This is a solitary ritual.
Appropriate decorations for the altar include fall vegetables and fruits and foliage that has already been dropped from trees, as well as seeds and pods. Prepare yourself and your ritual space as usual. Cast the circle, call the elements and welcome the gods.
"I have come here to celebrate the second harvest, to acknowledge my successes and failures honestly, and to look toward closing doord that need to be closed in my life. I celebrate this bittersweet time near the end and the beginning of the Wheel, where we reap our bounty and yet Nature must prepare to sleep. The nights grow, and the day diminishes, as the god grows old and begins to die."
Take time to meditate on these things and to judge your year. Put things into perspective. What goals did you achieve? What is still a work in progress? What things should you abandon? Accept anything you see as a failure and decide what to do with that thing. Celebrate your successes, the progress in life you have made.
Eat an apple while sitting, or some similar fruit. By eating it you're destroying it in this form to nourish yourself--that's why we grow and harvest food. Eat it to the core. How many seeds are there? The apple came from one solitary tree, but if left to complete the cycle, by falling or planting, this single fruit could become several trees.
"I accept the cycle of life. As this fruit dies it gives birth to new trees, gaining more from the sacrifice of change than from staying as it is. So too I must change and grow. So too must the god die to be reborn again--nature is renewal."
Keep the apple core or plant it if you wish.
When ready, thank the gods, dismiss the elements, and take up the circle.
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