YouTube Pagan Challenge – Week 8

The one where I talk about my Gods, and yes, there’s a bit of waffling here because I was kind of all over the place this morning, thinking about other things too 😛

Taking Time for Paris

I’m taking a few moments this morning for some prayers, though I’ll likely be talking to my Gods all day long about this atrocious attack.

I think now’s a good time for all of us to pray to our Gods, or work some magick, to wipe the extremist ISIL fucks from the face of our planet.

My thoughts and love are with you, Paris. ❤

EEEEE!!! The Wait Is Over!!!! (Mostly Because I’m Impatient)

I want to introduce you to my new products I’m offering in my shop now!! As of now, there are only the two up; I was going to wait until I could get up a goodly amount… but I’m just too damn impatient to wait!! I just want to share them with you!

I’m making tea inspired by and for our Gods, as well as whatever tickles my fancy (seasonal/holidays/pop culture paganism/stories).

The Deity teas are meant to be shared with your Gods, simply offered to them, or just to enjoy as you think on Their many adventures and lessons.

This Baldr tea is a delicious chamomile base, with orange, lavender and allspice. It’s like walking in a summer meadow.

And an Odinn tea! Minty, spicy, and earthy. It’s like a cool walk on blustery cliffs as you sip on a thermos full of hot tea. A blend of peppermint, spearmint, juniper berries and white pepper.

I was meant to have a Frigg tea up as well, but I ran out of dehydrated apples, so am waiting on them to be finished drying at the moment.
My plans are to flesh out the Norse side of things, as well as some for holidays (and by that, I do mean Yule right now, but there will be teas for the other Sabbats), witchier teas for divining or journeying to Otherworlds, and teas inspired by fantastical worlds from books and movies. There will be some pop culture pagan themed teas to be had as well as our historical Gods/myths.

I’m so excited! I hope you are too, and keep an eye out on my shop for more tea!!!

❤

My Odin, and other People’s Odins

So much yes.
I think a lot of issues with trying to have what someone else has, or thinking you or others are DOING IT WRONG because no two relationships look exactly alike, could be quelled if we could just accept that the Deity I get is not exactly the same as the One you get. That my history and experiences with Them are not yours. And in a simple term, my inside jokes with Them will be different than yours.

The other issue I feel that often gets brought into play too frequently is the fact that we want to be right, we want to have THE TRUTH, THE WAY, and if it looks different than someone else’s, they’re wrong. And since the Gods and spirits cannot come and incarnate just to tell us all for good who’s right and wrong in a way for everyone to plainly see and accept, it will remain a might sticky when one person’s perception of a Deity is quite different, or doesn’t make sense to another. (Also, look how misinterpreted and misrepresented the bible is, even if the Gods came to sort it out once and for all, everyone would interpret Their words to best suit themselves anyway :P)

What is so important to keep in mind is that the Gods cannot (and will not) be squished into a neat little box with Their name on it. They are expansive, growing, and evolving Beings, as are we in our much smaller capacity. It is a disservice to Them, and a disservice to ourselves to try to make my version of the Gods match up 100% laser cut perfection with yours.

Beth said it wonderfully, that even we have different roles and ways of interacting with each person in our lives, depending on the relationship, history, and shared interests.

The Blackberry Hag

This post has been marinating in my head for a while now, but I really got a shove to get it out of my head and onto the screen after reading Nono’s latest post (Some Misconceptions about Demons) in which he discusses—among other things—the distinction between the Face of an individual demon and the Hat that demon wears. Now, I am not involved with the Infernal pantheon, beyond being on politely friendly terms with Lucifer (I was definitely a Lucifer fangirl in my teens and early twenties, to the point where Odin found the most expedient way to make inroads into my head back then was by assuming Lucifer’s identity—which was done with Lu’s consent), plus a couple of Others encountered via making devotional items for Their people. However, I definitely see some correlations between the Hat/Face dichotomy and the way other, non-Infernal deities operate. I decided to…

View original post 2,513 more words

Listening To Them – TPE

This is a post for The Pagan Experience about deity & the divine.

