We so badly want the holidays to be a time of rest where we can hit pause on the ever changing landscape of life. And sometimes the holidays can be just that, providing us with a meaningful sense of celebration and community. But other times the holidays can feel painful, isolating, and dull.

I believe what unites these differing holiday experiences is our deep, human longing for home.

Home and the Holidays 

The classic Christmas song, “I’ll be Home for Christmas” captures many of the elements of our longing for home. In the song, the singer reflects on meaningful traditions of the holiday season (e.g., ‘snow and mistletoe,’ ‘present on the tree’), while also conveying the nostalgic warmth and magic of holiday gatherings (e.g., ‘where the love light gleams’). The tragedy of the song, however, is that the singer’s longing for home cannot be fulfilled, but can only be brought to life in the somber, distant realm of imagination. 

What is ‘Home’?

Home, as portrayed in the song, is a largely symbolic place characterized by a sense of safety, belonging, and warmth. Home is a refuge for each of us, a type of insulating barrier or blanket that nourishes our spirit and protects us from the harsh realities of life. 

This spirit of home is what makes the holidays so attractive and appealing. Through the various holiday songs and movies, we begin to hope and long for home, hoping that our family gatherings, traditions, or gifts will heal the aches of our heart and soul. 

For some of us, the holidays are indeed restorative, cheerful, and uplifting. But for others (like the singer in the song), our longing for home is unrealized, leaving us feeling discouraged and disconnected. For both types of experiences, there are ways to cultivate a sense of home, regardless of what the holiday celebrations (or lack thereof) looks like for you this year. 

Cultivating a Sense of Home for Yourself this Holiday Season

1. Reflect on the concept of ‘home’. The concept of home is extremely important and powerful. It reveals a deep longing that each of us has for connection, safety, and belonging. Reflect on what ‘home’ means to you and see if there are any memories of moments, relationships, or experiences that made you feel at home, especially memories around the holidays. 
2. Reflect on and acknowledge the changes in your life. Change is inevitable in life and can be responsible for the nostalgia, longing, and grief many of us feel around the holidays. Reflect on your own life and what has changed and how you’ve changed. But don’t stop there – take time to also acknowledge the change and see if it’s possible for you to extend gratitude and understanding towards the change you’re currently experiencing. 
3. Create new traditions and/or honor old traditions. Traditions are the bedrock of holidays since they provide a predictable source of meaning. Yet these traditions are often lost or forgotten over time. Reflect on past traditions you found meaningful and see if you can revive one or two this year. Or if nothing comes to mind, you can create new, meaningful traditions for yourself. They don’t have to be big or monumental, but can be as simple as watching a favorite movie, enjoying some holiday sweets, or walking around to see Christmas lights. 
4. Cultivate a sense of home within yourself. This step requires more time and may require the help of a therapist, but can be immensely healing and restorative. We often look outward to people or places to find our sense of home, but I believe each of us can cultivate a sense of home within ourselves. Through your reflection on the concept of home, you may have found some qualities that stick out to you – belonging, safety, warmth, acceptance. These qualities can be internally applied to our own experience and we can learn to extend warmth, compassion, acceptance to ourselves. This requires a willingness to acknowledge and be with your experience (e.g., feelings, emotions, sensations, thoughts), but when done consistently over time, you can begin to feel at home within yourself no matter what feelings, difficulties, or joys life or the holidays bring.

About the author: Kevin Culver, LPCC, is a professional counselor, published author, and owner of Resilient Kindness Counseling. Kevin has a MA in Mental Health Counseling and a BA in Theological Studies. With a background in spirituality, philosophy, and psychological research, Kevin provides a holistic approach to therapy that seeks to honor each client’s unique personality, worldview, and life aspirations. In his therapeutic work, he helps clients rediscover their humanity and create greater meaning in their lives, work, and relationships. He enjoys working with individuals from all backgrounds, but specializes in working with men’s issues, spirituality, and relationship issues. If you are interested in working with Kevin or learning more about his practice, please visit resilientkindness.com or email him at kevin@resilientkindness.com

I would wager the vast majority of people these days probably don’t consider much of a spiritual element in the way that they care for their dwelling space, save, perhaps, for a yoga or meditation corner. The closest iteration of ritual for some people is likely in the way they decorate, or even the regularity with which they clean their homes. 

As a person who is drawn to the art of subtle energies (intuition, psychic experiences, empathic feelings, etc.), I was very intrigued to come across The House Witch by Arin Murphy-Hiscock just days before our move. In all my studies of magic, alternative healing, and the like, the most I’ve ever come across about “hearthcraft,” if you will, can be generally summed up by the following statement:

“It’s important to take care of the energy in your space.”

