Category: religious work

The Pagan Experience blog project – week 2 – spiritual practice

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Wk 2- Jan. 12- Personal Practice– Share your favorite spiritual/magickal practices.

I’m going to share one of my current favourites which happens to be the new one implemented this year and lines up with my intention mentioned in the first project post. I am chanting or singing each morning. I wrote a chant that uses words from the flower prayer by Victor Anderson:

Who is the flower above me?
And what is the work of this god?
I would know myself in all my parts.

I quite like it, but I have switched to another because I am going to Winter Witchcamp in February. I want to be fully present in their community and I want to prep for that in ways more than packing up my stuff. Since 2006 this camp has opened and closed camp with a prayer bead set that they crafted and wrote words for as a community. It is long. I have it printed out. It takes me about 15 minutes to do it. I read the the parts and sing the repeating 3 lines that are like a refrain. Some days I sing parts that I might speak in addition to the refrain, but I like how the spoken word flows into singing the repeating three lines. This sets the tone for my day of doing something I love doing that lightens me (fulfilling the 2015 intention) and it connects me to the earth and the Divine with myself as the connector.

The whole prayer in pdf format can be found here.

The Pagan Experience blog project – week 1 – intentions for 2015

Published on by Boneweaver (aka pjvj)2 Comments

I am joining (a bit late) and we’ll see how it goes, yes? A prompt is offered for the beginning of each week and you write a post about the prompt. My first couple of posts will be decidedly short as I catch up, and the subjects don’t really need a lot of words, even for me.

WK 1- Jan. 5- Resolutions– What are your intentions for this new year? How will you find the resolve to bring them into your manifest life?

My intentions are to remain as present and conscious as possible to what I am filling my time and therefore myself with. I want to devote the extra time I have to things that make me lighter instead of heavier. Things that will bring Joy and not feel like a burden. I will have a morning practice that I do after coffee, but before the internet time suck happens. I will make sure of this by setting a timer that will remind me. That practice may change shape over time and more might be added, but the first one must be something that lightens my spirit.

Orange candles – my Work

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I need to order more. When I went to my supply to set lights for a friend’s dying grandmother I discovered only one orange candle left. I didn’t remember getting low. I would have ordered more because the dying or newly dead don’t always give enough warning to reorder in time. It’s a rather odd Job that I have, lights for transitions from life to death (and death to life, though orange candles are not for babies, white ones are). Not just a light, but specifically orange, always orange for the transition. Not everywhere that carries candles will sell orange except perhaps at Halloween so when I find a decent price I buy some. Except this year I didn’t even look and then poof, the last one went.

I have other colours for people who request candles and for workings either personal or purchased, but the inventory on the orange ones are always a surprise. One year they last and last and then another year they are gone quickly. I should have known to look at my stock as the holidays approached – so many leave at this time of year.

Thanks to ebay more are on their way. Do you think the dying will hold off on their final breath for a few days?

“Why can’t you be nice???”, or, why I get angry on the Internet

Published on by Boneweaver (aka pjvj)4 Comments

1) It’s my job.

2) It’s my Job.

3) People respond to it, not to my “let us pray for peace” posts.

I am a transition Priestess. I walk the Edges and I do it well. I move people and spirits from life to death, from here to there, from comfortable to uncomfortable, from complacent to transformed. It’s my job. If folks paid attention to nice, I’d do that, but on the Internet folks pay attention to RAWR! Especially on Facebook.

People engage when they see the !!!!!!s on my Facebook posts. Some engage in support, others engage to tell me I’m full of crap, or they are apologists, or they are simply saying, “But I….” Frankly, I don’t care from which direction you engage – you are engaging and that brings awareness, that promotes discussion. I tend to discuss the undiscussable (yes, not a word, I know). I discuss social injustice in a myriad of forms – racism, sexism, ableism, hetero-normative privilege, classism, etc-ism. I discuss sexual abuse. I loudly discuss these things.

I know most people who post to the OMGs!!! posts already agree with me. I also know from a decade on Delphi and other Beehive styled forums that posting only for those who reply is folly. Posting in controversial threads is for the lurkers. They are the ones who read, go off and think on all the sides they see voiced, and make up their minds.

Will I ever know who I influence? Nope. Do I care? Nope. Because my Job is to speak, to do, to be. What happens after that is somebody else’s Job. On the Internet I use a lot of RAWR!! Off of the Internet I use a lot candles, prayers, meditation, and energy work – sending for peace, praying for justice, lighting for Love.