So here is where I confess a terrible thing, I wasn’t listening to my Gods, namely Baldr. I wasn’t letting Him in. And this turned into Him showing up to someone else who was performing a reading for me (thank you!) being Super Grump.
It’s kind of strange to think of Him as that, seeing how much of what we know from lore sources have painted Him as a glorious, shining ball of light and happiness. However, let us remember in Saxo’s account, He was a fierce warrior who fought to have Nanna. And if you look at that story without the names attached to it, you’ll see the character He played was a bit brazen (or maybe a lot considering He decided He had to have someone else’s intended).
It always makes reminds me that there is no denying He is His father’s son.

So why would He be Super Grump to my poor, lovely reader and therefore at me? Well, I don’t know why exactly I had it in my mind that He was to be interacted with in a distant way, that for some reason there was a waiting period before w/We could interact in much closer proximity as I had been doing so with Odinn, and Frija (to a lesser extent), but I had kept Him at arm’s length. Ok, probably more like, across the street length. In fact, I had also cut myself off from Odinn and Frija (Who both let me know They were not too happy with my distancing as well), doubting that I was allowed to have those close relationships.

Ugh. What is human brain meat!!!!!!

I couldn’t even tell you why I did it. Perhaps things got really real when I got a reading from the lovely Beth back in December? I won’t divulge what was said, but it did kind of shake my world around a bit. Flail happened.
So I think with that reading, all of a sudden, things had to be super serious business. Formal. Restrained.

And I think now, when had things every been like that with Odinn & Frija? Never. There had been some more formal ritual things when I needed to mark something as important, but otherwise, o/Our relationships have been pretty friendly and informal. I would say even almost emphatically informal after I was frustrated and fed up with school, and after the not so nice thing happened. I needed comfort when They came to me, and that’s what I got. They’ve never been distant, ethereal beings to me. Until I tried making Them.

Then Baldr came into the picture and that’s when I got all worked up. And it took Him, the God people like to see as happy-go-lucky, and very shiny, kicking me in the pants to smarten up.

So why am I sharing this with you? Well, because having relationships with Gods can be a hard thing. We can’t physically see Them. Physically touch Them. Hear Them, smell Them, or taste Them. The way we experience pretty much everything in our life is based upon our physical senses.
It is hard to keep focused enough to see Them without our eyes, or hear Them without our ears. It makes the experiences with Them subject to how confident we feel in our non-physical senses, our sanity, and our worthiness at having relationships with any of Them.

Over the past few years, I readily admit questioning my sanity many times. So much of our conditioning (even from a church-going Christian background) is focused on our physical world. But we are not just physical beings. We are souls with bodies for a time. It’s well and good, and sometimes very nice (wink, wink) to be very in the moment and in your body as it feels all the stimuli from our environments: the smell of your favourite dessert baking, soft, warm fur beneath your hands, seeing someone you love in person after a long separation, listening to your favourite music that moves you to joy or tears, a warm breath across your skin in just the right place. These are delicious things. These are good things.

Yet, we also experience the world with our thoughts, who we are as a spirit. And how do you experience a non-physical being when you’re currently trapped in a limited human body? How can you do this reliably without letting yourself think you’re crazy? It is a very difficult thing, very difficult indeed.

What I have done to be open again, is just say to myself “fuck it”. I never worry about what anyone else thinks of me, why should I let conditioned filters that I sometimes let myself see myself through affect me? Why should I care what I think of myself if that thought comes from society’s filter that mystical people are crazy? Even Christians think their mystics are weird. And what difference would it make if I were crazy? Is my spirituality not feeding my soul? Does speaking/being with the Gods not feed my soul?
I suppose part of it could be that old “not worthy”, “feeling good is a sin” that could be surfacing. Well, that notion has never stopped me from having le sex, and lots of it. There’s no shame in that at all for me. I view sex as physical, yes, but so very spiritual as well. It’s something that lets us lose ourselves, become more than just who we are in our limited human bodies, if only for a few moments.
And I ask myself, is that not what my relationships with Them is like in a slightly different, brain-way? Absolutely. I am filled and inspired and awed, and I lose myself in o/Our interactions together because they/They take me somewhere else I couldn’t even imagine (in multiple ways), They teach me things, They’ve helped change my view of the world and my self (not that I had a bad view of either before, but now my view is wider, grander), They’ve made me very aware of the spirits in all things and how much humans have tried to cut Them all out, and I just simply enjoy Their company.
Just as friendships and relationships in real life, relationships with Them are important, fulfilling, and help me become a better person. (There’s also the perk with deity/spirit relationships of learning magickal things as well, thanks, Frija!).

