A sculpture of a woman sitting cross-legged on the moon, with her back facing the viewer and arms raised, revealing a galaxy pattern on her back.

Begin Your Day at Sunset

Five years ago, I asked myself a question. Then I asked my clients, community, and anyone else I thought might be interested: What would life look like if I believed that my day started at dusk, not dawn?

The question was inspired by a body of evidence suggesting that our forebears began their day as the sun melted into night.

It struck me as a quiet rebellion, an antidote to productivity culture, where you begin your day as a warrior ready to take up arms and battle through life.

In the Irish language, one of the words for sunset is luí na gréine, which means the ‘lying down of the sun’. The sunset felt like lying down with the ancestors.

Here, you will find Celtic-inspired practices to start your day with dreaming, not doing.

Orange and yellow journal contents page listing the introduction, how to use this journal, daily and weekly spreads, and notes.
Open workbook page titled “Seven Sunsets Distillation,” with prompts for reflecting on emotional patterns and creating a seven-symbol lexicon.
Open book spread featuring the question “What blessings has darkness offered your own life?” and collage artwork of two eyes over a dark, colorful background.
Two-page spread titled “Daily and weekly spreads,” featuring owl collage artwork over a celestial star chart.

Sunset Journal

The Sunset Journal is designed to help you reimagine your relationship with time, night, creativity and the Celtic Otherworld.

A hybrid of a book, a journal and original art, this guide will help you cultivate your own enchanted way of beginning your day.

Sunset Journal
Open journal titled “How to Use This Journal” held in front of a lush moss-covered forest setting, with cauldron artwork on the left page.
Sunset Journal book with a surreal golden face emerging from clouds beneath a starry sky
Open white spiral-bound book titled "Sunset Journal" by Jennifer Regina Murphy on a wooden desk.

‘In what may seem like one rich day in Tír na nÓg, one whole year will have passed in linear, mortal time. Similar to Kairos in the Greek tradition, Otherworldly time is deep and generative, like our night dreams, where all timelines can co-exist in a single moment.’

-Sunset Journal

Sunset Way

Thermal-style illustration of a black cat sitting beside a glowing fire, framed by a purple geometric triangle and circle.
Thermal-style illustration of a black cat sitting beside a glowing fire, framed by a purple geometric triangle and circle.

Collage art inspired by Æ

‘The grey cairn on the hill, when day sinks drowned in dew, Being weary of the world’s empires, bow down to you. Master of the still stars and of the flaming door.’

-W.B. Yeats

In a recent night dream, a man who looked like a red-haired Yeats gave me a painting of a flaming door that led to a sunset.

This, I understood in the dream, is the Sunset Way. It is not a specific destination or the perfect evening routine; it’s about becoming a ragaire, the Irish word for a night-time rambler, someone who wanders into the sunset and after dark.

From 29th November 2026 to 17th January 2027, I will host a Sunset Way online winter retreat for the aspiring ragaire. Join me at the flaming door.

Sunset Way
Pop art portrait of a woman with closed eyes, layered inside an ornate golden oval frame

‘To be honest I wasn’t quite sure what to expect when I preordered! But wow, it’s everything I’ve been needing and looking for. It’s helping me get in touch with myself and my intuition like nothing else has before.’

Pop art collage of a closed-eyed face inside an ornate golden frame

‘I had a feeling from the jump that Jennifer had made something special here. But now that it’s made the long slow way across the pond and into my hands, I have a new appreciation for what she’s done. The gorgeous pages are beckoning me to many splendid journeys to come.’

Stylized close-up portrait of a woman with closed eyes inside an ornate golden oval frame

‘Now I’m aching for the day to end so I can dive right in with Jennifer’s Sunset Journal. What a gorgeous, soulful creation.’

Portrait of a smiling woman in a white lace-trimmed blouse, framed against a colorful abstract sunburst background.

Meet Jen

I’m Jennifer Regina Murphy (Jen), a Dublin-born writer, creative artist and dreamwork practitioner. Drawing on my academic background in Medieval Irish & Celtic Studies, Anthropology, and Jungian Psychology, I guide people to make Celtic soul a living aesthetic by centring the beauty of Irish ancestral wisdom in the everyday experience of modern life.

About Jen

THREE Cauldrons

My work emerges from the three cauldrons of poesy, described in a mystical Irish text dating from the 700s. They offer a practical framework for beginning your day at sunset.

  • This cauldron begins upright, ready to be filled with the broth of life. It is about how we nourish ourselves. Our journey begins here.

  • This cauldron begins on its side, half full. The call is to turn it upright by moving through the four great joys and four great sorrows of life. It is about alchemy. You cannot reach the third cauldron – wisdom – without the transformative powers of joy and sorrow.

  • This cauldron begins upside down and empty and cannot be turned upright until we move through the other cauldrons. It is about the wisdom that shines from the soul. Our ancestors likely believed the seat of the soul was in the head. It makes sense, then, that the heart – where our joys and sorrows are lived out – is the pathway to the soul.

FREE MEDITATION

Sign up for my newsletter hosted on Substack & receive ‘Bring Home the Starlight: A Guided Journey with Lugh, Áine and Venus’.