Honouring the Ancient to Now
Sacred and Wild Wellness Traditions of the Equinox

Equinox! The word ‘equinox’ has gone out of fashion, yet it’s sacred and wild (plus sky-to-earth scientific), origins are still relevant today. In contemplating how the word went out of fashion, perhaps the ‘nox’ part conjures images of hidden night activities (‘nox’ being ‘night’). How this normal term ended up being associated with dark-devil-demons voicing metallica screams and black-mouthed hexens doing dark activities, when it’s simply a date on Seasons of the Year four-quarters calendar, is a mystery.

Imagine that whilst the Earth moves around the Sun it draws an energetic measuring tape as a ribbon coming out from behind it; this invisible energy ribbon eventually closing a circle called the Tropical Zodiac. This mathematical unseen circle ribbon/measuring tape has the zodiac signs Aries to Pisces marked on it as 30 degree sections, unseen. The Vernal Equinox (i.e. the March Equinox) happens approx between 20 and 23 March each year and marks what many astrologers think of as International Astrology Day, 00 Aries 00. Here are the dates for some upcoming years – 20 March 2025 (AEDT at 20.03); 21 March 2026 (AEDT 01.47); 21 March 2027 (AEDT 07.26). Those are dates for when the Sun shifts into Tropical Zodiac, 00 Aries 00, the March Equinox.

To take the mystery out of things, Equinox and Solstice are about how the Sun affects the main four-quarter Seasons. And really, why not grab the extra 20 days of quarter-year summer in March via this system? Naturally all respect also to any stuck alones needing to howl up from below or atop craggy places yelling any name they can remember for help with a cracked one word breath left until the SOS of the last ember of wax-wicks worlds send a black winged Valkyrie, black horse or black hooved hobbit as First Aid to save your life, if you didn’t make it across in the crossings, passings and X’s of it all.

If you have come to be afraid of anything with ‘nox’, or X, in it, then consider this ancient land awareness, for historical Equinox, from a quick web browser search (Microsoft Edge). ‘The word “nox” comes from Latin “nox” meaning “night” or “darkness”. It is a cognate of Ancient Greek “núx”, Sanskrit “nákti”, Old English “niht”, and Proto-Slavic “noťь”. The word “night” is believed to have originated from the Proto-Indo-European root “*nekwt-” meaning “night”’. And I’d like to add, from a trusty resource book, some First Nations/aboriginal/indigenous words for ‘night’, being – ‘biangri, bolool, maltthi, mundil, nuta, wiltcha’ (A.W. Reed).

There are many significant standing stones and landscape markers in the ancient land of Australia that indicate the Sun’s relationship with seasons, including the Equinox, right back through time. There are also long back traditions of honouring, noting, respecting and observing the Equinox in North-West flat map atlas lands, such as UK, Iceland areas and the Middle East. In some of those lands there are people who remain as pagans, modern-day druids and shamans, doing pilgrimages at Stone Circles still standing. Or in similar lands where the people don’t call themselves pagans, the regions and religions that have Holy Monuments, Churches or other Holy Buildings still standing, also do pilgrimages to those to see the exact position of the Sun at the Equinox; as well and many other places all about the world.

‘Equi’ connects with equine – wild horses – hence sayings about dark horses in the night – and night on Earth is commonly black with indigo inclusions of different shades, but not always. There are night places that are white. To be kind to the word ‘equinox’, as mentioned earlier, it’s great selling feature is that it provides an extra month of summer, after the standard world calendar says summer is over. None of this guff about Summer in the Southern Hemisphere ending at the end of that short month February, when the actual four-quarter Season of Summer (in the Southern Hemisphere) ends at the Equinox. After the Equinox things get quite cold, especially if you’re one of the towns, cities or sections of land not that far up from Antarctica.

To contemplate the sacred, the Equinoxes indicate something is happening with the balance of Light and Dark. When Autumn Equinox hits in March in the Southern Hemisphere (it’d be spring Equinox in the Northern Hemisphere in March), notice the nights skies from thereon. White is the generalised night-time colour of the twilight evening sky for example in Melbourne, or blue or grey, until about 9ish; but once the Equinox hits, the sky colour really does start to change between evening and night, and in Melbourne gets into the grey blacks, as an example.

Hence many ancient traditions are all about getting outside and collecting the last of anything from walks or wanderings, your garden or such, that is to do with Seasons. This indicates to the sacred self, e.g. the Inner Self, the Higher Self, the Shadow Self, the Guardians of Self-Soul-Spirit, the Guides of Soul-Spirit-Self, etc, that the Quarter-Year Seasonal Wheel is shifting when they move about from place to place. It’s a time to place the previous quarter year items away, clear your space for the next quarter year entering and give gratitude for all in the quarter past.

Many put their summer clothing, cosmetics and linen into boxes or deeper storage drawers. What do you do each Equinox, and what would you like to do that you have not yet tried out, which is combos of Sensible, Sacred, Wild, Wonderful and even a bit Wyrd with sound, body movement, drawing, painting, chanting, collage, journalling, exercising, performing, acting, walking, running, fasting, new food routines, cooking or experimenting with where your Soul, your Spirit, your Self, your Body, your Family Soul or etc is at?

There are always those who notice the signs, symbols and synchronicities of what is happening with Worlds Between Worlds and with the Invisible Upon the World. The First Nations, Indigenous and Aboriginal peoples of Australia have great sensitivity to such things, more often than not. Spiritualist Churches worldwide are renowned for putting names in hats for people who are ailing to say prayers for them at Equinox and all through the year, and asking their congregations to sit with prayer for those in need. What traditions do you come from? Respect to all cultures, ancient and modern, that honour land, soul, spirit wellness, collective and individual, which notice earth and sky, above and below, and help people caught in the fear of the ‘nox’, the ‘night’, the ‘nakti’, the ‘nuta’.

 

Michelle B Proctor is an accomplished astrologer and energy worker.  You can find out more about her services on her website https://www.radiantliving.com.au/