So I got kicked in the metaphorical pants, and here I am, in the thick of it again. It’s beautiful, and I’m inspired. It’s hard to remember to pay attention sometimes to hear Them, to visit with Them, ’cause They can’t just come to us and yell at us outside our windows. We have to make the time to just listen, to let go of doubts, to just be with Them.

It’s a strange thing breaking down all the things society teaches us to conform, to be the same as everyone else. To break that down and build up your self as a whole person, as someone who is not simply the physical and thought, but a spiritual person. Someone who is not afraid to feel (emotionally as well as inspirationally). Someone who feels the rush and tingle of energy flowing through us, sometimes welling up from within us, sometimes coming from something physically un-seeable. Someone who follows that and gives no fucks what anyone else has to say about it.
What a world it would be if everyone followed the deep wisdom that lies in the very hearts of us, connected to everything, to everyone.

I won’t isolate myself from Them. They don’t deserve that, and neither do I.

Week One Finished NaNoWriMo

It’s been one week of NaNoWriMo so far, and I have been on a role! After having successfully completing last year’s run, I already know I can write a lot, there is enough inspiration in me to spew forth All. The. Words. Why I chose the word “spew”, I do not know. Let’s move on.

I always do this to myself, but I have forgotten how much writing (among other creative endeavours) speaks to my soul. It may take a while for me to get into a scene, but when I hit the groove, I am basically going into a trance. And since this story of mine involves the Gods, I am also listening and feeling whatever direction they want me to go in. It’s been such an amazing exploration for me so far, letting this story unfold, letting things develop and present themselves in my writing.

I’m really enjoying describing sensual experience, the way my MC observes and experiences the world and people around her. This is especially true when she straddles the worlds. The one thing I’m still struggling a bit with is the characters, writing them complexly without making them contrary. Each day, I have ideas about all the potential paths the story could travel if my characters were “this way”, or what if they were a little more “like this”.  It’s only been yesterday and today that I’ve kinda begun to accept a more solid personality for them. I’m not worried about it not meshing with the earlier stuff I wrote though, that’s what editing and rewriting is for! Plus, keeping track of what I write every day in a plot map.

As much as I had planned in October, a lot of the plot has changed. The main plot points are still firmly in place, but the story itself has gotten so much darker than I originally planned it to be, but hey, Odin is one of the main characters, how could it not get dark and dangerous? Not to mention Who else will be popping in.
I’m definitely not regretting planning out as much as I did, it allowed me to begin exploring early ideas sooner, and for a few weeks before beginning. But it definitely seems like I need to sit down to write to see what’s actually going to happen.

Welp, I said I’d maybe post excerpts, and here is the first one! If you like it, let me know! If you think it’s a big pile of poop, also let me know! 😉

She was dressed as shieldmaiden now, a terror to see. Her hair seemed to flow as if in water around her, creating a copper glow as the sun shone through each strand behind her. Her eyes were furious, and their gaze bore into my very being.

It was as if every human part of me was being stripped away, my hopes, my fears, my loves, my memories. Each piece revealing the bones of me, the bones of her. I couldn’t have screamed if I had wanted to, she had taken my voice, my eyes, my ears. In a moment that lasted but seconds, and an eternity. I was before her, not seeing her or any of this world, just knowing it, viscerally. All of my flesh burnt to ashes, but I could feel those ashes coming back to me, reconstituting, rebuilding. My flesh clean, pure.

