June 28, 2018
Years back there was a rumbling on the Internet in regards to states passing draconian abortion laws. People were organizing, in the background and out of the public eye, a network to help women travel to a different state to get an abortion when their state closed so many clinics few could use them, or a new state law prohibited that needed medical care.
Con’t. at link
Honey bees, the ones who have doing community correctly down pat. They all have their jobs, they all do their jobs, and in so doing they support each other and the community. They care for and feed their queen. The queen is the center of the community and with care and food this center supports, maintains, and allows the hive to expand. This system also produces more queens! Whatever is at the center of community is fed and cared for so it will remain viable and useful. What would you like to be the center of Reclaiming Pittsburgh? How can we feed our community so it grows and thrives?
Join us for “Back to the Hive: Reclaiming Pittsburgh Community Meeting” on Saturday, October 21st, 2017, 1 PM – 5 PM, at 2011 Noble St, Pittsburgh, PA, 15218-2100.
First published on paganbloggers at Musings from the Bone.
At times I forget how much the Universe enjoys assisting in the process of manifestation. Speak your desires, take actions to support them, and notice when the Web of All That Is shakes the strings a bit to facilitate what manifests. For maximum manifestation of desires to be achieved I believe we work hand-in-hand with Creation, each needing the other for fullness.
I’ve been clearing my spiritual plate of all the items that were too shiny to pass on in the moment, but don’t serve the direction I’m heading in. I desire to make room for what is most fulfilling, what brings me the most joy, and what sends useful energy out into the world – the three of those together are the criteria for a thing being an emphasis in my life.
Discernment can be quite difficult when you are attracted to all the glittering bits and I was being easily distracted, so I wiped the plate. *boom* Empty. The decision of what to add back, what new things to plop on it, felt very intimidating at first, so I rode that scary part like the experienced rider I know that I am. I created my criteria to facilitate success from my end while trusting the Universe when something unanticipated is removed from my plate without direct action from me.
It’s an interesting time. Some things I feel will again be in my life in a few months, others I’m releasing indefinitely. In the meanwhile, I can feel the return of space in my breathing, that small pause between inhale and exhale where anything feels possible. What a delight!
I tend to side-eye myself (I use a mirror?) when coincidences pop up and I think, “aha! Connection! Intelligent Universe!” I seem to give more grace to other folks’ coincidences than to my own. Now, I do believe some things are only coincidence, and other things not, and the latter is more common as a rule.
I don’t jump to Reason It’s Written in Destiny™ straight off. I wait to see if anything else shows up. At times I feel a push to do a thing, with no known reason for the pushing to be as hard and urgent as it feels. Take for instance collecting the moon water at the ocean last week. I mean sure – witchywoohoo why not? But it felt like a mandate more than a desire. I’ve learned not to question so much and just do in those situations, and allow myself to wonder later when I’ll know why.
Yesterday I was told stories by a woman of her visit to Standing Rock to deliver supplies to the water protectors there. I’m not going to tell her stories here, they are hers to tell in her own blog. She talked of elders reskilling tribal members in the old ways of their traditions: herbs, and medicines, and blessings – especially the water blessings with wonderful details. There was a story of moondancers and a water blessing that reminded me much of the Waters of the World spell in my own tradition and we talked about this.
My friend had just stopped for the night, a pitstop on her way back home. As she thanked me for the couch of hospitality she reached into her car and pulled out a bit of sage from Standing Rock. She handed it to me as a thank you. I was touched. As I held that sage I thought of the moondancers and their water blessing. I thought of the moonwater I’d collected on a whim. I didn’t even side-eye myself, I just smiled.
These 3 things need to be put together as a working for the waters and the protectors. They have a purpose beyond the obvious. Mystery – how it arrives, what it holds, and what is released as it manifests is a big part of the draw to my path. What to do with these 3 things remains to be discovered, but once done I will again feel Mystery’s Touch. May I never tire of it.
I’ve been meaning to “note this somewhere” and here is as good as any place, yes? Starting about mid-August I’ve noticed unusually active spirits, sprites, Beloved Dead, and various other flitting-about Energies. Generally these are always around, seen when looking, and more easily visible as the veil thins towards Samhain. But this year, this year, they are early and active, like whoa.
It has been a distraction especially while driving. They are not fluttery wisps, they are dense and quick. So much so I’ve been reacting as if pedestrians are about to rush in front of my car. It is quite unnerving when I’m behind the wheel. I cannot fathom what it’s going to be like once we’re at Samhain, but I’m rather excited to find out. Hail our (often) Unseen!
It can be easy for me to fall into a rut with what Work I expect from which God. This is based on past experiences, trance with them, and their standard associations. I put Them in a box. They like boxes as much as we do, which is not at all, as boxes tend to suffocate, no matter how delightful.
Yemaya has Her box in my head. It’s a lovely one with salted waters flowing through the bottom, brilliant beige sands on the left, and plush greens on the right. Stars whirl and flash hot across the top and the walls are bright colours with art made of discarded seashells. The soundscape is a hearty mix of ocean waves, lapping brooks, birdsong, and music that carries the rhythm of my blood pulsing to my heart. The smellscape is sweet tangy flowers, brine, and the sensuous odour of Love. All of creation she holds in her hands, her heart, her womb. Her feet leave seeds of renewal with every step of the dance. I love her box. She does, too, but, it is still a box.
