A guided journey of empowerment and healing through life’s difficult passages, with practical tools, including embodied rituals, writing prompts, seasonal self-care practices, and community creation.   The journey of the Dark Goddess is a natural part of any difficult rite of passage. These transitions are often thought of as negative—death of a loved one, job loss, home loss, chronic illness, divorce—but even so-called “happy” transitions, such as marriage, the birth of a child, or retirement, can come with unexpected instability, grief, and a need for integration. In our culture, we may often feel like we should "move on" or "get back to normal." In studying myth, however, we come to understand that the purpose of challenging life transformations is not positive or negative.   Year of the Dark Goddess provides an anchor and a roadmap for navigating the disorientation of life transformations and offers resources for embracing changes as initiations that strengthen us and make clear our purpose and power. The book is modeled on ancient rite-of-passage ceremonies and journeys to the underworld and is structured as a four-phase rite-of-passage process: Preparation, Separation from the Known, Transition-Initiation, and Return-Integration. The book provides readers with practical tools—embodied rituals, writing practice, seasonal self-care and community creation—to ground and empower positive transformations in times of challenging change. Readers may use the book as both a linear guide through the initiation year, or a nonlinear tool for structuring their own unique rite-of-passage journey. Readers are invited to create personal challenges, reframe their rite-of-passage through myth work and sacred art, and create a potent and effective rite of passage ceremony to integrate their change.   The self-initiation process in Year of the Dark Goddess follows a ceremonial year, each quarter section is structured with the following: An interactive brief of themes and objectives for the quarter, such as making an altar, writing with the ancestors, creating herbal infusions, and storytelling. - A seasonal ceremony template appropriate to the rite-of-passage phase. - A unique retelling of an ancient myth or fairy tale and instructions for deep myth work. These tales contain the formula for how to successfully navigate rites of passage, consciously and unconsciously. - Journaling prompts for reflection and projection, making visible the initiation journey. “ Year of The Dark Goddess is a treasury of practices and wisdom, walking The Wheel of The Year through musings, folklore, and practices. Lara Vesta has woven together a rich web of meaning around the many faces of the dark goddess, creating an illuminating framework for the reader who embarks on this deeply transformative journey.” —Cyndi Brannen, Ph.D., author of Entering Hekate’s Cave “Lara Vesta’s  Year of the Dark Goddess  is deeply archetypal but not formulaic. Wisdom and insight surges throughout this book, and its invitation into living a new sacred story and crafting your own rite of passage is—pardon the pun—simply magical. Inviting and inclusive, this is a book (and a journey) for anyone who yearns for the kind of interior transformation that the Dark Goddess offers.” —Carl McColman, author of  366 Celt  and coauthor of  Spirit of the Celtic Gods and Goddesses “Lara Vesta’s Year of the Dark Goddess is a poetic and profound journey into darkness, guiding us as we navigate challenging times and personal transitions to rediscover our power, our connection with the Wyrd, to Spirit, and the Ancestral Feminine. As a student of her Wild Soul School teachings, I am grateful that Lara Vesta has birthed this new book into the world, again offering us work that is both Spirit led, methodical, and lovingly woven with empowerment and authenticity.” —Tara Rae Moss, holistic practitioner and author of The War Widow, The Ghosts of Paris , and other bestselling novels “ Year of the Dark Goddess provides much-needed support in the form of myth and ancestral remembering for the challenging moments that accompany a lived life. I felt life breathed back into my lungs when I read Lara Vesta’s words—accompanied by a fascination in learning and remembering the ancestral roots of so many of our modern-day words and stories. I appreciate the way Lara frames this book as a rite of passage in itself and guides you through it with written ritual and journaling prompts to support your journey. This is a book you’ll want to keep close alongside a journal and candle.” —Becca Piastrelli, author of Root & Ritual “Lara Vesta’s Year of the Dark Goddess is the book that I didn’t know I needed. I am so grateful it exists. It is both an exploration of the Dark Goddess and a workbook to help us heal from past issues that we didn’t fully process. I do caution you; it is not a fast read, but as the author reminds us, ‘Slowness is an ancestral practice, too.’ With