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The Pagan Experience blog project: March wk 3; Deity

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To catch up on this project I will be posting items  from others or reposting one of my favourites of my own. This week is deity and the divine, and I love this poem by Tom Hirons.

SOMETIMES A WILD GOD
JULY 19, 2012 
Sometimes a wild god comes to the table.
He is awkward and does not know the ways
Of porcelain, of fork and mustard and silver.
His voice makes vinegar from wine.When the wild god arrives at the door,
You will probably fear him.
He reminds you of something dark
That you might have dreamt,
Or the secret you do not wish to be shared.

He will not ring the doorbell;
Instead he scrapes with his fingers
Leaving blood on the paintwork,
Though primroses grow
In circles round his feet.

You do not want to let him in.
You are very busy.
It is late, or early, and besides…
You cannot look at him straight
Because he makes you want to cry.

…………………….. con’t. at  Sometimes a Wild God.

I kept a stone on my tongue most of the weekend so my ears had little competition and now it’s acting like a toddler

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The Pagan Blog project, March, Wk 2- Mar. 9- As Above, So Below What do you seek from the Divine? How is that reflected in the mundane? Where do you find your place of synthesis?

I kept a stone on my tongue most of the weekend so my ears had little competition and now it’s acting like a toddler.

I wrote this in a reply to one of my Facebook posts and as I wrote it I realized how very true it was. I was at a spiritual intensive and my part was to support, observe, and not lead or do the talky bits or in any way step into center. I relaxed into my role. I really leaned into that role because frankly, if you’ve stood in leadership in community, stepping back and not leading can be the equivalent of a week long rest for the soul.

Part of this stepping back for me involves pulling my aura in just a bit because my presence can be a distraction. I am a transition priestess; a border-walking, dead-talking priestess. When one walks with the Dust of the Dead in a cloud around one’s feet (picture Pigpen from the Peanuts™ comic strip), well it can be a distraction.

Another part is I am a very verbal person. It is a gift to be so and not so much the curse I, until recently, believed it to be. (Some other blog post I’ll talk about why I thought it a curse.) Being so verbal is not always appropriate so I’ve learned to curb it for periods of time. Here’s the thing, though. It is a key piece of Who I Am. When I curb it I have to later let it loose. If I don’t pay attention to the loosening it is indeed unruly and loud like a toddler. And thus the sentence came out: I kept a stone on my tongue most of the weekend so my ears had little competition and now it’s acting like a toddler.

It reminded me that “As above, so below”. It reminded me that we are exactly who we are and if we push too hard to be other, it squishes out the other direction. It reminded me that we are reflections of the curved black mirror of space, sometimes squished and pulled, but always always reflections of the divine, and always always ourselves.

After all: it’s just a fun house mirror.

As above, so below.

The Pagan Experience; March wk 1; Words!

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Knowledge, Wisdom and Gnosis – What do these words mean to you? How do express these principles in your spiritual work? Is any one more important than the other? Why?

I am fairly loose in the definitions of these words and straightforward.

Knowledge: what you know, not to be confused with Truth. Knowledge can be be “book learnin'” (possibly true) or knowing in your core (true). I don’t try to guess what lives in other people’s core. I concern myself with my own. Especially when I am in teacher/facilitator mode. Role modeling awareness of my truth is the most (best?) I can do.

Wisdom: I don’t claim it, though I think we all have at least some of it. It’s not a label I’m going to be comfortable bestowing on myself, “wise one”. Not because I think it is untrue, but it hits in a weird place like self-proclaiming the label of “elder” – some labels are best conferred, not claimed.

Gnosis: I skip right to UPG (unverified personal gnosis). Love it! Unverified and unverifiable to anyone except me, knowing. This is the liminal space where I meet my Gods, where everyone meets their God/s. That is as it should be. These relationships are personal, private dialogues between us and Them, unfettered by societal constraints of what is supposed to be possible and true. When I step between the worlds, I find it. When I speak to the Spirit House, I find it. When I drop into trance, I find it. I can share it partially within the limitations of speech and written word, but UPG is a thing that is more for me and less for the world. I am quite happy with that.

Importance of each – well, that varies on situation, the Work at the time, and what needs to be done with the knowledge, wisdom, or gnosis gained. It is not an even split and the percentage of each changes as needed.  The ties between them are close and they play off of each other in the creation that is my religious path. Too much of one all the time would reduce all of it. So I think an ever changing goodly mix of the three provides the most long term stability. A stable flexible path is what I strive for and generally accomplish. Go me! 😉

The Pagan Experience; Feb., wk 4; calling the Work into the world

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Wk 4- Feb. 23- Any writing for the letters C or D – I am keeping this familiar format on week 4 for those who have joined me from the Pagan Blog Project.

C: Calling

I attended Winter Witchcamp this year. It is held on a magical isle on a frozen lake in Wisconsin. I am not a fan of winter, but this place was beautiful.