I honour my Gods on and off the Internet. Some of Them are all about compassion. Not all of Them are about peaceful compassion. One of Them is about compassion that looks like a huge wave that flattens and takes the population of Crete. That is “Let’s start over” compassion. Another is about taking the spoils, the Dead, all of them – and placing them at the same banquet table. “Here,” She says, “dine across from your enemy. Forever.” One winks with His sole good eye twinkling at you, and chuckles at your flailing, compassionately. One bursts endless beauty and creation by gazing at Her reflection. And One dances at the crossroads, opens the way, and spins stories out of the ether, asking that they be repeated.

Why this post? Because people see RAWR!! and think that is Who I Am – sullen, angry, hunting for reasons to yell – and that is okay for them to think so. After all, what other people think of me is none of my business. But those same folks who don’t respond to my SJ posts because they no longer “do angry” also do not respond to my love and peace posts. Hhhmmmmm.

I get around 100 likes, comments, and shares off of two RAWR!! posts and <10 from two love and peace posts. Seriously. I’ve tested the theory. Quote an angry blogger, people respond. Posts photos from the Ferguson protest I went to, not a word. Cry horror at white privilege in Texas, people reply. Show Tibetan monks standing for social justice and get one two likes, no replies. (It may get more after this filters down to FB.)

So, I am going to stay angry on the Internet. And I’m going to keep my practices here at home. Both are my Job. You are mainly going to see only one of them online, though, because only one of them moves people best that I can tell. And moving people – here to there and Here to There – is my Job.

Update: Alive but not particularly social, Work, and an Anniversary

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Soooooooo many things. Mostly, things are happening spiritually that are very important and some of that involves human tasking to complete Work. Good things with Blossoming Bones Mystery School as the class Amoret and I are facilitating is going well and people appear to be running with the Work in wonderful and interesting ways. We have a team of “student facilitators” assisting with the discussion forum and that is wonderful, too. Amoret and I meet weekly to further the class, adjust to any changes in focus needed based on participant responses, etc.

I’m on the RAT (Ritual Arc Team) for next year’s summer intensive so Skype meetings for that. Spiralheart organizational meetings, via Skype, also. Initiate in-person and Skype meetings. Spiritual counseling. Mentoring get-togethers. Deep Listening group just getting off of the ground. And other not for public talking about Work.

All good things! But tiring. And with my neck and back screaming at meetings I am again readjusting my attention to self-care. Because hey! Still! I haven’t learned that I am not a robot! (Even though I know I am not. Stubborn streak?)

Still going to Tai Chi. In the fall my buddy and I moved to Sun 73 forms. It is pretty! It has kicking! (Sorta. Not huge kicks, but still – kicking!) I’m learning round loom knitting. I’ve made a cowl scarf! And it looks like a gift, not a practice piece. ~glee~ I’m now working on a hat, which is a gift for the hubster. Not a surprise gift, though he never reads my stuff, anyway, trusting I will inform him of Important Things. (He is so kind to think of me in this way even though experience has proven him wrong again and again.)

So with the busy I’ve dropped off of the social networks with occasionally sharing on FB and little original posting even there. Time, self-care, my students both online class and initiates, my marriage partner, my kids, my working partner, my coven members, my Gods demands (!!s) – so many pieces and they all work and I even have time for more stuff if I slack on social networks. And so I do.

Plus winter came early.

Plus today is 8 years that my mum died. It is an anniversary that stings greatly this year. You just never know when it will and when it won’t. I am again so grateful that she and I repaired our relationship in the years before she became ill and died. I am acutely aware that the reason this could occur was not only because I wanted it, but because she was a willing participant in healing it, too. I know this is not so for everyone who wishes such a thing and that always plops an extra helping of sadness on this day. Yet I am okay, in spite of the sadness and the big twinge, because I honour Death that is part our cycle, the same as I honour Life.

Blessings all around.

When the Dead tell Boneweaver Samhain is about the Living, too

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This past week has been an interesting flip on what has traditionally been my Samhain focus. As I connected, sure and happy in this potent time, I was reminded the thin veil is transparent from both sides. As I stepped forth to be with my Peeps in what is usually a celebration of the endless cycle and the Great Dance with my Beloved and Mighty Dead, I was gently turned around, hands settling on my shoulders as They stood behind me, and directed to see Life from Their side and not the Otherworld from Life’s side.

