Notes from the Oklahoma Beltane Festival & Retreat Director, Mendi Kellner
What are we Building?
“This is not a temporary retreat where we escape reality for a weekend. We are creating a living, breathing framework capable of holding us all year long.”
– mendi kellner
In my role as Director of Oklahoma Beltane, people often ask me what we are really building when we gather under the canopy of Osage Hills each spring. Yes, of course we gather to celebrate the turning of the Wheel. Yes, of course we light fires, raise energy, and dance. But if you look beneath the ritual and the song, you will find my life’s true mission—the dream I carry in my bones — we are building a village.
This is not a temporary retreat where we escape reality for a weekend. We are creating a living, breathing framework capable of holding us all year long. We are a community rooted in modern matriarchal care, deep reciprocity, and genuine belonging. We are an actual, permanent, physical village that serves both the broader community and the stewards who choose to live on the land, tending the soil and curating the village paradigm from within the sacred space we create.
Our festival theme this year is “We Are the Living Flame: Tending the Fires of Reciprocity.” When we say living flame, we are not talking about an abstract spark or an isolated fire. We are talking about the hearth fire at the center of the village. This flame stays alive only when every person knows how to tend it, feed it, and gather around it for warmth. To bring this vision into reality, we have to learn—or re-learn—how to be good villagers.
What does it Mean to be a Village?
For generations, society has taught us to be individualistic and transactional. We’ve been conditioned to believe that our worth is tied solely to money, productivity, or how much we can endure before breaking. The Oklahoma Beltane community is actively dismantling that framework. A true village is an ecosystem of shared care. We do not build it on rigid hierarchies; we are a circle where power, responsibility, and love move freely.
Being a Good Villager Means Stepping into Four Sacred Practices
1. Bring Your Unique Gifts and Own Your Strengths
Every single person who enters our circle carries a spark that no one else possesses. Whether your gift is organizing logistics, cooking a meal, holding space during high ritual, crafting, teaching, or simply bringing sacred presence and laughter to the hearth—the village needs it. We want you to own your magic without shame or hesitation.
“Voicing a need is not a burden to the community; it is an invitation for the community to love you.”
– mendi kellner
2. Voice Your Needs and Practice Deep Self-Honesty
A healthy village cannot exist if its people burn themselves out. Tending the flame means learning to tune into your body, your heart, and your intuition. If you need rest, rest. If you are grieving, bring your grief to the circle. If you need physical help, emotional support, or a meal, ask for it. Voicing a need is not a burden to the community; it is an invitation for the community to love you. In our matriarchal paradigm, when someone in the village is hurting, we don’t turn away. We surround you, hold space for you, and remind you who you are and why you are loved.
3. Show Up with Accountability and Reciprocity
Belonging goes hand in hand with commitment. We ask everyone in our community to show up when they can, where they can, in whatever capacity they are able. Accountability isn’t about guilt or perfection—it’s about honoring your promises to the circle so that the container holds firm for everyone.
“We must build a culture where calling each other in — rather than calling each other out — is seen as an act of profound love.”
– Mendi kellner
4. Embrace Loving Accountability Over Ostracization
Growth is messy, and living in community requires us to face hard things together. Being a good villager means being willing and able to be held accountable by our peers when our words, actions, or behaviors fall out of alignment with the safety and values of the village. Accountability is not about shunning, spreading rumors, or whispering in corners to exile people. We see how often the wider world—and even parts of our broader spiritual community—resorts to gossip or ostracization when toxic, harmful, or overwhelmed behavior arises. True matriarchal leadership asks something deeper of us.
When someone is struggling, causing harm, or acting out of deep overwhelm—even in situations where they may not even realize the harm they are causing—our first instinct shouldn’t be to discard them. If a person is willing to listen, reflect, and step into genuine accountability, the village wraps around them with support, education, and resources to help them heal and change. However, this only works if we are willing to be held accountable. We must build a culture where calling each other in–rather than calling each other out–is seen as an act of profound love. True safety in a village comes when we hold high standards for conduct, protect the vulnerable, and offer a path back to harmony for anyone brave enough to do the work.
Redefining Wealth: The 7 Forms of Fire Fuel
To build a village that doesn’t break our minds or bodies in the endless pursuit of money, we must change how we measure value. Wealth isn’t just what’s in a bank account. In our community, we recognize Seven Currencies of Reciprocity—seven ways to feed the living flame:
- Financial Contribution: Money that buys supplies, secures land, and sustains operations.
- Physical Labor & Vitality: The hands that set up camp, chop firewood, haul water, and clean space.
- Emotional Care & Space-Holding: The hearts that listen, comfort, and hold emotional safety.
- Mental Labor, Strategy & Knowledge: The minds that plan, structure, organize, and teach.
- Creative Skill & Artistry: The makers, decorators, musicians, and artists who infuse beauty into our space.
- Barter & Trade: The open exchange of physical goods, talents, and services without relying on cash.
- Spiritual Energy & Sacred Presence: The elders, crones, grounded practitioners, and seekers who anchor the magic and keep the hearth sacred.
Every single one of these currencies is real value. Every single one keeps the fire burning.
Stepping Into the Circle
If your soul has been aching for a place where others see you for who you are rather than what you produce–If you are tired of carrying life alone and are ready to experience a community anchored in elder wisdom, radical nurture, and shared strength–come home to the fire. Bring your gifts. Bring your needs. Bring your truth. Together, we are not just holding an event. We are tending the living flame of a village that will endure.
with love and fire,
Mendi