When I was whole once more, I stood before her, the rage in her steeled, she pulled out a short blade, sharp, and slid the point from the base of her palm to the tip of her middle finger. She took my right hand and did the same. She then grasped my hand with her own, and then I felt her moving through me as I moved through her. A flash of what must have been my ancestors so very long ago, being with these Gods, laughing with them, fighting alongside them, calling them kin.

I saw their marriages, their lovemaking, their children. Their blood flowed together, for generations. Both sides strengthened by the bonds, humans connected to all that was beyond their world in Midgard, to see that though their life was short on that plain, they would be reborn again and again, their spirit immortal. The Gods able to enjoy each day as it came, viewing their long lives with the eyes of a mortal being’s, allowing themselves to not become indifferent and stagnant.

Story Weaving Once More

So, the darkness has lifted quite a bit and I’m excited and engaged in things again. If you’ve seen anything from me on Twitter in the last week, you’ll know I’m preparing to give NaNoWriMo another whirl this year (that’s National Novel Writing Month, for those of you who don’t know about it yet).

I’ve spent the last week employing the Snowflake method, albeit a slightly abbreviated version of it, to pre-plan my novel this year. Last year’s was a write by the seat of my pants go, and while I really enjoyed doing it that way, just allowing things to unfold from the pits of my mind, I did end up planning things out as I went along anyway. So I figured I’d try it with a plan in place this time, although it’s not going to be super rigid and allows me some flexibility to play around with some things.

So today, I’ve been making a list of the scenes I’d like to write, and by doing that, I’ve discovered something else that will be unfolding within the story, which I am very happy about. I have to say, how this one is developing, I’m really quite excited to just read the story as I write it. I want to know what is going to happen, I want to see the relationships develop, I want to see how these characters are going to struggle and learn. I just want to know the story already!

I’ll divulge a little and tell you that it’s kind of a blend of fantasy, alternate history, and romance. Gods are involved, and I’ve already got some expansion into more than one pantheon in mind for a subsequent novel. I’m even thinking it may turn into a trilogy, you know, because that’s just what you do, and I can already see where I can take the essential story and expand into a greater and greater view of the world.

Needless to say, I’m anxiously awaiting November to begin so I can dive right into the deep end. I’m also upping the word count I’d like to achieve this year. Last year I did the standard 50,000, and this year, I’d like to up it to 60,000. We shall see what becomes of it!

Immersive Polytheism & Revivalism

The Household Gods – John William Waterhouse

After the past while of reading and watching things concerning these wonderful terms, I’d like to talk about some of the thoughts I’ve had about them. I’d really like to thank Camilla over at Foxglove & Firmitas for prompting all the wonderful discussion over the following terms she’s brought to light.

This is a long one, guys, so grab a cup of tea and get cozy 🙂

 

Revivalism

This is something that really clicked with me, and allowed me to stop fretting about choosing the either/or of Reconstructionism and Eclecticism. I gather that this is probably something that many people battle with because in Paganism, as much as we are influenced by the past, we live now, and our Ancestors had been disconnected from their Gods and religious practices for far too long. Not even mentioning the factions that like to break off and say their way is “best”. Yes, best for whoever chooses that path.

There is no unbroken line of authentic pre-Christian faiths and religions of the past, much that our Ancestors knew is lost. Much of what has been preserved has been so from a non-practitioner’s point of view, or even after the conversions had taken place.
We don’t know with 100% surety how people practiced or regarded their religions.

Let’s say that perhaps the conversions didn’t happen, that the people were able to continue practicing the religions of their Ancestors, do you think our practice today would look exactly the same? With all of this technology, with all of this science, with all of this access to information? I don’t think it would, which is why Reconstructionism doesn’t work for me.

I think that we wouldn’t be having to put in so much work at this point in building community, discovering the reality of the Gods and Spirits, and (especially coming from a Christian background), working through a lot of doubt. I think it would be just natural, and who knows where we could be if we had had all of this time to continue evolving practice, evolving the way people interact with all of Them?

