We make the world as we imagine it to be. Our every action creates the reality that we inhabit. Every act of kindness repaid threefold in a kinder world, every fearful fumble dredging up the black sludge of shame. Every minute spent just sat beneath a tree conjures a deeper love for nature. Rehearsing death reveals its purpose, its normality. Every tap of the contactless card a pledge of faith in currency, economy, the entire paradigm of commerce and capital. So much of our behaviour is unconscious habit, but denying our power and responsibility just allows the violence of karma to perpetuate. To change society, we must expose ourselves to ridicule. There is great potential in ridiculous action, for out of nonsense we weave the fabric of new sense. Our actions and our habits are still meaningful, even if we cannot perceive the emerging meaning.

When we bring consciousness to bear on the symbolism and significance of our thoughts and deeds, we enter the domain of ritual. Temporary spaces in which the power of performance impresses itself upon our minds and the wider reality. Spaces of the sacred and the profane, containers for transcendent experience, a realm of thresholds and portals to a web of meaning that stretches from the soil to the stars. Working between scales and beyond time, to draw down the cosmic drama into the everyday, or cast upwards our intentions to be caught by mysterious currents. Ritual is our birthright, our social fabric, and how we maintain and manifest the truth of our fleeting visions, how we beckon in what we see beyond the veil of the everyday. It is not enough to image the world we want to live in. We must manifest it.

Concluding our four-part occult odyssey, we've tripped through Tarot, Mythology and Astrology to land in the domain of humanity's oldest tool. We'll be joined by author, occultist and ceremonial magician Julian Vayne, whose book Getting Higher: The Manual of Psychedelic Ceremony has graced many a seeker's bookshelf. Together with Nikki Wyrd, publisher, ecologist and one of the directors of Breaking Convention, they'll craft for us a Solstice ritual to find the light on this, the darkest night. We'll be led down the path of healing by Dr Isabel de Salis of the University of Bristol, a medical anthropologist with a special interest in the Ancestors... and our Beloved Sara Zaltash, pioneering Islamic performance artist and interfaith minister in training, will bless with a journey into the political power of everyday ritual.