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Open-Air Divinations: Results from the 2023 Solstice
Solstice readings present a particular set of challenges that indoor practitioners rarely encounter: variable light, uneven ground, the presence of dew, and the near-certainty that someone will walk past at an inopportune moment. The group that gathered at dawn on the summer solstice of 2023 were experienced enough to have anticipated most of these difficulties. What they could not have fully anticipated were the readings themselves, which proved, by any reasonable measure, to be among the more instructive collective sessions this publication has documented in recent years.
What follows is a summary of the session’s conditions, methodology, and findings, compiled from notes taken by participants on the day. It is offered here not as a prescriptive model but as a useful case study for practitioners considering open-air work — whether for solstice events specifically or outdoor divination more generally.
Site Selection and Preparation
The location — a stone circle in the south-west of England, the specific name of which the participants preferred not to disclose — was selected several weeks in advance. This is standard practice for any outdoor reading of this kind, and the lead practitioner had visited the site twice beforehand to assess sightlines, ground drainage, and the prevailing wind direction at dawn. The last of these is not a mystical consideration. Odour management at an open-air session is a practical matter, and one that bears directly on the group’s relationship with the surrounding area. Practitioners who have read our guidance on avoiding nuisance complaints from neighbours will recognise the principle, even if the context here is somewhat more remote.
A large wooden tray — purpose-built, with carved channel grooves to manage fluid movement across the surface — was positioned at the centre of the circle on a stable folding stand. The tray was oriented east-west, with the reading surface angled to catch the low morning light directly. This is not merely atmospheric. Many practitioners find that natural raking light reveals surface texture and colouration in ways that artificial lighting does not replicate, and the solstice dawn offers a quality of illumination that is, in practical terms, genuinely useful.
Each participant arrived with their material pre-prepared and chilled. Cold transport is non-negotiable for outdoor sessions of any duration; the group used insulated containers throughout. Anyone uncertain about the relevant temperature requirements should consult our broader guidance on storing organs safely at home, much of which applies equally to field conditions.
The Reading: Sequence and Method
Seven practitioners participated. Each presented a single specimen in turn, with a short interval between presentations to allow for collective observation before the next offering was placed. This sequential approach, rather than presenting all material simultaneously, is particularly well-suited to group sessions where interpretive consensus is the goal. It prevents the tray from becoming visually cluttered before any individual reading has been properly considered, and it gives quieter members of the group space to contribute before the more dominant voices settle on a view.
The sequence moved from smaller, denser organs toward larger and more structurally complex ones — a progression that several of the participants noted afterwards had lent the session a sense of accumulating weight and clarity that they found useful in retrospect.
Highlights from the individual presentations included the following:
- A section of beef liver, presented first, displayed the kind of even surface colouration and clean lobe definition that practitioners generally associate with clarity of signal. The morning light picked out a slight asymmetry in the left lobe that two of the seven readers flagged independently — a point of some interest given the subsequent readings.
- A lamb kidney followed, and attracted comment for the condition of its capsule membrane, which remained unusually intact. Several participants interpreted the preserved structure as indicative of a reading oriented toward transition and continuity rather than rupture — a theme that recurred later in the session.
- A pork spleen, presented fourth in the sequence, generated the most discussion of the morning. The splenic pulp showed a distribution pattern that the group’s most experienced reader — who has written separately for this publication on spleenfold mechanics — described as among the clearer examples of protective or shielding patterning she had encountered in a collective reading. The remaining participants took some time to reach agreement on this point, which is itself worth noting: contested readings in a group context are not a failure of method. They are, more often, a sign that the material is genuinely complex.
Collective Interpretation
Once all seven presentations had been made, the group spent approximately forty minutes in collective interpretation before the light shifted too far for useful observation. The discussion was structured loosely around three questions that the lead practitioner had set in advance: what themes recurred across multiple specimens, where the readings appeared to contradict one another, and what, if anything, the session as a whole appeared to foreground that the individual readings did not.
On the first question, the group identified a consistent emphasis on transition managed carefully rather than resisted — the lamb kidney’s intact membrane, the spleen’s shielding pattern, and a quality of containment noted in two of the later presentations all pointed in a similar direction. On the second, there was genuine disagreement about one of the liver sections, with three readers seeing strong forward momentum in the surface patterning and two seeing something more equivocal. The group recorded both views rather than forcing a resolution, which is the correct approach. A collective reading that papers over internal disagreement is not a consensus; it is a convenience.
On the third question — what the session as a whole showed that the individual readings did not — the most consistent observation was a quality of coherence across the tray that participants found striking. Whether this reflects the particular conditions of solstice work, the site itself, or simply the experience level of the practitioners involved is difficult to say. All three factors are plausible contributors, and the group was appropriately cautious about over-attributing causation.
Practical Notes for Future Outdoor Sessions
Participants offered a number of logistical observations that may be useful to others planning similar events. The question of disposal deserves particular attention in outdoor settings: the group had arranged for sealed biohazard bags and a vehicle with adequate containment, and had checked in advance with the relevant land trust about their expectations. This is not optional. The reputational consequences of an improperly managed outdoor session extend well beyond the individual practitioner.
Weather contingency planning was another area the group identified as underprepared. Cloud cover at dawn would have significantly affected the quality of natural light, and the group had no fallback arrangement. For any future session of this kind, a portable LED panel calibrated to approximate natural morning light is a reasonable investment. It lacks the quality of the real thing, but it preserves functionality if conditions deteriorate.
Finally, several participants noted that the sequential presentation method, while well-suited to this group and this context, requires a degree of collective discipline that should not be assumed. A brief pre-session discussion of method — how long each presentation will last, how disagreements will be recorded, who is responsible for timekeeping — saves a considerable amount of friction once the session is underway. The solstice dawn does not wait, and neither, in the end, does the material.
The 2023 session will inform how this group approaches the 2024 solstice, and it is hoped that the notes here will be of similar use to practitioners planning their own outdoor work. Open-air divination rewards preparation in ways that indoor work sometimes does not, and the quality of what can be achieved in good conditions — as this session demonstrated — justifies the additional effort substantially.
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