Alas, we do not live in that world in our universe. Our ties have been cut, and there are remnants to give us clues. Now it’s up to us to pick up those ties, and start weaving with them again in the now and for the future.

I also think that even if we had been able to practice our ancestors’ faiths all this time, the Gods would not want or expect the same things as They did 2000 years ago, nor would They really be exactly the same personality as They were. They are living, They also evolve, and though I don’t believe They experience time linearly as we do, They are all They will become, They just have not revealed that to us yet because we are probably not ready for it. Everything in its time.

This also works itself into my idea that for each evolution of humankind’s culture, and general ease of simply living and surviving (in terms of being well nourished, free of disease, life-expectancy, and at peace with surrounding countries/city-states), the Gods change Their faces to be best understood by the people of whatever time they happen to live in. This doesn’t mean that Their other faces are irrelevant, but in a more general sense, more people will come to the Gods when Their personality that is currently being experienced by the masses appeals to the current attitudes, philosophies, and culture of the time.

As an example, human sacrifices aren’t necessarily what They want right now in the 21st century, seeing as there is not a huge amount of us in active relationships with Them (whatever that may look like). This requirement would simply be illogical for Them, as They need those of us who interact with Them to help others come to Them. There is also still a lot of work to be done in our world for polytheism (and all things that are not part of the monotheism-or-else culture) to be accepted, not treated as taboo, as sin, as evil, as other, so that those who are called to these paths can feel comfortable that they will not be discriminated against.

When we get to the point where everyone is free to choose, and we see masses returning to the roots of their Ancestors’ religion, who knows what the Gods will want from us then.

 

Until Camilla spoke about identifying as a Revivalist, unfortunately there was a bit of a back and forth argument happening in my head. As much as I know and really believe there is never an either/or to anything, sometimes my brain just doesn’t want to heed that idea. Let’s call that the unfortunate side effect of living in a culture highly influenced by Abrahamic faiths where even if something doesn’t involve any hint of religion, there is always only a right/wrong answer.

So for a while, though the internal struggle wasn’t overly terrible or causing me much turmoil, it was still there.

 

“Do I go whole hog and try to reconstruct?”

“No, Mia, just because They’ve connected with you, doesn’t mean that the culture They were worshiped within in history necessarily needs to be recreated here at this point in time. Besides, there isn’t enough information to do that completely.”

“But what if They don’t like anything I’m doing for Them? What if I offend Them?!”

“You can just ask Them, Mia. You know very well you can. They are not some distant God who can never be contacted by the likes of you. They chose you for a reason, and if They were not interested in helping and working with you, They wouldn’t have come in the first place.”

“Oh.”
Yep. When you work with the Gods and Spirits, They’ll let you know what They don’t like, what They do, and there are plenty of tools to use to divine what They do want. It’s not all about the interactions when you Journey, if that is what you can do.
So getting to extinguish this little nagging fire was nice for me. Another “coming home” moment.

 

So at the end of the day, for me, revivalism works as a term to describe who I am spiritually and how I practice. It is about finding out what you can about how our Ancestors practiced their religion, the way they viewed the Gods, but also realizing that we live in a very different world. That we have very different lives of abundance (at least here in North America) compared to our Ancestors. We also are not constantly fighting for our lives against other people who would take our land from us or whatever else they could want.
Why would the Gods show the same faces which appeals more to people of the past than to those who live now?

It also works for me because of the fact that the term “Revivalism” communicates that I am creating a living religion for myself and my future children. I am reviving my Ancestors’ religion, but allowing it to fit better with who I am and how I live my life today in the 21st century. The Gods and Spirits will show me what They want as proper protocol as They see fit to.

 

Disarblot – August Malmström

Immersive Polytheist

This is the other term which I absolutely adore, and reflects my practice more than any other combination of words out there at this point.

Every minute of my day, everything that I do, however mundane it may seem on the outside, I am constantly meditating on my Gods and Ancestors, sometimes interacting with Them, pondering over Their lessons, how They affect my life. There really is not much that is not coloured by thoughts of Them.