One night for ritual we called a bind rune into being. Actually called it, rune piece by rune piece, with intent, purpose, and ecstatic voices. We called across the camp, 3 layers, 3 runes, over and over and over again, until its magic was formed, its energy as clear and bold as the brisk night air.

The ritual started in 3 separate places: on the frozen lake, on the deck of the ritual hall with a fire blazing, and inside the ritual room. It was so cold that evening and my back ached with the frigid temperatures, but the frozen lake siren-sang my name so I bundled and wrapped and layered, and chose it, as much as it chose me, to start the ritual.

I arrived at the lake, walking on its icy hardness, to a straight line of coloured faerie lights stuck deep into the ice. Our group split on either side of this rainbow rendition of Isa in the ice, raised our voices, and began. “Eeeesaah” we chanted, just slowly enough to feel the vowels fully in our throats before we took a breath. The deck group immediately followed with “Naaauuthiiiz”, and right after we could hear the faint whisper through the air of “Laaayguuz”.

Over and over, timed and methodical like music, emotion-filled and full-bodied like prayer. Eeeesaah …….Naaauthiiz …….Laaayguuz. Over and over, then faster and faster, our frost nipped faces turned upwards to a brilliantly clear starry heaven, chant-calling our bind rune into existence.

Once the island was swollen with our conviction we fell silent.

The three groups gathered in the ritual room and we completed the working.

Isa/Nauthiz/Laguz; the energy bound that evening is carried within all of us who were there, stretching out in our world as we move forward with this Work.

Hail.

The Pagan Experience, Feb. wk 3, work smart, don’t work everywhere

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Wk 3- Feb. 16- Deity and the Divine– This will be the third week’s topic every month and an opportunity for you to share with everyone those who guide, inspire and inform you.

Some sort of shenanigans happened on my blog (I’m looking at you, Loki of the missing socks) when a draft managed to published itself with only the description of the prompt and the word “Hel”. I find this hilarious. But here’s my late post anyway.

I’m pretty tapped out ATM with SJ conversations that feel like they have never moved beyond the 101 level in spiritual spaces where I hold a high expectation of awareness + openness + growth. But, I am in the trad that I am for a reason. That said, while I understand how this can be a call to arms for some, for me it’s like someone nicked my jugular and I’m not gonna bleed out to create a fountain for the racists to quench their thirst.

This sentiment is prompted by incidents at this year’s Pantheacon, but P-Con is far from the only offender. (Oh if it were!) My Gods however like to take long term views of the humans and their flaws. And They’re pretty brilliant at that. Along with all the other directives and instructions and “Hey, why don’t you do this now!!”s there has always been an emphasis on work hard, but work smart. This has come in messages since I was a kid and the onus has been on me to work diligently in my corner of the world because the “It’s not fair!!” that rises in me at global injustice overwhelms to paralysis. This if course does not mean I get to stick my head in the sand, or ignore injustices elsewhere, but when it comes to parsing my energy and finances, do the most good often translates to places that don’t me a couple of grand to get to. (If I ever get to a place of financial security where a couple grand every month is doable – go me! – I’ll reassess.)

And right now I’m bone tired of my spiritual community having not progressed farther in the fight against privileges and abuse issues than society at large. Really? FuckThatShit. (“Really”, whisper the Gods.) They remain steadfast in their insistence that “work hard, but work smart, go where you’ll do the most good” is an oath I should continue to hold. They all deeply value self care, too. Hel, Poseidon, Yemaya, Kuan Yin, Papa Legba, and Cerridwen -so say all. So I shall.

The Pagan Experience; Feb., wk 2

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Wk 2- Feb. 9- Earth– The word “earth” has multiple meanings. What does it mean to you? How do you use its definitions to support your work?

This is a tough one. I don’t center the earth in my practice or on my path. I center beings, of all kinds. I admire and am grateful for the earth. I enjoy its steady support, its unemotional destructive forces, its beauty, and its mayhem. I can hear the trees whisper and the sea sing the songs of my soul. I adore its bright colours, birds, and animals. And still I do and feel and reference all of this from the place of human, through my filters.

I can go days without thinking of it or appreciating it still being under my feet. I can fold in on myself and ignore all outside my home. I try not to, because keeping connected to the earth is part of connecting to All That Is. When I become too internalized in focus and open back up to the world I always notice how very much I have missed it.

This earth may be nothing more than our collective co-created illusion, but what a beautiful illusion it is.

REBLOG – Oppression doesn’t go both ways

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Oppression Doesn’t Go Both Ways

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By Phoenix Calida

The problem with reverse -isms (racism, sexism, etc) is that they imply everyone is starting from an equal place. Of course, members of marginalized groups can be bigoted or prejudiced. But marginalized groups don’t have the same structural ability to behave oppressively. 

Saying “racism goes both ways” or “women can be sexist too” etc. etc. actively ignores existing power dynamics. It also leads to victim blaming because structural oppression should be able to be overcome *if* the victims are actually societal equals to the person being an asshole. 

If racism was truly a mutual 2 way thing, there would be equal incidents of oppression. The consequences of bigotry would go both ways.

CON’T at Source