I had occasion earlier in the week to hold space for 2 people, one an adult and one a child, as great pain washed over and around them. I let it flow over me and pushed it far out to join the ether-ocean where it could be transformed by Those on the Other Side of life. Though a few tears slipped down my cheeks, they were short-lived, my Job that day was to direct and push away, not absorb and join the emotional waves. Oh, I had them, those crashing waves, but I commanded them in-and-down, in-and-down, away from the upper world. I “lost it” as the saying goes, in a wee corner of my soul, boxed for a purpose until the work was done. I know me and I know how this goes. I knew I would “crash” the next day, full of fatigue and sorrow. I boxed those things because who I held space for are about as near and dear to me as is possible to be. and the way of being useful and showing my love in a situation where there is no quick fix was to just be there, and hold space.

The next day was a blur as it seemed every time I sat down I fell asleep, exhausted from the energy requirement of the day before. I do not regret holding that space. When loved ones hurt from things that are simply deeply painful and that only time can ease, one of the things we do in my tradition is hold gentle loving space for them. And so I did.

I sent 2 text messages in the subsequent 3 days, remaining mindful of the careful balance between allowing folks room to experience what only they can while not cutting them off altogether. So I held a much larger, more loose space in the following days. The fatigue lingered in lessening amounts each day up to yesterday, which was Samhain. I was away from home last night and I admit I checked my phone 3-4 times for my own peace of mind, but I sent no more messages, continuing to allow space for the other person and to allow myself space to celebrate Samhain in divinatory comradery.

It was a late night. I am once again sleep-deprived, but content. The message I received this Samhain? “Turn around. Look at the fullness of what Life holds from Our side. This is why we repeat – death, to life, to death, to life – to feel the richness from both sides.”

Through Their eyes,

Bone

American Gods

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This topic has been running around my blogroll – who are the American Gods? This is separate from the NA traditions who have their own rituals and Gods that are specific to them. This is not appropriation or My-Gods-Can-Beat-Up-Your-Gods thing. This is a recognition that the Land has Spirits that are unique to the land, tied to no one people or trad. And Beings that came with our ancestors, hung around, named again or renamed.

Rivers, mountains, valleys, lakes, woodlands and plains. Have you met any? Did They name Themselves? I’d love to hear from you, sharing as much or as little as you are willing or able.

So…wow

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I’ve been really struggling the past few weeks. At first mostly doing it alone inside myself and with some of my practices. Then with the assistance of a beloved friend and including many more of my practices. I’ve been struggling to get back to center and to who I am as I know me to be, useful and filled with purpose. I was slipping, fast. I am through nature, nurture, and design one who is fairly aware of others around me. Not in a bad “I am not important” way, but in a chosen way. It is thing gifted to me through many means. I was slipping away from that. And as unnerving as it was to realize it, it was so much more so to realize it was so insidious that I hadn’t really paid attention to the slipping. o_O

With intensity in the last week I’ve been doing (my version) of kala to clear blockages, and triple soul work to get back into right alignment, re-examining my moral inventory, surrendering, reaching out to Those who can assist. And still I felt off. Not that I was expecting an overnight reversal (okay, that would be nice, but it doesn’t happen that way for me), but I was expecting more of a return to my central Self and Spirit. After 2 weeks, hm? Because of the depth of the work I’ve been doing and staying open and genuine, yes.

So what am I missing I was wondering? I dive into the traditions and practices that are mine in a way my own soul is, and yet I sometimes struggle with those very things. “Have I lost my shit? Who walks through the world believing these things: transition work with the dead and the Dead, cleansing, transmuting energies as needed, speaking with Deity? Maybe, just maybe, I’ve been playing the ultimate game of fiction with me as the star.” (And yes, we all do and we all are, but still.)

Ask and be shown. I had the opportunity to speak with a lovely person today. She phoned me with a story she wanted to tell and I was happy to make space for her to tell it. While relaying her story she said a small bit, maybe 2 sentences in length, that was absolutely the affirmation I needed when I hadn’t even known I needed it. Chills ran up and down my arms when she said it. As we are just beginning to get to know each other there is no way she could have known what she relayed to me except to have heard it in the manner that she said she did.

Here I sit, still dismayed and pleased, centered, and myself again. It feels really really good to be me again.

*bounce bounce*

The gifts of PTSD – when the outside doesn’t match the inside

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Oh, the gifts of PTSD, how they keep on giving! I have been struggling with some of the effects in an arena I never thought I would need to struggle in. One of the twisting curiosities of my PTSD has been how certain things can trigger a reaction that seems on the surface to be completely divorced from the sexual abuse of my growing years. Over time I have refined my bodily reactions so that I can operate in the world in a manner that is similar to most people without drawing suspicion. However, in the circles I run in many of those “most people” characteristics fall away.