When I am cleaning the house, I connect with my Ancestors who for so long performed the same duties in the household. When I am in the garden, I connect with those who tended their own land, toiling much harder than I currently need to for food. I also think on the Gods Whose domains are concerned with what I am doing. When I watch a television show, or a movie, I see lessons or elements of certain Gods’ stories. When I interact with my family and friends, I think on the hospitality of my Ancestors, and how They along with my Gods would want me to behave towards others.

I often make it a point to offer up whatever song I am singing around the house or in the garden to Whomever comes to mind for it, Whoever moves me in that moment.

There is nothing that the Gods and Spirits don’t touch in my life.

 

But let’s look at the grander idea of Immersive Polytheism, which also works with the Revivalism, because, well, aren’t we trying to revive the religions of our Ancestors?

I absolutely agree with Camilla in her latest vlog about wanting to immerse her child in Polytheism. This is, in fact, where she came up with the term. And I think, how wonderful will it be in the future to see my kids, and their kids, and perhaps their kids raised completely immersed in their spirituality as they are each called to it? I’m not saying that my descendants have to be Polytheists of any particular cultural background, or anything else for that matter. But I would like to see them be able to come to their own conclusions and not struggle with themselves over how to do things. It would be second nature, and they would know to simply ask the Gods and Ancestors and Spirits what They would all like instead of self-doubting and feeling not of worth.

Now I feel I have been lucky in that I knew for a while before I knew about Paganism and officially called myself Pagan at 13 that I was not Christian like my family and lots of my friends. I was really lucky in that I had no problem with this fact. It was not something that I struggled with in the slightest except for one blip early on of wanting to please a friend who was very Christian (not that they were adamant about me changing my heathen ways).

So for nearly the entirety of my Pagan life, I have been able to be immersed in my spirituality. Moreso in the past few years since there’s been quite a bit of initiation and transformation going on in my life.

But I do realize there are still too many people coming to Paganism/Polytheism having been raised in another religion, which means things just simply do not come naturally to them. This is especially true if they have problems with their previous religion, because the tools which were given in a previous religion can be tools that would work for them, but there can be the need for the complete rejection of it all. So people come without any tools, already with plenty of the self-doubt that our culture likes to propagate within each of us, and that makes for some difficult times in discovering how to do this ourselves without the constant worry of doing it right according to other people.

 

So as you can probably gather, I am definitely going to be teaching my kids to ask Them what They want when my children are unsure. It’s kind of basic relationship tending, communication is key. I also will be teaching them some common practices, but will emphasize that whatever moves them intuitively to do something they feel will be well received is also very important and so very valuable.

My practice/beliefs will not look exactly like yours, but if we both serve and please the Gods, Ancestors, and Spirits, who are we to judge each other?

And as we Polytheists/Pagans become more and more widely accepted and sought out as time moves forward, we will grow and learn how to tend to our communities in whatever ways we are called to. Keep in mind in order to keep us all moving forward, we need to be open for discussion, we need to share our insights, hard as that can be sometimes. We need to not attack each other, because aren’t we all working towards the same kind of future?

Again, my practice/beliefs won’t look like yours, nor does they need to. How can we be taken more seriously if we are constantly infighting over semantics? Over whose spiritual penis is bigger than whose?

As much as it is about immersing our own selves in our practices and religions, it is also about helping others who would do the same. Community immersion. And this requires that we have people who are called to perform certain roles for fellow Polytheists to begin learning and figuring out how to do that. We absolutely need a Polytheistic ministry to help those who are dealing with hard stuff, as well as provide local leadership. We need to come together and decide how this needs to work.

 

Words Count

Why even have these labels? Aren’t labels bad? Don’t they box us in?

As much as I am usually against labeling and tiny boxes, these labels are seeming so far to be much more inclusive than others. Sometimes this comes down to the exact meaning and origin of words, and sometimes this comes down to the people who shape the way something comes to mean in the greater community.

Immersive Revivalist Polytheist encompasses anyone from any particular tradition. It doesn’t matter Who you worship, or how you perform your rituals.