Yemaya wants to come to Medusa camp in July. I’ve had other Goddesses and Gods surprise me with which events they wish to attend with me, eschewing their boxes. I guess at Who wants to travel for a gathering and then They tell me yes or no, while Others jump in demanding to be taken. Hel wants to come to Medusa camp this year. Of course She does! No surprise! Death is a big piece of this story. And …. so is life. Hel is always reminding me of her left side, the living flesh side. It’s amusing, because I know, I know, and yet She whispers in my ear, “Life feeds on death the same as death feeds on life.”
I should have suspected something big was coming with Yemaya when she insisted a few months ago that her shrine be moved to a more prominent place and she wanted more attention. Both have occurred.
I have a long time online friend who has started looming ask if I wanted a rainbow cloth/altar scarf for my Work concerning the Orlando massacre in a gay club on June 11th during Latinx night. My energies and spellwork are for the Beloved Dead and for healing and justice for the LGBTQA++ going forward. My friend asked what Powers and Gods with their associated energies did I want to pull in. Yemaya lithely jumped to Her delicious feet, stopped her dance of the heavens, turned full face to me, and said with somber eyes plus a firm tone, “ME”. (Others desired to lend power to this project, but Yemaya was first.)
My friend weaves magic into her work with the loom. To be quite honest, she weaves magic into everything. For her newest Art of looming she has a lovely process of calling and weaving which you can read about here. My cloth is near done. As my friend was weaving Yemaya stepped in, speaking Her expectations of me for this Work. These messages have been passed on to me. She is coming to camp, and to other events in the future, for this Work, for this Magic. Beautiful as it is, a box is constricting, and the Gods will not be limited. Nor should They be. They expect us not to limit ourselves, either. Ashé.
I have “reasons” for the colour candle I light for the newly dead, but the most significant one is “because I was told to” by whatever name you call the Universal Is. So it is orange candles for the newly Beloved Dead created by a bigot in Orlando, FL, in the wee hours of yesterday morning. Orange is for the transition, for the time immediately after physical death leading into the next phase. It is for the soul, not the body. It is for their essence, not their loved ones. There are many rites for those left behind, my work is for the ones departed.
I will be reading the names of these Beloved Dead, every day, until all are laid to rest by their loved ones. Then I will read them a final time for this working. And candles – lots of candles, as I do this part of my Job.
Hel wants in on this work, is full of deep sadness, but only can watch from the sidelines knowing those folks died in battle, and therefore aren’t Hers. Hel gets a candle for holding Her compassion.
There is other work, too. Odin wants in on this Work. He is requiring only a single jar candle, and a listening heart for what comes next.
Magic is being organized locally for a public call to justice and change.
We’re witches, damnit, let’s wield our tools for change!
One of the reasons many people turn to walk a different spiritual path than Christianity is because they balk at the way its tenets can be presented as the One True Way™, leaving no room for personal conversations with God about how to be of service to Them.
Unfortunately, the mindset that allows One True Way™ thinking doesn’t always get left behind with the religion. At first, and for awhile, it is pushed to the edges of the mind, but then time rolls on and the freedom to embrace Many Ways tarnishes a bit. More than one right way means that my voice cannot be always right, and in fact, sometimes my voice is wrong when applied to others. It is at this time that I turn and embrace more tightly the belief that there is more than one right way to do things, to approach things, and to hear the Gods.
It feels like bright and obvious hubris on my part to suddenly turn around and insist that all messages I receive from Them are applicable to all the humans. It’s one reason I chose the path I am on, to allow for variance, and differing thoughts, and loving supportive discourse interspersed with spirited dissent.
One True Way™ thinking is gaining voice in Pagan places. It is disconcerting and disappointing, but overall, I guess it is to be expected. In the past number of years it has become more popular to proclaim how to be a proper polytheist, why there is or is not any hard or soft polytheism, why and how to be a heathen, why and how to be Feri, who does Reclaiming better — the stench is all around and the only thing it can accomplish is to divide and divide some more. To pretend at “my beliefs are valid for me, not necessarily for you” instead of living it and to not take to heart “We are all our own spiritual authority” is the height of self-important arrogance and one of the reasons many left their childhood religion behind. It is one of the reasons I left mine behind.
That last one, the spiritual authority belongs to you one? You either live it or you don’t. There isn’t an in-between for when I want to Be Right and then move back into it when the subject matter isn’t really important to me. In my path we all get to converse with the Gods. Their messages to us are our own. While they may be applicable across the board, usually they are applicable to a much smaller group than everyone on earth.
Gods are multi-issue beings, same as humans are. They have many thoughts and a range of issues they wish the humans would pay attention to and address. Who They tell what varies greatly, and one message isn’t more important or more correct than the others. Kudos to you (and me) for speaking with Deity, but un-kudos to you (or me) for thinking we have the one true connection. That is anti-freedom of religious process and wholly opposite the idea of folks being their own spiritual authority.
If Moses wasn’t a necessary piece for the Christian God to have his message of ten delivered to the whole world, but rather one messenger to reach a particular group of people, then I’m pretty certain none of my Gods need a Moses to speak to all humans. Be a Moses to your small group, but accept there are other Moses’ and other messages being delivered to others.
One doesn’t get to allow others their own spiritual authority only when they agree, and insist on one true way compliance when they disagree. Well, one does get to do that, free will and all, but others get to have thoughts about you and me because of it.
Reclaiming Pittsburgh (Find us on Facebook)
Intention: Life calls, we return in joy: I am here.
Altar pictures below. In the first photo you can see our SJWW (Social Justice Warrior Witchcraft) global working for women’s access to appropriate health care that some in our community are engaged in. It is the honey jar on the left side in front of the tall white jar candle Thanks for bring that Juniper!
Life calls. We return in Joy. I am here!
LEAN IN TO JOY with BONEWEAVER 