One of the things that I have learned to do is to not immediately trust my gut reaction. Because I work with people who deeply trust their intuition which often centers in their gut sometimes my way of dealing with this can be problematic. I do trust my intuition, which is a combination of knowledge, wisdom, self-checks, Etheric Web checks, plus my physical gut reaction. I do not automatically trust my initial physical gut reaction unless I am in a physically dangerous situation meaning I have not negated my absolutely necessary fight or flight response. What I have done is learn how to double check my initial knee-jerk gut reaction. I do this because I learned early not to trust my body and the messages it was sending me because of the abuse and the associated defense mechanisms built up against that abuse.

When a situation triggers an initial strong gut reaction in me I refer to it as my “gut clench” response. I immediately dispel it while I do a quick deep check as to its truthfulness and authenticity. I do this by physically tightening up and giving an energetic push that moves the immediate gut clench reaction away from me. I then do an internal check to discover whether that gut clench is authentic or not. I have honed this skill for years and I do it very quickly. A deep core check and a poke at the Universal energy around me has served me well.

Most of the people that I do deep work with have learned to trust their immediate gut reactions and rightly so. That doesn’t mean that they are never wrong, but it often means that they have a freedom that I do not have with their initial gut reaction. Because I don’t feel I can trust my immediate gut reaction I have tempered my behavior accordingly and do my internal check because of my desire is to respond with my authentic self. This felt like useful way of caring for my own needs in a way that still allowed me to be real and respond to whatever was going on around me. I still believe that this is a useful tool for me as it brings a level of clarity that I would not have if I automatically reacted to my gut clench.

However, it has been brought to my attention that this particular mode of response feels far differently to others that it does to me. Because I work with deeply intuitive people I am also working with their heightened level of energy awareness. In a gut clench response I physically tighten up my body (and I’m guessing I also visually tighten up) and they are noticing. When I’ve been doing my energy push to move the gut reaction away from me so that I can drop down they are feeling that push of energy, too. What I did not know was that this tightening and energy push was being interpreted as resistance against whatever was just said or done. How this resistance translates emotionally to people depends greatly on their own personal filters and/or their filters in that moment.

This has left me in quite a conundrum. How do I maintain and honor my PTSD self-care while also addressing that when I do this it feels very differently to others? Another piece for me is remaining is remaining in the moment, rather than being tossed back into a memory, so in my head I say, “I am here. Now.” Saying that out loud in that moment would mean little to the people around me. For me to remain healthy I need to not drop what has been useful and healthy for me. So what to do? I think I need to tell people that I do this clench-tighten-push thing.  Also, I need to open space where people can comfortably ask me about it when it occurs, without fear of negative consequences. This feels like a good resolution for this conundrum.

I do not wish for my outside to inaccurately reflect my inside and chance being seen as stubbornly resistant, not thinking well of others, inflexible, or as one who can not be stood against without receiving flack. Learning that something I so highly value about myself has been seen and felt in ways that are so troublesome has been exceedingly difficult. Now that I have been made aware I can at least do something to mitigate the effects, which is far better than walking around unaware.

So, lots of interesting things have recently come up for me. A lot of deep reflection, conversing with deity, and some divination tools thrown in for good measure have helped me sort it out. This feels very true to me, the manner in which my outside self was misrepresenting my inside self and what I can do as a viable fix. Both of these pieces feel true. May it be so, May be so, May it be so.

I will not drag you kicking and screaming to the Work

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You want to learn, you want to do Deep Work. Kudos! I will assist you when you ask and when I am able, but I will not drag you kicking and screaming to it. If you want it the impetus must come from within you not from me on the outside.

I gladly parse out energy to willing people. I become miserly when you wish to lie on your back with the expectation that I’ll grab your foot and drag you with me. Push you? Oh, hayel yes! Catch you when you tip backwards from the force? Sure, as long as the lesson isn’t the fall itself. But if you want it you have to reach for it. That’s what this path is: being the force behind the Will and then engaging Will to be Who You Said You Would Be.

(On a related note: No skipping steps. No, IRAB (I Read A Book) or ITAC (I Took A Class) and now I’m ready to instruct others without all the praxis that must occur in between those steps. If you skip the steps the missing pieces will be spotlighted with time and the community you wish to engage will avoid you.

If you desire to be taken seriously, if your wish is to be Seen and Known and Trusted then you must Do The Work all the way through. You must want it, reach for it, and practice it. And check your ego and ethics every step of the way while surrounding yourself with folks who will call you on your behaviour if it looks like you’ve forgotten to do so.)

You can find those who do it differently than I do. You can find people who will prop you up when a faceplant is the work, who will take your hand and pull you forward while you protest and lean back. They just are not me. I will not work with those folks, either. Just so we’re clear.

/PSA