The Get Rid of Past Year’s Troubles Spell is a Samhain rite of enclosure and release. Unwanted objects are placed inside a small box, the lid is sealed with purple candle wax, and a ritual bell is rung three times. The sealed year is carried away when morning comes.
Perform it in the first hours of November 1, when Samhain stands between past and present, living memory and the long silence of the dead. The rite does not erase what happened. It removes the throne upon which old trouble has been sitting.
Some doors close only after the hand releases the key.
What the Box, Bell and Purple Candle Mean
The box gives the passing year’s burdens a boundary. Purple wax seals that boundary with dignity, memory, and transformed power. The bell divides one condition from another: before and after, carried and released, shadowed room and open road.
Choose a box small enough to hold in both hands. Plain wood or untreated card is ideal when the materials will briefly touch the earth. A metal or decorated box may be used when it will be opened and reused after the symbolic burial.
Materials for the Samhain Release Spell
- A few personal belongings you no longer need
- One purple candle in a stable holder
- A small box
- A ritual bell
- Small pieces of paper for troubles that have no physical object
- Optional black thread to bind the closed box
Choose modest objects that genuinely belong to the passing year: a broken token, an expired note, a ribbon, a copy of an old message, or something connected to a sorrow whose lesson can remain without its burden. Do not surrender an heirloom merely because grief once touched it. The object should be ready to leave.
Preparing What Will Be Left Behind
For every object, write one word naming what it carries. If a trouble has no belonging attached to it, write the word on plain paper and fold it away from you. Place all the objects beside the open box before the ritual begins.
Write one final sentence on a separate paper: “I keep the wisdom and release the weight.” This paper does not enter the box. Place it beneath the bell as a promise to the self who will wake in the new year.
How to Cast the Past Year’s Troubles Spell
- Begin during the first quiet hour of November 1. Set the box before the unlit purple candle.
- Take each object in turn. Name the trouble it represents and say, “The lesson remains. The weight departs.”
- Place the objects and folded papers inside the box. Pause after each one until its memory grows still.
- Close the lid. If using black thread, wind it around the box three times and knot it away from you.
- Light the purple candle and let a small amount of wax fall across the seam, sealing the lid.
- Ring the ritual bell three times. Let each note fade completely before the next.
- Place both palms around the box and speak:
Spirits who walk this threshold night,
I offer no harm and I ask for clear sight.
The old year is sealed; its sorrow may cease.
Let the future take root and flower in peace.What has been carried, I now set down.
What waits to bloom, let new light surround.
Ash to the dark and seed to the sun,
The lesson is kept. The burden is done.
- Repeat the incantation three times. Ring the bell once between each recitation.
- Snuff the candle and leave the sealed box untouched until daylight.
Releasing the Box at Daybreak
On the following day, carry the box away from the center of the home. If every material is natural and suited to soil, bury it shallowly in a place where you have permission. Mark no grave. Turn away without looking back.
For other materials, place the closed box briefly against bare earth. Let it rest through thirteen slow breaths. Then open it outdoors and sort the contents for respectful disposal or reuse. The spell lies in removal and changed relationship, not in leaving refuse beneath the ground.
Opening the New Year
Wash your hands and ring the bell once inside the home. Retrieve the sentence that waited beneath it. On the reverse, write one quality you will cultivate during the new year. Place it beneath the purple candle until the next full moon.
The bell has divided the old from the new.
The chamber is empty. The path enters view.
No grief is denied, yet no grief holds the throne.
I cross into morning with hands of my own.
Complete one small act that belongs to the future: open the curtains, wash the threshold, answer a message, or begin the task delayed by the old trouble. Release becomes real when empty space receives a living purpose.
Continue the Samhain Work
Use the Samhain Tarot Card Spread to identify what should be remembered after the release. The Samhain Offering Ritual can follow when you wish to honor the dead as well as close the year. For troubles that cling to the walls of the dwelling, perform the Expelling Ghosts Ritual before raising a new household ward.
The year has not vanished. It has taken its rightful place behind you.