Words drive so much of how we learn today, on our computers, on our phones, on our e-readers, books, everything. There’s much more reading than there is actual physical talking and sharing of information. The written word can be more clear as we can spend more time ensuring we are using the correct words and the correct tones. This isn’t to say that it is better than speaking and sharing aurally, each have their merits, but it is how we generally seek, learn, and work today.

So we have these words people can search for on the internet, and as more people continue to use these terms and normalize the lingo, the information becomes easier to access. The community grows and the ideas and real world implications grow. Those who are new to it or even new to Paganism/Polytheism can find it, and expand their own understanding of the different paths one may take, whether or not they apply it to themselves.

 

Words are how we communicate, and that means our interactions with the community at large. When we have the information needed to easily be circulated (and hopefully continuously improved upon as we learn more), we can create basic rites easily recognized all around the world. This doesn’t negate our own personal festivals, rites, and observances we create for ourselves, no, but it allows us all to be connected to each other no matter the background we come from.

If that means we all know handfasting/parting, funerary, birth, and life milestone rituals from a few different traditions (Celtic, Northern, Roman, Greek, Egyptian, African, etc), then you can count me in. I want to be able to support fellow Polytheists, and be part of a larger community which can pull together to begin the changes that desperately need to happen in the world concerning the general view of religions that are “other” compared to what is the current cultural norm.

We shouldn’t be fracturing ourselves just because I don’t worship Who you worship, or because my tradition and practices look different than yours. Again, open discussion, and a willingness to hear others out without becoming offended is very much needed. We need our words, we need some labels so that in the future, they don’t have to be so necessary, where everyone is comfortable just being who they are and doing what they do because we relaid the groundwork down.

 

Where to Find the Discussions

As of August 11, 2014

Camilla‘s Posts
Intro To Revivalism

Why I Don’t Call Myself a Devotional Polytheist

Asklepieion: My Big Dream
She discusses a dream for a community building project.

Some Thoughts on Immersive Polytheism

 

Beth‘s Posts
VR to Camilla Laurentine – Revivalism and Immersive Polytheism

The Gods as Individuals

Immersive Polytheism: A Few More Thoughts

 

Jolene‘s Posts
Immersive Polytheist Revivalism – A VR to Camilla Laurentine

 

Columbine‘s Posts
Discussion of Immersive Polytheism and Other Fun Things

 

Silence‘s Posts
Response to Camilla Laurentine – Terminology

Characteristics of Devotion

 

Cora‘s Posts
Open Forum Discussion
Where people got together to discuss how our current practices in community (also involving the discussion on Immersive Revivalist Polytheism) in dealing with one another can be destructive.

Thoughts on Community

PBP – Longing for the Divine

The Soul of the Rose – John William Waterhouse 1908

This is why we search, why we struggle, why we (sometimes) leave what others have told us is the right way, to sometimes push those people away. There is a longing, and it brings us to a journey that not many will understand. We need to connect with the divine, to know the Gods, however we see them, to know the spirits of all the things that surround us.

I’m writing this because I recognize after all this time on my path, I still long, I still yearn for a life ever more so entwined with the divine, to live an enchanted life. It hasn’t waned at all over the years, in fact, each day it grows stronger. This burning desire pushes me forward, has kept my mind day in and day out ever on the fact that all of this life I am living is touched and woven with magic, with love, with Gods and Spirits; nothing is devoid of the spiritual, though we try really hard to drown it out with constant visual and audio distraction.

Each day I try to think of all the ways in which I could be strengthening this or that connection, and yet… and yet I keep being told that it all lies within my voice, within music for me.

Perhaps it is this terrible consumer culture I’ve grown up in that keeps leading me to want to have all the tools (more on the spiritual side than the physical, tangible tools), but I’ve spent basically my whole life honing this voice. That is my tool. I understand sometimes we need to step back, and for the last while, I really needed to. Now, there’s such a push, and each time I sing, each time I create a song or a chant, I am brought closer to Them. It reignites my longing over and over for the Divine.

Offerings from the Garden