptable, rational, scientific, and intellectually sound, are comfortable precisely because they are the language of estrangement.

Starhawk

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

Starhawk

The test of a true myth is that each time you return to it, new insights and interpretations arise.

Starhawk

The witches, the wise women, and the healers were also always the counselors. It's a whole other tradition of knowledge and learning that has been suppressed because it had political implications.

Starhawk

Any creative work that is truly alive is influenced by a thousand chance factors in its generation.

Starhawk

Any ritual is an opportunity for transformation.

Starhawk

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

Starhawk

Life demands honesty, the ability to face, admit, and express oneself.

Starhawk

In a culture where profit has become the true God, self-sacrifice can seem incomprehensible rather than noble.

Starhawk

There are times when it is inappropriate to feel wholly good. Now is one of them. As the saying goes, "If you aren't angry, you aren't paying attention." This doesn't mean that we need to be in a constant state of rage or irritability or guilt. It means we need to use our magical tools to face the stark and overwhelming realities that confront us, acknowledge our feelings, and transmute them into the energy we need for change.

Starhawk

The god is Eros, but he is also Logos, the power of the mind. In witchcraft there is no opposition between the two. The bodily desire for union and the emotional desire for connection are transmuted into the intellectual desire for knowledge, which is also a form of union. Knowledge can be both analytic and synthetic; it can take these apart and look at differences, or form a pattern from unintegrated parts and see the whole.

Starhawk

Our magical tools and insights, our awareness of energies and allies on many planes, can deepen and inform our activism. And our activism can deepen our magic, by encouraging us to create ritual that speaks to the real challenges we face in the world, offers the healing and renewal we need to continue working, and a community that understands that spirit and action are one.

Starhawk

When we founded Reclaiming two decades ago, our intention was to bring together the spiritual and the political. Or more accurately, some of us for whom the spiritual and the political were inseparable wanted to create a practice and community that reflected this integration. Now, with the Bush forces pushing into an aggressive war, with horrific environmental and social problems left unaddressed, the need for activism is stronger than ever. The stakes have never been higher, and the sense of urgency is palpable.

Starhawk

When power relations of domination are no longer the norm in society, and when men assume truly equal shares of all aspects of childrearing, perhaps we will be able to fully reclaim the nurturing aspects of the God. Until then, let us hope some men will begin this process by the way they lead their lives.

Starhawk

Community means strength that joins our strength to do the work that needs to be done. Arms to hold us when we falter. A circle of healing. A circle of friends. Someplace where we can be free.

Starhawk

Any ritual is an opportunity for transformation. To do a ritual, you must be willing to be transformed in some way. The inner willingness is what makes the ritual come alive and have power. If you aren't willing to be changed by the ritual, don't do it.

Starhawk

The tide has turned! The light will come again! In a new dawn, in a new day, The sun is rising! Io! Evohe! Blessed Be!

Starhawk

To live with integrity in an unjust society we must work for justice. To walk with integrity through a landscape strewn with beer cans, we must stop and pick them up.

Starhawk

Sexual integrity means honestly recognizing our own impulses and desires and honoring them, whether or not we choose to act on them. If we value integrity, we must also value diversity in sexual expression and orientation, recognizing that there is no one truth, or one way, that fits everyone. Sexuality is sacred because through it we make a connection with another self - but it is misused and perverted when it becomes an arena of power-over, a means of treating another - or oneself - as an object.

Starhawk

We don't ideologically believe in the separation of spirit and matter, but in practice, we still tend to think that things that are too material, too real-life, are somehow not as spiritual. So a trance to Faery is perceived as "spiritual," whereas a trance to a Brazilian favela slum is not. We can argue about the reality of Faery, but the favela is undeniably real. If we truly believe that our spirituality is about deep interconnectedness, maybe it's more important for us to grapple internally with the reality of the favela than to dance with the faeries.

Starhawk