There often isn’t much more to it, so in the past I’ve done a few things here and there, but mostly ignored the energy in my home because, save for a neglected altar and a periodic smoke cleansing, I didn’t know what else to do. 

It is not a new concept to make the home a sacred space, but it is, I believe, in this period of collective upheaval and uncertainty, a better time than most to start trying. Cultivating helpful, loving energy in your home can be as simple or as formal (I’m looking at you, Capricorn!) as you’d like to make it. One of the most beneficial aspects of cultivating magic, chi, or energy in your home is that this spruced-up vibration then flows into other areas of your life. If this seems like a foreign concept, consider this:

Many of the principles of home and hearth magic share their ethos with Buddhist and mindfulness-based practices. 

In a nutshell, cultivating the energy in your home can be done by focusing in the following key areas, which have been paraphrased and expanded from The House Witch:

1. Learning to be present. This can be especially helpful in moments when we feel tired or rushed, such as trying to get dressed to get out the door, or sluggishly putting together a meal at the end of a long day. Focusing on the task at hand rather than what has happened in the past or the future helps to calm the mind and as such, the environment around you.
2. Creating intention. Even the smallest task, such as seasoning food or washing dishes, becomes an elevated experience when the intention is made to do it just so. This is not about micromanaging, but about creating awareness around why you are doing something, rather than just zoning out or seeing it as something to get through. With intention we harness the energy to nurture ourselves and our space.
3. Clearly direct your energy. Somewhat of an extension of creating intention, directing your energy means using your focus to pinpoint where you want your energy to go and what you want the outcome to be. When we are less mindful, especially when we are tired or rushed, we lose a lot of valuable energy simply because we are not creating clear intention and direction with our tasks. 
4. Hocus, focus. Pick one thing at a time to focus on. Life starts to feel overwhelming when our minds run rampant, trying to decipher and problem-solve everything at once. Meditation can certainly help with this, as can creating awareness around moments of feeling overwhelmed and scatterbrained. Even if you’re worried about tomorrow’s project, give yourself the gift of taking a mental break from that while you stir your soup, or place the blanket back on the couch. 

Humans also have a tendency to focus their attention on what they perceive as their personal space within a home, such as a bedroom or office. Collective spaces, like the kitchen and living room, are then left at the mercy of whatever energies collect by the colliding of multiple lives that occur there. Paying attention to shared spaces is just as important, if not more so, than monitoring the energy of private parts of the home. 

If you’re feeling ready to take a more active role in guiding the energy of your home, here are a few simple ways to get started:

a. Place a bowl of water or salt in a room to absorb unwanted energy. This can also be done in the four corners of the house to create a grid, but should be discarded and refreshed frequently. The same can be done using crystals and cleansing them on a regular basis. Smoky quartz and black tourmaline are good for this.

b. Clean with intention. Sweep towards the doors that lead outside, mentally picturing any unhelpful energy getting swept away along with it. Dispose of any debris in trash cans outside the home; don’t let it sit inside once it’s been intentionally collected. If you like you can follow this up with an herbal floor wash. Simply make a tea of your favorite loose herbs and dilute a bit with water, using the energy of your hands or focused intention that the herbs fill the water and your home with blessings and protection. 

c. Smoke is a common choice for cleansing a space these days, and can be very effective, but seeing as how white sage and palo santo are now at risk plants due to overharvesting, and are sacred to certain cultures, it’s great to look into other options. Juniper and mugwort are both quite prolific and cleansing in their own rite. Chimes or singing bowls can also be used to cleanse a space using sound vibration. For more folk-inspired techniques, hanging a rope of garlic or placing a cut onion in the center of the room are also said to dispel unhelpful energies. 

I tend to prefer philosophies that value the depth of intention over how closely one follows specific instructions. To that end, if there are ideas that come to you naturally about how you’d like to cultivate your space, I think that is just as valid as any instructions found in a book.

If you find yourself feeling frayed, lacking energy, or simply feeling the weight of the world these days, you are certainly not alone.

Taking time to care for both yourself and your home can provide a much-needed refuge, a place for you to rest and restore as you follow your path in this world. 

Blessed be. 

If you’re interested in more ways to take care of your home, including recipes and more complex rituals, please do read “The House Witch” by Arin Murphy-Hiscock. It does not fall under the category of “Wicca” but is simply based on the author’s personal practice, which takes inspiration from many different areas.